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This year, Congress will spend $3.7 trillion dollars. That turns out to be about $10 billion per day. Can we prey upon the rich to cough up the money? According to IRS statistics, roughly 2 percent of U.S. households have an income of $250,000 and above. By the way, $250,000 per year hardly qualifies one as being rich. It's not even yacht and Learjet money. All told, households earning $250,000 and above account for 25 percent, or $1.97 trillion, of the nearly $8 trillion of total household income. If Congress imposed a 100 percent tax, taking all earnings above $250,000 per year, it would yield the princely sum of $1.4 trillion. That would keep the government running for 141 days, but there's a problem because there are 224 more days left in the year.
Not even a 100% tax will work. We have no choice but to exterminate some social programs or America is doomed.
Not even a 100% tax will work. We have no choice but to cut some social programs or America is doomed.
I'm pleasantly surprised that you have not only come to this realization, but that you also created a post to debunk the liberal theories that if we only taxed the rich more, all our fiscal problems would be solved. Kudos!
It's doubtful that if it would bring in enough to balance the budget, which it wouldn't, that the additional money would be used to simply balance the budget. It would be spent and we would still have a deficit.
Just because it won't balance the budget doens't mean the top marginal rate of 35% shouldn't be increased.
What will the unintended consequences of that action be?
How do we distinguish between the people who earn high income every year and those who have a onetime windfall that they could use to better their lives over the following years?
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