Posted on 09/17/2011 4:54:13 PM PDT by kristinn
WASHINGTON — President Obama on Monday will call for a new minimum tax rate for individuals making more than $1 million a year to ensure that they pay at least the same percentage of their earnings as middle-income taxpayers, according to administration officials.
With a special joint Congressional committee starting work to reach a bipartisan budget deal by late November, the proposal adds a new and populist feature to Mr. Obama’s effort to raise the political pressure on Republicans to agree to higher revenues from the wealthy in return for Democrats’ support of future cuts from Medicare and Medicaid.
Mr. Obama, in a bit of political salesmanship, will call his proposal the “Buffett Rule,” in a reference to Warren E. Buffett, the billionaire investor who has complained repeatedly that the richest Americans generally pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than do middle-income workers, because investment gains are taxed at a lower rate than wages.
Mr. Obama will not specify a rate or other details, and it is unclear how much revenue his plan would raise. But his idea of a millionaires’ minimum tax will be prominent in the broad plan for long-term deficit reduction that he will outline at the White House on Monday.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
HOW MUCH IS BUFFETT’S BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY BACK-TAX BILL EXACTLY? ABOUT $1 BILLION
According to Berkshire’s 2010 annual report, the company has been in a near decade-long struggle with the IRS over its own taxes. Using public documents, a certified public accountant detailed Berkshire’s tax problems to Americans for Limited Government researcher Richard McCarty, revealing the damage could be close to $1 billion. Netright Daily adds:
According to page 56 of the company report, “At December 31, 2010… net unrecognized tax benefits were $1,005 million”, or about $1 billion. McCarty explained, “Unrecognized tax benefits represent the company’s potential future obligation to the IRS and other taxing authorities. They have to be recorded in the company’s financial statements.”
He added, “The notation means that Berkshire Hathaway’s own auditors have probably said that $1 billion is more likely than not owed to the government.”
$1 billion is not an insignificant chunk of change, even for Buffett, representing about 0.2 percent of the company’s $372 billion in total assets.
>>Why is it that whenever they raise taxes on the “rich”
the “poor” end up paying more.
Because the rich contribute a lot of money to Democrats and the poor are easily lied to.
And the middle class has no advocates in government.
I actually voted for Forbes on that issue.
One of the unintended consequence of this will be to make “tax free” bonds taxable, and thus will cause people to bid up their yield to compensate. This means higher costs for the state and local government entities such as school districts to pay more in interest costs.
How many billion in taxes does Buffett’s company owe the government? Let him pay up!
Yup. The WTF group at the white hut calls this effort: F*** Success!
Federal Employees owe $3.3 Billion dollars in back taxes! (click here for link)
“Ask.”
By the way, do Obama and Biden still Itemize on their their 1040?
What was it Albert Einstein said about insanity?
Oprah Winfrey, Bill Cosby, Famous AMOS, 60 percent of the NFL,
75 percent of the NBA, et. al. But they will all vote for Obama again.
So lower payroll taxes, if they’re higher than capital gains taxes. Lower taxes = higher share of tax revenues coming from. Higher taxes = lower share of revenues coming from. Warren Buffet can give all his income to the federal government, for all I care.
Well obviously then, he knows what he is talking about. There was a recent report of a number of large corporations that pay no tax whatsoever, or even get money from the government. Another thing, so long as the super rich, the world’s dictators, etc. can park their money in Switzerland, Caribbean banks, etc. we will all continue to be robbed. We can’t just change the laws here, they have to be changed throughout the world.
That pitter patter of feet you hear isn’t from a baby, but the sound of the millionaires in this country running to their jets to leave and never come back.
....Buffet refuses to pay his taxes now.
What good will another law do? (Especially a law enforced by his friends like Obama?)
I don’t know. 15% of $10,000 is $1500. That its too much for to pay. How about no vote allowed for people living off the government?
Why is it that whenever they raise taxes on the "rich" they continue to spend more.
“And, why doesn’t this administration go after the Federal Employees and Federal Retirees for the 3.3 BILLION dollars owed in back taxes?”
Good point. (And the Billion dollars that Buffett’s firm owes.)
Two big problems with this: First, Obama keeps conflating millionaires and billionaires, raising pictures in people’s minds of the latter while hammering the former. Second, many people who earn a million in a year don’t do so again for many years, and didn’t do so for many years before. They have simply had a good year, built upon their hard work before, and in expectation of which they will work in the future, or they’ve sold a business or asset. Obama’s wish to hit them hard during their one year of good luck while his crony capitalist friends are pulling in tens of millions year after year is dispicable.
But that is good that it is “too much”.
Those people who feel that way now have an incentive to vote for less spending to lower their tax rate instead of demanding somebody else pay their way.
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