From: bzs@ussr.std.com (Barry Shein)
Subject: Re: Tax the POOR, not the rich!
Organization: The World
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 1992 03:26:29 GMT


Sometimes I wonder if Murphy is purposely baiting...

From: murph@buscard.fidonet.org (Brian Murphy)
>Mr. News is misleading when he calls for the wealthy paying "their fair
>share" of taxes.  There is nothing "fair" about the tax burden of the wealthy
>as they take from government far less than the poor.

It's not normally the taxes the wealthy pay vs the taxes the poor pay,
it's normally wealthy vs the great middle class.

Obviously poor people don't pay much in taxes, although there has been
a definite trend away from income level as a source of tax revenue
towards income-insensitive taxes like gasoline, usage fees, etc.

>The wealthy have less
>use for police services than the poor;

Why would you believe this? They certainly have more to lose and make
more obvious targets.

Ever try to find a cop in a poor neighborhood? Try it some time, then
try it again in a wealthy neighborhood and tell us who is getting the
police tax dollars.

>they generally arrange their lives in
>such a way as to provide for their own security.

Strange generalization, why do you believe this one? Do you mean they
tend live in wealthy neighborhoods where muggings etc are less common?
I'll buy that.

However, that doesn't indicate that less dollars are spent per-capita
on police services in such neighborhoods. Would you be willing to make
that claim? If not, doesn't your whole argument kind of fall flat?

>Poor people break more laws.

Again, it's not poor vs wealthy, it's middle class vs wealthy.

It's not clear that the poor break more laws, perhaps they're just
charged and convicted more often. If poor people broke more laws
perhaps they wouldn't be so poor. Most farmers, by head count, in this
country are poor, dirt poor. Do you think they break more laws than
the wealthy, on average?

>The wealthy generally avoid public education but still pay for it.

Yet still benefit from public education as they need to hire people
who can read and write in order to build and maintain their wealth.

Or do you propose that wealthy people do all the bank teller'ing,
stock broker'ing, working their own factories etc?

>The list
>goes on - I think you get the pix.

Yes, that as usual you haven't a clue?

>I favor a flat tax rate - EVEN at 10-15% and higher - providing there are
>absolutely NO exceptions and deductions.  A flat tax is fairer and will
>encourage greater compliance.

But Murphy, that's the classic position in favor of taxing the
wealthy. They already pay typically 10-15% or less, often much less,
and benefit the most from exceptions and deductions.

You really are confused.

>As the tax code is now, tax breaks for the wealthy are necessary if you expect
>these same wealthy people to provide the jobs that everyone else needs.  Of
>course, some of the breaks are absurd but by and large the breaks offer
>incentive to do good with the money as in deducting contributions to
>charitable endeavors.

When was the last time you studied the tax codes? Might you list some
popular tax deductions taken by people earning over $500,000/year and
pay less than $50K in taxes?

Or, as we suspect, are you utterly without a clue as to what you are
talking about?

It's the contentless generalizations Murph, they give you away like a
sweat socks at a formal.

--
        -Barry Shein

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