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ctr70
ParticipantCan you imagine if Silicon Valley went Union like Michigan? Can you imagine a software engineer at Google saying to Larry Page, “sorry dude, I can’t write that piece of code that’s not in my job description”. “Sorry Larry, it’s 5pm, I’m done today, Union rules dude”.
One of the reason high tech as a 4% unemployment rate and Silicon Valley has the highest incomes in the U.S. and the best companies in the U.S. (Google, Apple, Cisco, etc…) is b/c they don’t have Unions. That is one of he reasons Silicon Valley is still a sector of the U.S. Economy that leads the world in innovation.
Bloated unions have been one of the reasons Detroit has gone down the drain and got it’s butt kicked by Japan and Germany in the auto business. And GM had to be bailed out of BK by Obama. Can you imagine what Michigan and U.S. auto industry might be like if it was run like Silicon Valley with no unions? Might it be a little more competitive? Might they make better cars? Might Michigan’s unemployment rate be a lot better and everyone better off as a whole? Hmmmm.
ParticipantMuch of the roots of all these problems are with Gray Davis and his rewarding the Public Unions (that paid millions to get him elected) by showering them with unprecedented massive pay & benefit increases. Scandalous.
Now instead of trying to change some of these scandalous abuses, California’s answer is to clobber our few high income earners busting their butts in the private sector every day with even MORE taxes (Prop 30).
December 10, 2012 at 6:02 PM in reply to: Bond holders vs. Calpers – who gets priority when CA cities go BK #756041ParticipantI’m fine with pensions as long as their is NO tax payer guarantee at all, they are 100% self-sustaining. If the investments tank, the difference should not be made up by tax payers, the recipients should get less. If they don’t get the 8-9% target return, tax payer money should not back these defined benefit pensions up.
December 10, 2012 at 5:54 PM in reply to: Taxing the rich more? How about making companies bring money back…… #756040Participant25% of the top income earners in the U.S. pay 90% of the income taxes. Isn’t 90% enough??? I just can’t see why Obama wants them to pay MORE and MORE. Isn’t that enough already?
I would rather see corporate taxes go up, prop 13 repealed and the mortgage deduction go away before raising income taxes on our innovators and high achievers. At least you can choose to not own real estate. You don’t have a choice with income taxes.
Participant[/quote]
Your numbers for SS and medicare are off.
Assuming worst case (highest tax) – which is for someone self employed. Self employed folks pay both employer and employee side of SS payroll tax.Your 40k earner would pay:
10.4% * $40k = $4760 SS tax.
Your 400k earner would pay:
10.4% * $106,800 = $11,107.20 SS tax.
(ss payroll taxes are capped at the first 106,800 of payroll income)Medicare also seemed off.
Your 40k earner would pay
2.9% * 40k = $1160 medicare taxes
Your 400k earner would pay
2.9% * 400k = $11,600 medicare taxessource: http://www.ssa.gov/pubs/10003.html#a0=0
If they are an employee – it will be less since the employer will pay a big percentage of the SS tax.
Medicare is a flat tax – so you can’t make any argument about the high earners being unfairly taxed. Flat is flat. 2.9% on all earned income.
SS is a regressive tax – higher earners pay a lesser overall percentage because only the first $106k is taxed… People making less than $106,800 pay the tax on their entire income.[/quote]
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I got my numbers off this site directly:http://www.paycheckcity.com/calculator/netpay/us/california/calculator.html
Regardless, people who make over $250k ALREADY pay way too much tax IMO as it is, and they shouldn’t have to pay more. They already pay WAY more then their share. The Fed and State Governments shouldn’t heap all the burden of our current debt & entitlement woes on this small group of financially successful people. If Obama raises the top bracket to 40% federal & you combine fed + state income taxes post prop 30, CA high income earners are going to be paying taxes close to European countries. And for all that tax we don’t get sh*t for services in the U.S. or Ghettofornia. At least in Europe you get something for being skinned alive by the Government.
Chuck Schumer one of the moderate democrats (and often voices of reason) in congress even said Obama should not consider $250k rich, he said it should be $1 millon+. Wow, someone with some common sense in congress!
ParticipantAnother thing for those high income earners who have portable businesses looking to move out of the state of CA to avoid the state income tax, is the cumulative effect of paying a state income tax. If you pay $30k a year in state income taxes, that is $300k over 10 yrs. And you invested that $30k saved every year on a down payment on a cash flow rental or a trust deed, you would have more like $500k+ over 10 yrs. So you are losing $500k over 10 yrs for staying in CA!
ParticipantNice job cherry picking Somalia Mr. renter guy, I wouldn’t have expected anything less from the Pigg serial poster:) Your forgetting prosperous countries like South Korea, New Zealand, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Uraguay, Malaysia, and Australia (just to name a few), that have lower personal tax rates than the U.S. I especially like Hong Kong tax rates capped at 15% no matter what a persons income is.
A high income earner in America can pay $100k+ over their career into Medicare yet they will never use it. Where the low income guy who will use Medicare most likely paid a paltry sum into it. That is amazing. Liberals should at least go out and shake the hand of those “evil” high income earners once a day, b/c those are the people going out every day to bust their butt to pay all the bills in this country.
Those Americans wanting and receiving a free lunch currently outnumber those that don’t, that showed clearly in our recent elections. And the solution to keep paying for that free lunch is to suffocate our precious few high achievers in our society with massive taxes to pay for it all (Prop 30).
That leads me to a great quote from Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.”
…something Greece and Spain are finding painfully true.
ParticipantBearishgirl…I have been up to Couer D’ Alene (and Sandpoint). In fact I got pulled over for speeding by a brother of a retired CHP (he was from CA too). There are SO MANY cops up there. It was nice, the there are 2 huge gorgeous lakes up there. But not for me to live. I wouldn’t even vacation there personally, there are much better spots. I like Montana & Colorado much better for example.
I would never live there personally, but I was impressed with Boise ID when I drove through there. Great place for a family fleeing CA. Very nice clean town, very NON ghetto look and feel (as opposed to so much of CA). Close to tremendous pristine hiking, skiing, boating. Great college football team:)
The top no state income tax destinations for me to flee CA & the 10.3% state income tax are Seattle and Portsmouth New Hampshire. Those would be my top choices. With the tax savings you could take a few nice long winter tropical vacations:) The NV side of Lake Tahoe would be OK but too quiet. I knew a guy who lived in Incline Village half the year and Sarasota FL (both no income tax states). Not a big Las Vegas fan. I couldn’t live in TX b/c too flat & hot. Never been a big Florida fan. Jackson WY is beautiful, but not as a full time resident.
I actually like everything better about Seattle over SD except the weather in a few of the rainier winter months. I think it’s much prettier, 1.5 hrs from real skiing, much better architecture, much better culture and look and feel. Portsmouth is a lovely New England town as well with Colonial architecture, 45 min from Boston, a few minutes from the Maine Coast, an hour from the White Mnts of NH, etc.. But I would go with Seattle over Portsmouth right now b/c Ports. is a little too small. But lovely, lovely town!
Bearishgirl… you have to stop going to places so hard on the eyes like ABQ and Tulsa and visit Seattle and Portsmouth:)
ParticipantThat is the point of the post, a person with a taxable NET income of $400k vs. a person with a taxable NET income of $40k.
ParticipantI just went on a tax calculation web site and compared what someone living in CA making $400k a year vs. someone making $40k pays in total taxes. The assumption for sake of discussion is single person:
$40k income
-$5,484 federal taxes
-$1,680 social security
-$576 Medicare
-$396 SDI
-$1,320 CA state income taxes
Total:$9,456 – 23% of income$400k income
-$116,400 federal taxes
-$16,800 social security
-$5,796 medicare
-$3,996 SDI
-$40,608 CA state income taxes
Total:$183,600 – 46% of incomeSo the person making $400k pays 20 times more in taxes as a total dollar amount! And the liberals want them to pay more!!! $183,600 is not enough blood for the parasites! What would be fair if it was a flat tax and the person making $400k also paid a total of 23% out of their paycheck. They would still be contributing $92,000 vs. $9,456 for the person making $40k. Still 10 times as much!
I personally think the whole escalating tax brackets are total BS. It is basically a legal means for the lower income to steal from the higher income because they outnumber them in the electorate & will always vote for the candidate who taxes “the rich” more. The ONLY guy who EVER got it right was Steve Forbes with the flat tax plan. Why should a person making $400k have to pay out double the % of his income as a guy making $40k? There has never been a good reason for it. It is totally unjust and unfair and IMO a Governmental form of theft, a form of stealing. A much better plan is the RADICAL shrinking of the size and scope of Government and more frugality with tax dollars collected, so our citizens can keep more of their money & choose to spend it how they wish.
I do not want to live in a Euro-style quasi socialist society where the Gov takes 60% of my income and re-distributes it. I don’t want to live in a place with chronic high unemployment and stagnant economies with no decent jobs like Greece, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, etc… I would rather personally choose how I spend my money.
ParticipantIf Obama raises the highest tax bracket to 39.6% and now CA is an additional 10.3% with Prop 30, you are just going to get DESTROYED paying taxes if you make a lot of coin in this state. That is just such a huge injustice. Soak the high achievers for half their hard earned income and squander it. I think they should be paying like 25% in taxes TOTAL…not freaking 50%.
I would guess CA is similar to the federal tax statistic where something like the top 5% of income earners in the state of CA pay over half of all the state income taxes. And you want them to pay more??? Here is an analogy for that…you get together with 20 friends and go have dinner. When the bill comes 1 person has to pick up half the tab while the other 19 divvy up the rest!! That is what is happening with who pays taxes in this country. And yet “they are not paying their share”???? WTF??? Biggest load of class warfare BS propaganda ever put out by the Dems.
Raising taxes on the so called “wealthy” is a clear signal from Obama and Gerry Brown to…go out and there and bust your butt and go the extra mile to do well financially, to make life better for your family, and we will absolutely CLOBBER you with taxes. We will DESTROY your wealth building efforts. Screw all you heart surgeons saving lives, entraprenuers creating jobs, top salespeople helping your company sell product, etc……we want HALF of what you make!
ParticipantGreat post Paramount. Instead of cutting back on the criminal state retiree pensions and benefits, guess what, just tax the so called “rich” a little more. The people busting their butts in the CA private sector every day. Awe, who cares, it’s just a “little bit” more, they won’t notice it!
While the socialists in Sacramento sit on their butts all day thinking up ways to spike their pension benefits and dream up more stuff they can tax the so called rich to pay for.
This is what happens when you have a demographic make up in CA that is getting poorer and poorer and less and less educated. They just vote to tax “the rich” more. Who cares, they don’t have to pay any of the bills. The “rich” will pick up the whole tab. Pelosi must be proud of her body of work with CA now having the highest poverty rate in the U.S…beating out Mississippi.
November 11, 2012 at 12:17 PM in reply to: Big government and absurdly strong unions destroyed Greece and Spain. Expect no less for California. #754355ParticipantI would never personally live in Tulsa OK I would only likely move to the Pac NW or New England, maybe Hawaii. Or possibly even to somewhere in Asia part of the year. But I have heard people say good things about Tulsa, it’s just not for me.
I wrote in another post what I think of the whole red state/blue state color coded map issue and how it is over simplified. The fact is there are still a lot of fiscal conservatives in places like CA, Pac NW, and the Northeast U.S. Many are the wealthier higher educated people working in knowledge based industries (silicon valley, biotech, venture cap, etc). They are of course still much smaller in numbers than the Dems, but just looking at a color coded map of the U.S. red state vs. blue state generalizes this. It makes one believe everyone in a blue state is a raging liberal and everyone in a Red state listens to Rush Limbaugh daily.
I think the Repub party suffers from a marketing “branding” problem with these color coded maps in being too associated with *social conservatives* in the bible belt. When there are many moderate Repubs that lean to the right on taxation, spending, size and scope of Gov, entitlement reform, unions, pro-business, financial regulation. But lean to the left on gun control, pro choice, climate change, environment, war mongering. These are moderate Republicans, more “Michael Bloomberg” type Repubs. And I think if the Repub party branded itself more along these lines, they would get more of the higher income undecided voters and women on the coasts, who really are fiscal conservatives deep down. Or they will be soon when they start looking at what’s left of their paychecks.
ParticipantI think people totally get the red/blue color coded maps of the U.S. wrong. They are too generalized. What these maps don’t show is there still are a lot of people in the Northeast, Pac NW and CA coast that vote Republican, but of course a minority of the population. A lot of the higher income people and business owners in these areas. There are a lot of people (working in knowledge based industries) who lean to the right on fiscal issues, taxation, pro-business, entitlements, unions. But then lean to the left on gun control, abortion, war, climate change, environment. Kind of “Bloomberg Republicans”.
I think a big problem with the Republican Party is a “branding” issue. B/c of the heavy association with the Republican Party and the bible belt social conservative issues. When many Republican moderates are more fiscal conservatives and not social conservatives. I think more Independents who were undecided would have voted for Romney if Repubs had better branding and didn’t associate so heavily with the social conservatives and the Rush Limbaugh crowd. People look at these color coded maps and think NOBODY in Coastal CA, Pac NW, Northeast voted Repub or are fiscal conservatives, which would be a wrong interpretation of the maps IMO. People look at the red/blue maps and make an association with the flyover states as representing 100% of the Repub party, and coasts 100% of Dem party, and associate the Repub party with those areas of the U.S. as being perceived as more backward. I think this is a shame, because the moderate side of the Repub party would appeal to more Americans living on the coasts if it was branded better. When they start taking a look at what’s left of their paychecks in the near future, they will be looking for a better answer.
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