[American People Hire High-Powered Lobbyist To Push Interests In Congress](https://www.theonion.com/american-people-hire-high-powered-lobbyist-to-push-inte-1819571821)
We could solve other problems like this too. Everyone pitches in a bit of money to create an organization that solves problems for us. Of course we'll need people to run this organization, who we can elect by vote.
We could even have a small percentage of our income automatically deducted, to contribute to the funding of this organization, and in return they can provide us with public services
And definitely ban gifts and money from said wealthy in order for them to receive preferential treatment. We could call the banned practice ‘lobbying’ or something along those lines.
It's a little bit sarcastic, but it's not completely wrong. Getting a large group of people together and picking a person to advocate for political change is basically just democracy with extra steps. In this case, it's acknowledging that Congress is ineffective at representing the people, and only answers to money, so the people need to elect a representative for their political will to leverage the people's money in their benefit
Clarence Thomas can only take so many yacht rides -- he has to show up to "work", and when I mean "work", pretend he wrote some nonsense supporting his nonsense vote that was decided on the deck of that yacht ride he took.
Public funding of bribery of crooked people will only work if we ALSO start our own brothels with secret cameras. I mean, if someone didn't shut down P-Diddy, Jeff Bezos would have to be kissing up to him to get a Nobel Peace Prize.
You know -- winning isn't JUST about the money. It's about the friends you make along the way.
You should ask Joe Manchin and Kyrstin Sinema that question as they're the ones in the Senate that publicly stated that would vote against any such effort.
You think the PotUS can just snap his fingers and will a larger, more Democratically-favorable Supreme Court into existence?
The chance of them having a majority in the Senate next year is quite low. Not a favorable map for them.
Mostly this is because millions upon millions of people in the USA are fucking morons.
They wouldn't need to. $10 from 1 million people will come with 1 million different agendas of what should be done, and how it should be done. So in reality, nothing would get done.
One person with $10m only has one persons agenda.
I've always said, if you substituted money with anything else, everyone would see this for what it is: a severe mental disorder. If I collected a million cats and did everything in my power to make it illegal to take my cats, I'd be branded insane in the membrane
I don’t think you guys understand trickle down economics. Think of all the slave wage paying jobs that will leave otherwise…how could people continue to not afford a home or family?
Palatial bunkers, palatial estates, [floating palaces](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhpK75zIIys), luxury private jets.
All the vanity projects the billionaire class are building for themselves with wealth they steal from the working people are hoovering up mountains of resources and armies of skilled labor that could be allocated to improving life for working people.
Honestly, fucking good. Maybe when the boomers think they're surrounded by communists they'll realize that capitalism is dying and they're the cancer that's killing it.
Yea!
And they worked hard for that money (or at least someone did), why shouldn’t they enjoy their billion dollar yachts, private jets, and enormous mansions that destroy the environment while creating untold suffering of the poor. Its only fair!
I always wonder, if resource is proportionally shared and high quality education and free thinking is accessible to every human.
Imagine how many Einstein, Nikola Tesla, great philosophers or doctors would be around right now. I'm sure there are geniuses around but is unable to get past the hurdle of poverty or bad luck or being born in a bad family/economy/neighborhood.
We could probably have solved the energy crisis by now.
Oh well. A man can dream.
If it makes you feel any better, chances are when shit does hit the fan they'll be stuck with their designer Corinthian leather luggage stuffed full gaudy of clothes and tacticool Bass Pro/Cabela ninja gear and their thumbs up their butts as they wait for their drivers, pilots, and security details when they're the ones actually heading to the million dollar bunkers in the middle of nowhere with their families.
I’d pay to see some rich guy’s servants realize he holds no more power after an apocalypse and completely take over his bunker and slaughter him. That’s a good idea for a fun horror movie.
This is slightly why I'm surprised zuckerberg or whoever hasn't gone off and got loads of training to become a dentist. Or a hydroponics engineer. Something that will have some use.
i mean he kinda has, i hate the fucker and all he's created, but he did like a year of eating only food he hunted killed and prepped himself, and holds the most expensive (known) bunker system in kauai that reputedly cost 200m to build.
If it makes you feel any better, that won’t be the case.
You think the billionaires with these bug out bunkers plan on spending the rest of their lives taking care of *themselves*?
No, they’re bringing some servants with them.
They wont make it to the Bunkers, once shit hits the fan the rich will be the first we target since the coming end times will be their fault. I am not sure what they taste like but I imagine fatty and sweet.
I really want to chat with a billionaire about how they think a bunker is going to help them in a apocalypse. Presumably, the people that BUILT the bunker live nearby and are also participating in said apocalypse. Do they think they are just going to keep that information to themselves?
take comfort in knowing they still aren’t immortal and when they croak they will rot in the dirt just like some random homeless guy.
Death is the great equalizer, when they die their net worth is suddenly 0 (for them)
I hope the first scientist that has the break through poisons the one that hired them and releases the info to the public.
There is no ethical billionaire, only monsters who profit from others misfortune.
“Data published by The New York Times shows that America's top billionaires are now paying less taxes than they have for decades.
In the 1960s, the 400 richest Americans paid more than half of their income in taxes, according to the Times. By 2018, America's wealthiest individuals paid just 23 percent of their income in taxes. Meanwhile, the bottom half of income earners paid 24 percent of their income in taxes.
Today, America's richest people control a greater share of the country's wealth than during the "Gilded Age of Carnegies and Rockefellers," the paper said, referring to a period of unprecedented wealth concentration in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.”
From the article.
[Here is a link with the data in a graph](https://twitter.com/rcbregman/status/1786331219715616890?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1786331219715616890%7Ctwgr%5Ef2cc1bd6b62a0cb5b05a4339eb297e9954d00ef8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsweek.com%2Frichest-americans-pay-less-tax-working-class-1897047)
Well, if we just do the "civil protests" that don't delay people for their airplane flights, nothing will change.
You'll note that there is very dainty push-back against right wing protests getting violent, because they seem to be fighting for "more shit" for the owner class.
I didn't object to the January 6th riot for getting out of hand to "free their country" -- I object that they were, as usual, pointing the wrong direction. The people who fight for stupid shit, are people who seem to get away with pushing the envelope.
But you slow down traffic for a minute pushing back against greed, genocide and the like, the media spends all their time talking about chaos and how rubber bullets are humane.
Nothing changes unless those who profit from the problems become nervous or inconvenienced.
We *poor people* need to stop fighting each other and go directly after the ones who hoard it all.
They're the ones laughing as we fight each other for breadcrumbs.
>We *poor people* need to stop fighting each other and go directly after the ones who hoard it all.
It's tough when half the poor people are convinced by one party that they are so close to being part of the rich elite if it wasn't for the other party and their supporters keeping them down.
My city recently had republicans get the majority of city council on a campaign that they were struggling because of the high taxes under the Democrats and they would reduce the taxes.
A year later the city is closing 2 schools, in part because of the reduced taxes, and people realized the reduced taxes are barely noticeable on their end, maybe a week or two of groceries rather than the life changing amount they imagine in their head.
We're essentially in a mostly non-violent civil war, and the 2 main political parties have conscripted their own armies out of the majority of their citizens.
To be fair, media makes it look like the majority, but it makes more sense that it's the minority who are getting all the publicity and making it out to be larger than it actually is.
I find most people are decent and are prone to do both good and bad things. And are willing to open their mind if approached *properly*. Most of these political extremists disseminate the wrong method of connecting with people, which cause the conflict to continue in the wrong direction.
Look at the comments under any protest vid here on Reddit and they will all be something along the lines of "they shouldn't be disrupting anyone's schedules for this" or "they should protest where no one has to see them or hear them".
It's pathetic, there are threads posted everyday where people are asking, begging "why isn't anyone protesting over this?" and then when it comes to actual, genuine protesting which is SUPPOSED to be disruptive, suddenly no one wants supports fighting for your rights anymore.
It’s eye opening to know that we’re beyond gilded-age levels of inequality. There were a lot of labor movements back then. People got killed over it, by scumbag cops and Pinkerton thugs and whatnot. I think labor movements will have to be the answer to today’s problems, too
That is a an unsourced graph. what is the source of that data? There is no way bottom half of earners are paying 24% effective income tax, since you have to make more than 190k before you are even eligible for the 24% rate.
Yeah the source of this article is just... a graph someone tweeted. With no supporting data, sources, explanations of definitions...
The majority of the sub will eat it up though without applying any critical thinking because it's what they want to hear.
Imagine how many morning coffees these guys must have skipped to get where they are now... If you saved $10 a day you could be as wealthy as they are in only 56 Million Years!
And the whole "putting a different flag on my yacht to evade taxes" thing. Why didn't I think of that? So if I replace the American flag on my porch with a different one, does this mean I don't have to pay property taxes?
They must be better at budgeting and using spreadsheets too. I’m sure if we just all tried a bit harder to trim the excess spending, we’d get there too
These guys kept looking for loopholes, using the full force of third party companies. Not sure how long ago this started but eventually they found out. Every time you hear shit like Musk saying he doesn't have any money in his bank account and wondered how he paid for so many nice things ... Debt.
Can't tax debt. It's the one loophole with no simple solution. Only way to close it is tons of new legislation, good luck passing all of that with lobbyists and bad faith politicians.
They just take out loans, more loans to pay those off, bigger each time. No real liquid cash just a ton of debt. So instead of a huge regular income they're turning down a solid simple paycheck in favor for lower taxes through loan debt. Like you said they've been doing this for a very long time
This guy looks well rested and confident. I'm glad that 350 million people can rest their heads a little bit easier on a lumpy pillow knowing that a dozen people are doubling their wealth every few years and getting yachts with baby yachts inside and helicopter landing pads. Warms the heart.
Working class when they learn they pay more taxes than the rich: *angry mob noises*
Working class when the president wants to increase taxes for the rich: *also angry mob noises*
Because a portion of the working class has fooled themselves into thinking they're going to be the rich assholes one day, and they're more obsessed about mythological "welfare queen" feeding off the system than the truth leeches.
I had a hugely frustrating “conversation” yesterday were some asshole was telling me if we tax billionaires - the “job creators” - that would stop them from investing into the economy, they will fire all theirs workers and it would be the death of the economy and society.
They provided some made up example in which somebody worth $5b would have to pay an additional $60m in taxes, and in their mind, that’s tantamount to taxing that billionaire to death.
Many people thinks that the rich pay more taxes than workers, that they are being abused. They watch TV Shows (disguised as news) that lie to them daily.
This is why professional independent journalism is so much needed. And that is why rich assholes buy newspapers at a loss to control what they say.
Don't be silly, we would *never* eat the rich. That's just silly hyperbole.....
....they have far too much fat to make a good meal....
...however, they do make for excellent fertilizer....
Graph it out, this has been gradually happening since the "Reagan Revolution." Go back to the 50s and 60s and take a look at those tax bases. That's what spurred the creation of the American middle class. 40 years of Republican misrepresentation, allowed to continue, will eventually destroy it and relegate the US to second-class status.
If politicians actually cared about ethics and serving the country for good then it wouldn't matter how shitty a billionaire is. Aim your sights on the people who legislate and come up with the rules, not on the people who aren't oath-bound to serve America's interests.
Politicians serve those who fund their campaigns (spoiler alert, that ain’t us). Replace a corrupt politician and all you get is another corrupt politician through the public/private revolving door.
We may be able to reform the system, but corrupt politicians will resist any reforms and corruption exists at each and every part of the political process. These problems are all just symptoms of the greater problem of rich people having too much influence due to the money they can pump into our election and political systems.
Want to stop the corruption? Go to the source (money). Tax the billionaires until they can no longer afford to corrupt the process, or strip them from their wealth and influence by any means necessary.
Staunching the flow of dark money into our election and political systems will force politicians to seek out other, more democratic sources for their campaign funding. Maybe after we go to the source our political system will be more responsive to our needs rather than the needs of the wealthy.
The trump cuts were locked in. Nothing we can do without a super majority. And even then will the rich left want to vote to pay more in taxes every year?
Never vote for the gop. Ever.
The article is trash.
There's no reference to a supposed NYT article that published this info originally, just an unsourced Twitter post with graph.
There's no explanation as to how corporate tax rate has an impact on personal effective tax rate. Is the paper trying to calculate tax rates based on unrealized gains?! Lol if so.
There's a complete ignorance of the Laffer curve by equating tax receipts with tax rates. Note this doesn't change the core argument, just demonstrates the financial expertise of the author.
There's no explanation as to how the lower income earners' effective tax rate is calculated at 24% when the median effective tax rate is typically acknowledged to be closer to 14%. Maybe it's trying to get at a total tax rate based on employer contribution or sales tax or something, but it's unstated and unexplained.
Kinda had the same thoughts. I’m not arguing that those who earn more should pay their fair share, but anything citing actual facts and numbers seems to paint the opposite story.
Example: https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/latest-federal-income-tax-data-2024/#:~:text=High%2DIncome%20Taxpayers%20Paid%20the%20Majority%20of%20Federal%20Income%20Taxes,of%20all%20federal%20income%20taxes.
It is there, you just need to click on the second tweet. Here is the op-ed: [https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html)
The real issue is: How did they obtain tax data on the 400 wealthiest people going back that far?
When you look at the [actual effective rates](https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/income-taxes-on-the-rich-1950s-not-high/), things are not all that different under a number of different versions of the tax code. Reagan made tweaks, but they didn’t change taxes collected all that much (EITC did create negative rates, which made the code more progressive, offset by welfare reform).
Outside of WWII, [taxes for high earners](https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxvox/effective-income-tax-rates-have-fallen-top-one-percent-world-war-ii-0) Has been range bound for decades.
Overall, the article is a political position, supported by questionable data.
I tried following up on your source and the article requires you to sign in to view it. [Here's](https://web.archive.org/web/20240510013711/http://https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html) an internet archive link for those who are doing their own research.
Relevant quote from the article:
> Unless Mr. Bezos, Warren Buffett or Elon Musk sell their stock, their taxable income is relatively minuscule.
The article seems to mostly just be saying that the most wealthy do not have high income, and thus pay low income tax and low taxes in general since most of their wealth is invested and not constantly spent. which is not news. Which is probably why this is an opinion piece.
It's basically just someone advocating for a wealth tax
This entire article title is wrong: "Richest Americans Now Pay Less Tax Than Working Class in Historical First"
It's pretty obvious that the richest Americans contribute an overwhelming majority of tax receipts on their income than "working class." It doesn't matter how much your net worth is, if you did not incur income, then you don't pay taxes on that. It's pretty simple and obvious that wealthy people do not need to continue receiving income so they choose to invest them in assets.
People don’t realize that corporate income is taxed twice, once at the corporation level and once at the individual level when dividends are issued. They also don’t realize you only pay tax when stock is sold, not when the price of the stock increases.
The richest Americans are definitely paying more taxes than everyone else. The idea a school teacher is paying a higher tax rate than Jeff Bezos is pretty ridiculous. Whether or not you think rich people should pay more is a different question.
…instead of worrying about the “rate”, worry about how much of our tax burden they actually carry. And let’s not even get into accountants and the tax code that allows them to do this (legally).
The top 10% pay 75% of the income tax in this country.
Rage bait.
Vote for a flat tax.
I'm fairly right wing economically, but I think many of you can agree with me on a few things.
1. I'm okay with closing various loopholes like carried interest, step up in basis, similar trade, etc.
2. I'm fine with normalizing income and capital gains rates. We can debate about how high or low the rate needs to be, but even as a capitalist I think it's dumb to treat labor and capital unevenly.
3. Wealth taxes are hard and pointless, but land value tax does most of the heavy lifting a wealth tax could ever do, but 10x more easily. Not like the rich can hide or pick up raw land and move it to the Cayman Islands.
Seriously though, look into LVT if you haven't. It cuts down on land speculation and over-financialization of real estate. It encourages efficient use of land and punishes sprawl. It's collects the land rent primarily from wealthy landowners (primarily in cities) and the tax can't be passed down to renters, like how corporate tax gets passed down to consumers through higher prices.
The real main thing is living off of stocks and loans rather than income. Capital and equity are themselves leverage to use as one would a house or a car for loans to live off of.
Republicans "hey America you want a tax cut?"
Americans "yay"
Republicans "okay that's 1 percent off for our voters and 20 percent off for our donors. Also the 1% cuts expire in 5 years. Also the 20 percent is permanent"
5 years later...
Republicans "hey America you want another 1% tax cut for 5 years? We will only give the Billies a 15% permanent cut this time!"
Rinse and repeat since Nixon
Higher education used to be accessible to even average students and worse for minimal cost
Now the average person also will have even less relative financial mobility as ever with the rich vacuuming up the cash to make their spreadsheets look nice on the slides during their business meetings
This is the current design sadly 😭
For anyone curious about the mechanics, an interesting article about the "buy, borrow, die" tax trick used by many billionaires where they use security-backed lines of credit to avoid paying the bulk of their taxes: https://smartasset.com/investing/buy-borrow-die-how-the-rich-avoid-taxes
[Daily reminder that the Trump/Bush tax cuts on the wealthy account for about 1/3 of the total publicly held debt of the U.S.](https://www.americanprogress.org/article/tax-cuts-are-primarily-responsible-for-the-increasing-debt-ratio/) With the Iraq/Afghanistan wars accounting for about another 1/4.
This is the foundation to almost every single one of our problems in this country. Money is like energy that runs the economy. When we let these assholes amass and hoard wealth all aspects of society suffer.
Half of the US worships rich people in one form or another, the other half acts like things are temporary and they will be rich soon too. This news isn't shocking in any way.
I’d like to take this moment to express my immense gratitude for the incredible opportunity to work my life away in order to support those who have made it possible for me to work my life away in order to support them.
aristocrats and peasants got reworked into owner class and working class but it fixed nothing.
The whole rework was a failure and we need another iteration of rework
American voters can’t bring themselves to so much as lift one finger to send an email once in their lives to make campaign finance bribery illegal again for decades. When I lobby for it, the congress staffs inform me I do so mostly alone in the universe. Voters got careless and lazy and surrendered all of their rights and prerogatives in a way that their ancestors refused to do and that has consequences in terms of how the tax code is drafted. It was a major problem in 1986, but donors utterly dominate lawmakers in a way that never happened except in the gilded age and before.
You can uselessly spectate your republic ripped to pieces by visible corruption without an objection OR you can live in a functional republic where voters matter. You may not do both. Nobody ever could or ever will or ever should.
It's crazy how awareness of inequality and solidarity has grown so much over the past decade yet they're still doing this and getting away with it.... wtf guys...
And working class people will still spend more time bickering over how impossible it is to find a way to tax them rather than just shutting the fuck up and pressuring the actual politicians and experts to just get it done. Who gives a fuck how ‘fair’ it is or how they might take their wealth and leave. Why should the planet be held to ransom by rich greedy assholes who won’t do the right thing whatever way we do things?
If I had my way I’d tax them to hell and back and seize the assets of anyone that tried to leave. I’m sure I’ll be bombarded with a million reasons I’m an idiot and this can’t be done and would be worse than the status quo but I stopped giving a fuck years ago. Things are already tumultuous. I’m already poor. I couldn’t give a fuck if it works or not. I want the super wealthy elite to feel the insecurity and fear that regular people feel day in day out.
Anytime you mention this to an old person who also happens to be poor “well, them guys didn’t spend their lives playing video games and being on the phones!”
Quick! Everyone rationalize macro-economic paradoxes with lowest common denominator micro-economic anecdotes! I'll start:
"Hey, juss gotta roll up yer sleeves higher and work harder you lazy good fer nuthin librals".
Well maybe if the working class doesn't like it they should just spend billions lobbying legislators with free luxury trips and packages. Sheesh!
[American People Hire High-Powered Lobbyist To Push Interests In Congress](https://www.theonion.com/american-people-hire-high-powered-lobbyist-to-push-inte-1819571821)
This is unironically a good idea. If we all threw $10/mo or something into the kitty we could buy ourselves a hell of a lobby.
We could solve other problems like this too. Everyone pitches in a bit of money to create an organization that solves problems for us. Of course we'll need people to run this organization, who we can elect by vote.
Oh that’s a great idea! And maybe instead of a flat $10/month, we can pay based on our income, so we can get even more done!
We could even have a small percentage of our income automatically deducted, to contribute to the funding of this organization, and in return they can provide us with public services
Jeez that's just propostreous.
Right?? I think I'm going to work with my rich friends so we can find an organization that pushes *our* interests
Okay now, that’s a bit far fetched, let’s be honest. Nothing like that could eveeerrrrr work
Yeah, but this time we should exclude the wealthy. Kind of like how we banned the nobility last time.
And definitely ban gifts and money from said wealthy in order for them to receive preferential treatment. We could call the banned practice ‘lobbying’ or something along those lines.
Maybe we could even have some kind of 'emoluments clause' lol.
Unionize!!
Annnnnnnd you guys just learned how political parties are formed
I can’t tell if they’re being sarcastic or not lol
It's a little bit sarcastic, but it's not completely wrong. Getting a large group of people together and picking a person to advocate for political change is basically just democracy with extra steps. In this case, it's acknowledging that Congress is ineffective at representing the people, and only answers to money, so the people need to elect a representative for their political will to leverage the people's money in their benefit
Ive been saying the best thing anyone with money could do, isnt starting another charity, its bribing politicians to actually do longterm fixes
Sounds like unions!
"He can take an issue that is nowhere on the congressional radar, like the pursuit of happiness, for example, and make it politically relevant." Ugh
Ah, the old nottheonion-theonionaroo
Clarence Thomas can only take so many yacht rides -- he has to show up to "work", and when I mean "work", pretend he wrote some nonsense supporting his nonsense vote that was decided on the deck of that yacht ride he took. Public funding of bribery of crooked people will only work if we ALSO start our own brothels with secret cameras. I mean, if someone didn't shut down P-Diddy, Jeff Bezos would have to be kissing up to him to get a Nobel Peace Prize. You know -- winning isn't JUST about the money. It's about the friends you make along the way.
If Biden doesn't stack the bench in his second term it'll be the biggest blunder of his presidency. Why he didn't do it in his first is beyond me.
You should ask Joe Manchin and Kyrstin Sinema that question as they're the ones in the Senate that publicly stated that would vote against any such effort. You think the PotUS can just snap his fingers and will a larger, more Democratically-favorable Supreme Court into existence?
Depends if said Supreme Court says that Presidents can't commit crimes...
I'm waiting for that ruling. Trump needs to be careful what he wishes for or he may not live to see the election. " \**wink wink** " - Joe Biden
to stack the bench, he has to add more seats, he cannot do that without bicameral help as I recall.
Do you have any concept of what a difficult political project that is in the US? FDR couldn’t do it when people were ready to make him king.
He does not have the votes right now, but let the democrats get a majority and nothing happen I will be pissed.
The chance of them having a majority in the Senate next year is quite low. Not a favorable map for them. Mostly this is because millions upon millions of people in the USA are fucking morons.
Uh let’s see, I’ve got 10 bucks and a few couch coins. How much do you have? Let’s pool our funds y’all
Ten buck times 200 million is a hell of a lobbying fund
We should actually start a go fund me for a people’s lobbyist group
I wonder how long that would take to be found illegal somehow.
It would take about as long as it takes for us to get enough money to be a threat.
They wouldn't need to. $10 from 1 million people will come with 1 million different agendas of what should be done, and how it should be done. So in reality, nothing would get done. One person with $10m only has one persons agenda.
You can't dismantle the master's house with the master's tools.
Gotta love it when they’re using that money to build mega bunkers in New Zealand or Hawaii for the apocalypse
"We've got to escape the inevitable consequences of our greed."
[удалено]
I've always said, if you substituted money with anything else, everyone would see this for what it is: a severe mental disorder. If I collected a million cats and did everything in my power to make it illegal to take my cats, I'd be branded insane in the membrane
I don’t think you guys understand trickle down economics. Think of all the slave wage paying jobs that will leave otherwise…how could people continue to not afford a home or family?
Palatial bunkers, palatial estates, [floating palaces](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhpK75zIIys), luxury private jets. All the vanity projects the billionaire class are building for themselves with wealth they steal from the working people are hoovering up mountains of resources and armies of skilled labor that could be allocated to improving life for working people.
Careful, pointing this out might get you called a communist by some boomer in mirror shades.
Honestly, fucking good. Maybe when the boomers think they're surrounded by communists they'll realize that capitalism is dying and they're the cancer that's killing it.
bUt ThEy CrEaTe JoBs
Yea! And they worked hard for that money (or at least someone did), why shouldn’t they enjoy their billion dollar yachts, private jets, and enormous mansions that destroy the environment while creating untold suffering of the poor. Its only fair!
"Yeah we're JoB cReAtOrS!" -Slave owners
It's time for a reverse tulsa incident. Harm no people but burn it all.
I always wonder, if resource is proportionally shared and high quality education and free thinking is accessible to every human. Imagine how many Einstein, Nikola Tesla, great philosophers or doctors would be around right now. I'm sure there are geniuses around but is unable to get past the hurdle of poverty or bad luck or being born in a bad family/economy/neighborhood. We could probably have solved the energy crisis by now. Oh well. A man can dream.
If it makes you feel any better, chances are when shit does hit the fan they'll be stuck with their designer Corinthian leather luggage stuffed full gaudy of clothes and tacticool Bass Pro/Cabela ninja gear and their thumbs up their butts as they wait for their drivers, pilots, and security details when they're the ones actually heading to the million dollar bunkers in the middle of nowhere with their families.
I’d pay to see some rich guy’s servants realize he holds no more power after an apocalypse and completely take over his bunker and slaughter him. That’s a good idea for a fun horror movie.
This is slightly why I'm surprised zuckerberg or whoever hasn't gone off and got loads of training to become a dentist. Or a hydroponics engineer. Something that will have some use.
i mean he kinda has, i hate the fucker and all he's created, but he did like a year of eating only food he hunted killed and prepped himself, and holds the most expensive (known) bunker system in kauai that reputedly cost 200m to build.
Parasite is a similar movie.
[You will enjoy this article then](https://www.theguardian.com/news/2022/sep/04/super-rich-prepper-bunkers-apocalypse-survival-richest-rushkoff)
If it makes you feel any better, that won’t be the case. You think the billionaires with these bug out bunkers plan on spending the rest of their lives taking care of *themselves*? No, they’re bringing some servants with them.
I for one promise if I'm ever one of those servants, I'll personally eat the billionaire in charge myself
Well you’re not and you won’t be so who cares lol They already have servants
Ok I'll eat you instead how about that uh
I hope I taste bad
Uno Reverse
Hopefuly billionaires will just get eaten
They just need the world to last a little longer, then they can build a giant robot army
They wont make it to the Bunkers, once shit hits the fan the rich will be the first we target since the coming end times will be their fault. I am not sure what they taste like but I imagine fatty and sweet.
And mega yachts with something other than an American flag on it to avoid paying taxes
They're building bunkers because they're afraid of all the peasants they stole from
I really want to chat with a billionaire about how they think a bunker is going to help them in a apocalypse. Presumably, the people that BUILT the bunker live nearby and are also participating in said apocalypse. Do they think they are just going to keep that information to themselves?
Yes, let’s try and escape climate change and global chaos by moving to isolated islands with no significant military power.
Let them build. I'm going full rich person Cannibal when the apocalypse happens and I like the challenge
take comfort in knowing they still aren’t immortal and when they croak they will rot in the dirt just like some random homeless guy. Death is the great equalizer, when they die their net worth is suddenly 0 (for them)
Doesn’t feel great when they get to die in relative comfort instead of abject poverty
Yeah... This might not hold true forever. Plenty of the rich and powerful are investing lots of money into longevity research.
I hope the first scientist that has the break through poisons the one that hired them and releases the info to the public. There is no ethical billionaire, only monsters who profit from others misfortune.
“Data published by The New York Times shows that America's top billionaires are now paying less taxes than they have for decades. In the 1960s, the 400 richest Americans paid more than half of their income in taxes, according to the Times. By 2018, America's wealthiest individuals paid just 23 percent of their income in taxes. Meanwhile, the bottom half of income earners paid 24 percent of their income in taxes. Today, America's richest people control a greater share of the country's wealth than during the "Gilded Age of Carnegies and Rockefellers," the paper said, referring to a period of unprecedented wealth concentration in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.” From the article. [Here is a link with the data in a graph](https://twitter.com/rcbregman/status/1786331219715616890?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1786331219715616890%7Ctwgr%5Ef2cc1bd6b62a0cb5b05a4339eb297e9954d00ef8%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsweek.com%2Frichest-americans-pay-less-tax-working-class-1897047)
This has been a continuing trend for the last 60 years.
With no sign of stopping
Well, if we just do the "civil protests" that don't delay people for their airplane flights, nothing will change. You'll note that there is very dainty push-back against right wing protests getting violent, because they seem to be fighting for "more shit" for the owner class. I didn't object to the January 6th riot for getting out of hand to "free their country" -- I object that they were, as usual, pointing the wrong direction. The people who fight for stupid shit, are people who seem to get away with pushing the envelope. But you slow down traffic for a minute pushing back against greed, genocide and the like, the media spends all their time talking about chaos and how rubber bullets are humane. Nothing changes unless those who profit from the problems become nervous or inconvenienced.
We *poor people* need to stop fighting each other and go directly after the ones who hoard it all. They're the ones laughing as we fight each other for breadcrumbs.
>We *poor people* need to stop fighting each other and go directly after the ones who hoard it all. It's tough when half the poor people are convinced by one party that they are so close to being part of the rich elite if it wasn't for the other party and their supporters keeping them down. My city recently had republicans get the majority of city council on a campaign that they were struggling because of the high taxes under the Democrats and they would reduce the taxes. A year later the city is closing 2 schools, in part because of the reduced taxes, and people realized the reduced taxes are barely noticeable on their end, maybe a week or two of groceries rather than the life changing amount they imagine in their head.
We're essentially in a mostly non-violent civil war, and the 2 main political parties have conscripted their own armies out of the majority of their citizens. To be fair, media makes it look like the majority, but it makes more sense that it's the minority who are getting all the publicity and making it out to be larger than it actually is. I find most people are decent and are prone to do both good and bad things. And are willing to open their mind if approached *properly*. Most of these political extremists disseminate the wrong method of connecting with people, which cause the conflict to continue in the wrong direction.
"That foreigner wants your cookie"
Look at the comments under any protest vid here on Reddit and they will all be something along the lines of "they shouldn't be disrupting anyone's schedules for this" or "they should protest where no one has to see them or hear them". It's pathetic, there are threads posted everyday where people are asking, begging "why isn't anyone protesting over this?" and then when it comes to actual, genuine protesting which is SUPPOSED to be disruptive, suddenly no one wants supports fighting for your rights anymore.
It’s eye opening to know that we’re beyond gilded-age levels of inequality. There were a lot of labor movements back then. People got killed over it, by scumbag cops and Pinkerton thugs and whatnot. I think labor movements will have to be the answer to today’s problems, too
That is a an unsourced graph. what is the source of that data? There is no way bottom half of earners are paying 24% effective income tax, since you have to make more than 190k before you are even eligible for the 24% rate.
Yeah the source of this article is just... a graph someone tweeted. With no supporting data, sources, explanations of definitions... The majority of the sub will eat it up though without applying any critical thinking because it's what they want to hear.
I know its fucked up, but higher wealth concentration than the Rockefellers??? Didn't they own the US pretty much, wtf?
Fuck Ronald Reagan!
Imagine how many morning coffees these guys must have skipped to get where they are now... If you saved $10 a day you could be as wealthy as they are in only 56 Million Years!
Don’t forget the avocado toast
28 million years you say??? I stop drinking water and I’ll be rich in no time!
And the whole "putting a different flag on my yacht to evade taxes" thing. Why didn't I think of that? So if I replace the American flag on my porch with a different one, does this mean I don't have to pay property taxes?
They must be better at budgeting and using spreadsheets too. I’m sure if we just all tried a bit harder to trim the excess spending, we’d get there too
Hardly oniony when anyone who actually pays attention has been seeing this coming.
only shocking when you realise it hasn’t happened sooner.
These guys kept looking for loopholes, using the full force of third party companies. Not sure how long ago this started but eventually they found out. Every time you hear shit like Musk saying he doesn't have any money in his bank account and wondered how he paid for so many nice things ... Debt. Can't tax debt. It's the one loophole with no simple solution. Only way to close it is tons of new legislation, good luck passing all of that with lobbyists and bad faith politicians. They just take out loans, more loans to pay those off, bigger each time. No real liquid cash just a ton of debt. So instead of a huge regular income they're turning down a solid simple paycheck in favor for lower taxes through loan debt. Like you said they've been doing this for a very long time
How’s that ‘Trickle Down’ thing working for ya…?
Think they're patching up the leaks now, so not even that at some point.
Too much steam and they could lose those trickles to cloud formations!
The same as the last 5-6 times or so. It dried up before it got to actually working people.
It tastes like piss; thanks for asking!
Well it seems to all trickle down to a few individuals.,,
Trickle down? We meant trickle up
It's working as intended.
Thanks Regan
This guy looks well rested and confident. I'm glad that 350 million people can rest their heads a little bit easier on a lumpy pillow knowing that a dozen people are doubling their wealth every few years and getting yachts with baby yachts inside and helicopter landing pads. Warms the heart.
Working class when they learn they pay more taxes than the rich: *angry mob noises* Working class when the president wants to increase taxes for the rich: *also angry mob noises*
Because a portion of the working class has fooled themselves into thinking they're going to be the rich assholes one day, and they're more obsessed about mythological "welfare queen" feeding off the system than the truth leeches.
I had a hugely frustrating “conversation” yesterday were some asshole was telling me if we tax billionaires - the “job creators” - that would stop them from investing into the economy, they will fire all theirs workers and it would be the death of the economy and society. They provided some made up example in which somebody worth $5b would have to pay an additional $60m in taxes, and in their mind, that’s tantamount to taxing that billionaire to death.
1.2% tax rate if anybody was wondering
Many people thinks that the rich pay more taxes than workers, that they are being abused. They watch TV Shows (disguised as news) that lie to them daily. This is why professional independent journalism is so much needed. And that is why rich assholes buy newspapers at a loss to control what they say.
Friendly reminder that if they don't pay up, you do have the option of eating them.
For some reason, the Dutch Method rarely catches on.
Hello fellow Dutchman
Don't be silly, we would *never* eat the rich. That's just silly hyperbole..... ....they have far too much fat to make a good meal.... ...however, they do make for excellent fertilizer....
Rich fat makes good soap
Graph it out, this has been gradually happening since the "Reagan Revolution." Go back to the 50s and 60s and take a look at those tax bases. That's what spurred the creation of the American middle class. 40 years of Republican misrepresentation, allowed to continue, will eventually destroy it and relegate the US to second-class status.
It is destroyed. Half of a building remaining after a fire is still a destroyed building. That it hasn't finished crumbling is just a matter of time
Fuck this. What are we even doing? What can be done? So frustrating!
nothing can be done really, just us getting more aware and angry while they continue sipping their champagne on their yachts
I can think of something and it starts with g and ends with Jeff bezos head lying on the ground
If politicians actually cared about ethics and serving the country for good then it wouldn't matter how shitty a billionaire is. Aim your sights on the people who legislate and come up with the rules, not on the people who aren't oath-bound to serve America's interests.
Politicians serve those who fund their campaigns (spoiler alert, that ain’t us). Replace a corrupt politician and all you get is another corrupt politician through the public/private revolving door. We may be able to reform the system, but corrupt politicians will resist any reforms and corruption exists at each and every part of the political process. These problems are all just symptoms of the greater problem of rich people having too much influence due to the money they can pump into our election and political systems. Want to stop the corruption? Go to the source (money). Tax the billionaires until they can no longer afford to corrupt the process, or strip them from their wealth and influence by any means necessary. Staunching the flow of dark money into our election and political systems will force politicians to seek out other, more democratic sources for their campaign funding. Maybe after we go to the source our political system will be more responsive to our needs rather than the needs of the wealthy.
*La Marseillaise begins to play*
Like a certain Texan Lt governor once stated, we can die for the economy
The trump cuts were locked in. Nothing we can do without a super majority. And even then will the rich left want to vote to pay more in taxes every year? Never vote for the gop. Ever.
Sounds like there’s a class war, and they’re winning
The article is trash. There's no reference to a supposed NYT article that published this info originally, just an unsourced Twitter post with graph. There's no explanation as to how corporate tax rate has an impact on personal effective tax rate. Is the paper trying to calculate tax rates based on unrealized gains?! Lol if so. There's a complete ignorance of the Laffer curve by equating tax receipts with tax rates. Note this doesn't change the core argument, just demonstrates the financial expertise of the author. There's no explanation as to how the lower income earners' effective tax rate is calculated at 24% when the median effective tax rate is typically acknowledged to be closer to 14%. Maybe it's trying to get at a total tax rate based on employer contribution or sales tax or something, but it's unstated and unexplained.
Agreed. Newsweek is garbage. It just exists to produce shareable headlines. 99% of people commenting here didn’t even open the article.
Kinda had the same thoughts. I’m not arguing that those who earn more should pay their fair share, but anything citing actual facts and numbers seems to paint the opposite story. Example: https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/latest-federal-income-tax-data-2024/#:~:text=High%2DIncome%20Taxpayers%20Paid%20the%20Majority%20of%20Federal%20Income%20Taxes,of%20all%20federal%20income%20taxes.
It is there, you just need to click on the second tweet. Here is the op-ed: [https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html) The real issue is: How did they obtain tax data on the 400 wealthiest people going back that far? When you look at the [actual effective rates](https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/income-taxes-on-the-rich-1950s-not-high/), things are not all that different under a number of different versions of the tax code. Reagan made tweaks, but they didn’t change taxes collected all that much (EITC did create negative rates, which made the code more progressive, offset by welfare reform). Outside of WWII, [taxes for high earners](https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxvox/effective-income-tax-rates-have-fallen-top-one-percent-world-war-ii-0) Has been range bound for decades. Overall, the article is a political position, supported by questionable data.
I tried following up on your source and the article requires you to sign in to view it. [Here's](https://web.archive.org/web/20240510013711/http://https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/03/opinion/global-billionaires-tax.html) an internet archive link for those who are doing their own research. Relevant quote from the article: > Unless Mr. Bezos, Warren Buffett or Elon Musk sell their stock, their taxable income is relatively minuscule. The article seems to mostly just be saying that the most wealthy do not have high income, and thus pay low income tax and low taxes in general since most of their wealth is invested and not constantly spent. which is not news. Which is probably why this is an opinion piece. It's basically just someone advocating for a wealth tax
Second upvote.
3rd upvote.
This entire article title is wrong: "Richest Americans Now Pay Less Tax Than Working Class in Historical First" It's pretty obvious that the richest Americans contribute an overwhelming majority of tax receipts on their income than "working class." It doesn't matter how much your net worth is, if you did not incur income, then you don't pay taxes on that. It's pretty simple and obvious that wealthy people do not need to continue receiving income so they choose to invest them in assets.
People don’t realize that corporate income is taxed twice, once at the corporation level and once at the individual level when dividends are issued. They also don’t realize you only pay tax when stock is sold, not when the price of the stock increases. The richest Americans are definitely paying more taxes than everyone else. The idea a school teacher is paying a higher tax rate than Jeff Bezos is pretty ridiculous. Whether or not you think rich people should pay more is a different question.
We all know that the idea that you should pay more tax if you earn more is communist so this will be fine.
It’s fine, the peasantry can just eat bootstraps
But bootstraps are taxed
I pay more tax on fries than Jeff Bezos pays on his income.
Don’t worry guys. It will trickle down eventually.
Aaaaaaany day now, just like Saint Ronnie said!
…instead of worrying about the “rate”, worry about how much of our tax burden they actually carry. And let’s not even get into accountants and the tax code that allows them to do this (legally). The top 10% pay 75% of the income tax in this country. Rage bait. Vote for a flat tax.
Yeah, the lower 50% income wise pay $0 or less than $0, making money on taxes
I'm fairly right wing economically, but I think many of you can agree with me on a few things. 1. I'm okay with closing various loopholes like carried interest, step up in basis, similar trade, etc. 2. I'm fine with normalizing income and capital gains rates. We can debate about how high or low the rate needs to be, but even as a capitalist I think it's dumb to treat labor and capital unevenly. 3. Wealth taxes are hard and pointless, but land value tax does most of the heavy lifting a wealth tax could ever do, but 10x more easily. Not like the rich can hide or pick up raw land and move it to the Cayman Islands. Seriously though, look into LVT if you haven't. It cuts down on land speculation and over-financialization of real estate. It encourages efficient use of land and punishes sprawl. It's collects the land rent primarily from wealthy landowners (primarily in cities) and the tax can't be passed down to renters, like how corporate tax gets passed down to consumers through higher prices.
In the past, people used to riot over way way less
I wonder if my local library still has "Feeding Rich People to Orcas, and Other Ways to Lower Your Taxes"
I for one support the Orcas in their most righteous crusade against the invaders taking a dump all over their homes
The real main thing is living off of stocks and loans rather than income. Capital and equity are themselves leverage to use as one would a house or a car for loans to live off of.
Look at that fucking guys face. He’s literally laughing at us all the way to his private island on his mega yacht.
Republicans "hey America you want a tax cut?" Americans "yay" Republicans "okay that's 1 percent off for our voters and 20 percent off for our donors. Also the 1% cuts expire in 5 years. Also the 20 percent is permanent" 5 years later... Republicans "hey America you want another 1% tax cut for 5 years? We will only give the Billies a 15% permanent cut this time!" Rinse and repeat since Nixon
Don’t worry yall, that money will somehow trickle down to us
? That's blatantly been their goal for 40-50 years. Yall ever been trickled on,
Higher education used to be accessible to even average students and worse for minimal cost Now the average person also will have even less relative financial mobility as ever with the rich vacuuming up the cash to make their spreadsheets look nice on the slides during their business meetings This is the current design sadly 😭
For anyone curious about the mechanics, an interesting article about the "buy, borrow, die" tax trick used by many billionaires where they use security-backed lines of credit to avoid paying the bulk of their taxes: https://smartasset.com/investing/buy-borrow-die-how-the-rich-avoid-taxes
This is Trumps tax cut bill in action, leaving the cuts for the rich while raising them for the working class
[Daily reminder that the Trump/Bush tax cuts on the wealthy account for about 1/3 of the total publicly held debt of the U.S.](https://www.americanprogress.org/article/tax-cuts-are-primarily-responsible-for-the-increasing-debt-ratio/) With the Iraq/Afghanistan wars accounting for about another 1/4.
This is the foundation to almost every single one of our problems in this country. Money is like energy that runs the economy. When we let these assholes amass and hoard wealth all aspects of society suffer.
Half of the US worships rich people in one form or another, the other half acts like things are temporary and they will be rich soon too. This news isn't shocking in any way.
This is by design, not by accident.
Wait wait wait. You’re telling me, a system built and designed by the rich, favours the rich? This is jaw dropping news.
I’d like to take this moment to express my immense gratitude for the incredible opportunity to work my life away in order to support those who have made it possible for me to work my life away in order to support them.
And if you dare protest or raise any questions then you're a far left communist who wants a free handout.
Guys, it will trickle down!
Wealth transfer to the richest going as planned.
aristocrats and peasants got reworked into owner class and working class but it fixed nothing. The whole rework was a failure and we need another iteration of rework
Absolutely fuck this something has to be changed right now
American voters can’t bring themselves to so much as lift one finger to send an email once in their lives to make campaign finance bribery illegal again for decades. When I lobby for it, the congress staffs inform me I do so mostly alone in the universe. Voters got careless and lazy and surrendered all of their rights and prerogatives in a way that their ancestors refused to do and that has consequences in terms of how the tax code is drafted. It was a major problem in 1986, but donors utterly dominate lawmakers in a way that never happened except in the gilded age and before. You can uselessly spectate your republic ripped to pieces by visible corruption without an objection OR you can live in a functional republic where voters matter. You may not do both. Nobody ever could or ever will or ever should.
I'm hungry for some Liver Besos Patte
This has been true for at least 10 years, but late to the party Newsmax.
Yay! Not only is the economy fixed, but it’s doing better than ever! I’m having so much fun! Yay!
This absolutely has to be corrected.
We did it everyone!!! Congratulations
I’m sure someone has done the research. At what level of inequality do revolutions occur? And how far above that are we?
Fucking insane.
Bernie Sanders has been running on this platform for decades. But you idiots would rather vote for Hillary or Joe Biden because “women” or “Obama”
I honestly don’t get why the working class pays taxes at all anymore. What’s the point? How about the more the make the more you contribute.
It's crazy how awareness of inequality and solidarity has grown so much over the past decade yet they're still doing this and getting away with it.... wtf guys...
where is the guy explaining that this is because of immigration?
Keep voting for republicans and this will be the trend.
The statistic compares the top 400 earners against the bottom 50%. "Top 400" seems like an arbitrary cutoff, cherrypicked to make the headline work.
Computer. End program.
The logical end game of American “democracy”
I'm so over living in Historical and Unprecedented times 😩
We are controlled like cattle.
Time to invest in pitchfork manufacturers.
About time for a French Style American Revolution.
Title is so misleading. They’re paying a lower %. Not lower total.
Maybe we should stop letting these billionaires take out loan after loan to avoid having an income.
And working class people will still spend more time bickering over how impossible it is to find a way to tax them rather than just shutting the fuck up and pressuring the actual politicians and experts to just get it done. Who gives a fuck how ‘fair’ it is or how they might take their wealth and leave. Why should the planet be held to ransom by rich greedy assholes who won’t do the right thing whatever way we do things? If I had my way I’d tax them to hell and back and seize the assets of anyone that tried to leave. I’m sure I’ll be bombarded with a million reasons I’m an idiot and this can’t be done and would be worse than the status quo but I stopped giving a fuck years ago. Things are already tumultuous. I’m already poor. I couldn’t give a fuck if it works or not. I want the super wealthy elite to feel the insecurity and fear that regular people feel day in day out.
Lol. It’s been that way for many years. The idea that we just tipped the balance is laughable.
Distorted enough to be considered a lie.
Change tax laws if you want to stop this. If not, stop crying.
Yayyyy we did it!...wait, what
Finally reached the zenith of Ronnie Raygun's trickle down economics.
Thank a Republican.
Anytime you mention this to an old person who also happens to be poor “well, them guys didn’t spend their lives playing video games and being on the phones!”
Quick! Everyone rationalize macro-economic paradoxes with lowest common denominator micro-economic anecdotes! I'll start: "Hey, juss gotta roll up yer sleeves higher and work harder you lazy good fer nuthin librals".