The Biden Presidency

Here's the national debt since 1900: The national debt has never been paid off, so why do you think that yours is the generation that will be asked to pay it off? Why do you think our national debt is particularly onerous?A certain amount of our taxes goes to pay off the interest and some of the principle of the national debt each year. What proportion of our taxes is paid by each income group? According to one conservative group, the trend has been for the rich to pay an increasing proportion of the national tax bill since 1980: (I spent a few minutes seeking confirmation of the information in this graph but came up dry - perhaps someone knows a source that would confirm or deny this.) Who is saying you'll be slapped with a bill for your share of the national debt? What propagandists are you listening to? Tucker Carlson? NewsMax?The reality is that you'll continue to pay taxes according to your tax bracket. Given your income ($27,000/year) and the standard exemption, your effective tax rate is almost zero.You're living in a fantasy world of conservative construction because it's much more exciting than the mundane world you actually inhabit. You've got this inner need to bring the message of salvation to the world, whether it be financial or religious, but you have enormous difficulty saying anything that is actually true. This is because you choose your facts based on who sounds most convincing to you rather than on actual facts. You're destined to be a sucker all your life.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar.

Cannot find any original source but this does seem to be a popular chart.Who Pays Income Taxes? - Foundation - National Taxpayers UnionSTUMP » Articles » Taxing Tuesday: Look Back to Olden Times and What Awaits Us in 2021 » 12 January 2021, 16:52a few more.Seems to be making the rounds in right-wing republican sites.

I found similar figures published from heritage.org (the name indicating its a right-wing propaganda purpose). Since I cannot post graphics, here's the information that I copied off:

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FEDERAL INCOME TAXES AND ADJUSTED GROSS INCOME EARNED IN 2018
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INCOME GROUP (Income Range)     SHARE OF ALL INCOME EARNED     SHARE OF ALL INCOME TAXES PAID
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Bottom 50% ( < $43,600 )        12% of all income              3% share of all income taxes paid
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Top 25%-50% ( $43,600 - $87k )  19% of all income              10% share of all income taxes paid
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Top 10%-25% ( $87k - $152k )    21% of all income              16% share of all income taxes paid
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Top 5%-10% ( $152k - $218k )    11% of all income              11% share of all income taxes paid
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Top 2%-5% ( $218k - $540k )     16% of all income              20% share of all income taxes paid
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Top 1% ( > $540k )              21% of all income              40% share of all income taxes paid

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Does everyone see their trick? The top 1% (about 3 million Americans) is defined as anyone with an income greater than $540,000, just a tiny bit more than a measly half million. That lumps together an extremely wide range of incomes, thus completely dodging the question while creating a false and misleading narrative.The VOX video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXCGbAv8YPw , presents a bar graph to show who pays the most (in terms of the percentage of their income) of four kinds of taxes: income tax (progressive, so the richer pay a higher percentage), corporate and property taxes (mostly the wealthier, but the poor pay property taxes indirectly through their rent), payroll taxes (the more you earn the more you pay but only up to a point in that only the first $130,000 of your salary is taxed, so the top earners don't pay more), estate taxes (again, only the richer), and consumption taxes (everybody gets hit more or less equally, except the poor pay a much higher percentage of their income since they have to spend every dime they make, whereas the rich can only buy so much and still have money left over). Factoring in all the kinds of taxation we find that every group pays about the same percentage, except for one particular group.The bar graph starts with 10 bars, one for each 10% of taxpayers, so its top group is the 10% richest. But then it adds an 11th bar, the 400 richest individuals, the billionaires. That would be the top 0.00012 %, or the top 0.012% of the top 1%. The video's analysis shows that those top 400 individuals do in fact not pay their fair share. And that is what this issue is about.So these figures being circulating are hiding that top 10,000th of one percent by lumping them in with the poorest of the top 1% who make only one-half to one million a year.For us to see what's really happening, they would need to break down that top 1% and show us the figures for that. Which they will never do since they want to avoid the truth. Figures don't lie, but liars sure can figure.Edited by dwise1, : Added "in terms of the percentage of their income"

Edited by dwise1, : Added "individuals" to describe the top 400

Anybody (who owned no house, had no kids, no spouse) making under $600 a week was very easily able to see the much lower federal income tax rates.Many poor white & minority voters were inclined to thank Trump at the ballot box due to the unmistakably lower taxes.That said, the payroll and sales taxes will put the poor in a very similar tax situation with the higher income earners. But the poor probably are enjoying the lowest taxes ever paid. In the respective lifetimes. Anyway.(Dont forget that stock profits get a top federal rate under 25%, so that might be a hint as to the real EFFECTIVE max tax rate anybody upper income pays)

One of the things that somebody learns, when they live among refugees, is how many of them want to join the American miitary when they turn 18. I lost count of how many teenage ethnic Iraqi refugees I know, overheard, or heard of that wanted to serve in the American military so they could make their former homelands peaceful.Throw in alot of Syrians too.We could very easily create multiple divisions of American citizens, of Afghan ancestry, to serve in Afghanistan, EXCEPT for the fact that the interests of the people do not match the interests of the politicians and the military brass.A peace force, of willing troops, just is not on the agenda.So a complete pullout is, by far, the best choice.We imposed our corrupt "interests" on the Afghan people, thus the Afghani support for our 20 year mission is so pathetic that the speed-of-light description does not due justice when one comments on the velocity of the organic fall our puppet's land control map is experiencing.Just like South Vietnam, our effective control on Afghanistan was totally opposed by the people. The current map, as opposed to the 20 year invasion map (technically held by the puppet government), shows it.The Afghani people have voted.Look at the map.Edited by LamarkNewAge, : No reason given.

I have a question. Do any of the Afghan youth that joined the US military themselves have the ability to be evacuated along with our US personnel?If not, I think that the US is not being fair to them. We should offer them amnesty, though I can understand that we cant pull everybody out without including their families. It is a very sticky situation indeed.

I realize that you have a point, but will note that I do not listen to either Fox or NewsMax. I make up my own ideas. Im saying that the figures are so going out of sync with reality that sometime soon, we will either default or China (or someone else) will dump their dollars and send the dollar itself into orbit. The game cant be played too much longer. My point is that it is irrelevant what percentage we have to pay. The reality is that the dollar itself will be the bubble that pops. I'll admit that I dont know whether what I say is true, but I feel that I intuitively see the handwriting on the wall. What is puzzling to me is how the lot of you see no problem with the dollar bubble popping. Have you ever considered what will happen to your net worth and buying power?Don't you want to protect your own interests or do you simply think that the bills will be paid and that if the rest of the world benefits more than the US it is meant to happen?

There are non-American citizens who have joined our military. They are under orders to go where their unit goes. They cant disobey orders. I know of no order that tells them they have to leave the military and "go home". I assume your question has to do with the anti-immigration stuff in this country.I wonder if you are actually asking about the (now defeated) Afghanistan army, that we helped train, whose fighting men were under the puppet government.We only allow a severely limited number of refugees into this country per year. It was 75,000, before the Trump administration, and he lowered it to around 50,000, I think. The American people hate refugee programs, because cities designated "refugee friendly" (or something along those lines, per the State Department) will pay for 3 to 6 month's rent for the refugees. Jealous American citizens will moan and groan (just listen to some old, white homeless person bitch about how " immigrants get treated better than us deserving citizens), and not only in refugee friendly cities like Lincoln.The American people have bought the greed inspired lie that ALL 1 million per year immigrants get "free stuff" when it is actually only around 5% of immigrants - refugees.Bad immigration policy created this bottleneck.Edited by LamarkNewAge, : No reason given.

You do not make up your own ideas. Wherever they're coming from, in this thread you're pretty much following one of the Republican scripts. You've said the exact same thing before, and if I wasn't stopping myself I would cite the exact same numbers that you ignored last time. Why don't we reverse the roles. Using math, please explain how "the figures are so going out of sync with reality"?Your Chinese scenario has severe negative consequences for their economy. China dumping US treasuries would cause the dollar to drop a little but the Yuan to rise, thereby making Chinese exports more expensive internationally, driving down demand for their goods and causing widespread Chinese unemployment, an outcome China desperately needs to avoid to maintain order. The consequences for the US would be minor as the dollars, the treasure securities, would easily find a new home. China only holds $1.1 trillion of US debt - total world debt is $288 trillion. If the Chinese were to dump their US debt it would be like throwing a pebble into the ocean. Please explain how that would happen. A person of integrity waits until he knows the truth before speaking. You're just spreading Republican panic points. Please explain it to us, oh Obi-wan! Only you can save us. Of course I want to protect my interests. That's why I don't take my financial advice from an inarticulate grocery worker so unable to manage his very common medical condition that it is affecting his brain. Start saying stuff that makes sense and connecting the dots and maybe people will start paying attention.--Percy

So what if China created a new digital Yuan and tied it to Gold? You DO realize that China owns more gold than they admit in official figures. Or do you think I fell for that lie also?

I do not knowing spread Republican panic points. I spread what I hear from Libertarians. Libertarians are not Republicans.
From their website:

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As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty — a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives and no one is forced to sacrifice his or her values.

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We believe that respect for individual rights is the essential precondition for a free and prosperous world, that force and fraud must be banished from human relationships, and that only through freedom can peace and prosperity be realized.(...)When you pay taxes, do you do so voluntarily? Or do you do so because you are forced to do so?

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If you don’t pay your taxes, what will happen? Will you be fined further? Harassed by the IRS or other government entities? Jailed?

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The Libertarian Party is fundamentally opposed to the use of force to coerce people into doing anything. We think it is inherently wrong and should have no role in a civilized society.

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Thus we think that the government forcing people to pay taxes is inherently wrong.

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Libertarians advocate for voluntary exchange, where people are free to make their own choices about what to do with their lives, their time, their bodies, their livelihood, and their dollars.

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If Americans want to give money to the government for one reason or another, they should be free to do so. If Americans prefer to spend their money on other things, then they should be free to do that also.

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Edited by Phat, : added

You do realise that’s nuts? No taxes mean no military - except for private militaries. No police. No Medicare or Medicaid. No Social Security. Just a different flavour of the Right.It’s Liberty for the rich and the corporations (Jeffrey Epstein would be just fine). Oppression for people like you.

No modern economy, especially one the size of China's, could tie their currency to gold. No modern economy currently ties their currency to the value of any mineral, including gold, and there's a couple good reasons for that. One is that their economy could grow no faster than the increase in supply of the mineral. Another is that the value of their currency would be tied to the value of a mineral whose value could be manipulated by other nations.I explained all this to you a short while back - you ignored it. You are running in circles and wallowing in self-imposed ignorance.You still haven't explained why China would take an action that would cause them great harm and us little. I never thought or cared about it. Two questions:

• How do you know this?
• Why does it matter?

I think you fall for any good story. You're a snake oil salesman's dream.--Percy

Phat, seriously, get help.--Percy

Did you have a straight face when you quoted that?Do Libertarians use the roads that other people's taxes paid for? Do Libertarians use the schools that other people's taxes paid for? Do Libertarians use the water and sewage systems that other people's taxes paid for? Are Libertarians protected by the police and armed forces that other people's taxes paid for?Of all the #$%ing god-damned stupid things that you've posted, I'm nominating that one for the #$%ing god-damned stupidest.For God's sake, THINK for once.