brad, you think you are the only one? i have traveled in circles with bankers since my infancy. my father was an executive in world of high finance. even after he retired, and to this day, 15 years later, he is still one of the most sought after consultants around. companies have given him 51% for his advice. i have talked these issues with more people than i can count, and not all of them are neoconservative in their views, or even conservative. many are, but many are not.

and i made my own way after "leaving the nest." that's why i have lived in my truck, and in poverty at times, in my adult life. i've seen both sides, both the silver and plastic spoon side of things. i've had to eat the "ketchup and hot water" version of tomato soup and have attended 1000 a plate dinners and know both sides very well and personally.

no offense brad, but it is you who don't know what you are talking about here. i do very well for myself, well into the 6 figures. and sorry, i don't find it amoral to help another person. and neither do many others. and that includes a few investment bankers i know.

stop acting like you are the only one here with a pot to piss in.

“Now, let's say that you tax the hell out of the wealthy to the point where either there's not as much incentive to gain wealth anymore”

We do not need to tax the Hell out of the rich to solve the deficit. We need to end the pork, have better enforcement of the existing laws and have 3-4 % more from the wealthy. That will not cause the wealthy to stop investing or changing their spending. The idea that to INCREASE TAXES 3% or 4% for the wealthy will cause the “sky will fall” is just BS!

Just as the idea that taxing other classes will make the "sky fall" as well.  If you are so against pork I must have missed your article criticizing the democrats and their pork filled Iraq bill.

i did. we've had this discussion before. and i still say they were smart. and the senate versions of the bill are showing that as more and more of the GOP abandons this president. even robert novak commented this week that this president "stands alone" and is "isolated" as the GOP runs away from him.

I wasn't addressing it to you, and democrats putting their pork in this bill shows that they are truly hypocrites.

No one cares what your dad does. 

In my experience, often the most uninformed, naive people are children of successful parents. Saying your dad was a success doesn't suddenly, as if by magic, endow you with knowledge of how the real world works.

One can snap on Reality TV to see how worldly the children or spouses of successful people are.

i know ya don't care. and i'm not asking ya to. what it does show is that i haven't just been around the rich for just a few years, but my whole life. that was the only real point there.

and you are right about "most rich kids" i wholeheartedly agree. that's why i went out on my own, paid my own way and forged my own path. my brother actually "followed in the nepotistic footsteps" ...i'd tell ya bout him, but i'm sure ya don't care. (really) he's actually done batter than me, economically speaking, but i have no regrets as i know i earned everything and "did it my way."



sure, and growing up, i didn't need reality tv, it was reality. not to say there aren't some good eggs too in the higher end circles.

Look, Sean, here's the thing:

Someone who knows something about money in the real world can instantly identify people who don't know about money when they argue for things that are dumb.

For example, Col Gene (and you) arguing to raise INCOME tax rates on the rich. This is dumb.

I recommend getting this:

http://www.shoppbs.org/sm-pbs-buffett-and-gates-go-back-to-school-dvd--pi-2477747.html

Gates and Warren Buffet both strongly believe that the rich should be contributing more to society. They believe the rich aren't taxed enough.

However, neither think the INCOME tax rate shoudl go up. As Buffet pointed out, he could have gone most of his life without paying a cent of income tax rates.  The tax system, right now, is so ridiculouarly rigged against people who WORK that it's ridiculous. 

Let me give you the example Buffet gave:  Rather than payng himself a salary, a business owner could simply borrow a bunch of money at a relatively low interest rate on the assets of his company and live in style for the rest of his life.  Amount of taxes he would pay: $0.  He would live in luxury for the rest of his life without paying taxes. And if his company merely "broke even", it wouldn't pay taxes either.

Meanwhile, people like you and Gene, who don't really understand money very well, are running around arguing vigorously to raise the income tax rate, as if THAT is a good idea when in fact all it does is punish people who are putting in labor and don't choose or cannot play such games.

I mentioned awhile back that if I wanted to, I could avoid paying taxes if I wanted to.  Raise my taxes and I could just pay myself $0 in salary and take it all in dividends which are only taxed at 15%.  Warren Buffet's idea is even more clever -- just borrow money from the business and as long as the company's value grows at greater than say 6% (interest rate) -- which any decent business is -- then you're golden.

So when I see someone arguing that the "solution" is to raise income tax rates, it is the same thing to me as someone saying that the solution to landing on the sun is to do it at night time.

Look, Sean, here's the thing: Someone who knows something about money in the real world can instantly identify people who don't know about money when they argue for things that are dumb. For example, Col Gene (and you) arguing to raise INCOME tax rates on the rich. This is dumb. I recommend getting this: Link-pi-2477747.html Gates and Warren Buffet both strongly believe that the rich should be contributing more to society. They believe the rich aren't taxed enough. However, neither think the INCOME tax rate shoudl go up. As Buffet pointed out, he could have gone most of his life without paying a cent of income tax rates. The tax system, right now, is so ridiculouarly rigged against people who WORK that it's ridiculous. Let me give you the example Buffet gave: Rather than payng himself a salary, a business owner could simply borrow a bunch of money at a relatively low interest rate on the assets of his company and live in style for the rest of his life. Amount of taxes he would pay: $0. He would live in luxury for the rest of his life without paying taxes. And if his company merely "broke even", it wouldn't pay taxes either. Meanwhile, people like you and Gene, who don't really understand money very well, are running around arguing vigorously to raise the income tax rate, as if THAT is a good idea when in fact all it does is punish people who are putting in labor and don't choose or cannot play such games. I mentioned awhile back that if I wanted to, I could avoid paying taxes if I wanted to. Raise my taxes and I could just pay myself $0 in salary and take it all in dividends which are only taxed at 15%. Warren Buffet's idea is even more clever -- just borrow money from the business and as long as the company's value grows at greater than say 6% (interest rate) -- which any decent business is -- then you're golden. So when I see someone arguing that the "solution" is to raise income tax rates, it is the same thing to me as someone saying that the solution to landing on the sun is to do it at night time.

Very good Brad. You get an insightful for this!

i was gonna say something that might get taken the wrong way here, but i'll just keep my mouth shut on that one.



actually, i have endorsed raising taxes on the wealthy, but i don't think i have specifically only zeroed it down to INCOME taxes. if, by my saying "taking a percent or 2 from the rich" is interpreted as only an income tax increase, then my apologies. but i think there are plenty of places we can find those percentages. i have talked about luxury and sin taxes, and other taxes that could be utilized. and i am open to suggestion.

as far as what buffett has said, i do know know that he said this, as reported by the ny times in november of 2006.

“There’s class warfare, all right,” Mr. Buffett said, “but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”

This conversation keeps coming back to mind because, in the last couple of weeks, I have been on one television panel after another, talking about how questionable it is that the country is enjoying what economists call full employment while we are still running a federal budget deficit of roughly $434 billion for fiscal 2006 (not counting off-budget items like Social Security) and economists forecast that it will grow to $567 billion in fiscal 2010.

When I mentioned on these panels that we should consider all options for closing this gap — including raising taxes, particularly for the wealthiest people — I was met with several arguments by people who call themselves conservatives and free marketers.






WWW Link

Sean,

If you are trying to pretend that Gene's articles aren't about INCOME tax rates or that you didn't realize they were then I think you are being disengenous.

I support the rich paying more. But not from income taxes.

It disgusts me when I see politicans like John Kerry and John Edwards arguing for higher income taxes even as they pay LESS than I do despite being mega rich.

he can speak for himself, as was i. i can understand the confusion. i was just attempting to clarify. again, i have spoken of adjusting rates at many other places besides income tax rates. i also seem to remember pointing out the fact that much of the rich don't pay payroll taxes like employees do and other differences in how they are taxed.



as do i. and yes, i believe we can do better than simply just looking at income tax rates. and where i won't go as far as saying those rates don't ever need adjustments or a re-look, there are plenty of other places we can look before income taxes.



it does make for good stump speeching, but i would like to think, at least away from the podium, that at least some of these guys (not all) are just simplifying the message for the masses. i don't believe they are only considering income tax adjustments, but adjustments, taxes, fees or whatever they are termed across the board to create a fairer system.

talking about the income tax rates and suggesting that they give a percent or 2 more of their income is an easy message to get across. most people can understand it. where that specifically comes from is hardly limited to a federal income tax increase. even within the tax code, there are always loopholes that can be closed and more creative things done than simply the increase of rate.

as far as the specific argument about the tax cuts when we were going to war, and suggestions that we "roll back" the cuts to the "clinton levels." is again, more political fodder than anything. it is the reflection of the resentment that alot harbor over the concept that when we go to war , there is "shared sacrifice." something this war hasn't seen, unless you include the sacrificing of our civil liberties and the lynching of our constitution. if a plan was put forth that the majority of americans could see the sacrifice without negatively affecting the economy with an undue adjustment in income tax rates, and found the funding elsewhere, i'm sure most would be satisfied. in this specific case, the argument wasn't only economic, but a social morale issue. the tax cuts are the easiest symbol of that lack of shared sacrifice that most people can understand and relate to.

but i digress,,,and i'm sure we have differences on what we feel is the best path forward. but i do agree that income taxes are definitely not the 1st place to look when you simply want to increase revenue and balance the budget. there are far more effective things we can do to make things more fair. but again, i am only speaking for myself here.

They favor higher income taxes because they won't have to pay it.

That's the thing -- whether it's guys like Kerry and Edwards or guys like Gene, it's always about demanding that OTHER people pay for their compassion.

When you raise income tax rates, you hurt "the little guy".  It's the same idiocy that leads Republicans and Democrats to try to impose various kinds of economic sanctions. The dictator isn't affected by them, only the people on the streets.

Raise the rich guy's income taxes and he fires a few people to keep his costs under control. Sometimes it results in the rich guy off-shoring his labor to make up the cost.  And then the same dumb asses who argued for the higher income taxes whine about outsourcing even as they caused it.

That's why I get frustrated when people who know nothing about economics or our tax system try to argue it.  They're just clueless.

I mean, hell, look at Gene.  He claims the rich are greedy.  Okay, let's assume they are. So you raise their taxes. Guess what the greedy rich guys are going to do? They're going to eliminate costs that don't help personally.  Less charitable giving. Cut those borderline workers.

What's funny is that human nature isn't that complicated. If you have two stores and one of the stores costs more than the other, then people will go to the store that's cheaper.  And yet people like Gene will argue that we should raise income taxes on the rich and then get surprised that the rich respond to it in ways they don't like. "Those bastards! They just outsourced their IT department to India and their labor force to Mexico!" while being completely clueless that it was idiotic government policies that made it a no brainer.

I seem to like the idea of a bigger sales tax. You could make it a tax on non-essential items or give refunds to the lower class to keep from being unfair to them since they need most of their money for essential goods (like food and a place to stay). That way, if you invest, you're not penalized for it and that can promote economic growth, and those that have higher income will probably consume more goods and therefore be taxed more in that fashion.

This would also prevent having to pay no taxes at all when doing something that Warren Buffet mentioned. Also, some of the taxes can be specific to related services. For example, have a gas tax, and have those funds be used directly for road work. The more people that are driving, the more money you get from the gas tax, the more money there is to expand/improve the roads.

Now, my main concern with regard to this kind of tax system is that if it discourages spending too much, then people will consume less to the extent where several businesses fail, thereby causing unemployment, thereby hindering economic growth. But I believe that the urge to consume will be strong enough with proper advertising and the like that it will be able to overcome this issue.

I like the idea of a national consumption tax.  That would be a lot more fair.

While it may cause some marginal businesses to go out of business due to a tiny disincentive to spend (though seriously, has the state sales tax ever been shown to hurt businesses?), I think it's preferable to robbing people of their money before they've even seen it. 

We want "the rich" to invest in things. If they're spending it on diamond encrusted cell phones, then it'll get taxed. But if they're using it to fund a start-up company then it wouldn't get taxed.