Quote:
Originally Posted by gimpy117
when the top tax rate was....drumroll.....93%
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Do have even the slightest clue how the tax code works (and did work)?
Tax brackets tax all
adjusted income above a certain value. So you have a 95% top marginal rate on, whatever, income over 1M$. That means that the last dollar before 1M$ is taxed at the next lower rate, and so on.
In addition, when the tax brackets were higher, the loopholes were vastly greater. There were also like 25 tax brackets. All you need do is look at US tax revenues as a % of GDP. It varies in a range of high teens to ~20% of GDP. The top marginal rate apparently had nothing to do with total revenues. In point of fact, the "rich" pay a higher % of taxes actually collected than ever.
So Ryan's talk about limiting spending to 20% of GDP is entirely reasonable. History shows that this is in fact slightly above total federal revenues. Adjusting tax rates should certainly be on the table. Alternately, scrapping the current tax code which is built to intentionally be complicated. It is full of pay offs as "incentives." Just set a flat tax designed to put 20% of GDP into the coffers.
Medicare and SS need to be cut.
I could promise top give you, gimpy, $100,000 in a week if you give me $10,000 today. Would you jump for joy? Why, when I don't have 100 grand to give you? So 1 week from now, I'd become
persona non grata at subsim, and you get nothing—in fact you are out 10 grand. What if Neal convinces me that SS is so cool that maybe I could give you
something, and I could stay around... so I offer you $50,000 for your 10 grand, instead. Do you take it, or whine that I owed you more, and get nothing?
That's where we are as a country. The entitlements are ridiculous promises that cannot be kept. If the country goes the way of Greece/Spain/Portugal, the people counting on SS/MC will be SOL. Ditto if we go the way of Argentina (hyper-inflation). Bottom line is that someone has to get off their ass and propose budgets that actually deal with the problems. That means reducing spending.
So far we have Ryan's plan. That's it. The administration and the Dems have as the plan to spend 1.2 trillion per year more than we have, then crow that it's 100 billion less than it could've been. That's it, that's their plan.
Look at the current dems. They owned both houses, and neglected to do their job last year and make a budget. THAT is why there could be a "shut down." Had they done their job last year when they controlled the entire government, no impasse now. Instead, they are bent about cuts that are chump change compared to their own vast overspending. If they can't pass 60 B$ in cuts, how can they address ~1.5 trillion in needed cuts (not over 10 years, but THIS year)? They can't because they have no desire to cut spending. Not now, not ever.