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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
This misleading statistic comes from news stories in 2010 and 2011(based on 2009 and earlier data) and refer to federal taxes only, as a share of the national economy...
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The statistics on the matter are quite accurate as always. The phony claim above meanwhile comes from lying right-wing propaganda sites and is easily demolished by looking up a few actual numbers. I encourage you to behave less like a bot by actually trying that instead of simply relying on the words of professional liars.
If you did try that, you would discover that the original press reports were based on data from BEA (the people who prepare GDP) noting that the ratio of "personal current taxes" to "personal income" was at its lowest level since 1950. Simple fact. "Personal current taxes" include ALL of federal, state, and local income taxes. Additionally, "personal income" is not nearly the same thing as GDP, so you were wrong there on two counts out of two. Meanwhile, even over at the Tax Foundation (the bogus "Tax Freedom Day" people), it is acknowledged that the level of all taxes at all levels to Net National Product was at its lowest level in 2009 since 1959. Still the 1950's no matter how a sensible person might slice it. Somehow your train seems not to have pulled into that particular station just yet.
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
Let's look at statistics that actually have meaning: the Federal government now annually spends a (non-wartime) record high of 40% of the entire nation's GDP.
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Laughable. 4th quarter GDP will surpass $17 trillion. 40% of that would be $6.8 trillion. Show me where federal spending is going to be at such a level.
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
The working class, which has actually LOST economic ground over the past 50 years, is now paying a record high percentage (98.7%) of the cost of federal government...
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The working class has lost ground chiefly due to Republican-inspired income and wealth redistribution schemes -- the very thing they like to whine about when it goes in the opposite direction. In this case, wealth-redistribution has been upward toward the already quite wealthy and away from everybody else, an objective accomplished by trashing employee benefits and forcing productivity gains into corporate profits and away from wage increases. Additionally, your 98.7% claims are patent nonsense, appearing to rest on the simply silly assumption that the economy is comprised of just two groups -- corporations and the working class. How bizarre!
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
...and is also paying the many economic costs of supporting over $17 trillion in federal debt alone (more than 100% of GDP).
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Yeah, it'll be higher this year, but interest on the public debt in 2012 was lower than it was in 1998. There's an appropriation for interest on the public debt of course. It comes out of general revenues. Not sure what other costs your imagination has conjured up.
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
For instance, "corporate taxes are expected to raise just 1.3 percent of G.D.P. in revenue this year,
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Your article refers to 2010. Cherry-picked data depressed by the effects of the Republican economic collapse. But at that, what percent of GDP would you have expected corporate taxes to be, considering that they were running at 2.0-2.5% of GDP over the years prior to the collapse?
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
I don't have mention that payroll taxes are a DIRECT LOSS OF LIFESTYLE to the working person, while they are nothing more than statistics on a table to a corporation.
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LOL! The only reason that payroll taxes appear as a part of your gross pay is so that you an afford to pay the tax. Those amounts have nothing to do with any product or service you provide to your employer. If payroll taxes went away, so would that part of your gross income, leaving you with exactly the same net pay that you have today. By showing up every morning, you prove to your employer that you are willing to work for that. Don't think he hasn't noticed. Of course, as a photographer, you might personally be one of those McCain-Palin "maverick" types off far from the herd as some self-employed artiste. The self-employed and their petulant narcissism can get really tiresome after a while, so let me try to head some of that off by noting that if you can't afford to pay self-employment taxes, you aren't good enough at it to be self-employed. It's just a hobby. Get a real job.
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Originally Posted by NHartphotog
The accumulated $17+ trillion in debt is not accounted for AT ALL in the macro federal tax burden statistic, and yet it is damaging in multiple ways: it not only must be dealt with economically (paid back or inflated away), but it imposes significant interest costs (a "stupidity" tax that buys the taxpayer NOTHING in services or benefits), and also requires suppression of interest rates and devaluation of the currency (which discourage saving and nullify retirement hopes).
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Complete gibberish. We have not paid off the public debt since 1836 and will never do so again. Ever. Neither will any of the other successful economies that are carrying debt -- which of course is ALL of them. All you are doing here is making it more and more clear how very little you actually understand about national finance and economics.
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