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Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

bloomberg.com

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Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#11

Post by Steko »

jere wrote: post #8

Let's be clear here. The deal means the bush era tax cuts remain for most people (a 3 percentage point reduction for most brackets), while we lose a temporary payroll tax for 2%: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-28/breaking-down-the-c... If I understand correctly, that means taxes should still be about 1% lower than they were during Clinton. I love how every time a temporary tax cut expires, we call it a "tax hi…

The bottom line is taxes are going up from what people paid two weeks ago. Calling that a hike is not disingenuous to me. It's a bit linkbaity, yes. The payroll tax holiday was a stimulus measure that was never meant to be permanent, yes. We should not compound the long term issues with social security by chronically underfunding it, yes.

It's a hike and one I'm perfectly happy to live with. As a commenter at metafilter put it:

Well, it's that or more ice floes to put the old folk on, and the ice industry isn't making any production gains either.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#12

Post by outside1234 »

I'll probably be unpopular, but it should be 100% of households.

We are in denial that we can have all of the benefits we want and not raise taxes. The choices we have is:

A) Cutting Medicare B) Cutting Social Security C) Cutting National Defense D) Raising Taxes

Everything else is noise. Choose some combination of A-D.

My choice is a 35% cut in C and D to cover the rest.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#13

Post by jere »

Steko wrote: post #11
jere wrote: post #8

Let's be clear here. The deal means the bush era tax cuts remain for most people (a 3 percentage point reduction for most brackets), while we lose a temporary payroll tax for 2%: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-28/breaking-down-the-c... If I understand correctly, that means taxes should still be about 1% lower than they were during Clinton. I love how every time a temporary tax cut expires, we call it a "tax hi…

The bottom line is taxes are going up from what people paid two weeks ago. Calling that a hike is not disingenuous to me. It's a bit linkbaity, yes. The payroll tax holiday was a stimulus measure that was never meant to be permanent, yes. We should not compound the long term issues with social security by chronically underfunding it, yes. It's a hike and one I'm perfectly happy to live with. As a commenter at metafil…

>The bottom line is taxes are going up from what people paid two weeks ago. Calling that a hike is not disingenuous to me.

I'm not so sure. If a company has a huge sale for 1 month and everything is temporarily 50% off, we don't call it a 100% "price hike" the next month. Maybe it's just me, but hike has a very specific connotation that isn't appropriate here.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#14

Post by smsm42 »

jere wrote: post #8

Let's be clear here. The deal means the bush era tax cuts remain for most people (a 3 percentage point reduction for most brackets), while we lose a temporary payroll tax for 2%: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-28/breaking-down-the-c... If I understand correctly, that means taxes should still be about 1% lower than they were during Clinton. I love how every time a temporary tax cut expires, we call it a "tax hi…

It IS a tax hike. Tax rates increase. The basic fact is: now, in January, tax rates are higher than they were last month, in December. No amount of renaming and shifting blame changes this basic fact. Taxes have gone up. Yes, there were times where taxes were even higher, so what? There also were times where women weren't allowed to vote, but we don't call denying a woman right to vote now "return to Lincoln-era freedoms", do we?

You can claim raising taxes is actually good and not a big deal. That's your opinion and you are entitled to it. You can not claim there was no tax hike - you're not entitled to your own facts.

>>> I don't see how we can ever fix the debt if no one is willing to pay more taxes and no one is willing to lose benefits.

Yet no news about any meaningful spending cuts - so far they just kicked the can down the road, as if anything will be different in two months.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#15

Post by jug6ernaut »

outside1234 wrote: post #12

I'll probably be unpopular, but it should be 100% of households. We are in denial that we can have all of the benefits we want and not raise taxes. The choices we have is: A) Cutting Medicare B) Cutting Social Security C) Cutting National Defense D) Raising Taxes Everything else is noise. Choose some combination of A-D. My choice is a 35% cut in C and D to cover the rest.

Medicare and Social Security are broken systems. Until you fix the problem you are only making it worse.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#16

Post by smsm42 »

outside1234 wrote: post #12

I'll probably be unpopular, but it should be 100% of households. We are in denial that we can have all of the benefits we want and not raise taxes. The choices we have is: A) Cutting Medicare B) Cutting Social Security C) Cutting National Defense D) Raising Taxes Everything else is noise. Choose some combination of A-D. My choice is a 35% cut in C and D to cover the rest.

You did look at how fast Medicare and Social Security grows? If yes and you're still thinking they can be sustained with current growth patterns by defense cuts and non-confiscatory taxation levels, you probably have some private math where 1+1 can equal one trillion if you believe hard enough.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#17

Post by gonepostal »

Steko wrote: post #11
jere wrote: post #8

Let's be clear here. The deal means the bush era tax cuts remain for most people (a 3 percentage point reduction for most brackets), while we lose a temporary payroll tax for 2%: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-28/breaking-down-the-c... If I understand correctly, that means taxes should still be about 1% lower than they were during Clinton. I love how every time a temporary tax cut expires, we call it a "tax hi…

The bottom line is taxes are going up from what people paid two weeks ago. Calling that a hike is not disingenuous to me. It's a bit linkbaity, yes. The payroll tax holiday was a stimulus measure that was never meant to be permanent, yes. We should not compound the long term issues with social security by chronically underfunding it, yes. It's a hike and one I'm perfectly happy to live with. As a commenter at metafil…

The Bush era tax cuts were also never meant to be permanent. That is why calling it a tax hike is disingenuous at best.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#18

Post by rednukleus »

jug6ernaut wrote: post #15
outside1234 wrote: post #12

I'll probably be unpopular, but it should be 100% of households. We are in denial that we can have all of the benefits we want and not raise taxes. The choices we have is: A) Cutting Medicare B) Cutting Social Security C) Cutting National Defense D) Raising Taxes Everything else is noise. Choose some combination of A-D. My choice is a 35% cut in C and D to cover the rest.

Medicare and Social Security are broken systems. Until you fix the problem you are only making it worse.

How do you propose to "fix" Social Security?

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#19

Post by geargrinder »

bippi wrote: post #6
thisisdallas wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Endlessly frustrating that there is such vindictive zeal on the left for pushing the face of the economy into the dirt by refusing to cut spending.

What do we cut spending on? There's never any cost-benefit analysis of what we stand to gain by cutting what's left to cut. It's frustrating, because the right wants a nice, happy round number to match their nice happy round-number of a tax rate they also think they should have to match the nice happy round-number of what's too big for a deficit. Meanwhile, there's a society that, by definition of "government" is goi…

The economy is not a zero-sum game. If we concentrate on getting the economy to grow, most of these problems (the deficit, federal spending and revenue) are easier to solve.

But our government (both sides of the aisle) seem to do everything in their power to stall the economy and create uncertainty. For the last 6 months, what business person could make a reliable forecast as to the state of the economy? It certainly has not been an environment where you would want to invest in growing your company or employees, given the number of unknowns (future taxes, economic growth, spending, even health care expenses).

Our politicians on both sides seem to be creating a system where they and lobbyists are the only winners. By making short-term decisions, various interest groups are forced to pump more money, more often, into this lobby/politician funnel.

Re: Senate-Passed Deal Means Higher Tax on 77% of Households

#20

Post by anonymoushn »

rednukleus wrote: post #18
jug6ernaut wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Medicare and Social Security are broken systems. Until you fix the problem you are only making it worse.

How do you propose to "fix" Social Security?

In current law it is already fixed. When it runs out of bonds in the "trust fund," it will automatically decrease its payouts to become revenue neutral.
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