The Briefing Room
General Category => Politics/Government => Topic started by: mystery-ak on April 10, 2019, 05:23:59 pm
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Warren releases tax returns showing million-dollar income, moments after pitching wealth tax
By Paul Steinhauser | Fox News
Presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren released her 2018 tax returns on Wednesday, showing she and her husband earned nearly $1 million last year.
The Democrat from Massachusetts used the release to once again highlight a bill she’s pushing that would mandate that the Internal Revenue Service publicly release the tax returns of the president, vice president, presidential candidates and federal officeholders.
“I’ve put out eleven years of my tax returns because no one should ever have to guess who their elected officials are working for. Doing this should be law,†Warren said in a statement, in a likely jab at President Trump and possibly rival Bernie Sanders.
But the details of her high income also come as the candidate doubles down on calls to tax the rich. Warren’s campaign released the candidate’s returns minutes after the senator concluded a speech to a union crowd in the nation’s capital where she once again pushed for her proposal to tax ultra-wealthy Americans based on their assets.
“I’m in this fight for a wealth tax. A two percent tax on the 75 biggest fortunes in the country. Two percent. That’s all we’re asking,†the populist senator with a history of taking on Wall Street and big businesses highlighted as she addressed a gathering of the North America's Building Trades Unions.
“We could provide universal childcare for every working parent in America. Universal pre-K…. for every child and still have $2 trillion left over,†she explained.
The senator released her previous 10 years of tax returns last August.
According to her returns, Warren and her husband Bruce – a professor at Harvard University – paid more than $200,000 in taxes last year on just over $900,00 in income. Warren made about $325,000 in book sales in addition to the $175,000 salary she receives as a senator. Her husband earned around $400,000 from Harvard.
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/warren-releases-tax-returns (https://www.foxnews.com/politics/warren-releases-tax-returns)
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Somebody help me understand why being successful makes somebody a hypocrite or illegitimate when they call for higher taxes on extremely wealthy Americans. This just seems like a poor argument to me.
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Somebody help me understand why being successful makes somebody a hypocrite or illegitimate when they call for higher taxes on extremely wealthy Americans. This just seems like a poor argument to me.
Hold your horses there, Dex. First of all, there is not currently any tax on wealthy Americans. So this isn't a matter of higher taxes. It is a matter of imposing a tax where none currently exists. It also is a matter of taxing again money that had already been taxed when it was earned. As for the hypocrisy part, she is targeting a small minority of the population using class-envy as her tool, even though her own class falls under that same class-envy attack.
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Hold your horses there, Dex. First of all, there is not currently any tax on wealthy Americans. So this isn't a matter of higher taxes. It is a matter of imposing a tax where none currently exists. It also is a matter of taxing again money that had already been taxed when it was earned.
Well, technically going from no wealth tax to some wealth tax qualifies as "higher taxes." I get it though, and you know what I mean. She wants the government to find ways to take more money from the most well-off Americans.
her own class falls under that same class-envy attack.
Does that not lend her credibility? She has skin in the game. I'm not making an argument in favor of what she's proposing. I just don't see her as being a hypocrite in this instance. I think it's the wrong way to go about attacking her stance.
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The problem is that there isn't enough money in it. If you want more revenue, tax the poor. There is a much larger number of them.
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Does that not lend her credibility? She has skin in the game. I'm not making an argument in favor of what she's proposing. I just don't see her as being a hypocrite in this instance. I think it's the wrong way to go about attacking her stance.
Correct. There is merit to having all elected officials show their returns. Someone with something to hide financially would object.
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“I’m in this fight for a wealth tax. A two percent tax on the 75 biggest fortunes in the country. Two percent. That’s all we’re asking,†the populist senator with a history of taking on Wall Street and big businesses highlighted as she addressed a gathering of the North America's Building Trades Unions.
“We could provide universal childcare for every working parent in America. Universal pre-K…. for every child and still have $2 trillion left over,†she explained.
To have $2T in the first place, even before spending a dime, would require the average of the 75 biggest fortunes to be $1.3T.
Even if she was planning to tax them every year for 10 years, the average would have to be $133B, which is more than anyone has.
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Correct. There is merit to having all elected officials show their returns. Someone with something to hide financially would object.
Somewhat Disagree. If they were private citizens, it's private data. Once they get to federal office, all subsequent tax data should be public.
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The problem is that there isn't enough money in it. If you want more revenue, tax the poor. There is a much larger number of them.
Let's run the numbers...let's say the top 75 fortunes are $2 Trillion. $2T times 2% = $40 billion, a paltry figure more closely resembling a rounding error in the overall scheme of things.
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“I’m in this fight for a wealth tax. A two percent tax on the 75 biggest fortunes in the country. Two percent. That’s all we’re asking,†the populist senator with a history of taking on Wall Street and big businesses highlighted as she addressed a gathering of the North America's Building Trades Unions.
“We could provide universal childcare for every working parent in America. Universal pre-K…. for every child and still have $2 trillion left over,†she explained.
To have $2T in the first place, even before spending a dime, would require the average of the 75 biggest fortunes to be $1.3T.
Even if she was planning to tax them every year for 10 years, the average would have to be $133B, which is more than anyone has.
Sounds like she's channelling her inner AOC when it comes to math and economics
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Does that not lend her credibility? She has skin in the game.
No, she doesn't. Her skin is income, approximately $1 million of it last year between her and her college-professor husband. But she isn't going after that. She is going after the after-tax wealth of people having over $50 million in assets. Socialists only go after other people's money - never their own.
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No, she doesn't.
She supports more than just a wealth tax on extremely wealthy people.
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Wealth Tax: There's little doubt that the political flavor of the day is what the left calls "democratic socialism." And one of this movement's more recent ideas, from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, is to impose a "wealth tax" on the wealthy. Sorry, senator, it's an old idea — one that's thoroughly discredited.
To begin with, the wealth tax is nothing new. It's been tried by many nations, but most who've tried it have dropped it. As recently as 1990, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 12 of its member countries imposed a wealth tax on citizens. Today, it's just four.
The irony is that those who ended their failed experiments with the wealth tax are those that America's "democratic socialists" say they most admire. That includes Denmark and Sweden, nations often cited by people like Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as worthy of emulation by the American left.
Why did those countries drop wealth taxes? As The Tax Foundation noted, "Countries have dropped the taxes due to the challenges they pose." Among others, those challenges include wealthy people fleeing the country to avoid taxes, and declines in investment and jobs.
https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/wealth-tax-failure/ (https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/wealth-tax-failure/)
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The irony is that those who ended their failed experiments with the wealth tax are those that America's "democratic socialists" say they most admire. That includes Denmark and Sweden, nations often cited by people like Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as worthy of emulation by the American left.
The American left definitely needs to learn from the trial and error of the Scandinavian countries that have been doing what they want to do for decades.
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She supports more than just a wealth tax on extremely wealthy people.
But we're not addressing other taxes she supports. We are addressing her wealth tax proposal. And under that proposal, she will not be taxed. She has no skin in the game.
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Elizabeth Warren's Wealth Tax: Here's What You Need to Know
Instead of creating a higher marginal tax rate, this 2020 Democratic presidential candidate is proposing a different way to increase taxes on the rich. (https://www.fool.com/taxes/2019/01/28/elizabeth-warrens-wealth-tax-heres-what-you-need-t.aspx)
See that? Instead of increasing her own taxes, she proposes taking wealth at gunpoint away from people who earned that wealth and paid taxes on those earnings. Typical socialist going after other people's money.
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And under that proposal, she will not be taxed. She has no skin in the game.
When considering the broader picture I think it's fair to say she has skin in the game. Fine, this particular thing might not hurt her, but I don't think it's reflective of her character in the way you're suggesting because she supports progressive ideology that will lighten her own wallet.
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“I’m in this fight for a wealth tax. A two percent tax on the 75 biggest fortunes in the country. Two percent. That’s all we’re asking,â€
This person seriously thinks she can wring anything substantial from only 75 people... out of 300 flipping million?
Most of their wealth is tied up in investments anyway. Warren makes it sound like Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates are sitting on stockpiles of cash. Of course not! That net worth is buried in stocks, real estate and other non-concrete instruments. The ones that cash out usually do so to invest their cash into something else, like pro sports franchises. Those kinds of assets are of little value for redistributing... it would only be good for nationalizing industries (i.e. communism) or using as instruments to prop up trust funds like Social Security (Bush-style compassionate "conservatism" if you can even call it that).
Just taking 2% off the top of a rich person's wealth is easier said than done.
Of course, there's some humor in desperately trying to shrink the base of people you're exploiting from the top 1% now to the top .00002%, to keep as many people as possible detached from the actual mechanisms of funding the government.
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When considering the broader picture I think it's fair to say she has skin in the game.
Fair? Based on what? Wishful thinking? Let's review. Warren is proposing a tax that will not touch her. Period. How does she have skin in the game?
Fine, this particular thing might not hurt her
Another way of saying that is that she has no skin in the game.
but I don't think it's reflective of her character in the way you're suggesting because she supports progressive ideology that will lighten her own wallet.
Her tax proposal does not change her personal income tax rate at all. She supports her proposal. Thus, her particular brand of progressive ideology puts her on the "no tax hike" end of the class-envy fence. Those are the facts. Your feelings may wish it not true, but feelings are not facts.
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Warren is proposing a tax that will not touch her. Period. How does she have skin in the game?
It's connected to her much broader ideology. I already conceded that with this specific proposal her money is not on the line. She also wants to raise income taxes on high earners, something that would impact her. She supports things that would impact her financially.
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It's connected to her much broader ideology.
Her much broader ideology is to make other people pay for it. In other words, it is not her skin that is in the game. It is the skin of other people. It's what socialists do.
I already conceded that with this specific proposal her money is not on the line.
Yet you still say she has skin in the game. Either she does or she doesn't. Either her taxes go up, or they don't. You can't have it both ways, even if you feel you should be able to.
She also wants to raise income taxes on high earners, something that would impact her.
Nope. Her proposal does not raise income taxes. This has already been pointed out to you. I even provided a link. Your feelings simply do not change the facts here.
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Nope.
So your position is that Elizabeth Warren doesn't want to raise income taxes or do anything that would impact the wallet of a household making a million dollars annually?
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So your position is that Elizabeth Warren doesn't want to raise income taxes or do anything that would impact the wallet of a household making a million dollars annually?
My position is that Elizabeth Warren's tax proposal is public record. It is what she is campaigning on. And it is a position based on fact rather than on my feelings about contemplating Warren's desires.
Again, Elizabeth Warren has put forth a tax proposal. And it is a proposal where 100% of the revenues generated will come from other people. It is a proposal founded on class envy in order to justify the taking away other people's wealth at the point of a gun.
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My position is that Elizabeth Warren's tax proposal is public record. It is what she is campaigning on. And it is a position based on fact rather than on my feelings about contemplating Warren's desires.
Again, Elizabeth Warren has put forth a tax proposal. And it is a proposal where 100% of the revenues generated will come from other people. It is a proposal founded on class envy in order to justify the taking away other people's wealth at the point of a gun.
Would you take the position that Elizabeth Warren doesn't want to raise income taxes or do anything that would impact the wallet of a household making a million dollars annually? I conceded a point and I think you should do the same. A household making a million dollars annually will certainly be impacted by the progressive ideology she supports, regardless of her current tax proposal. She supports an ideology that would inevitably cause her to make less money.
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Would you take the position that Elizabeth Warren doesn't want to raise income taxes or do anything that would impact the wallet of a household making a million dollars annually?
For the year that she made a million dollars? No.
I conceded a point and I think you should do the same.
The point you are conceding is directly connected to a claim you made - a claim that has been proven false. If you believe that I likewise have made a false claim, then provide evidence disproving my claim, and I will be happy to concede it. Until then, I am not at all willing to concede anything just because you offered a claim that wasn't true.
A household making a million dollars annually will certainly be impacted by the progressive ideology she supports
It is a regressive ideology in that it punishes those who create wealth and rewards those who do not. And it is already in effect. btw, almost a third of her household income was due to book sales, which is most likely a one-time event. So I don't expect her income to rise above the $1 million mark in 2019.
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Sorta-fearless prediction:
Someday, the democrat-communists are going to be in complete control of the government again (White House + Senate + House).
One way or another, they're going to push a "wealth tax" through, but probably not just on super-millionaires.
They'll go after 401k's and IRA's.
Just "a little off the top" to start, to establish the principle.
Then later on, they'll dig in.
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For the year that she made a million dollars? No.
The point you are conceding is directly connected to a claim you made - a claim that has been proven false. If you believe that I likewise have made a false claim, then provide evidence disproving my claim, and I will be happy to concede it. Until then, I am not at all willing to concede anything just because you offered a claim that wasn't true.
It is a regressive ideology in that it punishes those who create wealth and rewards those who do not. And it is already in effect. btw, almost a third of her household income was due to book sales, which is most likely a one-time event. So I don't expect her income to rise above the $1 million mark in 2019.
Yeah, a quick glance spots three different items I disagree with in the text I highlighted.
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And she didn't get her wealth from the Casino on the Res.