When they are someone paying more than their fair share in taxes, yes.
You're right, it makes much more sense to support CC. He obviously should receive support for getting money back to install solar panels, whereas I as military get paid more than enough to support my wife and 2 kids and shouldn't receive so many tax credits. It makes sense that Id only be deserving of praise if I had extra money to spend on golf carts and solar panels and other things that provide rebates that you don't agree with.
Is there anyone not paying more than their fair share that are taking advantage of these credits? Any people on welfare installing solar panels?
You are spinning my point. I want people to wake up and see these subsidies are unnecessary.
You make a comfortable income in the military. It isn't great, but it is more than the average person makes. You are only taxed on your base pay, get a uniform allowance, separate rations, housing allowance, and usually a COLA for the location they have you based. 100% medical coverage, a pension plan, and a TSP that's comparable to a 401k.
You do not need to be treated like someone who needs subsidized. I would be offended. I was offended when I qualified for things I didn't need. It was solid evidence that we have a Robin Hood government, taking from the rich to give to the less rich, just to buy votes.
My God, they buy votes with our tax dollars!
I think we can agree that CC falls into the higher tax brackets than we do. Now maybe he has several deductions available to him, but he probably shouldn't have most that he does. I will contend he should pay a lower marginal rate, and have none, or next to no tax deductions.
Would you agree stories like his free golf like cart shows the stupidity of our tax system? I love that it's another example to expose such things.
The panels are not the issue. The issue is it shows the stupidity of the government picking winners and losers. They are buying votes with this money, making people think they are helping. CC is an example of exposing the governments stupidity, or lack of stupidity for buying the votes.
So Obama was able to buy CC's vote by making tax credits for solar panels available to him? Solid logic.
Do you realize that paying taxes only on your base pay means you pay less than your fair share by more than $2,000 annually?
. You probably have more after tax money than I do.
Is that the ability of your reading comprehension?
I doubt they bought his vote. However, all this money going out does persuade people to vote one way or another. It's like political commercials. It has an effect, else they wouldn't do it.
You don't think congress is spending our money out of the goodness of their hearts do you?
Tell me WC, what exactly should my "fair share" be?
Probably at least $4,500 annual to the feds. That's assuming you are the sole breadwinner. Wife work too?
Nope, just me. Wife takes care of the kiddo. Might I ask how you came to this approximation?
In my head. Just finished calculations assuming you were E-6 with 8 years for the 2011 pay scale, 2011 1040. This shows you would have zero $$ federal tax liability after the child credit and get an additional $808 back from Earned income Credit. Crunching numbers adding only a housing allowance which I used $1280/month for leaves you with a healthy income of $4,374 monthly. Since taxes are based only on base pay, you get this extra $1,280 tax free. Anyone else would be paying 15% of that, or $2,304 in taxes on it. If it was income, it would disqualify you from EIC, meaning the net difference is $3,112. Now to make the same income after federal income tax only, you would need to make $57,500 annually, but wait... Include the increased state taxes, SS insurance, Medicare insurance, it's even more yet that you have to make to have the same net income.
I will say you pay about $3,000 less than your fair share. Not the $4,500 I said on the spot.
You probably take home as much as someone making $30/hr, but have no federal tax liability.
Have you ever taken the federal and state tax forms, and calculated how much you needed to make in a civilian job to have the same net income? When I left in 1992, I had 11 years as an E-5. My base pay was $1,430/month. I calculated I needed to make more than $18/hr. I think it was like $18.40/hr for the same net income after taxes. E-5 with 11, for 2011 was $2,947 monthly. More than double what I made in '92. My $30/hr for you might be low.
Last edited by Wild Cobra; 12-10-2012 at 03:55 AM.
FWIW, I don't pay state tax (from NH), and I've been in 13+ years. You could check out the housing allowance/COLA for Honolulu (it's roughly 2300 IIRC, I live onbase.)
Of course, the problem with taxing these allowances (BAH, BAS, COLA) is that it changes from place to place. BAH for an E6 in San Antonio is roughly 1300 a month. SHould I pay more in taxes because I move to a higher-costed area?
I haven't done the civilian comparison in a while, mostly because I plan on doing the full twenty years.
FYI, here's the new pay scale: http://www.navycs.com/2013-military-pay-chart.html
E-6 with over 12 years is 3495, which jumps to 3556 a month at 14 years.
As for $30 an hour.... well, there's a lot of weeks I work longer than 40 hours.
I think it would be better to address this problem by paying an area COLA, etc, as required, and tax it. Even if allowances are not taxed, should be used as income to test for EIC. You should not qualify for EIC. It's a slap in the face to people who have less net income than you, and don't qualify. You should feel insulted. It's also an indication of just how ed up our tax system really is.
Maybe military personnel shouldn't get the nominal standard deduction, but should file itemized deductions. When you take the rent out of the equation, it seldom is as much as the $11,600 allotted for a married couple.
Last edited by Wild Cobra; 12-10-2012 at 04:45 AM.
I was probably on duty 50+hrs a week as well, but most full time jobs here in the real world will just be 40 hrs.As for $30 an hour.... well, there's a lot of weeks I work longer than 40 hours.
I don't think most people realize how well the military actually pays. Then you get these single kids that think they are getting paid so little. E-1 is $1,516 monthly for 2013, and they effectively get to spend most of that. No food, rent,or utilities to pay for.
I can't believe how many times I heard new soldiers cry for how little they got paid, while not having to s out a dime.
Regardless, I'm a little envious. At times I wish I stayed in the military. They did away with my job field, and I was already an E-5 for 6 years. We had a standing joke for my MOS that you didn't make E-6 till someone died or retired. Nobody left this great job field after making E-5. Anyway, when the cold war ended, they turned my MOS over to civilian contract. I could have changed my MOS, but nothing available was appealing to me. I took the $28k+ separation bonus they offered. It was a slap in the face returning to the real world. I selected my job field because the same job when I joined in '81 was a $50k annual job in the civilian world. When I got out in '92, it was a $25k annual job. Technology advanced so far, qualified electronic troubleshooters were no longer needed. It went to "red light on circuit board means replace board." My component level repair ability was obsolete. It took me until June '94 to find a decent paying job, then by 3 years I doubled my income by proving myself and advanced.
Still, I was no fan of qualifying for EIC when I did get it in the military. Base housing was nice and spacious, never worried about money until it was squandered on expensive trivial things. I felt insulted that my family qualified for EIC.
For future reference, I say you have no "skin in the game." You have no federal tax liability. I believe you are part of the 47% that doesn't care if other people's taxes increase, because it does not affect you.
How would you feel about these credits, rebates, etc. if you actually paid federal income tax?
How Google Used Tax Havens To Avoid $2 Billion In Taxes Worldwide
Google Inc. (GOOG) avoided about $2 billion in worldwide income taxes in 2011 by shifting $9.8 billion in revenues into a Bermuda s company, almost double the total from three years before, filings show.
By legally funneling profits from overseas subsidiaries into Bermuda, which doesn’t have a corporate income tax, Google cut its overall tax rate almost in half. The amount moved to Bermuda is equivalent to about 80 percent of Google’s total pretax profit in 2011.
The increase in Google’s revenues routed to Bermuda, disclosed in a Nov. 21 filing by a subsidiary in the Netherlands, could fuel the outrage spreading across Europe and in the U.S. over corporate tax dodging. Governments in France, the U.K., Italy and Australia are probing Google’s tax avoidance as they seek to boost revenue during economic doldrums.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/12/10/1307661/google-tax-havens-world/
Boutons, you really are an ignorant sometimes. Google is a worldwide company that earns income and pays taxes worldwide. They set up their overseas business's in a zero tax country like the Bahamas because they are paying taxes in the other countries they earned the income in...german taxes in germany, french taxes in france, russian taxes in russia, etc. They wouldn't and shouldn't owe US income taxes on these overseas profits that they already paid taxes on where they earned the money.
Last edited by CosmicCowboy; 12-10-2012 at 11:05 AM.
That's the type of biting analysis you get from thinkprogress.borg
Seems like foreign profits in foreign countries are NOT being taxed, not fully or not at all, but transferred by Google to no-tax Bermuda.
Then there is the decades old scam of eg Google charging their foreign subsidiaries, esp in low/no tax countries, exorbitant fees so Google US tax is lowered and funds are transferred to low/no tax countries.
That's the type of biting analysis you get from TB
They're already paying taxes in foreign countries, dumbass.
Hard to tell for certain, but I'd probably still be a fan. I'm a fan of downsizing the military, even though I'm in. (Then again, I don't have much to worry about I think, as cyberwarfare is still going strong.)
I was actually eligible for welfare (due to that same base pay trick), but I didn't take it because I did think I was already compensated enough, and left the money in the till for those who need it. And frankly, I think I'd rather make $100K a year and pay taxes than make $50K-ish and not.
Corporate Profits Skyrocket While Corporate Taxes Plummet
Corporate profits are currently at an all-time high (while worker wages as a percentage of the economy have plummeted to record lows). But despite those sky-high profits, corporate income tax revenue is projected to be just 1.5 percent of GDP this year, below the recent average and far below the amount raised by the tax just a few decades ago.
As the Century Foundation noted in this chart, the corporate income tax, as a share of total government revenue, used to track reasonably well with corporate profits. But in the last decade, the two have become decoupled:
As the Century Foundation’s Benjamin Landy explained, “In 1952, the corporate income tax accounted for about one third of of all federal tax revenue. But, over the years, U.S. multinationals have devised increasingly complex tax avoidance schemes, far beyond the ability of the IRS to credibly monitor or enforce. Although the corporate tax rate was also lowered significantly in 1986, tax avoidance is one of primary reasons why corporate taxes supply less than 9 percent of federal revenues today.”
Between 2008 and 2011, dozens of multinational corporations paid no corporate income tax at all, despite making billions in profits. In 2011, the effective tax rate paid by American corporations fell to 12.1 percent, a forty-year low.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/201...taxes-plummet/
Human-Americans get thoroughly ed by Corporate-Americans.
It’s the Simpson-Bowles Personal Profit Tour: Making Money Off the U.S. Debt
In an earlier study of the Fix-the-Debt corporations, the Ins ute for Policy Studies found the publicly held companies – at that time 63 – stood to gain $134 billion if Congress approved their demand for a territorial tax system exempting offshore profits from American taxes.
http://www.alternet.org/speakeasy/le...-money-us-debt
re-patrioted profits are taxed.
Famous example was the $305B offshore than dubya/ head allowed to be re-patrioted at 5% tax rate in return for (BigPharma) job creation. A total sham, as BigPharma pocketed the profits and laid of 10Ks employees.
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