Posted by
darrel on Tuesday, February 24, 2009 11:47:43 AM
Comrade Chairman Obama has declared that he is going to raise the taxes on the rich. Some would guess that he would only let the Bush tax cuts lapse and return to the high rate of 39% for the top earners. I’m betting that the increase on the “very richest” will bring the top rate to much higher. But….who pays the tax increases that the very rich are charged? As Walter Williams would say “If you said the little man, the consumer, go to the head of the class”.
Big manufacturers and retailers don’t pay their taxes; we do. I’m not saying this to rag on the big businesses; it is just a fact of life. I have nothing but respect for the big businesses of this country, as long as they aren’t taking government handouts. The only monies that big business has is what we as consumers trade them for. We get their goods or services and in turn, we give them the fruits of our labor. It has always been a fair trade, or we wouldn’t have done it.
So, now the question begs for an answer: Who is going to be hurt the most by a tax increase on the “very richest”? I say it is going to be you and me, not the “very richest”.
When I go into a Wal-Mart and buy $100 worth of their product today, I will take out of their store a quantity of goods equal in value to my $100 bill, or I wouldn’t have done it. I may have liked the price to have been lower, but by making the purchase, I have agreed that their goods were equal to my pay for them. Nobody forced me to buy what I did, I declared when I bought the items that I was in agreement with the price charged.
Enter the new tax structure, increasing the tax on the “very richest” to let’s just guess, 45% or more. Wal-Mart now has to pay the higher taxes, and the only way they can pay it is by raising the cost of their goods. Let’s also agree that those on the bottom rung of the ladder get the expected lowering of taxes that Chairman O has promised, or about ten to fifteen dollars a week, give or take a cup of coffee or two. We would have already spent that fifteen or so dollars on the increase in the cost of a gallon of gas to get us back and forth from work, the cost of groceries that go into our lunchbox, the clothes we need for work, as well as the tools, and just about everything else we will be needing. Now, comes the weekend and we go to Wal-Mart to buy our $100 worth of goods, only to find out that the total amount we get for our $100 bill is quite a bit less. Therefore, in order to get the same amount of goods that we bought before the tax increase on the “very richest”, we have to fork over more of our take home pay.
The result is that the “very richest” remain the very richest while those on the bottom rung of the ladder who can afford it the least come out on the short end.
Tax cuts on the “very richest” benefit all of us. What needs to be done is government needs to learn, like the rest of America, to live within their means. Unless and until we can force government to live within a reasonable budget, such as under constitutional restraints, we will continue to have out of control government spending, for which they can only pay by taking our money by force, since they produce nothing of value that they can trade to us.
Don’t misunderstand what I am saying. I am not anywhere near the “very richest” in America, but if I need a job, I’m sure not going to get one from the poorest in America. If government keeps taxing the very richest, none of us will be able to find a job, as the smartest of that group will continue to move offshore, leaving us here at home wondering what happened. Government happened!