Raise taxes on the rich

[Ban my account ffs!]

Those of you that advocate this, and I know there's many of you, I have a simple question.


How?


I'm willing to entertain some scenarios here.  You tell me what Mr. RichGuy does for a living, and I tell you what I do to reduce his taxes.

For example:


1) Mr. RichGuy is an investor and a day-trader and works for himself from home.  He buys and sells all sorts of securities from all over the world.  He makes $20 million a year in profit.

Solution: Company registered in Seychelles Islands with bearer shareholders.  He is the only shareholder and his share certificates are kept in a private vault in Switzerland (contents of safe deposit boxes are not public knowledge).  His trading account is with any brokerage company in the world and the corporation authorized him as a trader on their behalf through a power of attorney form.

Is it illegal?  No, but Mr. RichGuy is supposed to disclose all money he receives from this company.  Does he?  Nope.



2) Mr. RichGuy2 owns his own internet business selling widgets.  He lives in Texas and has an office and warehouse he is renting.  He employs about 50 people that processes orders and ships the widgets.

Solution: Mr. RichGuy2 owns a corporation in Cyprus that is the sole licensed provider of said widgets worldwide.  All sales are made in Cyprus; your credit card gets charged there, money is deposited in to a bank account in Bermuda, etc., all in the name of this corporation.  This corporation is owned by a trust registered in the Netherlands Antilles.  All profits are made in the Cyprus corporation and is paid to the trust, from where it can be paid to any of the beneficiaries.  The Texas corporation invoices CyprusCorporation every month for all the widges shipped, rent, salary expense, etc.  Just enough to cover all the expenses.  As a result, the Texas company never makes a profit.

Is it illegal?  No, but Mr. RichGuy2 is supposed to disclose all the money he receives from the trust.  Does he?  No.  (Illegal)

To be legal again, the trust pays a corporate beneficiary in Denmark money.  All the investments are kept in Denmark because foreign control of a Danish corporation pretty much exempts the corporation from tax.  This corporation pays dividends to Mr. RichGuy2 in the USA, and by treaty with Denmark the tax rate on dividends out of Denmark to Mr. RichGuy2 is only 5% (or sometimes 0%).


If you make more than $500,000 a year, we can save you money.  Massive amounts of money.  We will pretty much eliminate your tax.  How aggressive and illegal you want to be is only up to you.  But why go illegal to eliminate all taxes if you only have to pay 5% and then be 100% legal?


So by all means.  Raise taxes on the rich.  It only serves to discourage the middle class (upper) from working harder.

Oh trust me, Richius... being the largest economy on earth has its benefits.  We could always pull the "if you want to do business in the United States of America, you are going to play by our rules" card.  How about a 90% tax on profits earned within the United States for companies with HQs in known tax havens.

How about a 90% inheritance tax on estates located within the U.S? 

How about a stiff luxury item tax on items either bought within or imported into the U.S? 

We can always find someone willing to point a gun at your head for failure to comply.

[Ban my account ffs!]

Raising taxes on the rich is absolutely necessary in countries where the inequalities raise a monstruous proportion as the USA. In countries who already have a solid welfare state, the only thing to do is not to lessen them ( as our dear Sarko did... ).

Thanks for this very intelligent and developped argument that makes me understand better your opinion.

Ah, Antonio, he's just a typical representative of the american working class - they don't know any better.  Strangely enough.

Antonio, when was the last time a poor employed anyone?  If the rich are taxed too much guess who they get rid of to pay the tax and stay rich..........YOU.  And if they dont buy stuff that rich peoople buy, who gets laid off.........YOU.

I wasn't under the impression that rich people used personal income to pay their staff.  Instead I was under the impression that it was revenue from the products and services they provide that pay the employees.

How do you propose fixing our budget problem?  Are we going to treat defense as a sacred cow and gut the entire welfare system?

Since you're so keen on bringing up "raising taxes kills jobs".. then we'll put it this way "cutting people off their welfare kills people."

If it's not the poor guy who dies himself, then he'll probably kill somebody else to get what he wants/needs.

We need large amounts of funding for schools, healthcare, and infrastructure with a safety net for the disabled and working poor.

Closing this deficit on the backs of the poor and lower middle class will do untold harm to this country.  Doing it on the rich will only do imaginary harm.

[Ban my account ffs!]

Does anyone who supports the "tax the rich" mantra have a real job and family responsibilities?

Contrary to conservative belief... you are not the only one paying taxes.

My sister is a mother who works 2 jobs to make ends meet.  Her jobs don't offer medical insurance, so she has none.  Her child has had medical assistance on and off, but they keep cutting it off and then she has to go through the whole application process again just to find out that her child was always eligible.  But that doesn't stop the bills from racking up.

She owes about $2500 in medical bills because she cut herself really bad last winter and had to go to the hospital in the ambulance.

Should she just go out and get a 3rd and 4th job when you cut her state support off (she had WIC and medical assistance for her son)?

Should she just not take her kid to the doctor?

All so the "rich guy" signing her paychecks (actually more like middle class small business owner) can get that extra yacht.  Poor rich guy.

Please offer a solution.  Without any kind of welfare of course, since that's what you're proposing.


Or should we consider my mom who suffered a debilitating stroke after her surgeon cut open a hernia that spread infection into her blood and caused massive hemorrhaging in her brain?  She worked her ass off for several years after that stroke, hobbling over to the lodge every morning at 7:30am, often falling (which led to sprained ankles and a broken leg), so she could run her business.  She was a dyed in the wool Republican... unfortunately she had to forego medical insurance for herself due to the extreme cost and the struggles she had with starting and running a family run resort.

Luckily in Minnesota we understand that sometimes life just plain sucks and that the least we can do is soften the blow.  Her huge medical bills were covered by the state.  She eventually lost the resort in the process, but her life was saved.

Then she finally got a job working for a friend in the hospitality business as a manager at a hotel.  Unfortunately her frail condition led to a series of falls that led to her needing brain surgeries due to a subdural hematoma.

She took the risk, opened her own business... and luck knocked her on her ass.. and she tried desperately to get back up and make things work.. but she got knocked down again.  Her doctor ordered her not to work at all... still, she took courses for medical transcription and did that for a while despite only having one working hand for typing.  Eventually that got too stressful and she had to quit that.

She paid her dues.  She lived the American dream... sending lunchmeat sandwiches with my dad to work on his 12-14 days so they could pay the mortgage on their new home and she could stay home with us 3 kids... then she took her dream and made it a reality with our resort. 

But she got burned by the Republicans when they started cutting the medical assistance budgets and she started getting notices saying she was no longer eligible (even though her medical expenses would have taken up 80% of the family's income).  She listened to Tim Pawlenty talk about how "some Minnesotans would have to learn to do with less" when asked about the 30,000 people he was kicking off hte state medical insurance program, knowing full well some of them could die (like my mom)... all so we could avoid a tax increase on the richest Minnesotans.

So, perhaps as you can see... it's very personal and I don't like it when people tell other people who are already worked to the bone and underpaid "to just go get a job for Christ's sake" or to "pick themselves up by the bootstraps"

Just how do you expect someone to improve themselves if they are disabled or have children to take care of, have no credit, and face ever dwindling resources to help pay for furthering education?

Oh, I know... that yacht is damn important.  But seriously.. that guy making the yacht can just as easily learn how to make a Crestliner or Lund boat and sell them to regular hardworking people.