"None of you have ever taken an economics class to understand how this really works!"

So...we know that Median household income is at an all-time high.

Is there someone who thinks that it would have been higher had the rich been taxed more?

Here's what you can't argue. The rich are funding this country. The top 1% picked up the bill for more than 40% of federal income taxes. So, even if you're not making more at work, someone in the >= top 1% is paying your fair share of the taxes.

"Says the guy who isn't concerned about inequality"

Not at all.

Rich people bitching about richer people is the epitome of rich people problems.

"The rich are funding this country. Liar"

If there is a lie, it's coming from the IRS. And the IRS data shows that the top 1% cover 37% of the total federal income tax burden. The top 5% cover 58%. The top 50% cover 97% of all federal income taxes.

Oh, and they pay a higher average rate as well...if you're up for that discussion.

"Yeah! One arbitrary metric is at an unspecified point that looks good for my argument!"

Is there a metric out there that you think paints a better picture?

"How about the fact that the promised outcome of every round of tax cuts never materialized?"

Promised outcome?

You don't think JFK's (he was dead before it passed) tax cut was effective? What about TRA 86?

Maybe you weren't aware, but both the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts resulted in revenues in excess of what they were prior to the cut.

This is actually a very weak article. I think it's intended to appeal to those who think economics is an emotional response. A few significant inaccuracies.

"What you say is true; but you have to re-read what you seem to have missed when your teacher talked about MARGINAL TAX RATES. This is how rich people escape taxation and let all the poor people pick up the tab. Best,"

Fantastic, let's talk about marginal vs. effective tax rates.

"But, as we said, the top 1% on average pays a higher effective federal tax rate than middle-income earners. According to an analysis by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, the top 1% " those making over $783,300 ($2.4 million on average) " will pay about an average federal tax rate of 30.2% in 2019. That's a higher rate than any other income category below it.

But those in the middle 20% of earners " with an expanded cash income of $50,001 to $87,300 " will pay an average federal tax rate of 12.4%, according to the Tax Policy Center analysis. That's less than half the effective tax rate paid by the top 1%."

"You should be using metrics that were claimed to be the targets of these policies."

I would assert that median household income captures that, especially if you take the unemployment rate into consideration. And prior to COVID, it was very low at a time when income was very high. So I'm not sure how you can say it's not working. I think to do that you would have to compare it to some other alternative, even if it was done through statistical modeling. But I don't think you would come up with a situation where higher tax rates led to more jobs or higher income.

It could...I just don't think it would.

#34

You're talking marginal tax rates. Again, that's cool bro, but it's the effective rate that matters. And in the 1950s, the top 1% only paid an effective rate of 16.9%, even though the top marginal tax rate was 92%.

"In fact, taxpayers whose incomes are in the bottom 90 percent of all incomes pay, on average, more in payroll taxes than in income taxes."

Yup.

And they receive commensurate or greater benefits in return for those tax payments.

But again, those are a different category of taxes. When people say death and taxes are a constant, they're wrong. There are lots of ways to get out of paying federal income tax. I don't know of any income earner who has been able to avoid income taxes.

"Middle Class now holds less wealth than the top 1%."

In 1975, median US household income was ~$47K (2014$). In 2019, it was $58,365 (2014$). So than median household income went up by around 25%.

If my household is getting richer, do I really have a basis for complaint that someone else is getting richer as well, even if they're getting richer at a higher marginal rate?

#41

I think you will always have a basis for complaint. I don't know that your sense of entitlement has any bounds.

That's OK. You can still wash my car for me.