Mr. Buffett's article doesn't directly deal with with the specific issue I raised. Its only about the dividend tax cut. Also its about the original proposal which was to eliminate taxes on dividends when the company is paying corporate income taxes (you would still pay taxes if a company that is losing money and thus paying no taxes decided to pay dividends). The version the Senate passed only reduces these taxes.
But to deal directly with Buffett's point. If Buffett owns 31% of Bershire, and Berkshire pays taxes he is effectively paying 31% of those taxes.
the Senate voted last week to supply major aid to the rich in their pursuit of even greater wealth.
The Senate did no such thing. Lowering tax rates is not providing aid or a subsidy. The money is still flowing from the rich to the government not the other way around.
It can, however, determine who pays for lunch. And last week the Senate handed the bill to the wrong party.
Before this break and after this break the rich will pay a disproportionate share of income taxes. Perhaps they should but that is another argument. My point is merely that they do.
Supporters of making dividends tax-free like to paint critics as promoters of class warfare. The fact is, however, that their proposal promotes class welfare. For my class.
Nonsense. His class (depending on exactly how you define it) is still paying most of the taxes. However if he thinks he isn't paying enough it is possible to send a check to the Federal government.
Have stats, tables and/or charts to back your statement?
The article I linked to included a chart and also information in text.
Some more links
taxfoundation.org
townhall.com
(Note the chart in this article contains data from another article that this one criticizes but even this original article shows the rich paying a little more. The text of the article shows how its really more then a little)
dailyhowler.com
Here is an article that is arguing for more "progessive" taxation (at least it argues for making the social security tax "progressive") and argues that conservatives overstate how the rich pay more, but its data still show that even including social security taxes the rich still pay a larger percent of their income in federal taxes. Its data is not completely current (some of it stops at 1988 and some at 1992) but the basic fact hasn't change. The rich pay a higher percent of their income in taxes.
korpios.org
There is a lot of data on this CBO site including
Total Effective Federal Tax Rate Under 2000 Law
(Note this is total tax rate not just income tax rate, the effective income tax rate for the poor is negative, and that doesn't include welfare and other benefits as they are not taxes, it would be more negative if you included them)
Lowest Quintile 5.3
Second Quintile 12.8
Middle Quintile 16.7
Fourth Quintile 20.0
Highest Quintile 27.4
cbo.gov
"
Another source of confusion about tax cuts stems from a misunderstanding of who actually pays the lion's share of income taxes under our federal system. If those in the top income brackets also pay the most in taxes, it makes sense that any tax cut is going to benefit them disproportionately. It just so happens that the top 1 percent of taxpayers pay 35 percent of all income taxes paid. The top 20 percent of all taxpayers pay 83 percent of all taxes. And the top 50 percent pay almost 96 percent of all federal income taxes."
mackinac.org
"In 1975, for instance, the top 1 percent of taxpayers, those earning more than $59,338, paid 18.7 percent of all federal income taxes, up from 17.7 percent 5 years earlier.
The top half of taxpayers paid 92.9 percent of all income taxes in 1975, meaning that the bottom 50 percent paid just 7.1 percent.
According to the most recent figures, released by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress, the share of total federal income taxes paid by the top 1 percent of taxpayers has doubled since 1975. In 1999, they paid 36.2 percent of income taxes versus 18.7 percent in 1975.
For perspective, the top 1 percent of taxpayers reported just 19.5 percent of adjusted gross income; thus their share of the tax burden exceeded their income share by almost 17 percentage points.
For the top 5 percent, the spread was more than 21 percentage points.
By contrast, for those in the bottom 50 percent, the difference between the percentage of total taxes and total income was minus 9.25 percent -- that is, their income share greatly exceeded their tax share.
ncpa.org |
