Posts Tagged New York Times
Richest Get Richer But Pay Less in Federal Tax
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Economic Development on February 18, 2010
February 18, 2010… It’s no surprise but it’s good to have the real data. The top 400 earners saw their tax rates drop as their income soared. No one gives us this information better than David Cay Johnston. He says that these top-income households have “soared to a new record high.”
“In 2007 the top 400 taxpayers had an average income of $344.8 million, up 31 percent from their average $263.3 million income in 2006, according to figures in a report that the IRS posted to its web site without announcement that were discovered February 16,” he wrote.
He continues: “The figures came at the peak of the last economic cycle and show that widely published reports in major newspapers asserting that the richest Americans are losing relative ground and ‘becoming poorer’ are not supported by the official income data.”
The report also shows that a number of the top 400 paid an effective tax rate of zero to 10 percent. In other words, you probably paid a high rate on your city income tax.
Now wouldn’t we all like income taxes in April to be so nicely priced for us?
Only 33 of the top 400, he reports, paid an effective tax rate of 30 to 35 percent, which is the maximum (or should I say, Republican) federal tax rate.
This data was first made available during President Bill Clinton’s administration. It has been made available again by President Barack Obama. Guess what? It was made inaccessible by President George Bush. Surprised?
Cay Johnston is the former tax reporter for the New York Times. He teaches now at Syracuse University.
His entire take is available here:
http://www.tax.com/taxcom/features.nsf/Articles/0DEC0EAA7E4D7A2B852576CD00714692?OpenDocument
Republicans Lie and News Media Spread It
Posted by Roldo Bartimole in Media, Politicians on February 4, 2010
February 4, 2010… The Audacity of No.
The Republican Party has put the country into serious financial jeopardy. Now they blame others.
Two Republican wars, two Republican tax cuts mostly to the wealth and a Republican prescription drug benefiting drug companies – and NONE paid for by the party that now sees disaster in deficits.
What gall.
Of course, one of the leaders of the dire need to deal with the deficit is our own Sen. George Voinovich. His image burnished by The Plain Dealer and Steve Koff recently as so, so concerned about our profligate spending.
In a paean of praise, Koff recently credited Voinovich, who ends his career this year, with going out by working to “force Washington to deal with the national debt that could doom the nation’s shaky finances…”
Where have Voinovich and Koff been for eight years?
The problem we all are in now has to do with the news media, the mainstream media’s biases. It’s utter failure to be honest about the predicament we are in and who caused it.
They are treating the dire problems the nation faces dishonestly.
The treatment of President Barack Obama and the Democrats in reporting the situation the nation now finds itself lacks the proper context that could make truthful. So it is a lie.
The news media’s failure is very similar to the way the news media treated Sen. Joe McCarthy by “reporting” his lies. Reporting and waiting for others to define his ravings. The major newspapers failed miserably by reporting lies as “news” in their supposed objective manner. He said it, didn’t he? That’s what we are reporting. That’s news judgment?
It wasn’t until after vast human damage was done that a few people spoke out or were allowed to counter his ravings. It took a major media figure as Edward R. Murrow to strike the blow to reveal the truth of Sen. McCarthy. We couldn’t expect that of a Tom Brokaw. Courage may be his subject but it isn’t his talent.
Now I read the newspapers, including the New York Times, for some honesty. But I don’t find it.
This is the reason 49 Republicans are a “majority” in the U. S. Senate. They have 49 Senators and a sad-sack news media. Unwilling to present the truth in full frontal view. Too timid for unvarnished truth.
Republicans are making a mockery of governing by simply saying “No” to everything of any importance. It’s a strategy right out of Rove. It should be headline stuff.
The message is clear. The aim is even clearer. They want to destroy the Obama administration. Stop it before it starts. No matter the cost to the nation. No matter the cost to ordinary people. Those suffering the most.
There’s an old ditty I like to tell in these instances:
Why will people never say the things all people know?
Why must truth be smiled upon as if it were not so?
Ask your daily newspaper and national TV news.