New GOP tax plan is terrible

[Dave70968]

How about eliminating the Social Security tax cap while you're at it?

A SS tax cap is only fair given the benefit cap.

 

[Frederick]

A SS tax cap is only fair given the benefit cap.

I disagree. 10% for a person making hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars is different than 10% for someone making 40 or 50,000 a year. I believe tax rates should be generally progressive.

 

[Dave70968]

I disagree. 10% for a person making hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars is different than 10% for someone making 40 or 50,000 a year. I believe tax rates should be generally progressive.

So...retirement benefits increase in proportion to income (read: amount paid in) up to a cap, but amount paid in can be increased without bound? What's fair about that?

 

[Frederick]

So...retirement benefits increase in proportion to income (read: amount paid in) up to a cap, but amount paid in can be increased without bound? What's fair about that?

the idea of Social Security isn't to provide a fair return to all investors, it's to provide the elderly with a pension in their old age. That way if they run into financial trouble and had their savings wiped, or they couldn't/didn't save properly for retirement, they have a small amount of income to live off of. That's the whole idea of social security.

Social security, as its name implies, is a form of socialism. Taxing current workers and wealthier Americans to give money to the elderly/retired who cannot sustain themselves. The money you 'invest' into the system is not invested, but is immediately paid by the government to current retirees. There's no 'fund' that it's kept in until you retire.

The fact of the matter is, no taxation is inherently 'fair.' The rich will always end up having to pay more than the poorer, by design. Because they can.

It would not be a fair system to tax the rich man just as much as the poor man.

 

[Dave70968]

the idea of Social Security isn't to provide a fair return to all investors, it's to provide the elderly with a pension in their old age. That way if they run into financial trouble and had their savings wiped, or they couldn't/didn't save properly for retirement, they have a small amount of income to live off of. That's the whole idea of social security.

Social security, as its name implies, is a form of socialism. Taxing current workers and wealthier Americans to give money to the elderly/retired who cannot sustain themselves. The money you 'invest' into the system is not invested, but is immediately paid by the government to current retirees. There's no 'fund' that it's kept in until you retire.

The fact of the matter is, no taxation is inherently 'fair.' The rich will always end up having to pay more than the poorer, by design. Because they can.

It would not be a fair system to tax the rich man just as much as the poor man.

Then why does the benefit scale at all? If it's just to be sure you can support yourself, shouldn't it be A) a fixed payment, and B) means-tested? What you're proposing is perhaps the least fair of any possible alternative. Either make is a simple safety net, or let it be a (quasi-) retirement program.

And yes, a tax can be fair--a flat percentage is a reasonably fair way of doing things, though in this instance, the payout needs to be proportional as well.

 

[Frederick]

Then why does the benefit scale at all? If it's just to be sure you can support yourself, shouldn't it be A) a fixed payment, and B) means-tested? What you're proposing is perhaps the least fair of any possible alternative. Either make is a simple safety net, or let it be a (quasi-) retirement program.

And yes, a tax can be fair--a flat percentage is a reasonably fair way of doing things, though in this instance, the payout needs to be proportional as well.

Means tested makes sense.

I don't agree with a flat tax. We don't want to tax the basic living income.

 

[Dave70968]

Means tested makes sense.

I don't agree with a flat tax. We don't want to tax the basic living income.

Payroll taxes--like SS and Medicare--already do that. Income taxes include deductions for everybody.

 

[John6185]

"It would not be a fair system to tax the rich man just as much as the poor man."

The poor are not taxed at all unless one considers they pay sales tax when they stop at 7-ll and buy cigarettes. They drive on the same roads that we do, use the libraries (albeit sparingly), use police and fire department services, their kids go to the same schools ours does and if they rent they pay no property taxes and many of them receive their pay in cash so they pay no state or federal taxes-this is fact, I know one person personally that does this.
At one time in our nation's history every worker paid their fair share of federal taxes according to their salary. I made $40 per week and had to pay taxes on that meager salary myself. I read today but I can't remember where I read it but it is less than 50% of the population paying taxes if I remember correctly and this is far too few. But politicians being what they are are not going to destroy their voting base by having the poor by paying a token of their salary in taxes. I say take away the Earned Income Credit! Why are we the taxpayers supporting them when they don't have the incentive to better themselves because we're providing for them? We work hard and obey the law, pay our taxes and what do we get? More mouths to feed evidently. I'm an old curmudgeon obviously.

 

[rc508pir]

So...retirement benefits increase in proportion to income (read: amount paid in) up to a cap, but amount paid in can be increased without bound? What's fair about that?

Dude, the Little Socialist is never going to listen to anything that you put forward so there's no point in even engaging him

 

[dennishoddy]

So...retirement benefits increase in proportion to income (read: amount paid in) up to a cap, but amount paid in can be increased without bound? What's fair about that?

I made 5X what my ex wife made in her lifetime, and she gets the same benefit.
Its part of the Ponzi scheme that keeps SS floating along.