Sunday, February 27, 2011
Bill Gates Fighting Microsoft, Ballmer, Allen And Other Billionaires On Tax
Microsoft maven Bill Gates, along with dad Bill Sr., think that Washington State’s wealthiest should be taxed to help foot the state’s education and health-care costs.
Other billionaires don’t agree. In fact, they are giving money to fight it.
Forbes - Christy Walton
Forbes 400: September 2010
The widow of John Walton inherited her wealth after the former Green Beret and Vietnam war medic died in an airplane accident near his home in Wyoming 2005. She got an extra bump in her fortune because of her late husband's early investment in First Solar; shares up more than 400% since 2006 initial public offering. But bulk still comes from her shares in Wal-Mart, the retailer founded by her father-in-law Sam Walton and his brother James in 1962. Today Wal-Mart has sales of $405 billion, and employs more than 2.0 million people. The philanthropist supports museums, education and organic gardening.
The Richest People in America - You Know, The Ones Who Pay 16% Income Tax
Here they are. The Top 400 earners in the US are known to pay around 16% of their income in taxes while the rest of us pay somewhere between 22% and 35%.
Oh plus we have to pay for healthcare and daycare, & college education (Those are paid for within the taxes of SOCIALIST countries like France, Germany, etc.
U.S. now has 403 billionaires with a collective net worth of $1.3 trillion. Here is a list of the country's 25 to
Who amongst these billionaires is thwarting balanced budgets by fighting corporate tax reform?
The 400 Individual Income Tax Returns
Wouldn't you like to know who these people are and what causes they are funding around the US.
Average tax rate of the top 400 is 16.6% — the lowest since the IRS began tracking the 400 in 1992
Yes that's right. The Top 400 earners in the US pay an average of 16.6% income tax. What do you pay?
Top 400 Taxpayers
By Barry Ritholtz - April 15th, 2010, 9:15AM
The IRS puts out an interesting tax document each year, looking at the returns of the nation’s 400 highest income tax paying people. The most recent year of complete data is 2007, when 143 million individuals filed tax returns.
Some of the data is quite astonishing:
• The top 400 U.S. individual taxpayers got 1.59% of the nation’s household income in 2007 — 3X the p% they got in the 1990s.
• The top 400 paid 2.05% of all individual income taxes in 2007.
• Only 220 of the top 400 were in the top marginal tax bracket.
• Average tax rate of the 400 = 16.6% — the lowest since the IRS began tracking the 400 in 1992.
• Minimum annual income to make the top 400 = $138.8 million.
• Top 400 reported $137.9 billion in income; they paid $22.9 billion in federal income taxes.
• 81.3% of income was from capital gains, dividends or interest. Salaries and wages? Just 6.5%.
• The top 400 list changes from year to year: 1992-2007, it contained 3,472 different taxpayers (out of a maximum 6400).
Washington DCs dirty little secret - stealth spending escapes public scrutiny
Another form of PORK? Or i this the other White Meat?
Battleground 2012: Taxpayers vs. Tax-Eaters
Robert Goulder | Feb. 3, 2011 02:45 PM EST
Everybody knows what a taxpayer is. We are the millions of people who pick up the tab for America's public spending. You, me, basically everyone you meet is a taxpayer. But what is a "tax-eater"? What do they look like? Where do they come from? And what should you do if you live next door to one?
The term can be traced back to British farmer and radical journalist William Cobbett (1763-1835) who railed against burdensome taxation in pre-Victorian England. Specifically, a tax-eater refers to any person or entity on the receiving end of public spending. If the chosen verbiage seems pejorative, that's exactly what Cobbett intended. His central belief was that tax-eaters are a drain on society and their numbers should be reduced to the greatest extent possible. In short, tax-eaters were freeloaders who unfairly rode on backs of others (i.e., taxpayers).
Fast forward to modern times. Cobbett's colorful language strikes a chord with today's Tea Party movement, which displays a marked intolerance for tax-eaters. This is what drives the conservative desire for smaller government. Should the number of tax-eaters in a given society grow too large in proportion to the number of taxpayers, your culture will inevitably descend into socialist hell.
TX Taxes Amazon and They Are Pissed!
Really? Is paying your fair share of taxes really worth leaving an entire State? Amazon will have to let go all the people employed there.
Amazon is amassing incredible profits and wealth and is partly to blame for Borders is out of business.
Perhaps TX should forbid Amazon from doing business in TX and allow a new small player to fill the space
Amazon to Texas: Adios
David Brunori | Feb. 15, 2011 06:43 AM EST
Amazon the internet behemoth is mad as a hornet at Texas. In fact, the company is so mad it closing its distribution center in Dallas. The company informed its employees that it is leaving because Texas is not treating them so nice. You see, Texas has billed Amazon $269 million for sales taxes the company never collected on sales in the state. Amazon says it has no physical presence in the state and thus is under no obligation to play tax collector. In fact, Amazon is so irate it is closing its nonexistent physical presence in Dallas to show Texas that it will not be pushed around.
Moreover, Amazon said it was “previously planning to build additional facilities and expand in Texas bringing in more than 1,000 new jobs and tens of millions of investment dollars to the state… We regret the need to reverse course.” Basically, the company is saying "we were going to do more in Texas -- although we really are not there but we changed our mind. I say: good for Texas.
Budget Deficit Silver Bullet: Close Tax Loopholes for MegaCorporations
David Cay Johnston and Chris L Hayes have just discussed what could possibly a silver bullet for fixing the US budget deficit and what Arianna Huffington calls the Assault on America's Middle.
Do you make less than $10M a year? If so, read this article and write to your congressman to fix the corporate tax problems that are destroying our middle class and small business AND causing a budget deficit!!
Can you imagine that the largest 1900 corporations get local tax subsidies at the expense of firefighters, police, and education?
Read on (or listen)!!!
The Breakdown: Why Aren't Corporations Paying Their Taxes?
February 25, 2011
While pressure mounts for both sides of the aisle to pursue more fiscally responsible budget plans in Washington and around the country, many are rightly wondering why generating more revenue from uncollected corporate taxes isn't on the agenda. There's even a citizens’ movement called US Uncut afoot to hold corporations accountable for their tax evasion. On this week's episode of The Breakdown, DC editor Chris Hayes talks with Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist David Cay Johnston about the manifold maneuvers corporations carry out in order to avoid paying their share of contributions to civil society.
tax.com: Obama Calls for Revenue-Neutral Corporate Tax Reform
Corporate Tax Reform
Obama cautioned that the corporate tax rate was damaging the country's ability to compete globally.
"Over the years, a parade of lobbyists has rigged the tax code to benefit particular companies and industries," Obama said. "Those with accountants or lawyers to work the system can end up paying no taxes at all. But all the rest are hit with one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. It makes no sense, and it has to change."
tax.com: House GOP 2011 CR Includes $603M in Cuts to IRS
The GOPs solution to a deficit problem is cutting the budget of the IRS, reducing their ability to collect taxes. At the same time the effective corporate tax rate for the top 1900 companies dropped to 1.9%.
Essentially getting started as an entrepreneur is tough but once you make it to the top, you dont have to pay taxes fpr the system that allowed you to get there in the first place
tax.com: Tax Rates for Top 400 Earners Fall as Income Soars, IRS Data
The report shows that the number of the top 400 who paid an effective tax rate of 0 percent to 10 percent declined slightly, to 25 in 2007 from 31 in 2006. In 1992 only 6 of the top 400 paid an effective income tax rate of less than 10 percent.
Another 127 paid 10 percent to 15 percent in 2007, up from 113 in 2006.
Only 33 of the top 400 paid an effective tax rate of 30 percent to 35 percent, which is the maximum federal tax rate.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
‘Big Oil’ lobby certain oil cos will cut jobs before accepting lower profits
Here it goes. A President finally has the balls to propose cuts to oil subsidies and big oil threatens the loss of jobs - rather than diversifying their portfolios to include more clean energy
Oil billionaires Koch Have No Values Beyond Money
So it appears that the Koch billionaires are not like their right wing buddy Rupert Murdoch. They will support anyone so long as the objective is to make them richer, whereas murdoch is hellbent on pursuing a conservative social agenda as well as making billions
Murdoch and Koch Make Billions Causing Friction
Right wing billionaires ungrateful for what they seek to increase their fortunes by stripping Americans of collective bargaining rights and extracting subsidies from US Govt
Union Hater Rush Limbaugh Member of a Union? | Gather
Limbaugh says union workers "bottom-feeding freeloaders." He's a member of AFTRA, an AFL-CIO union http://bit.ly/fajilK v @absolutspacegrl