Quote:
Originally Posted by redpoint5
If Buffett pays a lower effective tax rate (which I highly doubt), it's only due to his exploitation of legal means of avoiding and deferring tax payments to the government. Had his secretary been as prudent as he, they would be paying a lower effective tax due to their lower income.
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Investment income has long been taxed at a lower rate than actual work. The way tax policy is supposed to work, it means our lawmakers are trying to punish those of us who have to work for a living, encouraging us to live off of investment income instead. Or you could say that the rich have bought Congress.
Social Security and Medicare, reagrdless of how you dress them up, are taxes. Taxes not on income as such, but on payroll income. And they're capped so someone making $1m a year may pay more in SS than I do, but it's a much lower percentage of their income. If they're reasonably smart, they've got things structured so that most of their money isn't in regular payroll anyway.
We can't all be classified as owners and get our pay labeled as investment profits: most of your regular secretary's income will be payroll, taxed at a higher rate than Buffett's money as well as being subject to SS & Medicare deductions.