President Obama, Ruining America

Quote of the day -- On Fairness and Balance

A minimum tax for Americans and corporations makes sense

According to an article in The Star yesterday, from an article in Bloomberg News (ironically enough), 5 days earlier, more and more high-earning Americans are avoiding income tax altogether. (I say ironically enough because Bloomberg News is rather famously owned by the uber-wealthy billionaire Michael Bloomberg).

The article:

IRS Finds One In 189 High Earners Paid No 2009 U.S. Tax

The percentage of U.S. taxpayers reporting adjusted gross income exceeding $200,000 who paid no U.S. income taxes increased in 2009 to 0.53 percent from 0.51 percent, meaning that one in 189 high earners avoided taxation, an Internal Revenue Service study found.

My point in mentioning this today is not to rail against the wealthy who are, more and more, escaping and evading taxes altogether but to ask the rather salient and altogether appropriate question--doesn't it make sense that we have a national "minimum tax" for both individuals and corporations so that these wealthy people can and do pay their extremely fair share for a) being in America and b) having access to all the benefits therein like our schools, sewer systems, air traffic, all other infrastructure and--maybe most important of all, our markets?

Doesn't this make sense?

I'd propose that it kick in when people make over, say, $200,000 or $250,000 annually and when corporations do the same. (This might have to be tweaked for the corporations, I'm not a tax expert).

It's just logical.

First of all, they can afford it and second, it really is their duty to pay at least SOME taxes in order to enjoy--and maintain--all we have here. And by "some", I mean a 20% minimum. That's still a bargain.

No more skipping out totally on taxes. It's the right thing for them and for the nation. No matter how many deductions you pull out of your hat, there's a 20% minimum income tax.

Someone needs to propose such a thing.

And please, whatever you do, don't tell me it punishes success.

Don't even.

Link to original story: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-29/irs-finds-one-in-189-high-earners-paid-no-2009-u-s-tax.html

Rex Sinquefield & Clay Chastain: Just go away

I've decided Rex Sinquefield has joined Clay Chastain as yet another perennial, pain in the neck nuisances that haunt Kansas City and our environs and they both just need to go away. Mr. Chastain doesn't live here and hasn't for years, residing as he does back East but he keeps trying to drop in and give us mass transit. And while I'm all for mass transit (that's another issue), him buzzing around this city like a pesky, persistent fly at an otherwise pleasant picnic is a pain in the keister. Then there's rich man, St Louisan Rex "I have tons of money" Sinquefield who keeps coming up with ideas he can foist off on Missourians to--in his mind--"make our lives better" by screwing with our tax system, even though he's not an office holder. His latest idea, of course, is to do away with the income tax and to have a sales tax instead. He even brought in famed economist Arthur Laffer to tell "the Kansas City Star's editorial board Monday that there could be problems if Missouri trades its income tax for a sales tax -- if Kansas doesn't do something similar." (See link below).

Forget that a sales tax only is punishing to the middle and lower classes and that it benefits the wealthy greatly, sure, forget that. All that's important is that we live life as Rex "The King" Sinquefield thinks we should live it and as he would have the state be. Seriously, both of you jerkwads--go away. Leave us be. Whatever issues we'll have, we'll deal with them. Go home. Be quiet. Live your own lives and let us live ours. It's why we have government. Links: http://midwestdemocracy.com/articles/laffer-kansas-missouri-should-go-together-major-tax-reform/; http://www.kansascity.com/2012/02/17/3435777/kc-chastain-argue-light-rail.html

On doing your taxes online now

If TurboTax is free and H & R Block is free (for doing your taxes online) and you're not from Kansas City (because, after all, you would want to support a local company otherwise, right?), how do you know whom to select, anyway?

The US Middle Class is "radically shrinking"---and here are statistics to prove it

* 83 percent of all U.S. stocks are in the hands of 1 percent of the people. • 61 percent of Americans "always or usually" live paycheck to paycheck, which was up from 49 percent in 2008 and 43 percent in 2007. • 66 percent of the income growth between 2001 and 2007 went to the top 1% of all Americans. • 36 percent of Americans say that they don't contribute anything to retirement savings. • A staggering 43 percent of Americans have less than $10,000 saved up for retirement. • 24 percent of American workers say that they have postponed their planned retirement age in the past year. • Over 1.4 million Americans filed for personal bankruptcy in 2009, which represented a 32 percent increase over 2008. • Only the top 5 percent of U.S. households have earned enough additional income to match the rise in housing costs since 1975. • For the first time in U.S. history, banks own a greater share of residential housing net worth in the United States than all individual Americans put together. • In 1950, the ratio of the average executive's paycheck to the average worker's paycheck was about 30 to 1. Since the year 2000, that ratio has exploded to between 300 to 500 to one. • As of 2007, the bottom 80 percent of American households held about 7% of the liquid financial assets. • The bottom 50 percent of income earners in the United States now collectively own less than 1 percent of the nation’s wealth. • Average Wall Street bonuses for 2009 were up 17 percent when compared with 2008. • In the United States, the average federal worker now earns 60% MORE than the average worker in the private sector. • The top 1 percent of U.S. households own nearly twice as much of America's corporate wealth as they did just 15 years ago. • In America today, the average time needed to find a job has risen to a record 35.2 weeks. • More than 40 percent of Americans who actually are employed are now working in service jobs, which are often very low paying. • or the first time in U.S. history, more than 40 million Americans are on food stamps, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture projects that number will go up to 43 million Americans in 2011. • This is what American workers now must compete against: in China a garment worker makes approximately 86 cents an hour and in Cambodia a garment worker makes approximately 22 cents an hour. • Approximately 21 percent of all children in the United States are living below the poverty line in 2010 - the highest rate in 20 years. • Despite the financial crisis, the number of millionaires in the United States rose a whopping 16 percent to 7.8 million in 2009. • The top 10 percent of Americans now earn around 50 percent of our national income. Link to original post: http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/the-u.s.-middle-class-is-being-wiped-out-here's-the-stats-to-prove-it-520657.html?tickers=^DJI,^GSPC,SPY,MCD,WMT,XRT,DIA