Your new Tax Rate

[gid]

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/j...vSotYbcF7bQZ3O

NY Post has a good article on the "cliff' this Country is going to go over, also a good chart at the bottom of their page breaking out each income level. So now you too can see how much more you will be paying in Fed taxes
I was going to buy a new vehicle this year...not if we go off the 'cliff' I wont shop either...just food, gas and housing costs

[thatsmrmastercraft]

Yikes

[2RLAKE]

At work when we have issues we solve them ... No victims ... Be the change you want to be

Many elected officials have never held "real" job and have never lead in times of trouble. It's sad that they can't find a solution ... It's very simple math ... Here is the sum of the expenses and here are the taxes that they conveniently call revenue ... Taxes can't be less than expenses

We need to cut expenses wisely, challenge entitlement programs and find a solution here. Raising taxes this draconian will kill the economy ...those who make more spend more

[thatsmrmastercraft]

Originally Posted by 2RLAKE

At work when we have issues we solve them ... No victims ... Be the change you want to be

Many elected officials have never held "real" job and have never lead in times of trouble. It's sad that they can't find a solution ... It's very simple math ... Here is the sum of the expenses and here are the taxes that they conveniently call revenue ... Taxes can't be less than expenses

We need to cut expenses wisely, challenge entitlement programs and find a solution here. Raising taxes this draconian will kill the economy ...those who make more spend more

I would really enjoy being the guy to go through all the crap government programs with an ax ready to chop. I'm thinking I could find a little room to save some money.

[TxsRiverRat]

holy cArp - I'll be hit with an additional $53k in taxes

[FrankSchwab]

Originally Posted by thatsmrmastercraft

I would really enjoy being the guy to go through all the crap government programs with an ax ready to chop. I'm thinking I could find a little room to save some money.

OK, here's your chance. The US Budget for 2012 contained 3.7 Trillion dollars in spending, and 2.4 Trillion dollars in income, for a net deficit of 1.3 Trillion dollars. So to balance the budget, you need to ax 1.3 Trillion dollars from the Federal Budget.

(From Wikipedia)
Budget
(Billions) Function
$778.57 Social Security
$716.30 National Defense
$579.58 Income Security
$484.49 Medicare
$361.63 Health
$224.78 Net Interest
$139.21 Education, Training, Employment and Social Services
$129.61 Veterans Benefits and Services
$102.55 Transportation
$79.62 Commerce and Housing Credit
$62.02 Administration of Justice
$56.25 International Affairs
$42.83 Natural Resources and Environment
$31.76 General Government
$31.69 Community and Regional Development
$30.99 General Science, Space and Technology
$23.27 Energy
$19.17 Agriculture
$0.13 Allowances
($98.90) Undistributed Offsetting Receipts

Go ahead, give it a try - Eliminate 1.3 Trillion dollars from the budget. What you'll find is that, in simple terms, you can eliminate everything below "Medicare", gutting essentially the entire federal government, to do so. You'll still have to pay the $224 Billion in interest on the National Debt, so you'll still have to come up with that much more to cut.

At this point, you've eliminated (roughly):
Department of Education
Department of Agriculture
Department of Veterans Affairs
Department of State and Other International Programs
Department of Homeland Security
Department of Energy
Department of Justice
NASA
Department of Transportation
Department of the Treasury
Department of the Interior
Department of Labor
Department of Commerce
Department of Housing and Urban Development
Army Corps of Engineers Civil Works
Environmental Protection Agency
National Science Foundation
Small Business Administration

And left:
Social Security Administration
Department of Health and Human Services including Medicare and Medicaid
Department of Defense including Overseas Contingency Operations

What a government! Frankly, I think about half of those federal departments have outlived their usefulness and could go, but most of them have budgets in the $10-$20 billion dollar range - chump change. Killing them off won't make a visible dent in the deficit.

Sure, you could cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, but you'd end up with 40 million photogenic retired people outside your door with pitchforks and torches.

You could cut the defense department - but that could never happen. Spending slightly less than the rest of the world COMBINED on the military is somehow sacrosanct. Even completely lopping off the defense department wouldn't balance the budget.

Are you willing to take a shot?

/frank

[gid]

Also....as the Ag bill is tacked into this 'Cliff' dive. The price of milk is predicted to go up to $6-$8 a gallon. So not only will we pay more in Fed taxes but goods will go up as well.

FYI - I drink a gallon of milk a day, love it! So my monthly costs just went up $90 a month, roughly, just for Milk.

[GoneBoatN]

Originally Posted by FrankSchwab

OK, here's your chance. The US Budget for 2012 contained 3.7 Trillion dollars in spending, and 2.4 Trillion dollars in income, for a net deficit of 1.3 Trillion dollars. So to balance the budget, you need to ax 1.3 Trillion dollars from the Federal Budget.

(From Wikipedia)
Budget
(Billions) Function
$778.57 Social Security
$716.30 National Defense
$579.58 Income Security
$484.49 Medicare
$361.63 Health
$224.78 Net Interest
$139.21 Education, Training, Employment and Social Services
$129.61 Veterans Benefits and Services
$102.55 Transportation
$79.62 Commerce and Housing Credit
$62.02 Administration of Justice
$56.25 International Affairs
$42.83 Natural Resources and Environment
$31.76 General Government
$31.69 Community and Regional Development
$30.99 General Science, Space and Technology
$23.27 Energy
$19.17 Agriculture
$0.13 Allowances
($98.90) Undistributed Offsetting Receipts

Go ahead, give it a try - Eliminate 1.3 Trillion dollars from the budget. What you'll find is that, in simple terms, you can eliminate everything below "Medicare", gutting essentially the entire federal government, to do so. You'll still have to pay the $224 Billion in interest on the National Debt, so you'll still have to come up with that much more to cut.

At this point, you've eliminated (roughly):
Department of Education
Department of Agriculture
Department of Veterans Affairs
Department of State and Other International Programs
Department of Homeland Security
Department of Energy
Department of Justice
NASA
Department of Transportation
Department of the Treasury
Department of the Interior
Department of Labor
Department of Commerce
Department of Housing and Urban Development
Army Corps of Engineers Civil Works
Environmental Protection Agency
National Science Foundation
Small Business Administration

And left:
Social Security Administration
Department of Health and Human Services including Medicare and Medicaid
Department of Defense including Overseas Contingency Operations

What a government! Frankly, I think about half of those federal departments have outlived their usefulness and could go, but most of them have budgets in the $10-$20 billion dollar range - chump change. Killing them off won't make a visible dent in the deficit.

Sure, you could cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, but you'd end up with 40 million photogenic retired people outside your door with pitchforks and torches.

You could cut the defense department - but that could never happen. Spending slightly less than the rest of the world COMBINED on the military is somehow sacrosanct. Even completely lopping off the defense department wouldn't balance the budget.

Are you willing to take a shot?

/frank

I understand your point but our elected officials use this kind of logic for continuing to not address the problem/issue. When social welfare is mentioned they say cutting it would not put a dent in the deficit. Trimming defense spending would not put a dent in the deficit...

The thing is you have to start somewhere and the sooner you start the sooner it is fixed. The longer you wait the harder it is going to be to take the cure. All these wildly out of hand Departments of bla, bla, bla need trimmed. The time for less Federal Government has long since passed. Implement a straight/flat tax and you can get rid of a great deal of the IRS - just an example. Everyone is going to need an attitude of "do more with less" including the DoD and ourselves as individuals.

[nkorep2]

I dont think my taxes are going to be affected much at all. But I guess you have to make a decent amount of money to get taxed on it. Im in favor of a universal tax rate. Everyone pays their share. I dont think the vast majority of the people on this site should be paying my share.

[FrankSchwab]

Originally Posted by GoneBoatN

I understand your point but our elected officials use this kind of logic for continuing to not address the problem/issue. When social welfare is mentioned they say cutting it would not put a dent in the deficit. Trimming defense spending would not put a dent in the deficit...

The thing is you have to start somewhere and the sooner you start the sooner it is fixed. The longer you wait the harder it is going to be to take the cure.

But it's intellectual dishonesty to say "the sooner you start the sooner it is fixed". If you can't say what "start" means, and how it's going to affect the deficit over the next 1, 5, 10, 20 years, all you're really saying is "there's a bunch of programs that I disagree with that I want to kill, and I'm going to use the deficit as a cover to try to do so". You can talk all you want about <name your favorite government spending boondoggle>, but if cutting it doesn't impact the deficit then be honest - simply say "I don't like this program, and want to see it eliminated".

My point above is that we've passed the point where cutting school lunches or eliminating the EPA can have any affect on our national economic health. Defense spending is going nowhere but up - and it's going to be left in the dust by the rise in mandatory social spending. As the population ages and there are fewer workers supporting each retiree, and as new benefits get instituted for retirees to pander to the strongest voting block in the country, the deficits associated with SS, Medicaid, and Medicare are going to skyrocket.

The fiscal cliff problems don't matter in the long run - taxes aren't high enough to pay off the promises that have been made - promises that we don't have the political will to break. They will have to go up, unless a miraculous turnaround occurs in the economy that raises tax revenues without raising tax rates. Whether they go up next week, or next year, isn't that important from a long term perspective. Spending can't decrease significantly (and will IMHO continue to increase at an increasing rate), so taxes have to go up eventually.