Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

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Reub
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Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by Reub »

http://www.infowars.com/cameron-fleeing ... -collapse/

Who can blame the top 1% for looking to leave when the left is targeting them?
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MediumTex
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by MediumTex »

Where are they going?

If they are running AWAY from the U.S., where are they running TO?

The article talks about spiraling U.S. tax rates.  I wasn't aware that there had been anything but tax cuts over the last 11 years (at the federal level at least).

The article also talks about a few high profile people essentially buying second homes in different places around the world.  That's hardly "fleeing" the U.S.
Last edited by MediumTex on Fri Feb 03, 2012 12:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by MediumTex »

Reub wrote: http://www.infowars.com/cameron-fleeing ... -collapse/

Who can blame the top 1% for looking to leave when the left is targeting them?
Wait a second, wasn't it "the left" that basically made sure that all of the 1% in the FIRE sector were protected from the consequences of their own poor risk management by shifting their losses onto the public's balance sheet?

If I was Lloyd Blankfein or Jamie Dimon I would be carrying a Barack Obama lunchbox I would be such a big fan.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by stone »

Reub, don't you see a vital distinction between scapegoating people who have lots of money and merely wanting to reduce the political influence that money has or the extent to which money can be used to gather more money especially if that entails distorting the economy and the government in order to do that?
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

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Where are they running to?  The low-tax utopia of Somalia?  The U.S. is still a pretty stable, free place for a wealthy man and his money.

Also, define "targeting."  Simply returning to the capital gain & dividend rates of Ronal Reagan doesn't seem to be something that warrants mass exodus from the country.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by TripleB »

moda0306 wrote: Also, define "targeting."  Simply returning to the capital gain & dividend rates of Ronal Reagan doesn't seem to be something that warrants mass exodus from the country.
If we simply returned to the voting system of the early 1900's, would that not be targeting women?

If we simply returned to the civil rights system of the 1950's, would that not be targeting blacks?

From my understanding if we set capital gains and dividends at the marginal tax level, that would effectively more than double the taxes of wealthy Americans.

On one hand you can argue that they can afford it. On the other hand, capital gains and dividends earnings have already been taxed at the corporate level, and the money invested in those companies was earned as regular income from a job, which was taxed once already anyway. Add in inflation-tax and now the dividend/capital gains tax is a 4th level of taxation.

To me, all capital gains/dividends taxes should be repealed entirely. None of it is "fair" to anyone, regardless of income level.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by stone »

The UK might still be set up as a perfect hideaway for non-doms. Central London is oligarch central.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/03/2 ... 3C20110323
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by moda0306 »

TripleB,

Those examples are irrelevant when it’s the right claiming that we’re seeing unprecedented levels of taxation when it’s sorely obvious it’s not the case.  If you think we were more oppressed in the 1980’s, then trying to make the argument that things are significantly worse today gets increasingly difficult.  This is implied by conservatives' arguments today about taxation... that we're seeing things we haven't seen before if Obama hikes taxes.

Further, capital gains are often NOT already taxed.  C-Corps are only one type of entity that allows for large amounts of capital flow from retirement plans and lazy savers (not a pejorative).  A lot of private equity is done through partnerships that aren’t taxed at the entity level.  This leaves a huge preference for those taking income in this form.  And every business is free to exist as a pass-through entity if it so pleases, so they have options that for some odd reason they choose to overlook...

Let’s examine this thing we call a “corporation”? for a second… it’s an entity through which many argue that profits should flow tax-free, but liability for bad behavior should stop, entirely.  It’s backed by a legal/securities framework that allows people to buy and sell ownership like chips at a craps table… ownership of a business and entrepreneurialism used to be about long-term ideas and business plans, not quarterly profits and day trading.

The protection this legal framework offers to investors is huge, but the nature of it is anything but natural.  The reason corps even allow themselves to be taxed at C-corp tax rates, as opposed to the very available pass-through business structure, is the supreme access to capital the legal & liability framework give.  I don’t feel like this is really natural, and it creates group traps galore (HB term)… if we’re going to use corps to filter responsibility for peoples’ actions out of the system and create a completely contrived ownership framework (gov’t backed), as well as treat corporations like they have the rights of individuals, then profits being taxed twice is hardly a crime.
Last edited by moda0306 on Fri Feb 03, 2012 9:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by stone »

TripleB wrote: To me, all capital gains/dividends taxes should be repealed entirely. None of it is "fair" to anyone, regardless of income level.
TripleB, to me the issue is that although the acorn that started it all may have been earned payment for providing work or whatever, an oak tree of wealth can then grow from that initial seed money with virtually all of the oak tree being money passively harvested using money. Think of our PP's. They gained 4% above inflation and we provided nothing to anyone in order to take that money from them. Compound that over the years and we will have confiscated a lot.

What really first struck me was looking at the finances of the Wellcome Trust (a medical research foundation). They had £1B in 1986 and have £14B now and yet spend £700M per year and have only gained money from holding assets. That is simply what everyone with such asset holdings does. A bigger and bigger slice of the pie gets taken simply by holding assets.
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Re: Top 1% Leaving U.S. At Highest Rate In History

Post by stone »

Gumby found a link with those kind of ideas in it:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_democracy
"in his book Labor and Other Capital (1849), American businessman Edward Kellogg (1790–1858), said:
Money power is not only the most governing and influential, but it is also the most unjust and deceitful of all earthly powers. It entails upon millions excessive toil, poverty and want, while it keeps them ignorant of the cause of their sufferings; for, with their tacit consent, it silently transfers a large share of their earnings into the hands of others, who have never lifted a finger to perform any productive labor.[22]
While he considers these functions a public wrong, Kellogg also asserted the responsibility of the public to find and implement a remedy."
"Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment." - Mulla Nasrudin
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