A Taxing Debate...

With only four days remaining before the election, debate is still hot and heavy over both candidates' proposed tax plans. Some choice comments from the past few days...

"I do not believe the central issue of tax policy is "fairness." If it were about fairness, there would be no income tax at all. What Obama has done is place a thin veil of "middle class tax cuts" over a policy that is intended to do nothing more than appeal to class warfare. The purpose of an income tax is to finance the government. Period. Taxes are about money and economics. The only logical purpose for changes in the tax code is to affect the economic behavior of people and businesses in order to encourage positive economic behavior such as investments, savings and consumer spending. This in turn increases profits along with government revenues. To me, it makes no sense to redistribute wealth to those who pay little or no taxes. It may make us feel good about ourselves, but it does nothing to encourage job creation, investment in research and development and consumer spending. When we decide there are those in our society that need help, the government can provide help and it is called Welfare. We can argue about what welfare programs are truly necessary and actually assist the poor (see Welfare reform signed by Clinton--good for him) but we should not dress up welfare as a tax cut which results in the government writing a check to millions who pay no taxes at all."
-TennisDaddy

"To clear a few things up about how Obama's plan is going to hurt people making just over the $250,000 level, let's look at the real numbers. According to MONEY magazine, FORTUNE AND the non-partisan Tax Policy Center, here is what will happen to your taxes under Obama's plan:

Under $19,000-cut by $567
$19-38,000-cut by $892
$38-66,000-cut by $1,042
$66-112,000-cut by $1,290
$112-161,000-cut by $2,204
$161-227,000-cut by $2,789
$227-603,000-increase by $12

If you make less than $603,000, the biggest tax increase you can get is $12. You can also see that the majority of the tax relief goes to the real middle class--not the poor. Where do you guys all fall in? If you are paying more than $12 extra in taxes--you need to start buying the beer. If not, thank Barack for your tax cut."
-SC

"The company I work for is a private company owned by the physicians. My physicians are some of the lucky ones who make over $250k annually (many do not). We employ 125 people and service eight hospitals--providing care to over 800,000 patients annually. Our costs (particularly health care) continue to spiral upward--and radiology has become an IT business out of necessity in order to become more cost effective and productive--so we are as lean as we can get right now. Any increased tax on those greedy $250k+ wage earners means my bosses' incomes will go down. Because we have reached maximum efficiency, the only alternative will be to lay people off. Laid off people don't spend money and the economy slides further downward. Businesses that lay people off also have less people on their payroll which reduces income tax revenue. The business owners now have less take-home pay and no longer take vacations or remodel their homes, which impacts the middle class business owner because his "greedy" customers have reduced their spending.

Now some would argue that my owners should be accepting of working harder to make less money and therefore should accept a pay cut to retain their workers. The reality is that I will be forced to lay-off personnel if Obama/McCain raises taxes in an already tight cash environment. Hopefully, I will not become one of those that are laid-off, as I make a pretty good living and we middle managers are the first to be chopped. So, if Obama is elected president and raises taxes on my bosses, can my wife and four kids come live with you?"
-FoxFire

"Why is it that every time a Democratic or Progressive candidate tries to give even the smallest break to the people that have the least, conservatives conclude it will result in them becoming destitute and homeless? That's the same stuff they were warning about when we elected Clinton, and they survived just fine. Now after eight years of Bush disasters they are concerned about Obama costing them their jobs. Same old song. Want to save your employers some cash? End the war in Iraq and the $4 billion-a-month hemorrhage."
-E. J. Black
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