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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: steve dietrich who wrote (341248)	1/10/2003 12:58:07 AM
From: FastC6	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Get out of my pocket....it is not your place or your demoboob friends place to dictate to me how much money I need and don't need....get lost parasite.

To: steve dietrich who wrote (341248)	1/10/2003 3:48:26 AM
From: DavesM	Respond to of 769670

re:"Here's a pretty good breakdown of wealth distribution, and the effect the tax cut will have, if approved:" The problem is, that I think most of the income, wealth and tax numbers the left and right put out are full of crap (or half truths at best). First of all, income is only part of the formula that determines a person's wealth. Second, Mr. Farrell pretends he's Joe Lunch Box with his wife Mary School-Teacher (I guess Farell's idea of an average family). Well, the average teacher in the United States had a salary of $40,582 in 1999 in the United States. The median income for Joe Lunch Box (Prescision production, craft, and repair machine operator) was $30,374 in 1999. Now, this yields a household income of over $70,000 per year, or somewhere around the top 30% (70th percentile) in household income. Now let's look at those within the top 30% in wealth. We're talking about a nest egg of around $50,000 (according to Mr. Farrell). But according to data compiled by Professor Edward N. Wolff of NYU from U.S. Bureau of the Census for 1998, a household in the top 30% should have a household wealth of $180,000. Why the difference? First of all, the Maritz polled 1000 adults (unlike the size of data from the census bureau). Second, the purpose of the Maritz poll was to find out how much money people, individually have saved for their retirement. And not apparently, how much money people have invested (or available to invest), or their net worth, or how much money they have - in total. Third, since the Maritz poll was about how much people had individually saved for retirement, how much does it relate to family or household wealth - or the dividend income that Joe Lunchbox and Mary School-Teacher might expect?

To: steve dietrich who wrote (341248)	1/10/2003 7:36:05 AM
From: Tom Clarke	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

The Truth about Taxes by Anonymous Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner. The bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this: The first four men-the poorest-would pay nothing; The fifth would pay $1: The sixth would pay $3; The seventh $7; The eighth $12; The ninth $18. The tenth man-the richest-would pay $59. That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement-until one day, the owner threw them a curve. "Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20." So now dinner for the ten only cost $80. The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six-the paying customers? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share?" The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being paid to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay. And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth. "But he got $7!" "Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man. "I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!" "That's true!" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!" "Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!" The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They were $52 short! And that, boys and girls, journalists and college instructors, is how the tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore. Unfortunately, Liberals cannot grasp this straight-forward logic! hannity.com