See, that $2 trillion is not yours. You don’t have a right to it. It’s not the U.S. government’s. It’s theirs. And unless they see a way to create something with that money, they ain’t doing nothing with it, no matter how many loopholes you close or tax rates you raise.[/quote]
Surveyor,
As an individual on here who does my best to legally lower my tax bill, I agree with your sentiments. As an individual and a business owner (attorney), I hate every attempt by government to abscond my hard earned money. I agree that private individuals are (theoretically) far better equipped to spend the “profits” generated from business activity. Here is the problem: 1) A good accountant (I have one) can take anything that would by any fair estimation be a “profit” and transfer it, lend it, spend it, or invest it in such a way that the “profit” disappears. It’s the nature of an accounting system that taxes revenue – costs. Increase the “costs”, and the profit goes away. You can’t blame businesses or individuals from using the law to their advantage. Can you? (The Supreme Court says no).
The problem then is not with the businesses/individuals that legally pay little or not taxes. The problem is with the tax system. I think what gets everyone so upset is that the tax system is set up so that not all participants have equal access to tax lowering strategies. It is intentionally structured to favor wealthy individuals and corporations (that pay wealthy individuals in stock, dividends and capital gains). The thing that (rightfully) pisses people off is that the brunt of our nation’s tax revenue is generated by the bottom 80% of citizens who take home about 40% of income (and control a far lesser portion of wealth). This is bad social policy because it artificially concentrates wealth to those at the top.
So I think if you boil it all down, the gripe is this: why does someone making 50k/year pay 30% taxes, while someone making millions pays 5% (estimates)? As JFK famously said: “to whom much is given, much is expected.”
As a caveat to all this, in a truly global economy where money moves across borders in the blink of an eye, there is nothing one country can do. If the U.S. makes their tax system more “fair”, some other country will accommodate, and money will flow to that other country. So basically, the rich will always oppress the poor. It has always been that way, and it always will be.
