You don't want to pay taxes? Stop making money.

[krispos42]

Problem solved.



The rich and powerful can stop paying taxes any time they want to. Pick any high-salaried person: Oprah Winfrey. Mel Gilbson. Barry Bonds. Peyton Manning. Pat Robertson. Rick Waggoner. Britney Spears. Johnny Depp. Whoever; doesn't matter.


Doesn't manner. Every single one of them, unless they have truly epic problems with gambling, drugs, and hookers, has the option of stopping all income streams and living off the money they've already paid taxes on. Every single one of them has the option to never pay any payroll tax again.

No income tax, federal, state, or local.

No Social Security tax.

No Medicare.


NOTHING.



They can cash in their stocks, bonds, and other types of financial instruments that generate streams of money, put that big pile of cash in the bank with a 0% interest rate, and continue living a normal livestyle. You know, 60-foot sailing yacht, private airplane, golf at an exclusive country club, horse breeding, scuba-diving, fine dining... whatever.

I'm sure that BoA or Wells Fargo would be ecstatic to buy private insurance for A. Rod's checking account in lieu of paying interest on $100,000,000 or so.


Any one of these people can take what they've "earned", spend a million bucks a year from their already-taxed saving on whatever they want, not pay a dime in income taxes, and still have 8 figures left to pass on to their kids when they die.


So I don't feel sorry for them. I will not spare one millijoule of energy feeling sorry for the poor little rich elite.

Because they CHOOSE to keep paying income taxes. At that level of income, work is a choice, not a necessity.

So retire. There are 300 million people in this country, plenty of which would love to have your job. Lord knows there's no lack of would-be actors and actresses wandering around Hollywood, or would-be baseball stars in the various minor leagues or waiting to be discovered on some quiet Carribean island. And the business schools are humming, because lord knows we don't bother teaching our kids anything science-like anymore. Get an MBA! Fuck engineering, it's harder and doesn't pay as well.



I don't have that choice. In fact, right now, I'm technically homeless, thanks to my thrice-damned cowardly lackwit of a former roommate.

So I HAVE to work. Which means I HAVE to pay Social Security and Medicare and federal income tax and Minnesota income tax.

I don't mind the federal income tax so much... I calculated recently that my "tax freedom day" last year was January 15th. 3.85% of my gross. But it's everything else that eats away.

But Social Security? Medicare? Those taxes are paid only on the first $105,000 or so of income. That means that A. Rod and Mel Gibson pay only a couple of more times more into SSA and Medicare than I do... despite making about THREE ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE more!

A third of my net goes towards rent. The other two-thirds goes into my gas tank, or my phone, or my internet, or my refridgerator... pretty much all of which has their respective taxes as well.

But that's me. That's not them.


You want to help me, anti-tax forces? Fine. Repeal the gas tax and replace it with an equivilent increase in the capital gains rate. THAT will help me. Not moving my "tax freedom day" from January 15th to January 14th.

You want to help me, anti-tax forces? Fine. Drop the FICA percentage from 6.2% to 3% and remove the wage cap.

You want to help me? Give everybody in the country Medicare, keep the FICA rate where it is, and remove the wage cap. Because if you do that I won't have to pay an additional 10% of my wages of medical and dental insurance, and my car insurance will go down as well. Hell, you can even increase FICA to 10% with no wage cap... I'll still save lots of money!



But don't give me a load of bull about how cutting taxes for the rich will help me. It won't. The rich aren't going to pay above-market wages for labor "just because". They're not going to throw in a little extra with the rent, hire more people than they need, pay more for raw materials than they have to. The rich aren't going to say "hey, we just got a tax break, let's give the guys on the floor a bonus!" When the electric bill comes, they aren't going to round up to the nearest thousand and mail in a check with a sticky note saying "keep the change" on it.

I work in a factory. I use my hands to add intrinsic value to steel. You want to help me? Drive up demand for my product and my labor so I can be working 40 hours a week again, so I get regular raises and maybe, at the end of the year, some profit-sharing into my 401(k). And maybe even get some (gasp!) overtime!


:rant:

[valerief]

1. Good rant! nt

[Rhiannon12866]

2. Excellent rant, but that doesn't work...

I'm a prime example. I swear that the taxes I just paid yesterday were more than I managed to make in 2008. :-(

[krispos42]

3. You aren't one of them, you're one of us

Welcome to the bottom of the heap.

[krispos42]

4. One and only kick n/t