61% of taxpayers, or more than 100 million US households, paid no federal income taxes last year

[CDDP]

ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

The majority of US taxpayers - 61% - paid no federal income taxes last year due to the pandemic and ensuing policy response, according to CNBC, citing a new report by the Tax Policy Center.

The pandemic and federal stimulus led to a huge spike in the number of Americans who either owed no federal income tax or received tax credits from the government. According to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, 107 million households owed no income taxes in 2020, up from 76 million — or 44% of all taxpayers — in 2019. -CNBC

"It’s a really big number," said Tax Policy Center fellow, Howard Gleckman, adding "It's also really transitory."

According to Gleckman, high unemployment combined with large stimulus checks and generous tax credit programs (set to expire after 2022) account for the majority of the spike. He expects the share of nontaxpayers to fall starting next year.

The share of Americans who pay zero income taxes is expected to stay high, at around 57% this year, according to the Tax Policy Center. It’s expected to fall back down to 42% in 2022 and remain at around 41% or 42% through 2025, “assuming the economy continues to rebound and several temporary tax benefits expire as scheduled,” Gleckman said. -CNBC

Helping to ease the tax burden were pandemic-related increases in the child tax credit, the earned income tax credit, and the child and the dependent care tax credit - which together erased federal taxes owed for millions of American families.

This year, no household making under $28,000 will pay any federal taxes due to the credits and tax changes, according to the report - whereas around 43% of middle-income households are expected to pay federal income tax. According to Gleckman, the offsets in dollar terms were small for many families.

"Imagine somebody who would have owed $1,500 in 2020 income tax until they got two stimulus payments — $1,200 in April and $600 in December," he told CNBC. "That threw them into the category of nonpayers. While the payments resulted in a large percentage increase in their after-tax income, the dollar amount of their tax cut was only a tiny fraction of a high-income filer who received a tax cut of, say, $30,000 from the 2017 [Tax Cuts and Jobs Act], yet still owed some tax."

In 2020, the top 20% of taxpayers paid 78% of federal income taxes, according to the Tax Policy Center, which was up from 68% in 2019. The top 1% of taxpayers paid 28% of taxes in 2020, up from 25% in 2019.

 

[America 1st]

I thought we were against taxes on the poor and working class?

 

[Pillow Pants]

I've received no "stimulus" checks, no refunds. Nothing. I'm sure I'm not in the minority here. How many of you are in the same boat?

 

[Jtrain80]

I thought we were against taxes on the poor and working class?

We are against most taxes.

 

[imprimis]

I thought we were against taxes on the poor and working class?

Everyone, including the poor, should have skin in the game and that isn't sales taxes. Nor is it property taxes as Sec 8 recipients aren't coming out of their pocket for rent and neither are those not paying rent due to the eviction moratorium. Neither are the illegals who are on the government teat.

 

[America 1st]

Everyone, including the poor, should have skin in the game and that isn't sales taxes. Nor is it property taxes as Sec 8 recipients aren't coming out of their pocket for rent and neither are those not paying rent due to the eviction moratorium. Neither are the illegals who are on the government teat.

You lumped quite a few groups together there…

Anyways, fuck illegals and fuck income taxes on the individual. I’m happy for anyone who doesn’t have to pay them including billionaires like Trump.

If we wanna talk skin in the game it’s corporations that are making out way better than they should.

 

[thenick_ttu]

If we wanna talk skin in the game it’s corporations that are making out way better than they should.

Please elaborate. I would love to hear your thoughts on corporate income tax and how it is unfair and should be changed.
Before you start, consider two things… (1) corporations provide jobs and a livelihood to millions of people and (2) it isn’t just the “rich” who own corporations, MILLIONS of normal working class Americans own stock in coronations (via their retirement accounts).

 

[America 1st]

Please elaborate. I would love to hear your thoughts on corporate income tax and how it is unfair and should be changed.
Before you start, consider two things… (1) corporations provide jobs and a livelihood to millions of people and (2) it isn’t just the “rich” who own corporations, MILLIONS of normal working class Americans own stock in coronations (via their retirement accounts).

Well you said it yoreself; we treat corporations nearly identically when there is a big difference between ma & pop shops and FedEx. That’s just one thing.

Back to my original point though about corporations making out way better than they should; corporations shouldn’t be able to get away from paying taxes with loopholes.

Corporate taxes aren’t the same thing as individual income tax which is why it’s confusing to me that people think poor people (or any people for that matter) should be paying income tax when large corporations like FedEx & Nike zero out their federal corp income tax.

The stock thing is kinda a silly argument to me too. People that own stock, are making an investment, which is also completely different than income tax and taxed differently (as it should be). Only 55% of Americans own stock and those who do make that choice willingly just like any other investment. They’re certainly welcome to invest their money somewhere else if they don’t like a corp for whatever reason.

 

[thenick_ttu]

Well you said it yoreself; we treat corporations nearly identically when there is a big difference between ma & pop shops and FedEx. That’s just one thing.

Back to my original point though about corporations making out way better than they should; corporations shouldn’t be able to get away from paying taxes with loopholes.

Corporate taxes aren’t the same thing as individual income tax which is why it’s confusing to me that people think poor people (or any people for that matter) should be paying income tax when large corporations like FedEx & Nike zero out their federal corp income tax.

The stock thing is kinda a silly argument to me too. People that own stock, are making an investment, which is also completely different than income tax and taxed differently (as it should be). Only 55% of Americans own stock and those who do make that choice willingly just like any other investment. They’re certainly welcome to invest their money somewhere else if they don’t like a corp for whatever reason.

The VAST majority (like 99.9%) of mom & pop shops are not corporations (C-corporations to be accurate). They are setup as either an S-corporation or a partnership (usually a Limited Liability Company). Neither one of these entity types pay corporate income tax. They are considered "pass-through" entities because the income "passes through" to the individual owners and the tax is paid on the individual's personal income tax return. S-corporation and partnerships do not pay taxes the same as C-corporations. So comparing Walmart to mom & pop shop down the road, is grossly inaccurate. They are nothing alike.

What exactly are the "loopholes" that corporations exploit? I'm really curious to know what they are.

I know one that many people like to bring up is depreciation and specifically the ability to "accelerate depreciation". Depreciation in and of itself is quite unfair to businesses. For example, say a company goes out and buys a $100,000 piece of machinery. The tax depreciation rules state that the business can only deduct 1/7th of the cost of that piece of equipment each year because the equipment should last the company about 7 years. So the business spends $100,000 in cash to buy the equipment this year but only gets to deduct $14,285 this year. That seems pretty unfair to the business. "Accelerated Depreciation" allows that company to deduct the full cost of that equipment in year 1. So they aren't getting anything "extra". They are just getting what they spent. Oh and BTW, the depreciation rules are the same for Walmart and mom & pop shop (actually the rules are more stringent for Walmart). So if that's one of the loopholes that need to be erased, then they would be erased for mom & pop too.

The fact is we have no idea how/why FedEx and Nike paid no federal income tax in 2020. Is it because they used "loopholes" or because their expenses were larger than their income? If their expenses are larger than income, then it doesn't matter if the tax rate is 21% or 80%. They're gonna pay zero tax. And that isn't a "loophole", it is basic accounting 101. We need companies like FedEx, Nike and Amazon to be in America. They provide millions of jobs. If the corporate tax rates are too high, then those companies will outsource as much of their operations as possible to other countries, which would take away possible jobs from Americans. You've probably read a few articles about this so you know the high-level talking points, but you don't know the nuts & bolts of the matter. You're getting way too hung up on the fact that some corporations pay zero federal income tax. Federal income tax is just one piece of the pie. Walmart and FedEx pay MILLIONS of $$ every year in payroll taxes, excise taxes, registration fees, state income taxes, state payroll taxes, state franchise taxes, etc. All of those taxes and fees they pay go directly to the federal and state governments.

If we were to implement a system where individuals paid zero tax and corporations were responsible for 100% of our countries funding needs, we would be bankrupt in about 1 week. Remember when I said most business are organized as pass-through entities, yeah those business nor the business owners would be paying taxes. It would require a tax rate somewhere close to 100% in order to give that idea even a 1% change of being successful. Do you really think corporations are going to be excited to give away most of their net income in taxes, or are they going to increase their expenses to zero out their income? One super easy way to zero out income would be to give yearend bonuses to their employees. It makes the employee extra happy and the business doesn't pay any tax. That's 100% legal and not a loophole. Then the corporation has zero taxable income and the individual has extra income but they don't pay any tax. That's great for the individuals but is completely unsustainable for the government. Oh and wages are a deductible expense against revenue. Income taxes paid are not deductible against revenue.

Look, I am certainly no friend of the IRS and I encourage everyone to pay as little tax as possible, but to suggest that our corporate income tax structure is the problem is just plain ignorant.

 

[America 1st]

The VAST majority (like 99.9%) of mom & pop shops are not corporations (C-corporations to be accurate). They are setup as either an S-corporation or a partnership (usually a Limited Liability Company). Neither one of these entity types pay corporate income tax. They are considered "pass-through" entities because the income "passes through" to the individual owners and the tax is paid on the individual's personal income tax return. S-corporation and partnerships do not pay taxes the same as C-corporations. So comparing Walmart to mom & pop shop down the road, is grossly inaccurate. They are nothing alike.

What exactly are the "loopholes" that corporations exploit? I'm really curious to know what they are.

I know one that many people like to bring up is depreciation and specifically the ability to "accelerate depreciation". Depreciation in and of itself is quite unfair to businesses. For example, say a company goes out and buys a $100,000 piece of machinery. The tax depreciation rules state that the business can only deduct 1/7th of the cost of that piece of equipment each year because the equipment should last the company about 7 years. So the business spends $100,000 in cash to buy the equipment this year but only gets to deduct $14,285 this year. That seems pretty unfair to the business. "Accelerated Depreciation" allows that company to deduct the full cost of that equipment in year 1. So they aren't getting anything "extra". They are just getting what they spent. Oh and BTW, the depreciation rules are the same for Walmart and mom & pop shop (actually the rules are more stringent for Walmart). So if that's one of the loopholes that need to be erased, then they would be erased for mom & pop too.

The fact is we have no idea how/why FedEx and Nike paid no federal income tax in 2020. Is it because they used "loopholes" or because their expenses were larger than their income? If their expenses are larger than income, then it doesn't matter if the tax rate is 21% or 80%. They're gonna pay zero tax. And that isn't a "loophole", it is basic accounting 101. We need companies like FedEx, Nike and Amazon to be in America. They provide millions of jobs. If the corporate tax rates are too high, then those companies will outsource as much of their operations as possible to other countries, which would take away possible jobs from Americans. You've probably read a few articles about this so you know the high-level talking points, but you don't know the nuts & bolts of the matter. You're getting way too hung up on the fact that some corporations pay zero federal income tax. Federal income tax is just one piece of the pie. Walmart and FedEx pay MILLIONS of $$ every year in payroll taxes, excise taxes, registration fees, state income taxes, state payroll taxes, state franchise taxes, etc. All of those taxes and fees they pay go directly to the federal and state governments.

If we were to implement a system where individuals paid zero tax and corporations were responsible for 100% of our countries funding needs, we would be bankrupt in about 1 week. Remember when I said most business are organized as pass-through entities, yeah those business nor the business owners would be paying taxes. It would require a tax rate somewhere close to 100% in order to give that idea even a 1% change of being successful. Do you really think corporations are going to be excited to give away most of their net income in taxes, or are they going to increase their expenses to zero out their income? One super easy way to zero out income would be to give yearend bonuses to their employees. It makes the employee extra happy and the business doesn't pay any tax. That's 100% legal and not a loophole. Then the corporation has zero taxable income and the individual has extra income but they don't pay any tax. That's great for the individuals but is completely unsustainable for the government. Oh and wages are a deductible expense against revenue. Income taxes paid are not deductible against revenue.

Look, I am certainly no friend of the IRS and I encourage everyone to pay as little tax as possible, but to suggest that our corporate income tax structure is the problem is just plain ignorant.

Too much here for me to really pick apart all the parts I fundamentally disagree but the most important are:

businesses shouldn’t be able to outsource without paying more in taxes than it would cost to stay

I’m not suggesting we should eliminate all taxes for the corporate taxes alone (there are plenty of other taxes to be had).

corporate taxes should be based on profits and company size vs how much they pay their employees and manufacturer in America

write offs should vary by company size. C corporations should have limited write off opportunities compared to S corps

I could go on but I’m sitting down for the rally. Point being these corporations don’t need our protection and it should be illegal to pass on expenses to the consumer over a certain amount annually (as well as due to taxes, fines, tariffs, ect).

 

[America 1st]

@thenick_ttu i forgot to add that I also fundamentally disagree with the notion that we “need” Nike or FedEx, or any corporation really. I think it’s pretty easy to see why the whole “corporate” structure in this country is flawed.

Not only did The Founders fundamentally disagree with the idea of powerful corporations (corporations didn’t have the same legal meaning at all to them) but they felt large corporations were nothing but entities that would corrupt and challenge the government.

There are always going to be businesses eager to operate in the US economy as long as there is ample money supply. A shortage of jobs isn’t the problem (it’s a shortage of good jobs and competition / small businesses).

Reasonable minds can disagree tho so

 

[Zgdaf]

@thenick_ttu i forgot to add that I also fundamentally disagree with the notion that we “need” Nike or FedEx, or any corporation really. I think it’s pretty easy to see why the whole “corporate” structure in this country is flawed.

Not only did The Founders fundamentally disagree with the idea of powerful corporations (corporations didn’t have the same legal meaning at all to them) but they felt large corporations were nothing but entities that would corrupt and challenge the government.

There are always going to be businesses eager to operate in the US economy as long as there is ample money supply. A shortage of jobs isn’t the problem (it’s a shortage of good jobs and competition / small businesses).

Reasonable minds can disagree tho so

I’ll take you at your word on what the founding fathers wanted without references.
I do know that the fed and income tax were created in the worst president, Wilson admin.. Wilson was also responsible for the disastrous foreign policy that led us to Afghanistan… best that’s another topic.

now I do agree businesses are eager to operate in the us economy, but it’s not totally money supply. It’s the complex barrier of entry that stifles competition. and major corporations like this, and then they can do the bidding of the govt to get around the constitution.

I generally agree with your posts, but I’m really shocked you are still blue pilled when it comes to the currency and the dollar. Yes up until 50 years ago when the US note was based on the dollar the US currency meant something and this was the contract with the world. You think it’s a coincidence poverty, destruction of the middle class, widening of the wealth gap all started then?
back to America being first, the inflation is another form of tax and the money supply is not putting America first. You realize by being the reserve currency we have to give money and drape deficit, basically selling out the country, otherwise we would have had this inflation a long time ago.
Anyway, to end on a positive note….

 

[America 1st]

I’ll take you at your word on what the founding fathers wanted without references.
I do know that the fed and income tax were created in the worst president, Wilson admin.. Wilson was also responsible for the disastrous foreign policy that led us to Afghanistan… best that’s another topic.

now I do agree businesses are eager to operate in the us economy, but it’s not totally money supply. It’s the complex barrier of entry that stifles competition. and major corporations like this, and then they can do the bidding of the govt to get around the constitution.

I generally agree with your posts, but I’m really shocked you are still blue pilled when it comes to the currency and the dollar. Yes up until 50 years ago when the US note was based on the dollar the US currency meant something and this was the contract with the world. You think it’s a coincidence poverty, destruction of the middle class, widening of the wealth gap all started then?
back to America being first, the inflation is another form of tax and the money supply is not putting America first. You realize by being the reserve currency we have to give money and drape deficit, basically selling out the country, otherwise we would have had this inflation a long time ago.
Anyway, to end on a positive note….

I don’t love the central banking system either but The Founders got it right with the dollar. Sovereign countries need control of their own currencies (and countries)

Moving the dollar away from being backed strictly by gold, to instead being backed by the whole US economy, isn’t the problem if you ask me.

Put simply the problem with The Fed is that we have a private bank and unelected bureaucrats controlling our economy because Congress is too stupid and corrupt to even be bothered with the process.

Even if Congress wanted to remain on the central banking system (regardless of how you feel about that and The Founders warnings) they could implement that system 10000000x better with common sense reform.

Also

Corporations to the Founders were essentially public committees that were assembled to control municipalities and their spending. They never intended them to represent small businesses, large businesses, or to have the rights they enjoy today (that came via the SCOTUS)( including pass through, various ‘types’ of courts, accounting privileges, ect).

L,C,C, v. Letson was the beginning of this process and said corporations were citizens of the states where they were chartered.

County of Santa Clara v. Southern Pacific Railroad gave corporations 14th amendment protections. Even though the SCOTUS didn’t actually rule that explicitly the court report nevertheless recorded it and 11 years later the SCOTUS relied on that recording stating it was “well settled” that corporations enjoyed personhood under the 14A.

 

[thenick_ttu]

Too much here for me to really pick apart all the parts I fundamentally disagree but the most important are:

businesses shouldn’t be able to outsource without paying more in taxes than it would cost to stay

I’m not suggesting we should eliminate all taxes for the corporate taxes alone (there are plenty of other taxes to be had).

corporate taxes should be based on profits and company size vs how much they pay their employees and manufacturer in America

write offs should vary by company size. C corporations should have limited write off opportunities compared to S corps

I could go on but I’m sitting down for the rally. Point being these corporations don’t need our protection and it should be illegal to pass on expenses to the consumer over a certain amount annually (as well as due to taxes, fines, tariffs, ect).

I'll try not to make this too long but I want to touch on a couple of your points...

1) "businesses shouldn’t be able to outsource without paying more in taxes than it would cost to stay" - it would be impossible to regulate this. How can the IRS know if a business is outsourcing work in order to avoid taxes vs that is the best (non-tax related) decision for the business. It seems like you are suggesting that once a business is established in the US, they cannot ever change their business model? This isn't a bad idea in theory but it would literally be impossible to enforce

2) "corporate taxes should be based on profits and company size vs how much they pay their employees and manufacturer in America" - corporate taxes are indeed currently based on profits (federal income tax) and company size (less advantageous tax rules for large corporations) but at the same time, corporations are indeed taxed based on how much they pay their employees (payroll taxes) and how much they manufacture in America (excise taxes). So the US tax system is already hitting all of your "wants" here

3) "write offs should vary by company size. C corporations should have limited write off opportunities compared to S corps" - Currently, corporations and S-corps/partnerships are allowed to deduct their normal operating expenses, such as payroll, rent, utilities, repairs, maintenance, basically any expense that a business must incur in order to generate their money. Furthermore, Corporations do have limited write offs is some areas compared to S-corps/partnerships. Are you suggesting that corporation should not be able to deduct their operating expenses against their revenue because that's the only thing left to limit.

4) "it should be illegal to pass on expenses to the consumer over a certain amount annually" - this is capitalism 101... if my cost to produce a product goes up, then the amount I charge for that product must go up too. In your scenario, we could quickly reach a point where a business is charging less for their product than it cost them to produce that product? What business would do that? They wouldn't, they would simply stop producing that product.

5) "Not only did The Founders fundamentally disagree with the idea of powerful corporations (corporations didn’t have the same legal meaning at all to them) but they felt large corporations were nothing but entities that would corrupt and challenge the government." - I do not know the accuracy of this statement but I do know that our founding fathers were very much against a big, central government. They wanted government run "by the people" starting at the community level. They wanted strong state governments, not a strong central government. Everything you have suggested creates a much stronger, intrusive central government.

Based on this post and your follow up post, it seems like you (1) are very much against capitalism and (2) want to give the government/IRS even more power to enforce rules that are wildly different based on what type of taxpayer a business is. Like you said, we can agree to disagree because I would never in my life agree with either one of those ideas. I still love ya brother and you bring a lot of great stuff to this board but I don't think we should ever give the government (IRS especially) more power.

 

[America 1st]

I'll try not to make this too long but I want to touch on a couple of your points...

1) "businesses shouldn’t be able to outsource without paying more in taxes than it would cost to stay" - it would be impossible to regulate this. How can the IRS know if a business is outsourcing work in order to avoid taxes vs that is the best (non-tax related) decision for the business. It seems like you are suggesting that once a business is established in the US, they cannot ever change their business model? This isn't a bad idea in theory but it would literally be impossible to enforce

2) "corporate taxes should be based on profits and company size vs how much they pay their employees and manufacturer in America" - corporate taxes are indeed currently based on profits (federal income tax) and company size (less advantageous tax rules for large corporations) but at the same time, corporations are indeed taxed based on how much they pay their employees (payroll taxes) and how much they manufacture in America (excise taxes). So the US tax system is already hitting all of your "wants" here

3) "write offs should vary by company size. C corporations should have limited write off opportunities compared to S corps" - Currently, corporations and S-corps/partnerships are allowed to deduct their normal operating expenses, such as payroll, rent, utilities, repairs, maintenance, basically any expense that a business must incur in order to generate their money. Furthermore, Corporations do have limited write offs is some areas compared to S-corps/partnerships. Are you suggesting that corporation should not be able to deduct their operating expenses against their revenue because that's the only thing left to limit.

4) "it should be illegal to pass on expenses to the consumer over a certain amount annually" - this is capitalism 101... if my cost to produce a product goes up, then the amount I charge for that product must go up too. In your scenario, we could quickly reach a point where a business is charging less for their product than it cost them to produce that product? What business would do that? They wouldn't, they would simply stop producing that product.

5) "Not only did The Founders fundamentally disagree with the idea of powerful corporations (corporations didn’t have the same legal meaning at all to them) but they felt large corporations were nothing but entities that would corrupt and challenge the government." - I do not know the accuracy of this statement but I do know that our founding fathers were very much against a big, central government. They wanted government run "by the people" starting at the community level. They wanted strong state governments, not a strong central government. Everything you have suggested creates a much stronger, intrusive central government.

Based on this post and your follow up post, it seems like you (1) are very much against capitalism and (2) want to give the government/IRS even more power to enforce rules that are wildly different based on what type of taxpayer a business is. Like you said, we can agree to disagree because I would never in my life agree with either one of those ideas. I still love ya brother and you bring a lot of great stuff to this board but I don't think we should ever give the government (IRS especially) more power.

Appreciate the thoughtful response. I’ll try to be short and on point.

1- not impossible to enforce. Congress could easily create a government body to regulate this and any company found outsourcing or buying products from outside the US, without approval gets hammered.

2- companies aren’t taxed based on how much they pay their employees. They can pay their employees shit wages and still avoid tax through nearly unlimited write of opportunities and loopholes.

Employee wages should be accounted for as a separate item to these write offs and analyzed annually for competitiveness. If deem too low a company would face a tax penalty.

3- c corporations get write offs for things that are insane IYAM. We do know why Nike and FedEx zero out. DuckDuckGo and read about the deductions that are “entitled” to.

also it feels criminal including S corps in the same conversation as these c corporations. This is part of the reason the corporate model needs overhauled.

4- we wouldn’t quickly reach any point besides protections for consumers.

With a lack of competition in the economy and Corp profits at all time highs it would be sensible to make sure businesses are being ethical with their pricing. The cost of manufacturing going up doesn’t mean that price needs to go up for profitable companies. It’s not capitalism 101, it’s just greed 101, and we don’t live in a capitalist society (we live in a mixed economy).

5- The Founders didn’t object to strong central government. They wanted the federal government limited to the size it needed to be to provide the proper security to its citizens.

They didn’t want tyrannical government or oversized government which isn’t nearly the same as the above. The federal & state government are severely lacking when it comes to protecting individual citizen’s, and their interests, from the large corporations.

The inflation yore seeing right now is all that outsourcing and price gauging made front and center (along with other factors like poor policy and money supply).

Thomas Jefferson stated plainly that:

“I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country”.

Go read what I posted about Apple taking 1980 to task. Think about what Zuck the cuck did with the voter drop boxes. Look at amazon’s business model and the “write offs” they get. Corporations are begging to be taken down a peg or two and they can easily afford it; they’ll seek what’s best for themselves (profits / not what’s best for the individual citizens and consumers) by the very definition of their charter.

On to yore last paragraph:

Im not against capitalism. We can still have plenty of capitalism while handing down better standards and expectations for large and immensely profitable businesses / Corporations. Large corporations/ businesses objected to child labor laws and consumer / worker protections since the beginning of time and are still more profitable than ever. They respond to social expectations and regulations because of the capitalism you noted (especially if appropriate competition is in place as it should be) and because operating in the American economy is a great privilege that is highly valuable and lucrative.

We don’t need to raise tax rates either. Just get rid of the ridiculous deductions and institute penalties (criminal and monetary).

I don’t want the IRS alone to do these things. There should be separate entities created to achieve these specific requirements.

I don’t fear a powerful government (I think we should all want the US government to be extremely powerful)(I have plenty of instruments to protect myself from tyrannical government) and especially when we’re empowering the government to protect individuals (who or our economy was set up to benefit). The government, at least in theory, owes its loyalty to We The People.

I do fear powerful corporations. They’re only loyal to profits. They’ll abuse We The People wherever they can to make more profit. It’s they’re nature and why they were chartered.

Some closing thoughts:

“The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government”.

Thomas Jefferson

“Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains”.

Thomas Jefferson

 

[Cre8ive]

ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

The majority of US taxpayers - 61% - paid no federal income taxes last year due to the pandemic and ensuing policy response, according to CNBC, citing a new report by the Tax Policy Center.



"It’s a really big number," said Tax Policy Center fellow, Howard Gleckman, adding "It's also really transitory."

According to Gleckman, high unemployment combined with large stimulus checks and generous tax credit programs (set to expire after 2022) account for the majority of the spike. He expects the share of nontaxpayers to fall starting next year.


Helping to ease the tax burden were pandemic-related increases in the child tax credit, the earned income tax credit, and the child and the dependent care tax credit - which together erased federal taxes owed for millions of American families.

This year, no household making under $28,000 will pay any federal taxes due to the credits and tax changes, according to the report - whereas around 43% of middle-income households are expected to pay federal income tax. According to Gleckman, the offsets in dollar terms were small for many families.

"Imagine somebody who would have owed $1,500 in 2020 income tax until they got two stimulus payments — $1,200 in April and $600 in December," he told CNBC. "That threw them into the category of nonpayers. While the payments resulted in a large percentage increase in their after-tax income, the dollar amount of their tax cut was only a tiny fraction of a high-income filer who received a tax cut of, say, $30,000 from the 2017 [Tax Cuts and Jobs Act], yet still owed some tax."

In 2020, the top 20% of taxpayers paid 78% of federal income taxes, according to the Tax Policy Center, which was up from 68% in 2019. The top 1% of taxpayers paid 28% of taxes in 2020, up from 25% in 2019.

I paid taxes by God.