The rich will pay more taxes, Boehner says

[twomp]

Taxes on the wealthy are going up, House Speaker John Boehner conceded Wednesday in challenging President Barack Obama to sit down with him to hammer out a deal for avoiding the fiscal cliff.

Obama, however, continued to insist on Republicans first ensuring no tax hike for anyone but the top 2% of Americans as a first step toward a broader agreement on tackling the nation's chronic federal deficits and debt.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/05/politi...html?hpt=hp_t2

[Matt Collins]

Define "rich" and define "wealthy"?

I know a lot of people who make good money and employ others, but are not living a lavish lifestyle by any stretch.

[lx43]

My taxes are already going up over 3% because of this Obamcare tax on my unearned income. How much $#@!ing more do I have to pay? A 100% of everything that I have.

[AuH20]

Is this tactic to appease the foreign bondholders?????????? That's what it smells to me. Nevertheless, it will buy them a few months.

[Inkblots]

Is this tactic to appease the foreign bondholders?????????? That's what it smells to me. Nevertheless, it will buy them a few months.

Not really. Observe:


Adjusting the top marginal tax rate has essentially no impact on total Federal income tax receipts - in fact, the correlation coefficient between them over the plotted period is -0.05. This means that the two variables are essentially decoupled, but if there's any impact at all, raising the top marginal rate slightly decreases income tax receipts.

This is because the top rate payers are precisely the people with the resources and incentives to engage in jurisdictional arbitrage, leave income as unrealized capital gains, or game the tax code to minimize their payments. If our fearless leaders in Washington really wanted to boost revenues as the primary vehicle for closing the deficit, they'd need to take the one move that is positively correlated with rising tax receipts: pass a broad-based tax rise on the middle class. Which, interestingly enough, will happen automatically at the end of this year.

[nobody's_hero]

And the rich will just leave, and whoever is in the next-highest bracket becomes the new 'rich'. Which leads to an endless cycle of 'shaving a little off the top' . . . until we've reached rock bottom.

That's the thing about wealth redistribution. You don't actually have to be wealthy to have your income spread around. You just have to have more than the guy next to you.

I'd spare myself a sigh of relief, for I recall someone once saying that the income tax was only going to apply to the richest 2%.

[jj-]

boehner go home

[oyarde]

Well , he is wrong about my income, I have become so tired of listening to these reprobates talk about how to divide my income, I have decided to pay less tax, soon, I may choose to participate at an even lower level, Now, I am marking myself down for a raise in 2013.

[Victor Grey]

Define "rich" and define "wealthy"?

To the Boehner and Obama crowds?

Anyone approaching 6-figures a year.

Approaching. Not after taxes or necessarily in that range formally.

Those in the 6 range are the same as those in the 8 and 9 in their eyes, in terms of not paying their fair share. However that arbitrary concept works.

[Shane Harris]

Not really. Observe:


Adjusting the top marginal tax rate has essentially no impact on total Federal income tax receipts - in fact, the correlation coefficient between them over the plotted period is -0.05. This means that the two variables are essentially decoupled, but if there's any impact at all, raising the top marginal rate slightly decreases income tax receipts.

This is because the top rate payers are precisely the people with the resources and incentives to engage in jurisdictional arbitrage, leave income as unrealized capital gains, or game the tax code to minimize their payments. If our fearless leaders in Washington really wanted to boost revenues as the primary vehicle for closing the deficit, they'd need to take the one move that is positively correlated with rising tax receipts: pass a broad-based tax rise on the middle class. Which, interestingly enough, will happen automatically at the end of this year.

great chart. shared. source?

[John F Kennedy III]

John Boehner is a Great Conservative.

[Rudeman]

A lot of the people on the left want to raise taxes because they think it'll raise revenue, we obviously disagree. BUT they believe they can bring in 20-21% of GDP in revenue, why has no one pointed out that federal revenue has only been above 20% of GDP 3 times in US history? 1944 = 20.91%, 1945 = 20.4% and 2000 = 20.62%.

The Clinton era was the most revenue the federal government took in over an 8 year period (94-01) and that was an average of 19.29% of GDP.

Obama's budget somehow projects to bring in even more revenue in 2015-22 (19.49% of GDP) and yet his plan still doesn't balance.

Now that might seem absurd until you see what the CBO projects over the same period: 20.59% of GDP in revenue with every year being 20+% of GDP and projects that we'll reach 21+% for the first time ever by 2022. This also doesn't balance.


The liberals like to bash Ryan's budget but his revenue projections were at least in the realm of plausibility and not some fantasy land projections (18.48%).

Bottom line, even with fantasy revenue projections they still can't produce a balanced budget, yet they pretend that spending isn't the problem.


If anyone cares about the actual numbers according to whitehouse.gov here it is in print form:

Year	GDP	Revenue % of GDP
1930	97.4	4.2
1931	83.9	3.7
1932	67.6	2.8
1933	57.6	3.5
1934	61.2	4.8
1935	69.6	5.2
1936	78.5	5.0
1937	87.8	6.1
1938	89.0	7.6
1939	89.1	7.1
1940	96.8	6.8
1941	114.1	7.6
1942	144.3	10.1
1943	180.3	13.3
1944	209.2	20.9
1945	221.4	20.4
1946	222.6	17.7
1947	233.2	16.5
1948	256.6	16.2
1949	271.3	14.5
1950	273.1	14.4
1951	320.2	16.1
1952	348.7	19.0
1953	372.5	18.7
1954	377.0	18.5
1955	395.9	16.5
1956	427.0	17.5
1957	450.9	17.7
1958	460.0	17.3
1959	490.2	16.2
1960	518.9	17.8
1961	529.9	17.8
1962	567.8	17.6
1963	599.2	17.8
1964	641.5	17.6
1965	687.5	17.0
1966	755.8	17.3
1967	810.0	18.4
1968	868.4	17.6
1969	948.1	19.7
1970	1,012.7	19.0
1971	1,080.0	17.3
1972	1,176.5	17.6
1973	1,310.6	17.6
1974	1,438.5	18.3
1975	1,560.2	17.9
1976	1,738.1	17.1
1977	1,973.5	18.0
1978	2,217.5	18.0
1979	2,501.4	18.5
1980	2,724.2	19.0
1981	3,057.0	19.6
1982	3,223.7	19.2
1983	3,440.7	17.5
1984	3,844.4	17.3
1985	4,146.3	17.7
1986	4,403.9	17.5
1987	4,651.4	18.4
1988	5,008.5	18.2
1989	5,399.5	18.4
1990	5,734.5	18.0
1991	5,930.5	17.8
1992	6,242.0	17.5
1993	6,587.3	17.5
1994	6,976.6	18.0
1995	7,341.1	18.4
1996	7,718.3	18.8
1997	8,211.7	19.2
1998	8,663.0	19.9
1999	9,208.4	19.8
2000	9,821.0	20.6
2001	10,225.3	19.5
2002	10,543.9	17.6
2003	10,980.2	16.2
2004	11,676.0	16.1
2005	12,428.6	17.3
2006	13,206.5	18.2
2007	13,861.4	18.5
2008	14,334.4	17.6
2009	13,937.5	15.1
2010	14,359.7	15.1
2011	14,958.6	15.4

Direct link to xls file: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/defa...s/hist01z2.xls
Direct link to whitehouse.gov page with all sorts of historical tables: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals

[Noob]

Rand should try to attach Obamacare repeal to any of the tax bills.

[ghengis86]

Rand should try to attach Obamacare repeal to any of the tax bills.

Best idea yet

[Noob]

Best idea yet

Let's jump on this, call their offices and demand that they attach Obamacare repeal to the tax bills. Maybe they would respond to it,

[ghengis86]

Let's jump on this, call their offices and demand that they attach Obamacare repeal the tax bills. Maybe they would respond to it,

This should be pitched in grassroots central

[Inkblots]

great chart. shared. source?

Thanks. The chart is my own work. The data on top marginal rates (as well as median rates, not shown) was taken from Saez et al. (2010). The GDP and person income tax revenue figures come from the Office of Management and Budget historical tables.

[Matt Collins]

To the Boehner and Obama crowds?

Anyone approaching 6-figures a year.

Approaching. Not after taxes or necessarily in that range formally.

Those in the 6 range are the same as those in the 8 and 9 in their eyes, in terms of not paying their fair share. However that arbitrary concept works.

It's my understanding that if you live in the north east and make less than 6 figures then you're pretty much in poverty.