Tax system fair?

awec

UCDVet wrote: »

I pay all of the taxes while getting none of the benefits. Sucks to be me

Well, you benefit from policing, infrastructure etc but you won't benefit as much as a low earner who may get state benefits or access to taxpayer funded schemes.

The people who pay more tax generally see less for it. They have less need of state money. People who pay less generally see more benefit. They have more need of state money.

Higher earners prop up the income of lower earners.

arctictree

Since this is a discussion about fairness, what about the special rate of USC of 10% that only applies to self employed people earning over 100k ?

ie high earners in banks, large companies, and public service don't have to pay it.

Apparantly the Govt decided that they could levy this on the self employed as they are the least vocal and cannot strike. Jobs economy my arse.

And BTW my annual salary is about 40k, self employed.

Chuck Stone

awec wrote: »

The people who pay more tax generally see less for it. They have less need of state money.

Have you completely failed to absorb the information Hooradiation has provided you with or are you so wedded to your dogma that you just ignored it?

If you have high earnings then you have a greater stake in the smooth running of the state/society so you should pay more - Adam Smith (The widely lauded Father of economics and Capitalism) explains below.

The expense of government to the individuals of a great nation is like the expense of management to the joint tenants of a great estate, who are all obliged to contribute in proportion to their respective interests in the estate.

Adam Smith

Also, the notion that high earners pay the most income tax is a horribly reductive. High earners pay a greater proportion of their taxes in income tax but focussing on income tax (and wages) alone is very convenient because it is a 'letter box view' of taxation. Creating this image of the burden of tax being on high earners in the mind of the public is a testament to right-wing propaganda.

The public are hit with all sorts of taxes and flat charges. Petrol, consumer goods, alcohol, tobacco, TV licence, fines etc are all levied at a flat rate. How much people pay in taxes should be calculated as the sum total percentage of their wage that gets taxed by income taxes and the cost of living.

Now if we're to consider wealth instead of income as a measure of how someone should contribute then the wealthier you are the less proportionately you pay. Property tax is an attempt to tax wealth rather than income - you can't hide property offshore or with 'creative' accounting.

lawhec

Working out a tax system for the running of governmental authority, departments, services, infrastructure and schemes to its best level for what it is supposed to do does not depend on an arbitrary idea of "fairness", rather it needs to be worked out based on achieving the best income they can get from it balanced against the economy that it levies taxes from. Income tax itself is only one part of the equation.

A proposal for a flat tax rate on income as opposed to a progressive rate needs to look at two main areas in particular and breakdowns of them - one being the effect such taxation can have on the economy at local, regional and national level, and the other being how the amount of raising of monies by authorities to help provide for its functions.

On the first, it would need to be worked out just how much (a) what the rate of a single tax level is and (b) what is the annual tax free allowance. In the case of (a), if you shift more of the tax burden more on to low paid workers from those in high brackets, you may cause economic imbalances if you do not study the potential effects very carefully which could cause certain sectors to collapse or reduce market competition. For example if you run a business where you are dependent on middle & low wage earners for your custom, if the burden of taxation on middle earners remains roughly the same but increases on low wage earners, those in the latter will have less opportunity to spend their money on your services. Businesses that focus their services on high wage earners may get an increase in custom, but it isn't certain, because general evidence over the last few decades has been that higher wage earners getting a lower tax burden tend to save the surplus they get rather than spend it. Instead, low wage earners are more likely to spend any surplus they get from an easing of the tax burden, stimulating economic demand. In certain economic times, encouraging people to save money from their income can be a good idea to stop an economy overheating and suddenly crash, but it generally isn't a wise policy if you are looking for demand to be stimulated to build an economy up from a crash. That leads to (b) and in the UK one of the main planks of the coalition governments implementations in Westminster has been to raise the allowance of earned income before it starts being taxed to a proposed level of £10k by 2015. In Sweden one of the planks of the centre-right coalition there has been to reduce the rate of the lowest level of income tax. In both cases nearly everybody benefits from low to middle and even a few high wage earners because they have a little bit more money to spend themselves and if managed correctly such a reduction can lead to an increase of overall government tax intake from a combination of levies on certain items purchased with this extra spending money through VAT, fuel duty etc. and also with a higher incentive for some people to take on lower paid work rather than remain on welfare or social security because greater incentives are there to take on such work, hence helping to reduce the welfare trap.

When the two are put together, an implementation of flat income taxation needs to deduce at what level this should be applied at and what other forms of taxation are affected to ensure a balance. If you follow the principle of the Laffer curve, you're looking to see how you can raise the most monies for governmental provisions while keeping the economy it is dependent on for raising them ticking over. The problem is that the point of best returns is never fixed, it is constantly moving. This applies not only to flat implementations of tax, but also progressive and regressive forms. In fixing a value of both a single level on income taxation along with the tax-free allowance level the problem is not setting the flat-tax level so high that earning above the threshold (whereby not earning above the threshold still gives you a living wage) discourages people taking on additional work in the same fashion that a few others on this thread have mentioned about suddenly getting into the higher tax bracket. To reduce this factor, you can lower the allowance that is tax free - but the risk in doing this is that it can start encouraging grey and black markets of cash-in-hand work that doesn't get calculated for income tax. That's why in most countries that have progressive tax systems there is first a tax-free allowance that you could at least exist on somewhat (albeit not terribly healthy or well) and that the first level of income tax starts at a fairly low level, usually below 20%. The Republic of Ireland in terms of its progressive income tax system is actually fairly close at present to a flat system compared to many others as the level from where you currently have a tax-free allowance to the highest level of taxation is not a terribly big leap.

Next to be looked at are countries which have implemented flat-rate income tax systems. Simply looking at percentages applied doesn't tell the whole story. In places where income tax is low but there is still notable governmental service provisions, such funding has to come from somewhere else. For example in New Hampshire in the USA, there is no state income tax but there are high property taxes to make up the short fall. In Estonia, it has a flat-tax rate on income tax in the low 20's but the costs of social insurance in the same earnings mean that the combined values together see most workers get the same deductions from their income as a percentage as workers in western countries. Monaco has no income tax but high social insurance levies. Hong Kong itself doesn't have a exact flat-rate income tax but its semi-progressive system is quite low - where the government there makes up in funds is though high land value taxes. Then the economies of countries with flat taxes aren't necessarily thriving places that are hugely desirable - I can't see many Irish men and women packing up going to live and work in Romania or Bulgaria any time soon for example. Where the benefits of flat income taxation tend to work best are in small countries or authority areas that have taxation powers. For example the Obwalden canton levies a 1.8% flat income tax alongside national and local taxes but has a population of less than 36,000 and has a very low unemployment rate. You then also have the likes of Jersey, Guernsey, Cayman Islands etc. which use low (often flat) income taxes, low taxes for businesses and very business friendly environments to attract overseas business to locate there. But there are some problems to these approaches. For example Jersey has about one-third of its population relying to some extent on social security which is becoming a major burden on the Bailiwick, but it cannot simply raise taxes to help offset this lest it may drive businesses away. In quite a few of the Carribean Islands that act as tax havens e.g. Bermuda, public sector jobs make up a large amount of work for the local population and hence is strongly tied into ensuring their tax haven status is strongly maintained. In the Swiss cantons like Obwalden mentioned above which are largely small, rural and Swiss-German speaking, they also have significant amounts of people employed in agriculture. Unlike most industries there, the Swiss federal government highly subsidises farming in the country. Remove the farming subsidies there and the cantons affected, most of whom only have an unemployment rate of 1-3%, and most farms would become uneconomic and unemployment would suddenly shoot up - it's no surprise that most of these cantons largely support the SVP which retains its support for farm subsidies despite being massively neo-liberal in all other areas of economics - it's a form of welfare distribution by other means.

Overall, I've been reading about how flat and progressive taxes be implemented around the world and if a flat rate income taxation was seen to be strongly favourable to nearly all forms of progressive taxation, I'd support it. But I currently see no strong evidence that it's so except where such a levy was a very low percentage as to have very little burden to most workers like the example of Obwalden above. One of the problems that I see in Ireland is that because it is so centralised a lot of what is subject to taxation seems to disappear into a black hole - in countries where regional and local authorities have tax raising powers, either through income or levies, there tends to be more transparency in seeing where your income that is taxed is spent on e.g. public parks, street cleaning, schools etc. Since rates were abolished for domestic properties in the late 70's, there's a dislocation in how taxation from people in places like Donegal, Wexford, Laois etc. gets sent to Dublin and then doled out again to county and urban councils without any effective local powers to raise them independently. As I see it, taxation is at its fairest when it is democratically decided on at different levels and that you can see how such taxes apply to public services in a reasonably efficient and honest manner. If you can't see it, then you can get the sense that you feel cheated.

SafeSurfer

Wompa1 wrote: »

Thus why IT Companies in Ireland struggle to find skilled workers in Ireland?

At one stage, I think it was 2007, there was 14,000+ vacant IT jobs in Ireland. Also ask Dan Rooney about the lure or lack there of, of the current Irish workforce.

Vacant IT jobs in Ireland during a global IT skills shortage shocker.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8c5c963c-a877-11e1-b8a9-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2BOBymoHt

usernamegoes

http://www.politics.ie/forum/economy/59715-economic-miracle-cure-case-negative-income-tax-ireland.html

The above is an interesting article on a negative income tax system which I think is a very interesting system. The flat rate version seems to me to be a good solution.

Ideally, I'd like to see a poll tax, but that will never happen here.

To me the purpose of a tax system is to raise funds for spending on state services that's it. It's not to encourage 'good behaviour', punish 'bad behaviour' or to redistribute wealth.

SafeSurfer

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Property tax is an attempt to tax wealth rather than income - you can't hide property offshore or with 'creative' accounting.

A very poor attempt. A millionaire with a mortgage free home will pay the same property tax as his neighbour with a 100% mortgage on his home. One has an asset, the other has a liability.

Who has the most wealth?

Chuck Stone

SafeSurfer wrote: »

A very poor attempt.

That's why I specifically used the word 'attempt'. At the moment it's a flat rate but you can be sure that it will be graduated in the future.

lawhec

usernamegoes wrote: »

http://www.politics.ie/forum/economy/59715-economic-miracle-cure-case-negative-income-tax-ireland.html

The above is an interesting article on a negative income tax system which I think is a very interesting system. The flat rate version seems to me to be a good solution.

It's not a bad article but it doesn't go over anything that hasn't been talked about before with regards to any form of NIT. The main problems are that the NIT is mostly theoretical - it hasn't really been implemented in any significant level anywhere. It also doesn't necessarily lead to reducing public administration work as explained with the WTC scheme in the UK, hence why there are moves to reduce its scale and increase the income tax threshold instead to reduce bureaucracy and allow more money to remain directly with low earners. Also because it hasn't really been tested in reality, there are no recordings in place to look at possible unintended consequences that all tax systems can succumb to. Just because a taxation plan looks simple doesn't necessarily mean it's effective. Indeed a flat-rate income tax compared a progressive one doesn't necessarily cut out loopholes (in any case with the use of computers, the talk of more man hours being required to calculate progressive taxation compared to a flat taxation is near redundant though not failsafe - computers can turn occasional errors into major f*ck ups!). To cut out the loopholes you have to close the loopholes themselves e.g. tax breaks, and some of these loopholes are not necessarily desirable to close.

usernamegoes wrote: »

To me the purpose of a tax system is to raise funds for spending on state services that's it. It's not to encourage 'good behaviour', punish 'bad behaviour' or to redistribute wealth.

That's a contradiction - it is in no government or authority's interest, even a laissez-faire one, for 'bad behaviour' to be increasingly encouraged or rewarded. Especially if such behaviour could contribute to undermining various areas such as positions of recognised authority (e.g. police forces, judicial system), economic activity (e.g. black markets, piracy, contract enforcement), individual and collective rights and freedoms, and even the security of the country.

Also the redistribution of wealth is not only about welfare and social security money payments, but also about the public ownership of goods, materials and services that everyone uses one way or another that are run by departments or agencies of governments. In this sense this brings things to people that even if they are well off might not be able to otherwise afford either for free at the point of use or at a subsidised rate. Roads, policing, schools, public health, military, public transport, fire brigades, environmental protection, public parks etc. are all things that at some point which under public ownership that someone will have used directly e.g. roads, with others indirectly e.g. military. But very often most of us don't stop to think exactly what it serves and how it impacts not only our own well being and others as well wherever we know them or not. A lot of us take public infrastructure for granted because we've grown up with it. This is wealth held that is deemed for the public good to allow more people to use than otherwise - wealth just isn't coins and notes in your hand or figures in your bank balance.

SafeSurfer

Chuck Stone wrote: »

That's why I specifically used the word 'attempt'. At the moment it's a flat rate but you can be sure that it will be graduated in the future.

You miss my point Chuck.

The household charge is a flat rate tax.

A graduated property tax is NOT a wealth tax.

Two identical houses will attract the same property tax under a value system regardless of the liabilities attached to the property.

So someone who owns their home outright, mortgage free will be taxed the same as someone who has just started paying off their mortgage and has, say 5% equity in their property.

The new property tax will NOT be a wealth tax.

Wealth = assets-liabilities.

Ray Palmer

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Have you completely failed to absorb the information Hooradiation has provided you with or are you so wedded to your dogma that you just ignored it?

I think you failed to understand how taxs are applied here.
1) higher earns pay a higher percentage of their earnings in tax.
2) everybody pays tax for goods and services they use. Petrol,road tax etc.
3) the country has to provide certain infrastructure to get tax returns. Everyone is charged for use

Chuck Stone wrote: »

How much people pay in taxes should be calculated as the sum total percentage of their wage that gets taxed by income taxes and the cost of living.

Why? That is a disincentive to work hard. It means if somebody works extra the pay more and get no benefit for working more. Why learn a new demanded skill?
Calling it right wing to think our current tax rates a bad idea misses something crucial. It isn't a graded tax system that is the problem it is the grading we have.

No problem paying more tax when I earn more than others. Paying a higher portion I have an issue with. The tax grading is a disincentive to entrepreneurs. Why would I risk money and time when money made will have 56% taken away?

hooradiation

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Void of logic with a thin veneer of reason.

Let's see you back that up, shall we?

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Taxes paid by users and businesses pay for most infrastructure. They also have to provide these either way. Use of taxes is not the same as consumption without return.

This, literally means nothing.
If you'd like to try again.....

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Very selective in how you put your argument together but not many would fall for such a silly view.

Don't conflate your mistake with a common view.

Ray Palmer

hooradiation wrote: »

Let's see you back that up, shall we?



This, literally means nothing.
If you'd like to try again.....




Don't conflate your mistake with a common view.

Obviously your retorts fully answer what I said well done

CruelCoin

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Why would I risk money and time when money made will have 56% taken away?

That is especially relevant when you consider that roughly 3/4 out of 5 start-ups fail in their first 2 years.

The risk to reward ratio for entrepreneurs is way out of kilter.

allibastor

CruelCoin wrote: »

That is especially relevant when you consider that roughly 3/4 out of 5 start-ups fail in their first 2 years.

The risk to reward ratio for entrepreneurs is way out of kilter.

the old adage of an entrpreneur still stands, its about living a few years of your life like most people wont, so you can live the rest of your life like most people cant.

if it was easy to get a company up and runnign we would have no one left to work in the business as it would be all small businesses around.

Ray Palmer

allibastor wrote: »

the old adage of an entrpreneur still stands, its about living a few years of your life like most people wont, so you can live the rest of your life like most people cant.

if it was easy to get a company up and runnign we would have no one left to work in the business as it would be all small businesses around.

So in your eyes only businesses that will make you massively rich should be even attempted?
The government should encourage native entrepreneurs and the more there are the better the odds of getting successful ones. Better than taking in foreign companies that relocate very easily. Or companies that take profits out of our economy

Zab

Ray Palmer wrote: »

He specifically said they get more for the taxes they pay. It simply isn't true or plausible

Yes, but he didn't mean directly from the government.

Ray Palmer wrote: »

No problem paying more tax when I earn more than others. Paying a higher portion I have an issue with. The tax grading is a disincentive to entrepreneurs.

You just said you weren't advocating a flat tax, though. Seems to be at odds with the above statement.

Fighting Irish

summerskin wrote: »

I'm in almost the exact same situation(been together 16 years though).

We're single when it suits the government, but a couple when it doesn't. Tax relief should be based on whether you live together, and also whether you have children or not. We're not married, so I don't get any tax relief for my children, but also can't get single parent tax relief as I'm "not single" even though my tax code says I am.

Backward country in so many ways and it drives me mad.

why not just say you're not a couple?

Zab

lawhec wrote: »

Working out a tax system for the running of governmental authority, departments, services, infrastructure and schemes to its best level for what it is supposed to do does not depend on an arbitrary idea of "fairness", rather it needs to be worked out based on achieving the best income they can get from it balanced against the economy that it levies taxes from. Income tax itself is only one part of the equation.

Great post, but I do think that "arbitrary" fairness does and has to come into the equation at multiple levels, and not only at the simple "tax as a % of earnings" concept put forward by most of this thread. Of course, ideally the fairness would be made as non-arbitrary as possible.

Ray Palmer

Zab wrote: »

Yes, but he didn't mean directly from the government.

We pay addition taxes on services and taxes used for a return is not the same as just spending the taxes.
Infrastructure charges like motor and bin taxes have us paying high tax and for services. Subsidising lower paid so they don't pay for use.
Indirect benefits for highly paid which the lower paid also use. So I reject that the higher paid benefit more from taxes. Proportionally they don't

Zab wrote: »

You just said you weren't advocating a flat tax, though. Seems to be at odds with the above statement.

It isn't. The rates are ever increasing at the moment. The rates and application is not good. I pay roughly 42% on my entire income in taxes and am entitled to nothing.
We are being pushed by two competing systems. Tax by use and high taxes. There is always some overlap but it is overboard here.

Yes I get the country is screwed and revenue has to be raised but tax benefits being cut has been short sighted. Tax relief on pensions being a prime example. No doubt I will be refused a state pension as it will be means tested when I retire.

Bare in mind after paying 30k in tax one year I was entitled to nothing the next year. I was apparently meant to save my earnings. 30k provides a mother of one with all her benefits

hooradiation

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Obviously your retorts fully answer what I said well done

I am fantastic, it is true.

Do feel free to aspire to my level at your earliest convenience, and we can pick up this up then.

Chuck Stone

SafeSurfer wrote: »

The household charge is a flat rate tax.

Presently.

So someone who owns their home outright, mortgage free will be taxed the same as someone who has just started paying off their mortgage and has, say 5% equity in their property.

You're not comparing like with like. If two people buy identical houses both will pay identical property tax rates. Whether they are paying a mortgage is largely circumstantial.

Wealth = assets-liabilities.

So a house isn't an asset?

Chuck Stone

Ray Palmer wrote: »

So I reject that the higher paid benefit more from taxes. Proportionally they don't

You rejection of reality doesn't amount to a hill of beans.

Try setting up a business or accumulating wealth in a country where the costs of graduates, infrastructure, policing, courts, healthcare etc are not socialised/risk spread and see how far you'd get without having a private militia to enforce your privilege.

The more you get from the system the greater stake you have in its smooth running, ergo, the more you are required to put back in.

Guess what nasty Marxist said this?

"The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion"

None other than the 'Capitalist' fan-boy's Messiah, Adam Smith.

Zab

Ray Palmer wrote: »

Infrastructure charges like motor and bin taxes have us paying high tax and for services. Subsidising lower paid so they don't pay for use.

We all pay motor and bin tax. They aren't generally considered progressive taxes, quite the opposite.

Indirect benefits for highly paid which the lower paid also use. So I reject that the higher paid benefit more from taxes. Proportionally they don't

The benefit is not directly from the taxes. You're seeing the taxes you're paying vs the "benefit" you're getting from the spending of those taxes. You're ignoring the fact that the entire system is what allowed you to earn money in the first place, and all of your earnings are coming as a benefit of the system (combined with other things, obviously, such as your work).

It isn't. The rates are ever increasing at the moment. The rates and application is not good.

I'll accept that you didn't intend to advocate a flat tax, but your words in the post I quoted definitely do advocate it.

Markcheese

Big Steve wrote: »

I think we need to develop something like the German tax system. I was looking at it the oother day. their high and low end percentages are similar to ours (U.S.C. excluded) but it seems to operate on a sliding scale.
25k at 22%
25k - 30k at 25%
30k - 35k at 30%

etc etc. I'm using those figures to illustrate my example I am not saying they are right but I do think it would be fairer. You pay more tax on a certain bracket of your pay and not get lumped into a higher bracket as soon as you exceed a certain limit by even the smallest amount.

Yeah , a friend was working in Germany, no tax bands each aditional euro is taxed at a slightly different rate, looks complicated but not difficult for a computer..
You can't tax the poor (except with vat) cos they haven't got it...
You can't tax the (really)rich cos they'll move their money
That leaves the middle who are already screwed and have mortgages and kids but because of that they can't leave...
That leaves pensioners ... The pension pot (or state) is in Ireland so can't take it overseas... Most haven't got big commitments so they won't starve, and well off pensioners tend to save not spend so their money doesn't do much... Yeah they'd be pissed but aren't we all ...

SafeSurfer

Chuck Stone wrote: »

Presently.



You're not comparing like with like. If two people buy identical houses both will pay identical property tax rates. Whether they are paying a mortgage is largely circumstantial.



So a house isn't an asset?

You really have no understanding of economics do you?

I think you are the only one claiming that the new property tax will be an attempt at introducing a wealth tax.

A house is an asset yes. But a mortgage is a liability.

Wealth is calculated by subtracting assets from liabilities.

If I got a loan from a bank tomorrow for 1 million euro does that mean I am a millionaire?

Of course not because I have a million quid but I owe the bank a million quid.

Do you not understand that?

Markcheese

To get back to thread title , is the tax system fair...a section of society will always find the tax system unfair, the state changes the system for it's benefit .. to encourage growth in a sector,bring in investment ect ..or just more revenue.
Problem is change the tax system and you change the group who suddenly have to deal with the change ... And in an era of increasing taxs most people are going to find them unfair.....

So when everyone tells you they're being unfairly taxed our broke government needs to tax everybody to just below breaking point ( the really rich and the young are mobile the rest of us ain't)...
Fairness just doesn't come into it....

Ray Palmer

Zab wrote: »

We all pay motor and bin tax. They aren't generally considered progressive taxes, quite the opposite.



The benefit is not directly from the taxes. You're seeing the taxes you're paying vs the "benefit" you're getting from the spending of those taxes. You're ignoring the fact that the entire system is what allowed you to earn money in the first place, and all of your earnings are coming as a benefit of the system (combined with other things, obviously, such as your work).

I'll accept that you didn't intend to advocate a flat tax, but your words in the post I quoted definitely do advocate it.

Have never said the system is a complete mess just it is not balanced correctly. The rates and application or the problem.
A cap on tax rate applied makes sense to me as it is punative at the moment. We lose revenue as people avoid hefty taxes by moving things off shore.
The suggestion that society can only be either stable or chaotic is simplistic. Taking it from a theory derived from a moralist does not make it so. Amazing a warlord system would make it hard to make money. so to suggest stopping this means I benefit from being taxed via a stable society is just overboard.
Not all taxes need to be progressive either. All for charging people for use of the roads as and when they used. It is possible but unlikely ever to happen.

Rates are not applied we'll and combined with direct taxation on other items is overly done.

Chuck Stone

SafeSurfer wrote: »

You really have no understanding of economics do you?

A have a little knowledge of it. I guess you're an expert wise one?

I think you are the only one claiming that the new property tax will be an attempt at introducing a wealth tax.

The thing about property is that it can't be hidden. I didn't say that a property tax is an efficient way of taxing wealth, hence why I said 'attempt'.

I'd imagine a fair tax on property would have an ability to pay clause. Someone could inherit a house but be on the dole and it would hardly be fair to expect him to pay.

Anyway, this is a digression from the central question of the thread.

emul8ter25

summerskin wrote: »

No, not penalise them, make them pay their way. Tax should be the same level for all wage earners. Why should I pay a higher percentage of my earnings than those people I employ? Why should employers be punished when they create jobs that then of course create more taxable incomes for the government?

Should be a flat 35% tax rate on all earnings by everyone. Why should people in better paid jobs be punished for furthering their careers while lower paid workers often get away scot-free?

You seem to forget things like the fact we live in a society that allows you to have that business and make a good living.

Do you receive deliveries to your business? You benefit from the infrastructure that allows that to happen.

Do your workers need to be educated? You benefited from that schools that made that happen.


The greed of the wealthy is fairly sickening.