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To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (2153)	11/4/2002 2:18:42 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6901

Again: You're going to blame the ENTIRE poverty problem in CA on Cheney and Lay??????? There were hardworking people having trouble in this state BEFORE the power crisis too. While Clinton was President. Silicon Valley in particular has almost idiotic housing costs. They have actually dropped since the tech bust, which should make it easier for those people. They problem is hardly all energy costs. But claiming those two men are responsible for a problem that long predates their entry onto the national scene is absurd. The income taxes, both state and federal, are graduated. People at the lower end of the scale already do pay significantly less. Frankly it impresses me as a bad idea to give anyone the impression that gov't and its services are free.

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (2153)	11/4/2002 4:56:03 PM
From: KLP	Respond to of 6901

Karen, you may not be aware that the following is true currently for the income tax rates: This list is a discussion of the flat tax as a percentage of the income, BUT it shows the current tax rates for a married couple group: Below $20,000: Average tax now: -$2,575 % of income: -15.9% 20-30k: Average tax now: - 718 % of income:-2.8% 30-40k: Average tax now: 643 % of income: 1.9% 40-50k: Average tax now: $2,235 % of income: 4.9% 50-75k: Average tax now: 4,841 % of income: 7.7% 75-100k: Average tax now: 9,732 % of income: 11.1% 100-200: Average tax now: 18,993 % of income: 14.3% ctj.org 8888888888888888888888888888 Taxpayers' reality: The more you make, the more you pay Nation's wealthiest 5% pay 55% of income taxes, IRS says 04/09/2002 Associated Press king5.com >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> "This trend is not going to reverse," said Scott Hodge, executive director of the Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax education and research group. "This will be the demographic for the 21st century taxpayer." For 1999, the most recent year for which complete Internal Revenue Service statistics are available, 6.3 million taxpayers whose incomes were in the top 5 percent paid more than 55 percent of all income taxes. They had incomes above $120,846 a year – meaning two spouses could each earn a bit more than $60,000 and be considered among the nation's richest. "It's very easy to move into the top echelon of taxpayers," Mr. Hodge said. The wealthiest 1 percent – those earning $293,415 and up – paid over a third of the taxes, while their share of the nation's taxable income was 19 percent. They pay income taxes at the top rate, now 38.6 percent, compared with a maximum rate of 15 percent for the majority of lower-earning taxpayers. Taxpayers in the bottom half paid only 4 percent of the income taxes in 1999, according to the IRS. These 63 million taxpayers earned, on average, less than $26,415 a year. Going back to 1989, the top 5 percent income group paid about 44 percent of income taxes, the bottom half almost 6 percent. At that time, the top tax rate paid by high earners was 31 percent. Looking ahead, the 10-year, $1.35 trillion tax cut enacted last year reduces income taxes in three steps, with the final step coming in 2006. In that year, according to the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, taxpayers earning more than $100,000 a year will pay almost 59 percent of all income taxes. Those with annual incomes of less than $30,000 a year will pay about 4.4 percent in 2006, about the same as they do today. In Congress, this disparity in the tax burden causes perennial political trouble for Republican tax-cutters because any across-the-board reduction meets with Democratic criticism that it would mainly benefit the wealthy while siphoning away money for government programs. For that reason, many tax breaks contain income cutoff points that leave out the top income earners. A prime example is the child tax credit, which is $600 for the tax returns due April 15 and will gradually rise to $1,000. This year, that credit begins to phase out for married couples filing jointly who earn more than $110,000 a year. <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<