GOP introduces their own health care bill---with other stuff in it too

[viper37]

How do you live on an income tax refund? 

with the money he receives from his income tax refund, he uses it to buy food&pay his rent, instead of buying a new subwoofer or some new furniture.

[Admiral Yi]

What is it with Republicans' hard-on for no corporate tax, and no capital gains or interest tax?  It's even funnier when they talk about it right after saying that the tax system shouldn't discourage working. 

Don't they realize that this results in a highly regressive taxation that rewards investment and discourages work?  Why shouldn't dividends and capital gains be taxed the same as any other income, especially if there is no corporate tax?

False dichotomy.  People don't choose between working and investing.  Working or not working is an allocation of time.  Investing or consuming is an allocation of income.

[derspiess]

How do you live on an income tax refund? 

with the money he receives from his income tax refund, he uses it to buy food&pay his rent, instead of buying a new subwoofer or some new furniture.

Okay.  But is he concerned about the refund itself, or that his net tax liability would go up? 

I guess I never understood what was so magic about getting a tax refund when it had forced you to receive a smaller check throughout the previous year.

[MadImmortalMan]

Why shouldn't dividends and capital gains be taxed the same as any other income, especially if there is no corporate tax?

This is another example of using taxes to promote behavior. The thinking presumably is that incentivizing investment creates jobs by providing capital for growth. The more investment capital there is, the easier it is to get. The easier it is to get the lower the barriers are to growth and innovation. The lower the barriers, the more entrepreneurial enterprises will spring up blah blah blah.

I'm rather cold on the concept of using taxes as a behavior modifier, but there you go.

[Savonarola]

incentivizing

[Syt]

incentivizing

Your eyes are bleedified!

[grumbler]

When you translate this from GOPtard spin to American English, the word "revenue-neutral" means you have to exclude Medicare, Social Security, and military spending from the budget calculus.

You have no idea what you're talking about, do you?

You shouldn't reply to him.  It just encourages him.

When Neil is right, he is right.

[grumbler]

I didn't agree to that.

That's why the troll hasn't gotten hungry enough to find a new bridge to hide under somewhere else.

[Fate]

I didn't agree to that.

That's why the troll hasn't gotten hungry enough to find a new bridge to hide under somewhere else.

But you're still here. 

[Fate]

Faeelin, you're a stupid liberal. Intelligent conservative economists have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that as you decrease tax rates, you increase tax revenues. Indeed, as the limit of the tax rate function approaches zero, tax revenues approach infinity. Reaganomics 101 dude.

actually, it looks more like a bell curve than anything else.  As you increase it, the marginal gains are less.

You mean you could get a Republican like Hans to admit that there's a point at which they shouldn't argue for additional tax cuts? I'll believe it when I see it.

[alfred russel]

The Republican assault on the middle class continues. A family making $60k with 2 kids pays a lot less than 10% in taxes. But a high earner would win big under this plan.

[alfred russel]

Dividends should be taxed like all other income.  Dividends from foreing companies should be taxed higher. 

No, they should be taxed at the cap gains rate. Otherwise, why not just pay your "dividends" in the form of stock repurchases? In a textbook world, a stock repurchase benefits shareholders by the same amount as a dividend, only a stock repurchase is in the form of a cap gain.

[DGuller]

The Republican assault on the middle class continues. A family making $60k with 2 kids pays a lot less than 10% in taxes. But a high earner would win big under this plan.

To be devil's advocate, is that how it would work?  I think standard deduction was mentioned, so the 10% isn't really the 10%.

[viper37]

False dichotomy.  People don't choose between working and investing.  Working or not working is an allocation of time.  Investing or consuming is an allocation of income.

Up to some point.  If people are taxed more for work than for investments, they may choose to work less and invest more to supplement their revenues.

[viper37]

Okay.  But is he concerned about the refund itself, or that his net tax liability would go up? 

I guess I never understood what was so magic about getting a tax refund when it had forced you to receive a smaller check throughout the previous year.

I can't answer for his specifics, however the general idea of the tax refund (and I've had numerous debate with people, trying to convince them to pay less taxes during the year and instead invest the money), is that if you have that money in your pocket during the year, you will spend it on all kind of things.  More expensive clothes, a little bit more travels, a little bit more booze/cigarettes/drugs, while when you get a big lump sum a year later, you buy something big, or you use it for critical needs.

It's like forced saving without interests.  When banks don't pay us any interests, we're mad, but when we do it to ourselves, it's ok