You’re right. While I don’t remember that last time the payroll tax went up, it’s lower wages and general costs that are driving jobs offshore. In some cases, the reverse is true, as for some positions the H1B visas allows a company more flexibility/control and the opportunity to pay a lower wage. That’s SOME positions, not true across the board, but I’ve seen it happen.
The fallacy that people usually jump to is that if there were no payroll taxes, wages would rise. Not true. Why would they? The company’s share of your acquaintance’s payroll tax is being paid by the company’s customers, not HIM.
The cost of government must be extracted from the economy in some manner. A head tax would be the most regressive and a property (net worth) tax would be the most progressive. And when the Constitution was signed property taxes were the primary tax source. But I don’t hear any traditionalist Republicans arguing for that. Wonder why?
You’re right. While I don’t remember that last time the payroll tax went up, it’s lower wages and general costs that are driving jobs offshore.
In Software Engineering we’ve seen 20-30% wage reductions in the past 20 years due to competition from China and India. You can hire a good qualified software engineer in India for wages that barely cover my property tax. And they live very nicely in India…this includes a live-in Nanny and house-keeper. Makes it tough to compete and why many companies have moved a lot of software development and engineering in general to India and China.
The governing bodies seem to be awash in wealthy politicians. Not many middle class wage earners except for those who jump from one political job to another. Do you thing they are going to pass property tax laws? Hardly. It has nothing to do with the party they belong to. When the middle class does well, the whole economy does well. Yet, how many politicians at the federal level belong to the middle class ? National elections are now the domain of only those with great personal wealth.
They don’t even hide it. They favor tax laws that directly benefit themselves.
The marginal tax rate as favored by each of the parties, really only differ by a few percentage points. The
big changes really occurred when the average wealth of the individual legislators compared to the middle class rose. When once the rates were over 90 percent and the average politician was closer to middle class in wealth, it has dramatically dropped as their wealth grew. It has NOTHING to do with the name of the party in power…it has to do with the wealth of the party in power.
Sadly, middle class members of both parties actually think the wealthy people who represent them are looking out for their well being. They could not care less about their constituents until election time. You need proof. The bail outs which were signed into law were done so by both the party and administration in power at the time the following party as well. Though the bail out was necessary in some form, that it benefited the most wealthy over both administrations is proof that it was bought and paid for by the wealthy of our nation. They continue to get wealthy as we speak while the middle class wage earners of both parties suffer through a recession.
Warren Buffet can support any proposal he wants…I guaranteed that if passed with his support, he’ll still be the second (or whatever) richest man in the world. Neither he nor Willard will be affected to the extent they would even notice it more then hiring another tax lawyer to do their bidding.
Was watching this show the other day about Romney’s tax filings.
One thing that was sticking out was the fact that Romney gave his sons $100 million. For MOST of us we are only allowed to GIVE our children (or any other relative) a one time $26k gift. Romney didn’t break any laws…but the law is different for the rich. And by giving this to his Sons he paid NO TAX on the $100 Million. It was done via trust funds and stock options. The rich are able to take assets they have that are producing enormous income and, under the law, give that money to their children and not pay any taxes on it. That’s because Congress allows a very tiny group of people—the Romneys by their income are in the top 1 percent of the top 1 percent—to not count as having any value the real source of their income, something called carried interest, if they give it to their children.
Gee, that’s good to know. I was holding back giving my kids a million each for fear of taxation. They’ll be glad to hear that.:=). Funny how when either party was in control, neither made any attemp to close this loop hole. My Point exactly.
“One thing that was sticking out was the fact that Romney gave his sons $100 million”.
I’m trying to figure out if there is any way that I can be Mitt Romney’s elderly adopted son.
I have a high school classmate whose family was quite wealthy. This classmate was expected to go into the family business along with his older brother. The older brother has had alcohol problems and had numerous affairs. The younger brother, my classmate, told my wife at our 50th class reunion that he wished he had struck out on his own after high school and made it on his own. Perhaps Romney is actually depriving his sons the satisfaction of achievement through one’s own work.
“MikeInNH February 2 Report
Was watching this show the other day about Romney’s tax filings.
One thing that was sticking out was the fact that Romney gave his sons $100 million. For MOST of us we are only allowed to GIVE our children (or any other relative) a one time $26k gift.”
Oh, MikeInNH, we’ve been getting along so well, but I have to say that you’ve got that totally wrong. Last time I checked, there was a $1 million dollar lifetime exemption (oops, turns out that’s increased) on gift tax, and you only had to file paperwork if you gave more than $10,000 IN ONE YEAR (I believe that figure has gone up and indeed it has, to $13,000 per spouse giving jointly to total $26,000… it’s been so long since I’ve given). There is NO limit on the amount anyone is ALLOWED to give anyone, in one year or over the course of their lifetime.
You can say “carried interest” all day long, but while you’re doing that there’s a billion monkeys saying “life isn’t fair” making iPhones in China. Doesn’t change anything.
p.s. hard to believe Romney gave his sons $100 million when his net worth is around $250 million, but as you say, it was on a show. I watched a show recently where a guy delivered a pizza, and you wouldn’t believe what happened!
Oh MikeInNH. Well, at least you found one of the monkeys who didn’t make the cut for the iPhone team. Just because someone else says “carried interest” doesn’t make it true, because money is fungible. Putting money in a trust is not the same as gifting the money under the law, and the type of income that was the money’s source is irrelevant. What exactly was I wrong about? Shirley you weren’t saying you were WRONG AGAIN?
“Hard to believe” doesn’t mean “didn’t happen” as the pizza guy found out.
Yes, Caddyman. Apparently so. Are you going to get back to the oil discussion? Or is that too far gone? Littlemouse and Mike, please stop with the mutual antagonism.
Cdaquila…Please READ the posts…I’ve ONLY reacted to littlemouses remarks. Please remove the little dweeb…He adds NOTHING to this forum. Only slide remarks and attacks. He has ZERO knowledge about auto’s. I’ve received more then a few private emails from other posters about littlemouse.