Property Taxes

An Outrage: 21,000 Wealthy Americans Avoid Paying ANY Income Tax!

Deductions and exemptions in the US Tax Code have allowed approximately 21,000 wealthy Americans, including billionaires, to avoid paying ANY income tax to the US government!

How can one avoid paying taxes?

Donations to charity
Earning income overseas
Writing off doctor bills
Investing in state and local governments

This number, 21,000, is only one half of one percent of the 4 million taxpayers who make up the top 3 percent. So no one is saying that the wealthy do not pay taxes, as a group, but many pay only what Mitt Romney pays, less than 15 percent, because they do not work for a living, and instead make their income primarily on investments.

Altogether, about 3 million people who earn more than $50,000 pay no federal income taxes, while 56 million Americans who earn less than $50,000 avoid federal income taxes.

While there is a lot of anger about the 56 million, realize most of these people make so little, far less than $25,000 for most, and continue to pay medicare and social security taxes and sales and property taxes, and cannot make ends meet as it is, while the 21,000 who are wealthy and avoid taxes could contribute a decent percentage of their income, but have lawyers and accountants to avoid their responsibilities!

There is a dire need to crack down on tax avoiders, but it will not happen under a President Romney, and in fact, will only get worse if the former Massachusetts Governor is elected President, while the poor and working class will actually have more taken from them, when they already have so little!

The False Argument About Federal Income Tax Collection From Low Income Earners

Conservatives LOVE to point out that 47 percent of the American people pay no federal income tax, and that it should be required that everyone contribute, before we raise taxes on the extremely wealthy and the corporations!

The fact is that the reason that so many Americans do NOT pay federal income tax is because their earned income is so low, or because of various deductions that are available to everyone in theory. And the wealthy get a lot more benefit out of using these tax deductions!

The fact that corporations and the wealthy pay very low taxes as compared to their income does not bother conservatives, but damn it, those poor people or single mothers MUST pay their fair share, which would, at the most, be maybe under $25 per year if a minimum was required.

That is NOT going to resolve the issue of collection of enough taxation to deal with federal budget demands!

And, of course, those who do not pay federal income tax because of low income, still pay the payroll tax on Social Security and Medicare, which can be quite a burden on a low income, while for Social Security, if one earns more than $106,800, they pay NO additional Social Security tax!

Additionally, all taxpayers pay state and local sales taxes and property taxes if they own their home, and this can be quite a burden on low income earners!

So the argument about federal tax collection is a FALSE argument, and conservatives should be criticized for their lack of honesty about the matter!

Florida Governor Rick Scott: The “King” Vs. The Legislature And The People!

Today marks the beginning of the Florida legislative session, with more than a two thirds majority of Republicans in both houses, but a new Republican Governor who fought the establishment and won the Governorship, and has acted as if he is a monarch, since he became Governor nine weeks ago!

Despite his involvement in Medicare scams in the 1990s, for which he should have gone to federal prison instead of paying heavy fines, Scott utilized $73 million of his own fortune to win the Governorship by the smallest margin in Florida history, about 50,000 votes. He was the only Governor candidate nationally, and actually the only wealthy person to win public office mostly based on his personal fortune, other than Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson. Like Ron Johnson, he ran as the anti establishment candidate of the Tea Party Movement, and he has already shown evidence that he does not wish to cooperate with his own party leadership, and to act stubborn and inflexible, and ignore the news media as much as he can.

Scott has enraged many, including his own Republican Party, by canceling the bullet train project from Orlando to Tampa, turning down $2.4 billion, which now will go elsewhere, while Florida lags on planning future transportation needs in central Florida.

Scott has refused to allow a prescription data base to keep track of pill mills, which have become endemic in South Florida, and with Florida leading the nation with drug addicts based on illegal pill prescriptions, on the basis of privacy rights, even though 42 other states have such databases. This is insane, with the reality that there are more pill mills in Broward County, Florida, alone than there are McDonalds or Starbucks in that county, with its main center being Fort Lauderdale.

Scott sold two state jet airplanes without legislative permission, and that will lead to increased costs for future Governors when they need to purchase a plane, as Scott is using his own private plane, and not thinking of future costs.

Scott unveiled his two year budget plan before a Tea Party crowd, rather than before Republican colleagues or the mainstream news media. He is calling for more than $3 billion in cuts in education and health care, while drastically decreasing corporate income taxes and property taxes by $1.7 billion, and cutting state regulation of utilities and insurance companies. College tuitions would skyrocket, and Scott has rejected taking federal funds to start implementation of the Obama Health Care Plan, and is fighting in court to repeal it.

Scott also wants to end teacher tenure, force major pension contributions by state workers, cut unemployment benefits and Medicaid, privatize state prisons, and end collective bargaining as is being attempted in Wisconsin and Ohio, and already exists in Indiana.

Scott is a nightmare even to his own party, and although they are very conservative, many of them are upset at his haughty, arrogant, dictatorial approach, as if there is no legislature or courts, and that somehow he expects that everything he wants to do will be done because KING RICK wants it so!

There is, as reported earlier, a move to pass a recall law, and some even wonder if Scott could someday face impeachment if he refuses to recognize the role of compromise, even within his own party in the legislature, let alone considering the opposition.

Florida seems to be on the road to total disaster, with the state, already in the bottom ten in education and other social services, about to face a political, social and economic crisis that will put it front and center, even ahead of Wisconsin and Ohio and other states with “bully” Governors!