I have been reading some political and economic stuff this weekend and wanted to share this link with you from Forbes Magazine.
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2009/1005/taxes-financial-aid-college-roughing-up-middle-class.html
This stuff makes me mad.
Keep living free in Him yall.
Wheeler
Great thoughts here, Wheeler. I appreciate that your passion is invested in these types of issues, as they effect people a lot.
ReplyDeleteA couple of questions from this that arose when I read it:
* What can we do to change this (we being the government, as they are the ones implementing these plans) within the context of the graduated tax system?
Obviously, the Obama administration is taking steps in this arena, whether those results are enriching the economy or, as this article says, is making it easier to play games with these "perverse incentives".
*How do we fix it so that the lower- and middle-class workers have the opportunity to afford college, families, saving money, homes, ect. by working effectively without collapsing the tax system so that the highest classes are able to avoid paying a proportionate amount of tax on their income? It seems like a very precarious see-saw here. I don't think I would ever purposely not work in order to gain benefits, but that's just my perspective...I guess that's the issue in question.
*Wheels, what do you think of Obama getting the Nobel Peace prize: many say premature?
Within the current 'progressive' tax system is how I will address this, even though the tax system itself is a huge part of the problem. People should not be taxed on earning money, they shuold be taxed on spending it. Thus the fair tax system (http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_main). But for sake of argument I will write of things I have read that could help this problem within the current 'bad' system.
ReplyDeleteTaxes should be lower. The whole reason the people in the article canot afford college is because by the time the are taxed so much money out of their pay checks, they cannot afford secondary education. The 'progressiveness' of the system is circular logic. earning 110K puts you in a high bracket and exepmts from most tuition assistance programs. then they take a larger chunk because you are in the high bracket. suddenly you need the assistance that you dont qualify for. Punishment for doing well. You work hard to throw your money into a pool to help others, but are not qualified for the help yourself. The problem is deep rooted. Governmetn get bigger and bigger and the general idea is that for the US to solve a particular problem we need the government to intervene, when its the governments intervention that causes the shortfall in the first place. Example 2. The housing crisis.
How will the government get revenues? First, the government gets plenty of revenue, the government (all of us) needs to spend less and become smaller. Second, I read a statistic that the low taxes under the bush administration brought in more revenues than the clinton tax setup. Reason: although the brackets were smaller in percentage, businesses and individuals were economically more properous without taxes hnidering them. More money made equals more money paid. http://74.125.47.132/search?q=cache:http://www.heritage.org/research/taxes/bg2001.cfm
"incentives" are rebates. when you buy a stereo and get that 50$ rebate thing. the $50 was already yours. its a marketing trick.
And I think you would definetly consider not working. If you had to work 40 hours a week for a net gain of 10k in a year, A better investment of your time might be with your family.
Obama getting a peace prize....
http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-BarackObama/idUKTRE5983AM20091009
My thoughts? Norwegian Socialist Academics tend to act like socialist academics. They appreciate theory, not action. I think they have made fools out of themselves and have lost a lot of respect.
ps. he just spent the last few months touring europe and apologizing for his country. That is what they would like to hear. In their eyes, it warrants a peace prize. Misery loves company.
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