Monday, June 08, 2009

Defining Wealthy Down

Remember those of us who said that Obama would have to lower the bar for what is considered “wealthy” in order to pay for his spending?  It’s happening. 

President Barack Obama wants Congress to consider taxing the wealthy instead of workers to pay for a health-care overhaul, as House Democrats discuss a plan to require health insurance for most Americans.

[...]

Obama’s own proposal would set a 28 percent cap on tax deductions for items such as mortgage interest, investment expenses and charitable gifts for Americans in the two highest tax brackets, which would be 36 percent and 39.6 percent under his proposals. Without the cap, they would be able to deduct 36 cents and 39.6 cents on the dollar for those expenses, respectively.

This would apply to single taxpayers making $171,550 and higher.  $208,850 for a married couple.  So much for the old yarn about his tax increases not hitting anybody earning less than $250,000.

BTW, by the end of his presidency, the threshold for being “wealthy” will go even lower.

(8) Comments
Posted by Owen at 0640 hrs
Politics + Politics - General

  1. Wealthy will be anyone who doesn’t work for the government at that point, assuming there will be any other type of work left here.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 08, 2009 at 1221 hrs


  2. Is anyone really surprised by this? It was inevitable.

    And that’s on top of the past four months of unemployment data. Seems that since the unemployment stats were first compiled in 1948, the past four months have seen the fastest rise in unemployment in any other four month span. Not much tax being collected by th 9.4% of the workforce now unemployed. Wow that stimulus is really working well!

    Or maybe this is the “funemployment” at work?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 08, 2009 at 1252 hrs


  3. The Obama administration is setting themselves up for even greater failure with these bad tax policies. Let me explain.

    1) By eliminating these tax benefits it eliminates there value, so why should I have a mortgage if the interest is no longer deductible. So instead of paying my mortgage monthly, I will make additional payments to pay off the mortgage and not spend money in the economy. Good for me, debt free quicker, bad for the economy, no money being spent.

    2) By eliminating the tax deductions on certain items people will reduce their contributions. Charities will receive less and people will look to Uncle Sam for more aid and assistance, therefore requiring more government spending and less funds for debt reduction. Bad for Obama.

    3) This bad economy has finally gotten Americans to think about their personal finances. Every American should eliminate all debt including mortgages, covert all IRA’s to Roths in 2010 and then focus on building a retirement nest egg of tax free ROTH IRA accounts. The governments tax collections will go up for a year or two and then be completely gone for the future as all retirement savings will be in tax free accounts and americans will be better off.

    In the end Obama will fail in that the tax revenues he needs will not be there, the future tax revenues will also be gone and expenditures will continue to increase. Too bad Obama.

    Hows that Hope and Change thing working for you now?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 08, 2009 at 1524 hrs


  4. Gee ... what a shock.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 08, 2009 at 1736 hrs


  5. Well, it’s something to “change,” all right…

    Posted by Calvin on June 08, 2009 at 2136 hrs


  6. Obama ecourages everyone to go back to school to obtain a better job. Let’s say you do the right thing and get a higher education - and alongthe way meet a wonderful person in one of your classes and get married soon after graduating. You both work hard and move up the coporate ranks to the point where your dual income exceeds $209K. Your President wants to now punish you for your success. The message is: stay out of school, do drugs and live off of the free handout of the government. Thank you Mr. President!

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 09, 2009 at 0904 hrs


  7. Roth’s will not save you. When they start running out of things to tax, they will start licking their chops at all the tax free money out there.

    Just remember it took a Carter to get a Reagan.

    Help is on the way…

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 09, 2009 at 1247 hrs


  8. Bill,

    You’ve been reading Nick Murray!

    The government cant tax an account that was funded with taxable contributions, and taxed conversions. They have already had their bites at the apple. This is the best time for investors, you convert your beaten down holdings, convert them at a low cost,minimizing your tax burden, then hold the investments until they return to their pre Obama meltdown values. So when your accounts are back to decent levels you have avoided the tax burden.

    With Obama though you never know what he will tax to remake America into the 60’s hippe world that he and his liberal elitists think it should be.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on June 09, 2009 at 1854 hrs


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