If, God forbid, Hillary changed parties tomorrow

if that happens I will join the whiter than white el supremo kill everyone but wasps party.

does that mean i will have to kill me ?

In a thread sometime back when someone mentioned the 'high' rates of tax in the UK, I looked into the matter and it seemed that on average the UK taxpayer was taxed at roughly the same rate - or even sometimes slightly lower - than in the US (Yes, I was surprised too. There are, of course, all kinds of variables, single/married, filing separately, age etc that make generalisations difficult).

Part of the reason is that every UK taxpayer has a 'personal allowance', a certain amount of money that they are allowed to earn without paying any tax on it (technically it is the band rated at 0%). This ranges from $8,690 to $12,818 depending on age [at today's exchange rate]. I believe the lowest tax band is the US is 10%. I must say that I like the idea of a 0% tax band! Virtually no-one lives at this level (and if they do, good luck to them), but we can all have a certain amount of income which is unquestionably and untouchably ours.

The UK tax system also has a list of 'non-taxable' income which surprisingly contains "National Lottery, and gambling prizes".

In addition VAT (value added tax) which is roughly the equivalent of sales tax (with the importance difference that it is already included in the price ticket, so what you see is what you pay) is NOT levied on a whole host of things. The following are all zero-vated for VAT: Food (other than purchased in a restaurant), clothing, books, drugs and medicines, train and bus tickets, insurance, postal services (except telegrams) education, health services and a lot of other things including land and (I'm sure I read this somewhere) gold.

Col since you have avoided the real question and somehow brought Cheney into this let me ask again.

Since you are part of the class warfare movement. How much should each pay?

Low class
Middle class
Uppder class

And col, are you a socialist?

Well?

Why don't we just listen to all those who want Prs. Bush to be responsible for everything. All our paychecks should just go to him, after all isn't the "buck stops here" what we should expect from our president? ;~D

25% flat, no deductions.

If social welfare is needed, give 6000 euros to each citizen every year, a cheque every month.

Preferably, abolish income tax altogether, replace with single tax and fees for goverment services. (Government services includes the building of highways or public transport systems which make driving on free roads possible. Such services should be funded by petrol levies.)

25%? I'm not sure how things are where you live, but a 25% flat tax would be a tax increase for the vast majority of Americans.

Note that the 6000 quid per year would offset a lot of that. Also note that I think sales taxes etc. should be abolished.

Here taxes start at 20%, I am paying 42%. 25% sounds like a natural conclusion to me, because it's 1/4 of what one produces. I like even numbers.

If you make 20,000 a year, under my system you'd get to keep

20,000 * 0.75 + 6000 = 21,000 (I think)

If you make 35,000 a year:

30,000 * 0.75 + 6000 = 32,250 (possibly)

If you make 100,000 a year: 81,000

If you have no income: 6000

Whether this would constitute lower or higher taxes I do not know for any given country. But my goal was not to make taxes lower or higher, my goal was to come up with a fair system. And I think this system is fair.

Modify the 6000 quids as needed. I was going for a 500 quid/month citizen's dividend.

A 15% flat tax would destroy ALL low and most middle income families.

Ahahahahahaa. I see you're talking out of your ass again Col. Let's see, so far, this year at my current job I've grossed $13,346.66 since the end of April. I've been taxed $2,547.80 so far this year (this does NOT exclude things like medical, dental, vision and life insurance which also comes out of my own pocket). Let's do some math shall we:

Seven...five...carry the one...

Oh, lookee here...it appears that I'm being taxed at a rate of about 19% give or take. Let me take a look around...hmmm, I live in my own house, I'm paying off about $25,000 in credit debt, I own three cars free and clear. Oh, what's this? A $20 bill in my pocket? Well I'll be.

Yeah, Col, I'm really hurting with that 15%. Last I looked, I was middle class. I made some piss-poor financial decisions in the late 90's (hence the credit debt), but I seem to be doing just fine over here.

I thought that a flat tax of 15% federal and 5% state would have been good, but I kind of like whip's idea of having a kind of hybrid system. It's pretty fair and eases the pinch on those who really need that extra cash, while putting just a little extra burden on those who can afford to let go of another 1 or 2% without noticing too much. I'd set it at around 8, 14 and 20% myself (total state and federal).

Seems to be working fine for me.

-- B