Progressive Income Taxation, Or Any Income Tax For That Matter, MUST BE SOPPED!!!

Hi C-Mach. Thanks for opening up the debate. Since the nature of debates is to express differing opinions, please understand that anything I say should not be personally taken against you. Having said that, I'll move on to the debate. Some of your figures are not completely accurate. For the fiscal year of 2005, the top 1% of earners paid 40% of all income taxes and the top 50% paid 97%. http://www.taxfoundation.org... The wealthiest people in America have ways of getting around paying the 35% income tax bracket. Warren Buffet himself criticizes the U.S. tax system as his secretary had to pay a higher income percentage in taxes than he did. I quote "[We] pay a lower part of our income in taxes than our receptionists do, or our cleaning ladies, for that matter. If you're in the luckiest 1 per cent of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99 per cent." http://business.timesonline.co.uk... We know that the top 1% of the population pays 40% of all income taxes. However, the reason that they pay so many taxes (with all the legal advantages they get) is not that these few people are being burdened with an excessively high tax, but that they are hold an excessive amount of the nation's wealth. As one becomes excessively wealthy, the less the they spend, by percentage, on purchasing consumer products. In order to have a strong economy, the government needs to have a strong middle class because more money will be spent on consumer products. Let us look at this mathematically: Say someone who earns about $10 million per year spends about $500,000 -- 5% of their income -- on consumer goods. Now consider someone who earns $200,000 per year. This person will spend a higher percentage of her income on consumer products, say 50%, which comes out to $100,000, still less than the other person's $500,000. If every person who earns $200,000 / year each spends about 50% of their income in consumer goods, then 50 people, which collectively earn $10 million / year, will still spend 50% of those $10 million on consumer goods. However, one person who earns $10 million / year will only spend about 5% of those $10 million on consumer goods. Even if that person spent more money than each of the others alone (which is a scenario one must account for, since the richer people become, the bigger and more expensive the TV sets they buy, etc), the percentage of the total $10 million spent on consumer goods is still less when compared to the percentage spent by all the other 50 people collectively. This illustrates why it is better for the economy to spread out money more evenly, as opposed to excessively accumulating capital in the hands of few people. We avoid the latter and encourage the former through progressive income taxation. "Progressive income taxation has ruined many Americans' lives." (1) So you claim. "Make them pay for my taxes because I'm jealous of how much money they have." (2) Whoever told you this was either biased or simply prefers to remain ignorant. Notice that a stronger economy means that the country is better as a whole. Thus, we are not taxing the rich just because we're jealous of their wealth. We're taxing them more because it is what's best for the economy of the country we live in. "Remember, THEY GIVE YOU YOUR JOB." (3) You really think so? Why? Do you think that the richest people in this country are the ones that provide most jobs? "Do you want them to have a disincentive to do that? NO, OF COURSE YOU DON'T!!!" (4) If anything, progressive income taxation boosts the economy, which provides more jobs for everyone. Do you see an incentive now?