The Next 4 years......

[Stentor]

Originally Posted by nevermind65

Giving all those massive tax breaks to the wealthy sure paid off now didn't it?

According to The Tax Foundation, in 2005 the top 1 percent of taxpayers (AGI over $364,657) earned approximately 21.2 percent of the nation's income (as defined by AGI), yet paid 39.4 percent of all federal income taxes. That means people representing the top 1 percent of tax returns paid about the same amount of federal individual income taxes as the bottom 95 percent.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/press/show/22652.html

Also, most tax deductions for folks making over $365k are phased out (primary tax deductions available are mortgage interest and charitable donations; they can't even take the deduction for their kids--as this is phased out), and they get hit with the AMT. So you might want to get informed a bit so you can step back from your class-warfare mentality.

nevermind65, how much more should folks in the top tax bracket be expected to pay? When is enough, enough?

[Bobcat]

Nevermind65 .... "the economy sucks under Bush and unemployment just skyrocketed " ... I spent my working life in manufacturing and sales . Still have contacts there. Food for thought ... Obama says he is going to give Unions an open ballot for elections ... no more secret ballots . This opens folks up to all sorts of pressure from the Union organizers and will make organizing plants/workplaces much easier . I have been told that some companies are already shedding people ( they are an expense that can be reduced ) while they can and also speeding up automation plans .
Maybe it`s my imagination , but isn`t unemployment much higher in states that are heavily unionized ?
Stock market going down ?? Part of it is because people are told capital gains and dividend taxes are going up . Guess what ... you sell now to save money ... I did .
Second , go back and check, but when the Democrats increased the minimum wage recently , the unemployment rate went up the next month .... Bush`s fault ??
Don`t get me wrong ... there is plenty of blame for both parties , but I believe it was Chris Dodd and Barney Fwank that were heavily involved in the fiasco at Fannie May and Freddie Mac ... and yes , Republicans were also involved , but not to the extent those two were ... and this was the final straw ,imo , that brought everything down .
Raise taxes on the evil rich ? Must be nice to be able to legally steal someone`s money and give it to someone else ... oh , I forget , they don`t really need all that money they worked for .
Read Ayn Rand`s book ... Atlas Shrugged .

[nevermind65]

Originally Posted by Bobcat

Nevermind65 .... "the economy sucks under Bush and unemployment just skyrocketed " ... I spent my working life in manufacturing and sales . Still have contacts there. Food for thought ... Obama says he is going to give Unions an open ballot for elections ... no more secret ballots . This opens folks up to all sorts of pressure from the Union organizers and will make organizing plants/workplaces much easier . I have been told that some companies are already shedding people ( they are an expense that can be reduced ) while they can and also speeding up automation plans .
Maybe it`s my imagination , but isn`t unemployment much higher in states that are heavily unionized ?
Stock market going down ?? Part of it is because people are told capital gains and dividend taxes are going up . Guess what ... you sell now to save money ... I did .
Second , go back and check, but when the Democrats increased the minimum wage recently , the unemployment rate went up the next month .... Bush`s fault ??
Don`t get me wrong ... there is plenty of blame for both parties , but I believe it was Chris Dodd and Barney Fwank that were heavily involved in the fiasco at Fannie May and Freddie Mac ... and yes , Republicans were also involved , but not to the extent those two were ... and this was the final straw ,imo , that brought everything down .
Raise taxes on the evil rich ? Must be nice to be able to legally steal someone`s money and give it to someone else ... oh , I forget , they don`t really need all that money they worked for .
Read Ayn Rand`s book ... Atlas Shrugged .

Obviously you missed my whole point. To sit there and say "the sky is falling" when somebody has yet to even take office is a bit like crying wolf. I'm not a union fan and never claimed to be. I personally think they are driving the prevailing wage lower with all their antics. On the flip side though, we continually see manufacturing leaving overseas and while the middle class has only seen small wage increases over the years, the elite of our society has benefitted massively from the tax cuts and freebies.

Say what you want, but it is pretty obvious that all those tax cuts over the last few years haven't seemed to create a lot of permanent jobs since the unemployment rate is skyrocketing.

As for the market, I'm buying like mad. 20 some years left to retirement and guaranteed it will rebound a few times between now and then. There is way too much money in the market for it to be so low.

[Cobrabill]

Originally Posted by Bobcat

and yes , Republicans were also involved ,

That would be incorrect.ALL people invloved(making decisions) at Fannie & Freddie were Democrats.

[Bobcat]

Guys ... maybe I put it poorly . Nevermind 65 , maybe I did miss your point and if so I apologize . I agree that we don`t know what our new President will do yet , however , when he says some of the things he says , people react . One of the reactions was to the new power unions could have. I had one company owner tell me he would seriously consider firing all his employees and hire all temps from an agency . This would allow him to get rid of anyone who wasn`t working out with no Union problems and also have other benefits for him .
This gets a little involved on manufacturing going overseas and jobs leaving , but when the tax burden is so heavy on industry , they look for ways to maximize profits . When Daimler and Chrysler merged , the reason the new company was based in Europe instead of the US was because there was roughly a 16% advantage to incorporate in Europe .
Please understand that I am probably unhappier than most about jobs going overseas as I have been involved with manufacturing all my working life and was/am damn proud of " Made in America " and still buy American wherever I can .
Cobrabill ... what I should have said was that the Republicans can share blame for not screaming bloody murder about what was happening . Keeping quiet means they are also to blame in my mind .