2008-10-26

Adam Smith the Socialist

It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.
So there.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Do you think this is what he had in mind?

The Top 1% of earners pay @40% of all taxes.
The Top 5% of earners pay @60% of all taxes.
The bottom 50% of earners only pay @3% of all taxes.

So, while the statistical average may be something like 25K per taxpayer, thats because those top 5% pay many, many times that amount each, and the lower 50% pay much less than that...in fact most of the lower 50% pay no tax and actually get money back...through earned income credits, etc.

and if we like adam smith quotes:

(refering to taxes)First, the levying of it may require a great number of officers... Secondly, it may obstruct the industry of the people, and discourage them from...business
(wealth of nations, book 5, chapter 2, part 2)


Ann Rand anyone...

Anonymous said...

This might also be helpful

The top-earning 25 percent of taxpayers (AGI over $62,068) earned 67.5 percent of nation's income, but they paid more than four out of every five dollars collected by the federal income tax (86 percent). The top 1 percent of taxpayers (AGI over $364,657) earned approximately 21.2 percent of the nation's income (as defined by AGI), yet paid 39.4 percent of all federal income taxes. That means the top 1 percent of tax returns paid about the same amount of federal individual income taxes as the bottom 95 percent of tax returns.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/22652.html

Anonymous said...

During 2006, Tax Foundation economists estimate that roughly 43.4 million tax returns, representing 91 million individuals, will face a zero or negative tax liability. That's out of a total of 136 million federal tax returns that will be filed. Adding to this figure the 15 million households and individuals who file no tax return at all, roughly 121 million Americans—or 41 percent of the U.S. population—will be completely outside the federal income tax system in 2006.1 This total includes those who pay no tax, and those who pay some tax upfront and are later refunded the full amount of the tax paid or more.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/show/1410.html