Quote:
Originally Posted by Arragonis
Just out of interest, and I asked this before on a taxes thread but didn't get real numbers - just how much are people paying in :
- Income tax
- property "tax"
etc.
For example I see valuations here - what does that mean in terms of tax in the colonies (or indeed the Commonwealth) ?
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Income taxes are all over the map; there are brackets with different amounts of withholding depending on how much you net. If one has lots of deductible expenses they can offset their gross income; of course my favorites are the child and dependent deductions that force the rest of us to subsidize breeders.
I think basically we have the lower income class paying no income taxes (or even getting PAID at tax time)
if they've reproduced enough. This is in addition to qualifying for assistance programs of all description, including help for food, rent, gas, child care, and who knows what else but only if you have the spawn. Without them you can go live under a bridge for all the govt cares. The middle class naturally gets soaked the hardest with probably most paying about 30% in??? for income taxes only. The wealthy technically have the highest tax brackets but then they are the ones who can afford to hire tax and investment professionals to sniff out and utilize any of the 500,000 loopholes that are available in that strata. One suspects the real tax burden on them isn't as onerous as they tend to make it seem.
Property taxes are all over the map too. Live in an area of relatively cheap real estate like me and the tax could be 5% of it's value every year (so, around every 20+ years or so I will have given the govt more money than I paid for the house itself); areas where the typical house is worth 5x what mine is (very common) do not see tax bills 5x what mine are- they are less than 5x. It is also highly dependent on what State one is in and what flavor of retards one's local govt consists of, but 99% of the time they are infatuated with growth and will stop at nothing to spend everyone else's money on expanding the infrastructure- with schools being the elephant in the room- without much regard for what the residents in any particular area may want... although as often as not, the residents are like minded to this growth thing and are willing partners in expanding the sprawl and congestion network.
There is a measure called "Tax Freedom Day" where supposedly the average American has finally paid his debt to the govt and the rest of the year's income is his. I think that includes the myriad other taxes though, like sales and whatnot. And we are up to what- in May sometime?- having worked from Jan 1 to TF Day for the govt.