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Millennial men with different incomes

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Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#21

Post by dogma1138 »

rayiner wrote: post #5

The comments about taxes are really interesting. There is a perception in the U.S. that the wealthy don't pay enough taxes, but in reality the top 10% carries a much a larger share of the tax burden (relative to their share of income) than in countries like the U.K., France, Germany, and Sweden: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/04/05/ameri... . So the question is: where does this perception come from?…

It's the perception. In Europe the middle class and the lower classes share more of the tax burden than the rich. This what pretty much keeps them fixed in their respective bracket.

When you pay over 50% of your income in taxes this includes VAT, property tax, national insurance and other taxes rather than just income tax you never actually accumulate wealth under almost any circumstances.

You end up being dependant on the social services that you mostly fund because you simply can't get a head regardless of how well you are paid. This is why there is almost no new money in Europe especially the continental countries.

Taxation in Europe is an industry many EU countries have tax revenue at 50% of their GDP that's not a healthy system.

And as far as wealth redistribution goes that's also a myth, EU countries have lower corporate tax rates than the US they also have lower capital gains taxes with some countries having them at 5% or lower.

At the end it's the middle classes who gets screwed the most with the lower classes not far behind.

VAT and high import tariffs make the EU a pretty bad place to live on average and below income.

Food is expensive because importing cheap food is hard and by the time you save enough money on a "luxury" item you get stuck with 20% VAT premium on everything.

The US tax system is by far better, the problem in the US is lack of focus on public spending and programs, you spend more public funds on education and health care than Europe but the result is questionable at best. This not only shows that the taxation in Europe is too high but also that the US can have a single payer system without additional taxes if it restructures Medicare and Medicaid and its state and public schools.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#22

Post by nwah1 »

tuna-piano wrote: post #19

Does the $1.5M earner not add up to anyone else? His expenses are $6K a month ($72k a year, but call it $100k). His after tax income, call $800k. That leaves $700k unaccounted for - and he's talking about saving $15k for his kids college, or not being able to retire for 15 more years? I don't get it.

He didn't say how many kids. Or how many mothers.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#23

Post by omonra »

tuna-piano wrote: post #19

Does the $1.5M earner not add up to anyone else? His expenses are $6K a month ($72k a year, but call it $100k). His after tax income, call $800k. That leaves $700k unaccounted for - and he's talking about saving $15k for his kids college, or not being able to retire for 15 more years? I don't get it.

First thing that jumped at me.

He also says "I wish I could pay off the mortgage". From what he described, he should be able to pay it off in a year or two.

Doesn't add up.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#24

Post by nugget »

tuna-piano wrote: post #19

Does the $1.5M earner not add up to anyone else? His expenses are $6K a month ($72k a year, but call it $100k). His after tax income, call $800k. That leaves $700k unaccounted for - and he's talking about saving $15k for his kids college, or not being able to retire for 15 more years? I don't get it.

I'm guessing that his income grew rapidly and this may be his current "run rate" if everything goes well (or of course he could be inflating the # for PR purposes).

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#25

Post by michaelchisari »

dogma1138 wrote: post #21
rayiner wrote: post #5

The comments about taxes are really interesting. There is a perception in the U.S. that the wealthy don't pay enough taxes, but in reality the top 10% carries a much a larger share of the tax burden (relative to their share of income) than in countries like the U.K., France, Germany, and Sweden: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/04/05/ameri... . So the question is: where does this perception come from?…

It's the perception. In Europe the middle class and the lower classes share more of the tax burden than the rich. This what pretty much keeps them fixed in their respective bracket. When you pay over 50% of your income in taxes this includes VAT, property tax, national insurance and other taxes rather than just income tax you never actually accumulate wealth under almost any circumstances. You end up being dependant…

> This what pretty much keeps them fixed in their respective bracket.

The most recent study suggests that European countries have higher class mobility than the US does. High taxes are not holding their populations back, especially if it results in cheaper medical care and universal education.

I agree that our spending focus is terrible, though.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#26

Post by tuna-piano »

I assume many people here are earning amazing incomes, >$100k.

Does anyone else feel extremely guilty about this? When I read about the guy who takes two trains a bus and walks a mile to get to work, while trying his best to save just $1100 for a car, my heart breaks. The work I do is easy - I sit in front of a screen in my own house. When I go to a fast food restaurant and order from a woman in her 40s, who likely has kids at home, I can't help but feel a sense of guilt (and also luck). Even as I earn more money, I feel guilty spending it, so I end up just saving a large part of it.

Not sure there's a point or a problem or something I'm trying to solve, just wanted to share my feelings and see if others felt the same way, and hear any advice or thoughts they had.

Edit: I do take some (perverse) solace in the fact that it seems many extremely poor people across the world seem happier than the average wealthy office worker I know. Add up: long commute + winter weather (and darkness) + unfulfilling work + expenses that expand to their level of income = potentially a pretty unhappy person, even though they are high income.

Edit 2: Reading about how the low earner saved up for a $160 pair of shoes also gave me some warm feelings. Maybe that's why rich people do challenging, but relatively pointless things like hiking mountains. We don't have enough challenges in our daily lives, so we invent them so we can feel good about ourselves after.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#27

Post by dogma1138 »

michaelchisari wrote: post #9
rayiner wrote: post #5

The comments about taxes are really interesting. There is a perception in the U.S. that the wealthy don't pay enough taxes, but in reality the top 10% carries a much a larger share of the tax burden (relative to their share of income) than in countries like the U.K., France, Germany, and Sweden: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/04/05/ameri... . So the question is: where does this perception come from?…

This comes up a lot in a discussion about taxes, and there's a big logical problem with it. We have a much higher wealth gap than those countries. So tax burden as a percentage isn't a useful metric. If we had a healthier lower and middle class, they would be paying more in taxes, which would ease the burden on the wealthiest considerably. But our middle class is shrinking, and the rich are becoming extraordinarily r…

The US's "poor" have a higher purchasing power then the median income of not only the EU average but the rich EU member states.

Income inequality means squat when your middle class has more wealth than some of the last decimal point percentiles in Europe.

Europe doesn't have income equality it has income stagnation and it assures that through taxing both you and your employer not only that your income would be on average lower that your post tax income would be considerably lower.

You can be making 100-150k $ in Europe and have almost no ability to accumulate wealth due to the taxation this is not equality this is enforced wealth caps. If you are old money or corporations on the other hand you enjoy some of the lowest corporate tax rates in the developed world as well as tax heavens and low capital gain taxes all from within the EU or one of its "territories".

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#28

Post by virtuexru »

tuna-piano wrote: post #26

I assume many people here are earning amazing incomes, >$100k. Does anyone else feel extremely guilty about this? When I read about the guy who takes two trains a bus and walks a mile to get to work, while trying his best to save just $1100 for a car, my heart breaks. The work I do is easy - I sit in front of a screen in my own house. When I go to a fast food restaurant and order from a woman in her 40s, who likely h…

God damnit dude; it's Monday. I didn't need this! sips Starbucks while typing this on a MacBook Pro in a large AC'ed office building while making 100k

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#29

Post by dogma1138 »

michaelchisari wrote: post #25
dogma1138 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's the perception. In Europe the middle class and the lower classes share more of the tax burden than the rich. This what pretty much keeps them fixed in their respective bracket. When you pay over 50% of your income in taxes this includes VAT, property tax, national insurance and other taxes rather than just income tax you never actually accumulate wealth under almost any circumstances. You end up being dependant…

> This what pretty much keeps them fixed in their respective bracket. The most recent study suggests that European countries have higher class mobility than the US does. High taxes are not holding their populations back, especially if it results in cheaper medical care and universal education. I agree that our spending focus is terrible, though.

That study was flawed to some extent it wasn't about class mobility it was about generational income.

When you adjust for the massive immigration coming into Europe from Africa and the Middle East and from new member state joining in you get a completely different picture.

Sure you can easily hack the system if you are from Poland or Romania just move to the UK for a few years and when you go back home you move up the ladder.

But when you look at local/native population the picture is completely different.

In the UK which traditionally had one of the highest class mobility figures in the world adjusted for immigration the middle class growing in England was mostly old money running out of it not people becoming richer.

And more importantly when you look at debt and net worth rather than just generational income the picture in Europe as a whole is dire.

Re: Millennial men with different incomes

#30

Post by antisthenes »

tuna-piano wrote: post #26

I assume many people here are earning amazing incomes, >$100k. Does anyone else feel extremely guilty about this? When I read about the guy who takes two trains a bus and walks a mile to get to work, while trying his best to save just $1100 for a car, my heart breaks. The work I do is easy - I sit in front of a screen in my own house. When I go to a fast food restaurant and order from a woman in her 40s, who likely h…

You should feel somewhat lucky, because your parents made a substantially bigger investment in you than you realize, through which you were allowed free time to acquire the technical aptitude to become a developer (or whatever else allowed you to become a high earner).

Whether you want to keep feeling guilty is up to you, but you should definitely go thank your parents again!

> When I read about the guy who takes two trains a bus and walks a mile to get to work, while trying his best to save just $1100 for a car

In countries where public transportation is the norm, there isn't anything strange about the first part of the sentence. It's just that USA really punishes non drivers through some really poor infrastructure choices made 60-70 years ago.

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