I never disagreed with your numbers.

I never said the rich don't pay taxes, in fact, in Post #13 - I said they pay more types of taxes due to having more streams of income and more investments.

Nor have I been of the camp that the rich don't pay taxes, I simply believe they should pay more, in fact, I think the top 20% should pay more, which effectively means that I think my own taxes should be higher.

Your point would be valid if the rich earned a disporportionate lOWER share of the total income of US Citizens, but instead they earn a disporportionate GREATER share.

So no matter how you structure the tax laws (Within reason), the Rich pay a higher % of the total tax collected, pointing this out is BASIC MATH.

BUT, none of this speaks to the impact of taxes on a middle income person's standard of life.

People in the top 20% can afford to pay more taxes as the money comes out of discretionary funds or funds that are just saved, while tax cuts for the lower 80% mean more money for healthcare, food, education and potentially savings, since few Americans in the lower 80% have significant savings.

I'm sure the publications you mentioned have all pointed to the negative savings rate amongst Americans.

In fact, lowering taxes on the lower 80% of income earners, coupled with higher taxes on the affluent, could help strengthen the dollar which could conceivably make up for the loss of discretionary income amongst the higher earners.

It's obvious you're quite out of your depth here as you're completely missing the point.

SO let's make it simple - who is going to be hurt more:

A Family of 5 Living off of $45k/yr (AGI) who sees a $2k annual increase in taxes, or a Family of 5 living off of $150k/yr who sees $6k increase in taxes?

Who would benefit more from a reduction in taxes?

Seems to me that $200/month would serve that middle income family well and the higher income family could live without an additional $500/month without it severely impacting their finances.

That's the basic issue at hand here when talking about Tax Burden: what income group pays the highest % of the total tax collected is completely academic, as the real issue is how is your individual tax burden impacting your personal finances.

Not to mention the fact that a family earning $150k/yr (AGI) could probably afford to max out IRA & 401k accounts, while a family living off of $40k/yr can't. Which has even further implications with regards to wealth building, retirement, etc.


Peace,






M2