USVI-On-Line

Teddy, I like the Sales tax thing even better........Having lived in Chicago, IL and in Temple, TX I grew to apppreciate the "no State Tax" thing.

I am sure it would have us all breathing easier in April too.

cypressgirl wrote:You pay 25% in income tax and you think Bill Gates pays 19%??????????

I'd love a flat tax! I've been for it all along. Let's all pay 35% and call it quits. I'd vote for that in a heartbeat. Abolish the IRS and throw away that rediculous tax code that no one can understand. I'm with ya' Lulu!

I don't think that I actually pay 25%, I'm just in the 25% bracket. I know they took everything I paid in, and they said that's the bracket I was in, but the math didn't work out to me. But I'm not much for fuzzy math, and I think the IRS is where that term came from.

I just put all the info in tax act, and it takes my moolah. I was just shocked that I pay the same rate of taxes as a person who makes almost 3X as much as me.

Yeah, there would be freeloaders in the new system, but I watched plenty of people who don't pay taxes file to get the same economic stimulus check that I worked my hiney off to get. And I had to save mine because I'll have to pay taxes on it next year!

Hey, and Anthony....jump on in. The water's fine in this pool of pundits....I have the feeling if we keep going by the end we'll have a strong economy AND world peace.

David- n Hampton, VA wrote:Teddy, I like the Sales tax thing even better........Having lived in Chicago, IL and in Temple, TX I grew to apppreciate the "no State Tax" thing.

I am sure it would have us all breathing easier in April too.

I'll bet a lot of accountants and IRS agents would be against it though.

I would like some of our European friends to weigh in. I know that a lot of people here are afraid of "socialized" programs, but I'll bet that we're paying similar rates of taxes as they are and not getting nearly the same benefit. (Primarily, I dream of a world where we have health care not attached to our jobs and we don't graduate from college 100 grand in the hole...)

Lulu,

My wife is Canadian. (Free health care in Canada)

They (Canadians) come south when they want/need real health care (meaning anything serious, life threatening, or long term with a high probability it can be corrected with high tech/high energy medicine.)

Normal colds and flu, yeap they have coverage.....but if they need Cancer treatment or back surgery.....and they can afford it.....they fly south.

With respect to what we pay compared with others.....here is a link for an overview of it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Inco ... ountry.svg

Do you know how many Detroiters I know who sneak into Canada (or marry a Canadian) to get free health care? It sure beats no health care. I'm sure my cousin who's going to die because she lost her job and has cancer would settle for some Canadian health care right now.

I don't know the intricacies how universal health care would work here. I don't have all the answers, but it's very disturbing to me that people in our country die because they're sick and they don't have a job. Or they lose their house because they got too sick for their insurance.

There has to be a better way. This is supposed to be the best country in the world.

Lulu,

Not to sing a sob story here....but I know all about needing health care.

My daughter has cerebral palsy and Crohn’s she lost her health care (which was horrible coverage anyway…but was something) last week when she was fired. We are taking it out of our pocket to pay for here COBRA…..because she can not afford to be without coverage as then….when she does find work again, the new health care wouldn’t cover pre-existing conditions.

I know all about it.

The problem is how does this get paid for without diminishing our present knowledge, skills and abilities in the medical profession? The best and brightest work here because they can get paid the best. (I know....the insurance and pharmacy companies have ruined it by overcharging on everything along with the horrible judges that let these hundred(s) million dollar lawsuits be awarded when a tragic accident did occur....but we still have the best for a reason. It is we pay them the best.)

I am sorry to hear about your daughter's situation. I'm just glad that you have the money to keep her COBRA going for a while.

My biggest thing is that our health care shouldn't be attached to our jobs, for reasons just like your daughter's. I got sick when I got downsized a few years ago, and I had to go untreated. It was really scary. (My work didn't offer COBRA, not that I could've afforded it if they had.)

I don't know what the answer is. I suspect that we have let greed get out of control to the point that maybe we can't fix it. I do however, know that some doctors will tell you they are barely making it from fighting with insurance companies and just not getting paid for whatever reason. I'm not saying we wouldn't offer people a fair amount for providing care, but insurance companies wouldn't be getting rich like they do now.

Lulu, you mentioned the European and tax!
I have to admit that I cannot understand, why people think that USA nearly will collapse, if people have to pay more tax. In most of the European countries the tax are higher than in USA. And I don’t feel that it’s a hell to live in Europe. And some people are still hard working to make a better income. And self-employed still can earn a lot of money. And I don’t think the unemployment rate is higher than in USA. Not in Denmark – we have manpower shortage.

Even though I have got some explanation about your health system, I still feel that something is wrong, if a family perhaps have to sell their house, if one in the family gets cancer and needs and expensive treatment. I also wonder that it has to cost a lot of money to go on college. Why isn’t it free?

Of course there will always be room for “parasites” in such a system as the European, and of course I don’t like that. And of course some of the money we pay for education is wasted, because the person never uses the education. But that the price you need to pay for being human and give everybody a chance regardless of their social status.

I don’t have a high income more, so I pay about 35% of my total income in tax. My husband works and has a good income. He pays more than 50% of his total income in tax. Further on we pay much more than you in indirect taxes (food, oil, cars etc.). I know that some of our tax is going to lazy people, but I also know that if something should happen to us or our family, we will be taken care of. I don’t say our system is perfect. It isn’t, but I cannot tell which system should be better.
And I’m not a socialist or a communist!!

loria wrote:maybe i am daft, but it would appear that the top 25%includes the top 1% and the like, so the graph is a bit misleading--what i would like to see is how the top 1% proportion of their income compares to persons in the 5-2 %ile, etc--that- at least to me--would offer truer comparisons

Loria, we have a progressive tax system. There is nothing misleading about the top 1% of wage earners paying 40% of all income taxes.

Also nothing misleading about the bottom 50% paying only 3% of all income taxes.

Further still, there is nothing misleading about the fact that Obama is going to give a tax rebate to people who don't pay ANY income tax at all. That I believe, is called welfare, no?

The larger question is, what are we teaching our children? Many of you have said that you don't think socialism and redistributing the wealth is a bad thing. So now, contrary to American traditions, we are going to teach our children to go to school, get a good job that you like to do, invest your money in whatever makes you happy, etc. But, the government is going to take part of your success and give it to someone who sits on their ass? That is not the lesson I want to teach my son and daughter. Why? Think about the inverse to that. With every lesson, there is a flip side. I don't want my kids to think for even one second that it is acceptable for them to rely on government, or the hard work of other individuals.

Now, I said "invest in what makes you happy". That's because I don't believe financial investment has to be the only way to make you happy. My wife and I don't make a ton of money, but enough for her to stay home with the kids. I have a 401-k, as does she from when she worked. We choose to "invest" our money (non-401k money) into vacations, and activities with the kids. That works for us. We live paycheck to paycheck because of that. I don that because my Dad died when I was 16, and for me, it has always hit home that the best thing you can do for your kids is to teach them personal responsibility, and fill their childhoods with the best of memories - like my mom and dad did for us. People ask my wife and I how we can afford to travel like we do - it is how I choose to "invest" my money - in the memories of my children.

Growing up, we weren't rich in terms of money by any means - my Dad worked for the old First National grocery stores for 30 years (Finast). But damn it, I saw that man get up everyday at 5:00 am, and head out the door to a job he really didn't like very much - and probably in the end killed him. He was the smartest, kindest man I have ever known - and a man who used to pay people out of his own pockets to work for him on a Saturday, so that he didn't have to miss my baseball games.

The lessons he taught me were to stand up for myself, and if you don't succeed, there is nobody to blame but yourself. Go to school, do well, get a job you LIKE going to everyday, and the rest will take care of itself. And, it has. My Dad was a very wise man.

Now, do you think I was handed anything in life? My pops died at 16, leaving my mom, my sister, and I. He was a 20 year diabetic, so life insurance wasn't there for him. My mom at the time made, I don't know, $30,000 (1993). And we had a $180,000 mortgage. I was a junior in HS. Somehow, even given the financial hardship we found ourselves in, my mom managed to get both me and my sister through college. I of course have 25k in loans, but that is an investment in myself that I would never change.

I tell you this not for the sympathetic vote. I realize I am pretty unpopular around here, and that I can be abrasive, and maybe even a bit condescending.

I have been passionate here because I love my country, as I know all of you do. However, I do not think that the direction that Mr. Obama wishes to lead us is in good standing with our American tradition - nor the values taught to me by my own father.

Here's a quote from Thomas Jefferson's 1st Inaugural Address:

"Still one thing more, fellow-citizens--a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities." - Thomas Jefferson, March 4 1801

This is in direct opposition to the direction that Mr. Obama wants to take us.

Linne,

I am playing the casual observer on this thread (and most of the political threads) for now. However, I would like to let you know how much I appreciate your take on this. Your words are thought provoking and one line, in particular, hits home.

"I also wonder that it has to cost a lot of money to go on college. Why isn’t it free?"

As Pete and I are about to send one child off to college next year and two more the following year at a cost of $50,000+ per year, per child, we know the expense of post high-school education.

verjoy wrote (page 22):
OK, I will give my opinions most of which are conservative.

Thank you for your polite answers and the explanations.

The war
I too respect the military and the soldiers who risk their lives.

Health Care
I don’t know how the health care system functions in Canada, so I cannot say anything about that.
But as you can see above, I’m not a fan of the system in USA.

Tax
Don’t be so afraid of tax. I’m sure that Obama isn’t stupid, and I also think, he will have some advisers. So I cannot believe that if he will be the next president, everything will go wrong in USA.

Guns
I know that the Americans “love” the right to wear guns, and now even teachers in schools can be armed. I don’t now for sure, but for me it seems, as if it can cause more killings.

Death penalty
Of course you cannot compare an innocent child with a person, who has been guilty in killing.
But still you take a life, sometimes in an inhuman way and before the use of DNA also sometimes
the wrong person. But I fully understand that a crime can be so terrible that you wish that the person, who did it, shouldn’t have the right to live.

This tread
I learn from it too and find it so interesting. But just now I spent too much time reading here and trying to find out what people mean. Sometimes I cannot quite understand it. Too example. I don’t know for sure what SJ meant with this:

would add that most of the intelligence comming from our Europian allies were confirming our intelligence of WMD's in Iraq. Our intelligence was budget was drastically reduced under President Clinton.

Linne

Thank you for your kind words Marcia. Sometimes I'm afraid if people think that I shouldn't intervene in the debat being a foreigner - it's just difficult to resist when it interest you.

Linne

linne wrote:Thank you for your kind words Marcia. Sometimes I'm afraid if people think that I shouldn't intervene in the debat being a foreigner - it's just difficult to resist when it interest you.

Linne

I'd like to echo my wife's appreciation of your contributions. Personally, I feel as though we Americans are too prone to believing that our system is perfect..."America, love it or leave it"...seems to a favorite saying.

Well, there is much that we could improve upon. And, the only way to do so is by listening to others, beyond our boarders, who have insights to offer. Other countries, including yours, do many things in a better way than we do. I don't know why so many Americans are afraid of examining our shortcomings and learning from others. That is not weakness, it is strength.