Bernie Sanders at his best

[Daldaen]

Originally Posted by Orruar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I think everyone should pay their fair share, both rich and poor. But most of the time when people complain about people not paying their fair share, it's people who pay 0% in taxes complaining about people paying 20-25% in taxes and thinking they should be paying more like 40-50%+. I think it's much more of a problem that nearly half our country pays $0 in federal income taxes than the hedge fund managers that are taxed at an average of 23.8%.

All I ask is that if you're going to complain about people not paying their fair share when they're already paying over 20% of their income, that you be one of the ones who is actually chipping in a decent amount. If we're at a party and chipping in for pizza and you put in 50 cents, you can't then complain that the guy who put in $10 isn't paying enough.

Paying their fair share is a false catchphrase that people like to use.

Basically what they really want is to increase the top tier (or make a new top tier of earned over X) from 40% to 45 or 50%, and generate the same amount of revenue by taxing millionaires that new rate as you would taxing the lower half of the country 10-15%.

It would work.... But it's certainly not fair. Well, it would work until the tax code is again changed and allows further loopholes to avoid paying their taxes.

I don't really see the fact that half pay nothing in federal taxes as the problem though. Many of those at the very bottom live hand to mouth, it's very difficult to take away 5-10% of their income and still subsist with the bare necessities. It seems more ideological than practical to find the lack of a federal income tax on the lowest earning individuals as a big problem. You're just not going to pull in the revenue required to run our government by making that change. Removing loopholes and increasing the top tier tax bracket may though, and without impacting their lives in a huge way.

Is that fair or people paying their "fair share", no of course not.