"Bottom fifty percent pay no taxes"

[abelenkpe]

Or the other ever popular talking point "people on the bottom collecting checks and paying no taxes!"

Help me out here. I collected unemployment once in the early nineties and distinctly remember being told that the money would be regarded as income and I would have to pay taxes on it. Is that not still the case?

Do people receiving social security or disability not pay taxes?

Even if they don't pay income tax isn't the state getting some revenue back through sales taxes every time they use the income to purchase anything? I think it is inaccurate to say the bottom 50 percent pay nothing and would appreciate any info to help refute such claims.

Many times I hear pundits claim those receiving benefits are lazy and sitting around doing nothing. If they are unemployed we should be looking at providing jobs something that is scarce despite years of providing tax breaks to supposed job creators. But most receiving food stamps or Medicaid are working poor, people who work all day and don't recieve a living wage. How can they be referred to as lazy?

[Angry Dragon]

1. In my state unemployment is taxable

They pay sales tax, gas tax, extra taxes if they smoke or drink,

and the only jobs the 'job creators' create are jobs for themselves

[bhikkhu]

33. Exactly - net taxes is about 40% of income for most everyone on the bottom rungs

Net taxation for those making $500k and above is about 17%.

[cbdo2007]

2. Just ask someone if they would rather not be making enough money to pay taxes....

or if they would rather be making what they are now and have to pay taxes on it. Every single time, people will choose to make more and pay taxes.

This is literally the only issue ever, where people are actually jealous of those with less than they have.

[underpants]

3. If we made everyone pay taxes (net) the economy would collapse

this is also the problem with the flat tax. Our economy relies on poor and middle class infusing money into it by spending. Spending everything they make.

[Turbineguy]

4. That goes to the

James D. Allen Postulate: "If you have to pay taxes, you're in good shape. Pay 'em!"

I am fortunate enough to pay taxes. It's not that I like paying taxes, it's that I like being fortunate.

[vi5]

5. Here are some good links for you.

I've had my parents trumpet this lie to me (and they are actually Democrats). I sent them these links which pretty much explain it fully.


http://dmarron.com/2011/07/27/why-do-half-of-americans-pay-no-federal-income-tax/

http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/07/51-zombie-lie

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/14/business/economy/14leonhardt.html

[PotatoChip]

39. Thanks for the links. From your first link,

this:

The second reason is that for many senior citizens, Social Security benefits are exempt from federal income taxes. That accounts for about 22% of the people who pay no federal income tax.

I have always known this to be true, but never knew the exact percentage of seniors who make up that RW oft-quoted figure of "50%" or "half".

Not that it makes any difference to me personally... I don't care who the people are that make up that half... For me the bottom line is that poverty is severe enough that they should be exempt from paying income tax. Plus as already mentioned, it's not as if they pay no taxes.

However, I consider it an important point to make whenever freeper types bring up that 50% POS statement, because one of their reasons for doing so is to play into the lazy-bum/welfare-queen/disability-parasite BS meme. It never seems to occur to these jerks, that their own grandparents who may have worked their entire lives, might fall into this category if they are only living on their SS income(s) and perhaps some small pensions.

Furthermore, another important point to bring up if one ever finds themselves debating this with RWingers is that among this 50% most of them DO pay income tax for the majority of their lives. In other words, that 50% demographic is very likely a shifting one, with people going through a temporary period of financial instability/poverty for whatever reason... For example someone who is laid of from a decent paying job thus having to temporarily take a low paying one, or a college student who will eventually land a good job upon graduation, or two working parents w/an income low enough for income tax exemption while their children are still in the home, ect. ect.

[vi5]

45. Some other things to counter with...

Payroll taxes are very regressive. Those are all paid at the same percentage by everyone who works and collects a pay check at all and for the wealthy, only on income up to 106K or something like that. Everything they make above that is exempt from payroll taxes. And those taxesgo to things like Social Security and Medicare.

Since life expectancy is lower for the poor and lower middle class than it is on the wealthy (and even lower life expectancy for African American men), then the wealthy and upper middle class get to collect those benefits longer than the rest.

Just some more points to use when discussing this stuff.

[PotatoChip]

46. True. Another very good point. nt

[brewens]

6. I know one couple that not only don't pay taxes but actually

come out way ahead. If you count their deductions for five kids, food assistance and the cost of the medicaid that has saved their kids lives a couple times. They have to be coming out ahead maybe $15,000 every year on the average.

As you can probably guess, they are evangelical conservatives! The good part is, people like that all over the country have to be getting the idea that the Republicans aren't really on their side.

[dems_rightnow]

7. As it regards Federal income tax

Social Security and Social Security Disability may be up to 85% taxable, or completely nontaxable, depending upon your other income.

Unemployment benefits are taxable income.

That's not the same thing as saying they will actually PAY Federal income taxes, after deductions.

Naturally, sales taxes and a variety of taxes and levies will be paid when the money is spent.

[kwolf68]

8. Not sure, but it really doesn't matter

I don't think the poor SHOULD pay any taxes, other than things like sales tax, on non essential consumption.

This idea that the poor have it so easy is funny...I don't see many rich people dumping their wealth so they can 'avoid taxes'.

The bottom line is, the more money you have the more free you are to do things.

Can poor people just jump in the car and goto museums, vacations? Do they have money to get their possibly talented daughter swimming lessons? If their kid makes all As, can they take them out for ice cream or buy them a pet? If their air conditioner blows up can they come up with the 5K to fix it? Can their kids play sports, get tutoring or extra coaching? Can they replace their crappy stove? Will a poor couple be able to afford to a nice anniversary out to eat?

In the United States, you are more free to do whatever you want, provided you can pay for it!!!!!

The bashing the poor because they 'pay no taxes' is a disgusting argument considering the MISSED opportunities they and their kids incur simply because of being poor. The last thing we should do is fuck with them more.

[bemildred]

9. Bottom 50% have no money. nt

[TheKentuckian]

10. It is false. I've net paid EVERY year I have worked, including in high school. I have never

earned over 42k and have several times had to pay over and above the taxes taken from my check.

When I have gotten refunds, it has never offset my entire responsibility and each year I have net paid Federal, state, and local. As that I am aware of there is no method to get back local money even when Federal and state have been way over paid.

The statement is a boldfaced lie that is often parroted by even some "Democrats", usually fairly comfortable ones who see themselves in a higher caste than the poor and working class.

[RebelOne]

11. Unemployment is taxable. Social Security is not.

I have been collecting unemployment and am having the taxes deducted from the check. I also collecting Social Security and do not pay any taxes on it.

[dems_rightnow]

18. Your experience doesn't make it the right answer.

Social security is taxable for many people. It would be for you, if you had much other income.

[RebelOne]

22. Yes in past years, when I was working, I did pay tax

on my social security. But I was laid off my job in January of 2010. I was working and collecting social security because I was 70 years old. When I filed my taxes for that year I did not have to pay taxes on my social security. In fact, I received a $900 refund.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

31. Social Security is taxable if you make over a certain amount of extra earned income per year

Unemployment doesn't count in the equation.

[indurancevile]

34. social security IS taxable.

http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=179091,00.html

[eridani]

52. Under some circumstances, Social Security is taxable

Your net income is not high enough.

[Cool Logic]

12. "Undocumented workers do the jobs that Americans refuse to do."

I have no idea whether that is a true statement or not. However, if is, that would seem to indicate a certain amount of laziness amongst the poor.

[immoderate]

15. Yeah, if they weren't lazy they would appreciate the $3/hr.

Collecting dividends by the pool is not lazy though.


--imm

[rfranklin]

17. Americans don't want to work for slave wages...

and why should they? The fact that we tolerate employers using illegal immigrants and paying them slave wages (if they pay them at all) is a mindboggling disgrace.

And the same people who are so quick to make this claim are the same ones that want to shoot the people sneaking in over the border.

[RaleighNCDUer]

25. The truth of the statement is:

"Undocumented workers to the jobs that Americans refuse to do for the same rate of pay."

You see, Americans believe in the minimum wage, and will not work for less than that - because they know that at minimum wage (never mind below minimum) you have to hold 1.75 jobs - 70 hrs/week - to have a livable income.

There's another word for the less-than-minimum wage: slavery.

[provis99]

28. guess what? Illegal immigrants don't want to pick fruit for minimum wage, either.

Think they tell their kids "Son, I hope you grow up to be a poverty-stricken fruit picker like me"?

As soon as they can, they quit these rotten jobs, too.

[SheilaT]

41. Actually, undocumented workers

doing such work happens only because the employers aren't willing to pay a reasonable wage for such work, and it's the undocumented workers who are desperate enough to take those jobs.

For decades now I've been angered by those statements about how Americans think themselves too good to do certain jobs, when the truth is that some jobs are so hazardous or so awful in some way or so badly underpaid, that no reasonable person is willing to do them.

I don't find very many smug, well off persons flocking to pick fruit or clean hotel rooms or work in slaughter houses.

[OHdem10]

13. Not defending them at all. They are so wrong it makes my head

almost explode.

Those collecting checks are those who receive the income
Earned Income Tax Credit. These are the working poor who
earn so little that Reagan )rather than ever suggest Businesses
pay better salaries,) instituted the Earned Income Tax Credit
to reward work rather than have people on welfare. Yes,
their Icon instituted this subsidy.

Now what is behind this continuing talking point.

Have you noticed there is another Talking Point.
Reform the Tax code and BROADEN THe TAX BASE.

Put the two together.

They started with 50% do not pay taxes. Conditioning
the people to the idea some people do not pay taxes.

BROADEN the TAX BASE. This means you need more taxpayers.
Simple go DOWN THE ECONOMIC LADDER start making some
of the 50% start paying taxes.

I have been pointing this out for over a month now.
Finally. Friday, PBS Lehr Newshour, in an interview
with J. Huntsman, this was made clear.
"We must have more people paying taxes, if we are to
be competitive." Make the lower end pay but cut Corporate
and High Incomer's Taxes. This was spelled out loud and
clear.

Write every Democrat and find out how many of the
agree with Reform the tax code and broaden the base.

[hughee99]

14. Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed that

when discussing what "the rich" pay, ONLY income taxes are discussed. No mention is made of the property taxes on their McMansion, the sales taxes on their Lexus, or the excise tax on their yacht. When discussing "the poor" all sorts of other taxes are discussed.

[RockaFowler]

19. I'm sick of it, too

Oh yeah and we had to pay taxes at the end of the year because my husband is on Unemployment. I'm sick of all of these people saying 50% don't pay taxes. That bull is just that bull. Look, I pay sales tax, gas tax, property tax, etc and so do my friends down the street. This is getting out of hand. The class warfare is just horrible. You have people who make next to nothing complaining that someone else is on Unemployment and/or Welfare. It just makes me so sad . . . I hate what the Repukes have done to this country. And it started with their idol - Reagan.

[subterranean]

16. Right-wingers like Perry are referring to Federal income tax when they say that.

They never mention all the other taxes that the lower 50 percent pay. But many people don't pay income taxes because the deductions and credits reduce their tax bill to zero. Republicans think that's unfair. If they want the poor and lower-middle class to pay income taxes, they will have to scale back or eliminate the deductions and credits.

[OHdem10]

21. Some of the bottom fifety percent will be paying INCOME TAX

They need more people paying taxes.

[indurancevile]

37. It simply isn't true that the bottom 50% of filers pay no income tax. It's false. No need to refer

to other taxes to rebut the falsehood, just show them the irs figures.

http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/indtaxstats/article/0,,id=96981,00.html

[polmaven]

20. The person known as GE

didn't pay taxes for 2010 either.....I'm guessing General Electric is not in the bottom 50% earnings category, is s/he?

[OHdem10]

24. You are missing the whold point.

Broaden the tax base means have more people pay taxes
so they can cut the Corporate Taxes and Higher incemers.

They plan to have more of the 50% pay more.

[polmaven]

51. OK - I guess that means

the person named GE will get a larger refund next year so that s/he continuse to pay less than $0....right///

[RaleighNCDUer]

23. And the fact is, even if they have the deductions to wind up paying no income tax,

they still pay a higher percentage of their income in other taxes - sales taxes, vehicle taxes, etc. - than the wealthy pay on ALL their taxes combined.

[subterranean]

26. I see it as another attempt to divide people against each other.

They want to deflect attention from the m/billionaires by telling people that our problems are caused by the family making $25,000 a year not paying enough taxes.

[creeksneakers2]

27. When does that 50% figure come from?

because Obama had a $400 per person tax credit, $800 per couple, that has been terminated during negotiations with the GOP. I'd expect that credit was putting lots of people in the zero bracket who won't be any more.

[madville]

29. I beleive it on federal income taxes

The top 50% of income earners pay about 98% of collected personal income taxes. The top 50% are net tax payers while the bottom 50% across the board pay nothing or in many cases actually make money by filing their taxes.

I love it, I work the right amount where we stay eligible for the EIC and with other deductions and credits I never pay federal income taxes. We get back more than we have withheld, we had about $4,000 withheld in 2010 and received a tax refund of almost $8,000. So we actually made almost $4,000 by qualifying for the EIC and with the child tax credits.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

30. Here's where the lie comes from:

The median HOUSEHOLD income in the U.S. is about $50,000. That means that half of all U.S. households earn less. Now that's a household of any size. If you have a non-working spouse and two kids and a mortgage of the right size, you pay no federal income taxes.

Some math-challenged (or deliberately deceptive) right-winger decided that this meant that 50% of ALL households pay no income tax, which is just plain WRONG. (I'm a one-person household, and in most years I've made less than $50,000, sometimes a lot less, and I've NEVER been exempted from income taxes.)

What the right-wing wants you to think is that 50% of the population are freeloaders (and it helps the right-wingers if you imagine those "freeloaders" to be dark-skinned with ten children each) and that the poor abused rich people, you know, the "job creators" are groaning under the burden of paying for these people who sit around watching their 60" plasma TVs and driving their Acuras, which they bought with their welfare checks.

Here's the way to combat it. Mention the medium household income. Ask the mouthbreather what his/her household income is. You have a 50% chance of it being less than $50,000. Ask them if they pay taxes, not only federal but state, gasoline, vehicle, FICA, and sales taxes.

We have a whole nation of people who just repeat what they hear on TV or the radio without thinking. It's a failure of an educational system that has been redesigned to make people look for THE one right preapproved answer instead of thinking things through.

[bhikkhu]

32. Utter BS - below $500k income, most people pay 40%

...that's all taxes, which is the most inclusive measure. Property tax, sales tax, state and federal, etc.

There are so many deceptive ways to divide things up (both ways, really), but for people who's incomes are $500k and under, the net tax burden is about 40% of income.

For those making greater than $500k, the net tax burden is about 17% of income, which is a bit unfair.

If you look at net worth - assets rather than income - then its much worse. The bottom 40% own nothing, and the next 10% own close to nothing, so you can come up with all kinds of creative ways to phrase that. If we rearranged people and distributed them perfectly evenly across the country, but sorted them by wealth so the richest lived the farthest east, and the poorest lived farthest west, there would be 25 hedge fund managers in Maine who owned more than every single person west of the Mississippi...and that sort of thing.

Mostly, the disparity about volume of federal taxes paid by those at the top says more about the disparity of income - its not "why do those guys pay so much more", but "why do those guys have so much more". The tax codes are actually written to their advantage - without which the difference would be even more staggering. Why is that? What did those few do to deserve so much more than the vast majority of people?

[enlightenment]

35. This website is very useful for facts concerning taxation.

If you look at each state, the summary will give you both the pros and the cons of various state schemes. For instance - Nevada has one progressive taxation feature (no sales tax on food items) and several regressive features (no personal income tax; high sales and excise tax; business payroll instead of corporate profit tax).

Also very clear charts and graphs.

http://www.itepnet.org/state_reports/whopaysfactsheets.php


edited for spelling

[indurancevile]

36. it's untrue to begin with that the *bottom* 50% pay no income tax.

that was supposedly 50% of *filers* which pay nothing; that includes people *above* the 50th percentile.

If you open the 2009 file you will find that the bottom 50% does indeed pay income taxes. Some *individuals* in that grouping may not pay, but that is true of individuals in the top brackets as well. Of course the top as a group pays more -- because they have more income. Nevertheless, many pay nothing.

http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/indtaxstats/article/0,,id=96981,00.html

[blogslut]

38. Here's another way to look at it

All working Americans pay withholding taxes. The government takes that money no matter how small the paycheck. The only way the working poor can get it refunded is if they file an income tax return each year. In essence, the working poor involuntarily lend the US government a certain amount of money with every paycheck.

[eppur_se_muova]

40. Oooooh .... curse those lucky duckies!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_duckies

[saras]

42. It's a stupid lie - why waste intellectual effort treating it seriously?

The correct answer is "Yes. It's because they don't have enough MONEY to OWE any taxes. Don't you understand the civilized world's economic systems?"

Whether it's factual is completely irrelevant. What matters is that it is, AT BEST, an unimportant distraction.

[Orsino]

43. The non-spin versions:

"The people at the bottom are paid so little that even we can't bring ourselves to force an income tax on them."

"The people at the bottom are supporting the worst excesses of those at the top, who aren't burdened by income taxes, either."

[upi402]

44. it's called CIVILIZATION for a reason

and some in our midst will never understand that concept. No matter the facts.

[madokie]

47. Thats actually not true

during raygun's term they started taxing SS and UI.
That doesn't really affect the rich people as they don't have to depend on either like we do. To them its just a tax right off at the end of the year. These stories like this is done to get people thinking that what isn't is.

[MrMickeysMom]

48. In what Universe does this happen?

Everybody who works pays a payroll tax, or wage tax, even if they're too poor to pay federal income tax... That means it's either 7.65% if employed by someone else or 13.3% if self-employed.

Then, these people at the low income level, who likely live in neighborhoods where they have to go to a Rite Aide to buy groceries, or are limited to one type of grocery store, pay taxes on everything they buy from this meager existence.

Lazy, my ass... It's more likely they're under-norished and exhausted.

So, meanwhile, the only people who are well off are the rich, or the big corporations. Then, if you'll consider that a corporation like GE doesn't even pay income tax, let's talk about who is lazy, or evil, or doesn't give a fuck about the 50%. Also, let's not forget the amount of SAY those corporations have over what the poor don't have to say.

[JackRiddler]

49. Simply false. Bottom 50 percent pay FICA, Medicare, unemployment, sales taxes...

the payroll taxes provide a SURPLUS above Social Security and Medicare and this has financed about 40 percent of all the deficits (war related) since 1980!

And of course, most of the bottom 50 percent ALSO pay income tax! What an absurd lie.

More is collected in payroll taxes than in income tax. The discretionary part of the budget (which is supposed to be paid from income tax) is underfinanced.

The real situation is in many ways the opposite of this big lie.

[Brigid]

50. Those who say this miss the point.

The point is, working people's wages are so low they don't even rise to the level where the income tax kicks in. That is not a good thing if you want to work on improving the economy and reducing the deficit. But some of these idiots just don't -- or won't -- get that. :banghead: