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In 12 Years, Income For Richest 400 Americans Quadruples, Tax Rate Nearly Halvesl

Quote:

New data released by the IRS reveals that, over a period of 12 years, tax rates for the richest 400 Americans were effectively cut in half. In 1995, the richest 400 Americans paid, on average, 29.93% of their income in federal taxes. In 2007, the last year for which the IRS has released data, the richest 400 Americans paid just 16.63%.

http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/...t1_small-B.gif
http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/...t3_small-B.gif

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/18/...sparity-chart/

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Originally Posted by Jetdawgg (Post 4004798)

http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/...t1_small-B.gif
http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/...t3_small-B.gif

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/18/...sparity-chart/

'95: $6 billion x 30%= $1.8 billion in tax revenue....

'07: $22.9 billion x 17%= $3.8billion in tax revenues....

so the tax rate halved but the $$$ of taxes paid more than doubled...and left wingers want to complain...lmao

based on '95 rates its a whopping $3billion more....hey dawg- any charts for the $$$ of taxes the welfare class paid in 1995 versus 2007??? any #'s on tax revenue lost of those who didn't pay fed tax in '95 versus those that didn't pay in '11??

TIA....

just think, if we use the numbers in this chart:

http://www.jetsinsider.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=228766

and for hypothetical purpose assume that the 63.2 million people who did not pay $1cent of federal income tax in the largest bracket made an average of $30K and they paid a tax rate that's half of what the top 400 pay now (8%) that would bring in 150, 680, 000,000 in tax revenue...

but hey- think progress and the left wing are all about "fairness"...:yes:

We need tax reform that’s clear we have a budget problem that’s clear. Nobody is talking about solving it by increasing taxes on 400 people. This is more hyperbole to remove transparency from the debate which needs to happen.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Come Back to NY (Post 4004813)

Please note: for the most part, these are pre-crash numbers.The deficit has grown much larger and faster since 2008

Clearly reform is needed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Winstonbiggs (Post 4004917)

We need tax reform that’s clear we have a budget problem that’s clear. Nobody is talking about solving it by increasing taxes on 400 people. This is more hyperbole to remove transparency from the debate which needs to happen.

actually the left talks about it all the time as is their dear leader at 1600 Penn Ave....maybe JetDawgg can help here- did thinkprogress run any articles or charts about 68 million Americans not paying 1-cent of federal income tax as they did the chart above????

Quote:

Originally Posted by Come Back to NY (Post 4004953)

The American recovery act which the Democrats passed in 09 cut 237 Billion from taxes for the middle class. I guarantee they won't point to that as a reason the rich get richer and the middle class falls behind.

The reality is inflation which has been the policy of this administration and the Fed will make those with hard assetts richer and those who depend on their paycheck for day to day living poorer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jetdawgg (Post 4004919)

Please note: for the most part, these are pre-crash numbers.The deficit has grown much larger and faster since 2008

Clearly reform is needed.

How about everyone pays taxes. If you use the system you pay for it!

/facepalm.

You do realize, that you're discussing the Top 0.000114% of Americans, right?

0.000114%

45% of taxpayers pay no net. Thats ~ a million people.

The top 400, the top 0.000114% (1 in 1,000,000 or so) is what you're discussing here, and (assumedly) using as a wedge for policy change.

Unbelievable. Tell me, how did the bottom 400 (0.000114%) do....surely you MUST know that too, or else you're not doing your full due dilligence.

Fish, the top of the chain holds more wealth than the bottom 80%. The problem is that the wealth of this nation is held by a small amount of people

The One-Percenters

Quote:

"The upper 1 percent of Americans are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation's income every year. In terms of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent.

"Their lot in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding figures were 12 percent and 33 percent."

So I discover in a piece by Joseph E. Stiglitz in the new issue of Vanity Fair. These facts confirm my impression that greed is now seen as a virtue in America. I'm not surprised by the greed of the One-Percenters. I'm mystified by the lack of indignation from so many of the rest of us.

Day after day I read stories that make me angry. Wanton consumption is glorified. Corruption is rewarded. Ordinary people see their real income dropping, their houses sold out from under them, their pensions plundered, their unions legislated against, their health care still under attack. Yes, people in Wisconsin and Ohio have risen up to protest these realities, but why has there not been more outrage?

The most visible centers of these crimes against the population are Wall Street and the financial industry in general. Although there are still many honest bankers, some seem to regard banking and trading as a license to steal. Outrageous acts are committed and go unpunished. Consider this case of money laundering by Wachovia Bank, now part of Wells Fargo. This Guardian article reports: "The authorities uncovered billions of dollars in wire transfers, traveler's checks and cash shipments through Mexican exchanges into Wachovia accounts."

The bank paid fines of less than 2% of its $12.2 billion profit in 2009. No individual was ever charged with a crime. We need not doubt that Wachovia executives received bonuses over the period of time when they were overseeing these illegal activities. Permit me to quote one more paragraph:

"More shocking, and more important, the bank was sanctioned for failing to apply the proper anti-laundering strictures to the transfer of $378.4 billion -- a sum equivalent to one-third of Mexico's gross national product -- into dollar accounts from so-called casas de cambio (CDCs) in Mexico, currency exchange houses with which the bank did business."

If a third of the Mexican GNP passes through your bank and you don't ask the questions required by law, you are either (1) a criminal, or (2) incompetent. I can't think of another possibility.

Stories like this have become commonplace. Two of the most common types of news stories about banks recently have involved their losses, and the size of their executive bonuses. Bloomberg News reports: "JPMorgan Chase & Co. gave Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon a 51 percent raise in 2010 as the bank resumed paying cash bonuses following two years of pressure from regulators and lawmakers to curb compensation."

And here's more, from the Wall Street journal: "$57,031. That's about what the average U.S. archaeologist made last year. It's also what J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon made every day of last year -- $20.8 million total, according to the firm's proxy filing this week. Anyone who has doubts about the resiliency of Wall Street banks and brokerages should ponder that figure for awhile. The J.P. Morgan board also spent about $421,500 to sell Dimon's Chicago home. And they brought back the big cash bonus, doling out $30.2 million in greenbacks to Dimon and his top six lieutenants."

The CEOs of the venerable trading firms that were forced into bankruptcy were all paid bonuses. In a small recent case, executives of Borders intended to pay themselves $8 million in bonuses until a U. S. Trustee objected. A company spokesperson said, "The proposed programs were designed to retain key executives at Borders as we proceed through the Chapter 11 reorganization process." In short, retain those whose management bankrupted the corporation.

Corporations in theory are managed to benefit their shareholders. The more money Wal-Mart can make by busting unions and allegedly discriminating in its hiring practices, the happier its shareholders become. Yet obscene bonuses penalize even the shareholders. Isn't that, in theory, their money? Wouldn't it be decent for the occasional corporation to put a cap on bonuses and distribute the funds as dividends?

I have no objection to financial success. I've had a lot of it myself. All of my income came from paychecks from jobs I held and books I published. I have the quaint idea that wealth should be obtained by legal and conventional means--by working, in other words--and not through the manipulation of financial scams. You're familiar with the ways bad mortgages were urged upon people who couldn't afford them, by banks who didn't care that the loans were bad. The banks made the loans and turned a profit by selling them to investors while at the same time betting against them on their own account. While Wall Street was knowingly trading the worthless paper that led to the financial collapse of 2008, executives were being paid huge bonuses.

Wasn't that fraud? Wasn't it theft? The largest financial crime in American history took place and resulted in no criminal charges. Then the money industries and their lobbyists fought tooth and nail against financial regulation. The Republicans resisted it, but so did many Democrats. Partially because of the Supreme Court decision allowing secret campaign contributions, our political system is largely financed by vested interests.

We know that Bernie Madoff went to jail. Fine. No Wall Street or bank executive has been charged with anything. It will never happen. The financial industries are locked an unholy alliance with politicians and regulators, all choreographed by lobbyists. You know all that.

What puzzles me is why there isn't more indignation. The Tea Party is the most indignant domestic political movement since Norman Thomas's Socialist Party, but its wrath is turned in the wrong direction. It favors policies that are favorable to corporations and unfavorable to individuals. Its opposition to Obamacare is a textbook example. Insurance companies and the health care industry finance a "populist" movement that is manipulated to oppose its own interests. The billionaire Koch brothers payroll right wing front organizations that oppose labor unions and financial reform. The patriots wave their flags and don't realize they're being duped.

Consider taxes. Do you know we could eliminate half the predicted shortfall in the national budget by simply failing to renew the Bush tax cuts? Do you know that if corporations were taxed at a fair rate, much of the rest could be found? General Electric recently reported it paid no current taxes. Why do you think that was? Why do middle and lower class Tea Party members not understand that they bear an unfair burden of taxes that should be more fairly distributed? Why do they support those who campaign against unions and a higher minimum wage? What do they think is in it for them?

If it is "socialist" to believe in a more equal distribution of income, what is the word for the system we now live under? A system under which the very rich have doubled their share of the nation's income in 25 years? I believe in a fair day's work for a fair day's pay. Isn't that an American credo? How did it get twisted around into an obscene wage for shameless plunder?

One of the challenges facing the One-Percenters these days is finding ways to spend their money. Private residences grow as large as hotels, and are fitted out with the amenities of luxury resorts. Fleets of cars and private airplanes are at their owners' disposal. At work, they sink absurd mountains of money into show-off corporate headquarters that have less to do with work than with a pissing contest among rival executives. Private toilets grow as large as small condos, outfitted with Italian marbles and rare antiques. This is all paid for by the shareholders. One area of equality between the One-Percenters and the rest of us is that we sit on toilets of about the same size. What's different is the size of our throne rooms.

I find this extravagance unseemly in a democracy. Many of today's One-Percenters feel no more constraint than Louis XIV. A culture of celebrity has grown up around these conspicuous consumers, celebrating their excesses. I believe rewards are appropriate for those who have been successful. I also believe a certain modesty and humility are virtuous. I find it unbecoming that those who fight most against social welfare are those most devoted to their own welfare.

In America there is an ingrained populist suspicion of fats cats and robber barons. This feeling rises up from time to time. Theodore Roosevelt, who was elected as a Trust Buster, would be appalled by the excesses of our current economy. Many of the rich have a conscience. Andrew Carnegie built libraries all over America. The Rockefeller and Ford Foundations do great good. Bill Gates lists his occupation as "philanthropist."

Yet the most visible plutocrat in America is Donald Trump, a man who has made a fetish of his power. What kind of sick mind conceives of a television show built on suspense about which "contestant" he will "fire" next? What sort of masochism builds his viewership? Sadly, I suspect it is based on viewers who identify with Trump, and envy his power over his victims. Don't viewers understand they are the ones being fired in today's America?

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011...ters.html#more

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jetdawgg (Post 4005525)

Fish, the top of the chain holds more wealth than the bottom 80%. The problem is that the wealth of this nation is held by a small amount of people

Why EXACTLY is that problem? I could see if those 20% enslaved the 80%, or stole from them. But they didn't (criminals excluded of course).

So why is this bad? Hard work is rewarded.

Quote:

Originally Posted by quantum (Post 4005803)

Why EXACTLY is that problem? I could see if those 20% enslaved the 80%, or stole from them. But they didn't (criminals excluded of course).

So why is this bad? Hard work is rewarded.

"without redistribution, one generation's successful individuals would become the next generation's embedded caste, hoarding the wealth they had accumulated." -Patrick Diamond and Anthony Giddens

Quote:

Originally Posted by quantum (Post 4005803)

Why EXACTLY is that problem? I could see if those 20% enslaved the 80%, or stole from them. But they didn't (criminals excluded of course).

So why is this bad? Hard work is rewarded.

Because, the more money the bottom half has, the more people the top half has to sell their stuff to. Who do you think buys cheap flat screen TV's? The top 1%?

Hold on...lemme go ask SAR.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PlumberKhan (Post 4005825)

Because, the more money the bottom half has, the more people the top half has to sell their stuff to. Who do you think buys cheap flat screen TV's? The top 1%?

Hold on...lemme go ask SAR.

So you want to make the rich even richer? While the poor get TVs?

It all makes sense now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bitonti (Post 4005821)

"without redistribution, one generation's successful individuals would become the next generation's embedded caste, hoarding the wealth they had accumulated." -Patrick Diamond and Anthony Giddens

Class warfare and working-class jealosy is a powerful tool in politics.

When you can decry those better off than yourself as "enemies", to be attacked and denounced only for having done better than yourself, you can drive voters to support you based on one of the most evil but basic human emotions, the desire to have what others have that you don't, and to shift blame for your own lackings on others, and away from yourself.

Bit (and those like him) would have you believe we are old India, where once you are in a financial bracket, you're there for life, and your childrens lives, and your grandchildrens lives......a claim I would personally discount.

My father came to the U.S. penniless and uneducated. As low on the employment food chain as they come, he cleaned up **** (literally) for a living, as well as working two other jobs. When he died, he was an upper-level Dept. Manager at one location in a large Hospital Conglomerate, making ~55K a year (in 1990 dollars) and owning his own home, and multiple cars.

I, as his eldest child, with lastly less personal motivation, have already surpassed him in financial terms. My younger brother as well. Only my youngest bro has not, and that is perhaps more due to other issues I won;t get too into here.

Point being, wealth and station are not Static in the United States today. Personal effort and good planning and taking personal responsabillity for oneself can rise you up the tiers of fiscal success in rather short order, as can a lack of effort, work ethic, poor planning and bad decision making can have you fall from the upper ranks equally quick (although even then, one can rise again with the right efforts).

Our Welfare system should be designed to assist those who need a temporary hand getting back up, or getting started from the bottom. Not a life-long crutch from Mother State, "cradle to grave" as they say in Europe, providing all the comforts and needs of life, effort/work free.

And we should spend less time worrying about what other people have, or how they got it, or how we can steal it from them for reallocation, and spend more time on how WE can better ourselves and out lot, by ourselves and our own effort.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JetPotato (Post 4005839)

So you want to make the rich even richer? While the poor get TVs?

It all makes sense now.

Exactly!

That's why ALL gubbermint "handouts" are just corporate welfare "handouts" disguised as social welfare to keep the pinko libs happy.

Food stamps = guaranteed $$$ to Walmart and Aldi's
Section 8 = guaranteed $$$ to landlords
Medicaid = guaranteed $$$ to docs and hospitals
Tax Refunds = guaranteed $$$ to electronic stores

Quote:

Originally Posted by PlumberKhan (Post 4005825)

Because, the more money the bottom half has, the more people the top half has to sell their stuff to. Who do you think buys cheap flat screen TV's? The top 1%?

Hold on...lemme go ask SAR.

Let me get this straight. I have tons of money I give a bunch of it to the govenment who takes their cut and passes a reduced amount to everyone else. With that reduced amount they buy stuff I sell. I pay my, employees, my shareholders, the bank and the government a portion of the profits and I make more money.

Sounds like a plan.

How 299 CEOs earned more than 100,000 of their own workers put together

How 299 CEOs earned more than 100,000 of their own workers put together: Executive pay skyrockets 23% in 2010

Quote:

Happy days are here again, for chief executives at Standard & Poor's 500 companies at least.

Executive pay at 299 U.S. companies has skyrocketed 23 per cent over the past year to a staggering $3.4billion.

That's enough money to cover the average pay of more than 100,000 workers at the companies involved.

Meanwhile the average wage earned by the CEOs - $11.4million - would pay the salaries of 28 U.S. Presidents, or 700 minimum-wage workers.

Nearly 190 of the CEOs got a pay rise compared to their 2009 levels, the new study by the nation's largest labour union found.

The AFL-CIO presented the data in a report today. The figures are part of the union federation's annual Executive PayWatch, a searchable database charting public information on payment at S&P 500 companies.

AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka called the figures proof of a culture of 'runaway CEO pay'.

'The disparity between CEO and workers' pay has continued to grow to levels that are completely stunning,' he said in Washington today.

AFL-CIO deputy director Brandon Rees called the pay levels 'simply unacceptable'.

But executive pay is coming under threat from the proposed 2010 Dodd-Frank Act.

The law overhauls financial regulations, giving shareholders a 'say on pay' vote on the amount given to management. The votes aren't binding, but they will 'encourage' boards to reform the compensation process, according to AFL-CIO.

They will do so by relying on public shame and embarrassment, the strongest weapons currently in AFL-CIO's arsenal for reducing executive pay.

The law also calls for the compensation committees of a company's board to be composed of independent directors.

The legislation has already come under attack from Republicans who are fighting to repeal a provision requiring publicly traded companies to report the ratio of pay between the CEO and the median pay of employees.

Mr Trumka slammed the Republican drive as 'trying to do everything they can to dilute the law and go back to business as usual for Wall Street'.

Mr Trumka himself earned a total compensation of $283,340 in 2010. He claimed his pay compared to employees at the union is 4:1, which he said was 'not bad'.

The 12million-member union has been publishing studies on executive compensation since 1997.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz1K5FsYC6L

What is clearly being overlooked by a few here is that these types of imbalances in wealth distribution causes revolutions, civil unrest and uprisings.

Rewarding people for being rich is one thing, breaking the backs of those that are not is something else.