HOLY FUCK GET IN HERE HAPPENING IN CT

[SuburbanFarmer]

Screw it. Smitty is right. All these retarded taxes are half of the problem.

I'm not saying eliminate all these taxes obviously, they do need revenue, just the corporate tax; taxing productivity is not what you want to do, the "corporate tax" is a wholly political tax, doesn't make economic sense, it's just a populist sop, but the sales tax in Connecticut is only 6%, so I would rather raise that tax, a tax on consumption, to something like 15%, and get my revenue there, while just eliminating the 9% corporate tax altogther.

For whatever reason, consumption taxes are absolutely anathema to some Americans. I can't explain why, but it really raises their hackles. Maybe it has something to do with our huge shopping culture. I have very intelligent friends and relatives who share a strong conviction that, even if the tax burden were lessened elsewhere, the psychological effects of raising prices through a sales tax would devastate the American economy.

I'm not sure I agree with them, but these are not naturally panicky people, so their predictions of economic doom did make me think.

It's the psychological effect of losing money that you haven't seen yet (income tax) vs paying it out yourself at the register.

Human nature doesn't allow the latter to be equal.

[Smitty-48]

Also bear in mind, Calculus, I can own those big corporartions as a shareholder, and run my business at the same time, and they're already dinging me for capital gains on my shares, so why do I want to get dinged twice as a shareholder, just to "stick it to the corporations"? I'm the corporations too, both small, and big, at the same time, so I'm just sticking it to myself if I'm "sticking it to the corporations".

Never mind that they can't even spend the money responsibly, why do I want to give this unnacountable out of control public sector unionized Nanny Police State more money again? Just throwing good money after bad. I'm paying these people, and they just use the money to beat me over the head with a cudgel.

Pay them more money? Good lord, man, by rights these cretins should all be shot, many Canadians have been shot by the Crown, for far less indeed.

[Calculus Man]

Well, in Canada, most small businesses are corporations too, they get a "small business deduction", but that only takes the rate down to 10% from 15%, as a small business, I'd be willing to let the big corporations have their 15% back, if I could get my 10% back, taxing those big corporations more doesn't do anything for my business, but as a small business, I'm closer to bankruptcy all the time, unlike the big corporations, that 10% could be the difference between life and death for the company, when times get lean.

Yeah, a lot of our small businesses incorporate as well, but we have S-corps, which are pass-through entities, so the profits are taxed as personal income.

I hear you on the shareholder angle. Honestly, capital gains taxes aren't something I've had to deal with much, since I don't sell very often. The stuff I do trade in and out of is more like gambling (riskier companies, options, etc.), so I don't really mind the government taking their cut. But when the time comes, and I'm selling stocks like JNJ, I am probably going to be uber pissed.

The fact that you have to pay taxes on a price increase which may be totally inflationary is definitely theft. Even moreso than normal taxation.

[Smitty-48]

It's triple dip at the federal level, income, capital gains, and business taxes, then they hit you all over again at the provincial level, then they have a consumption tax too, harmonized sales, then the local Bolshies come calling for the property taxes, it's bloody highway robbery, sir.

Something's gotta give, if not, we're not just killing small businesses, we're preventing them from ever being started in the first place.

[Smitty-48]

I hear you on the shareholder angle. Honestly, capital gains taxes aren't something I've had to deal with much, since I don't sell very often. The stuff I do trade in and out of is more like gambling (riskier companies, options, etc.), so I don't really mind the government taking their cut. But when the time comes, and I'm selling stocks like JNJ, I am probably going to be uber pissed.

Don't forget investment properties, including apartments, even if you just rent an apartment out from your primary residence; capital gains.

[Calculus Man]

Preach, brother.

Are you counting dividends in the income or capital gains category? How are they taxed in the Great White North?

[Smitty-48]

Preach, brother.

Are you counting dividends in the income or capital gains category? How are they taxed in the Great White North?

Capital gains are exempt to 50%, then you have to take into income. Interest and dividends are 100% taxable, but there is a deduction for dividends, the dividend tax credit, exactly how much is related to your bracket.

[Calculus Man]

Preach, brother.

Are you counting dividends in the income or capital gains category? How are they taxed in the Great White North?

Capital gains are exempt to 50%, then you have to take into income. Interest and dividends are 100% taxable, but there is a deduction for dividends, the dividend tax credit, exactly how much is related to your bracket.

If we moved to your system, it would be a vast improvement.

[Smitty-48]

At the highest tax bracket here, you'd pay $267 on a $1000 capital gains, $316 on a $1000 in dividends, $535 on a $1000 of interest.

At the lowest tax bracket however, you'd pay $75 on a $1000 of capital gains, $200 on a $1000 of interest, and you'd not only pay nothing on dividends, it's a negative marginal tax rate, the deduction is more than the tax, they end up deducting the $200 dividend tax, and then pay you another $40 on top.

Essentially, compared to the US, we hit you up for more if you're in the top brackets, and charge far less if you're in the lower brackets.

I have no beef with this tax specifically, it's a good system, the problem is double, and triple dipping, hitting up the same productive activity over and over with different taxes, they have an insatiable hunger for income because they're going around in helicopters dropping free money on entrenched and special interests in order to buy votes, and there's no end to it, it's a bottomless sink hole, so they just keep dinging everything multiple times, money grab after money grab, to the point of killing the very productive activity which they are trying to extract revenues from, then everybody starts whining that they don't have jobs, so they get money dropped on them from the helicopter too, and so the snake is just eating its tail.

It's not this tax OR that tax, it's this tax AND that tax AND this tax AND that tax, and so on and so forth, so many taxes at so many levels, all on the same activity, so that the public doesn't see how the damage is done, if they just added it all up and presented it as one big tax, there would be a revolt, but that's why they don't do that.

They have absolutely no interest in simplifying the tax code, because then the Lefty dingbats who run this country wouldn't be able to convince the gullible public that it's not the bloated government leviathan which is destroying job creation, instead of their preferred Bolshevist scapegoat of "it's the corporations!"

[apeman]

+1