And yet still, those 10%ers provide 70% of the countries tax revenues. Bunch of slackers!:rolleyes:

Get your head out folks. They’re carrying you. Not only are they providing the vast majority of the tax revenue, but those are the folks making jobs. I’ve never seen a poor guy make jobs for anyone.

OASDI and Medicare are technically mandatory insurance premiums, not income taxes, and they're levied only on earned income. Almost all of Buffet's income is "unearned." He does pay himself a salary of about $100k/year, which he pays OASDI and Medicare taxes on. Buffet pays roughly the same OASDI and Medicare premiums as his secretary, and he receives roughly the same OASDI and Medicare benefits as his secretary. That seams roughly fair to me.

Wealth accumulation is not a "thorny problem," unless you're a militant socialist who wants a nation of peasants who are dependent on government for their survival, and therefore grateful for and obedient to said government.

another way

Pretty sure it is a tax. I bet somewhere along the line the SCOTUS said so too.

It works like a tax, the Congress can change the tax rate and the payments whenever they want, it is a tax. It is a payroll tax, not a sales tax, not an income tax, not an excise tax, but it is a tax.

Everybody calls it a tax.

The newest tax on every American has two components. . Is the tariff on goods from China. Tariffs are to protect the home market manufactures.

That tariff protects none to my knowledge or such an insignifigant amount. It has to be considered a very broad based tax. Even Trump stated he was impressed with the amount flowing into the treasury from it.

The second component is the huge markups on most Chinese goods sold in north America. These markups are based on their cost. So a nominal fifteen percent increase at cost. Is really a lot of money at retail. So to me that tarrif also enriched retailers.

Retailers other than the massive chains are being driven out of business. People basically window shop them and order the identical item off the internet from suppliers with no overhead.

A smart internet sales operation would even engage drop shipping. I already see this where you order from an American source and the item is shipped to you from China.

Medicare is more of a tax, because you pay a fixed rate on all earned income, and Buffet's Medicare benefits are the same as some peasant who made $15k/year their whole life.

But, OASDI is more of an insurance premium, in that your maximum payment is capped, and your benefits are based on how much you paid in.

You have rights with insurance that you don’t get with SS. They can change SS tomorrow after you have paid in for forty years. Can’t do that with insurance.

Yeah, the most important one is that SS is far beyond broke. Yet, we still have to pay "premiums." If we don't, an IRS SWAT will show up at our house pointing sub-machine guns at us. Great!

Which makes them taxes, not premiums.

You don’t pay your premiums, you lose your insurance. You don’t pay your taxes, and you lose your liberty, or your possessions.

The "I" in "OASDI" specifically stands for INSURANCE.

I hope you don't believe that meme. Please tell me that should have been posted in the thread about political humor.

The insurance companies just change their name and address.