2005 Tax deduction

Believe it or not, you're rich. At 64K, you are well into the top 25% of income tax filers. You only needed an Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) of $57,343 to make it into the top 25% in 2003. (AGI is before deductions such as mortgage and Prius) The top 25% of tax filers paid 83.88% of the Federal taxes in 2003. The top 10% (AGI of $94,891) paid 65.84% of the Federal Taxes. The top 5% (AGI of 130,080) paid 54.36% of Federal Taxes. And the top 1% paid 34.27%.

And conversely, the bottom 75% of tax filers paid only 16.12% of the Federal taxes in 2003. The bottom 50% of tax filers paid only 3.46% of the Federal taxes in 2003.

I bet you didn't realize that you were rich. When you hear talk about taxing the rich, look in the mirror, because they're talking about you.

Summary of Federal Individual Income Tax Data

[snapback]172134[/snapback]​

[/quote]


AGI is arrived at after the deduction for clean fuel vehicles is taken but before itemized deductions (medical expenses, mortgage interest, taxes, contributions, etc.) are taken.

 

I do my taxes online, and just answer a bunch of questions. Since I don't use it, I had completely forgotten the standard deduction went up!! My bad.....

I don't see the clean fuel deduction line in the AGI section of last year's form. (I guess the original deduction that was offered 2 or 3 years ago had expired, yes?) That's why I thought it was taken with the itemized deductions and didn't realize it could be added with the standard. Sorry, folks. I stand corrected!!

And thanks for the heads-up on the mileage rate. I figured it would go up again (was .385 last year), but I just hadn't looked it up. So I guess when I do my taxes online, I'll be asked to provide miles driven Jan-Aug, then those driven Sep-Dec.....

 

Then how come I can't afford a hummer, nor the gas to go in it? :lol:

It must be a status symbol to drive one, cause they sure are not practical!.. far too nice and expensive to actually take them off road!

 

Probably because, like most regular people, you think rich is someone who is very well off (i.e., a millionaire). That's certainly what it sounds like when politicians talk about tax breaks, taxing the rich, and such. The truth is just as posted. The "rich" in the US are comprized mostly of the middle and upper-middle class.

 

according to whom, in comparison to what and in what terms?

 

From www.themiddleclass.org:
"While the U.S. Census Bureau has no official definition of the "middle class," conventionally it has come to represent the large swath of the American people with incomes between approximately 200 percent of the federal poverty threshold and those of the nation's top five percent income earners--roughly $25,000 to $100,000 a year. "

And one of the definitions from Wikipedia:
"What is considered "middle range" can be quite broad, especially since most Americans yearn to be known as "middle class". Though an average yearly income in the United States is about $30,000, incomes all the way from $20,000 up to $75,000 a year are generally considered middle class."

I can find no conventional definition that defines "middle class" on the basis of taxes paid.

 

Thank God!.. I'm Rich!!!!! I"ve always wanted to be RICH!!!!.....
Wait a minute? Hummers must be for "Filthy Rich!"... money & gas to burn! :angry:

Maybe thats why we "Rich folks" are trying to save gas, so the "Filthy Rich" will have more to burn!....
Yea!... I think thats the way it works!... nothing like good ol American Economics at work!
Hey!.. then we Filthy Rich folks could get them poor "Middle class rich folks" to help pay for our roads by taxing those poor thrift mongers for every mile they drive too!
I sure wouldn't want my Hummer to get taxed, just because it burns gas like water!.... in Fact I think we should get tax breaks for buying our Hummers!

Whoo Hoo!.. what a bargain!

Boy, it would be nice to be "Filthy Rich!"

 

Perhaps ... but you may come around you know. Think "taxes" when you vote.

We only get the taxes we deserve, because we vote for the people who tax us. We are, metaphorically speaking, the "King". It makes no sense to complain about taxes unless you use your voting power.

 

Why in the world are we getting any money back from the gov't - makes absolutely no sense at all! (Of course I took it and didn't feel guilty) but the feds tax us too much to begin with and then we expect handouts at others expense.

 

You're right, but thats hopeless too.... its very difficult to really know and trust the issues presented. We are lied to so much and there is so many games and lies, often the most honest and best ones for the office are the ones that don't know how to play the game well nor do they have the money to do so.

There have been times I have been so confused on the issues, I was afraid I would actually vote for the wrong person?
I think alot of people hope and assume someone else with a better handle on the issues will make a better vote... so they let them do all the work!

Only problem,..... there are so many suckers in this country that it really pays off when the politicians play thier games. Car dealers do the same.

Then the other problem is even when the true issues are known, there are so many "idiots" out there that vote for the wrong causes?
We have so many people that vote without thought and conviction of truth and right and wrong, they vote for who scraches thier back, and who makes them "feel" good.... some movie star or someone that promises to fix "one" little problem that no one else has ever fixed and they sell the whole nation to do it!

Most don't vote for the whole.. . they vote for "themselves". We are so easily manipulated, because we love to believe what we want to hear!

You get a guy that says he will help the health care system and thats all we hear.... we vote him in and not only does the health care system not change, all the other issues that came with the package get institued that we didn't even care about.

This is why GM has always played the political game of lies in advertizing they have always played. They know it pays off.

When are we going to reward the car makers, and politiians that are honest?
By what means are we to tell their status?... the media?... Ha!... they are just as crooked!
How about a track record!

Sounds kinda hopeless doesn't it?

If everyone would learn all the issues and could actually trust them that would be one thing.
But things are so corrupt now that even when a leader gets in office with full integrity and have intentions to change things, they are overwhelmed with the corrupt system in play and often are neutered into watered down actions that really accomplish very little. If they rock the boat too much, they are blackballed and discredited by the big money. Its seems the best way to get changes done is to try to do it without offending the big money. The mafia still controls. Anyone who disagrees is nieve. Big money makes the world go round.

I used to not believe all this and marvelled that out of all the things Jesus could have said about the economy... he said something that only now is becoming clear....
"The LOVE OF MONEY IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL" .... that phrase makes no sense to the nieve and those that haven't been around long enough to learn the system.

There is alot of political gangsters and power at play that run things behind the scenes.
One part of government tries to help, while the other takes away.

 

Nope. I'd invest in the stock of companies smart enough to build cars like the Prius, both so they have the money to expand, and because I consider them a good investment. (And in fact I have: I own stock in Toyota, and in Matsushita, the parent company of Panasonic, which makes the batteries for the Prius.)

 

I have to say that every time I see that penquin get slapped, I laugh, over and over again!
Thanks

 

"Rich" is obviosuly a comparitive term. To a Mexican family living on the median of a busy Mexico City street amid the exhaust fumes, a poverty-stricken American family in a run-down tenement is "rich." To a working-class family just barely making the house and car payments, the guy who can afford a Hummer and the gas to burn in it is "rich." To that Hummer-driver, the corporate exec with a private jet is "rich."

I'd say that being "rich" is having enough money to buy the things you want. Some people are fabulously rich on $20,000 a year because they don't want a lot of stuff. Some people are poor on $64,000 a year because they want everything they see, they run their credit cards up to the maximum, and then don't have available cash for emergencies or necessities.

Americans (most of us) really are rich. But they make themselves poor by buying things they cannot afford. I'm not talking about the genuinely poor: people who don't have enough money to pay for the cheapest available apartment. I'm talking about people who own a home twice as big as they really need, who buy new cars on debt financing, who borrow money to take a vacation, and then complain that it's hard to keep up with the payments.

 

Well good or bad it is a few bucks in my pocket. We have always used the tax code as incentives for a particular behavior. It is not much but there you are. What frosts my glutti is the 100k deduction for large trucks that one of the local dealers is advertising right now. Come in get your mega monster truck and get 100k off your income tax!

 

You are sooo right on! Especially the second paragraph

 

ha, so individually our incomes are not even considered middle class??

yet here we have a brand new car which we pay more than the minimum on every month, and a rental home full of nice things, and we pretty much want for nothing except maybe to go out on a date here and there.

all that from working-class income. awesome. life will be GREAT when i get a real job.

i also find it amusing that people who make 100K a year are considered middle class. i mean, yikes that's a lot of money!

 

You're changing the rules by applying them individually.
The quoted numbers are for households.
I think you'd be surprised at how unrich a household income of $100k can seem.

 

oh, so it is household. okay. wasn't sure.

the way i see it, how rich you feel depends not on your income but on your financial demands in proportion to your income.

 

Want to feel a little better about that 100k deduction (and FYI, most people don't qualify to take that much)? If the buyer ever stops using that mega monster truck for business (or his personal use miles constitute 50% or more of the miles that the truck is driven), he has to recapture (or pay taxes) on that extra depreciation. If he takes it that much depreication in the current year, he also ends up with very little depreciation in the future; he pays more taxes. You could end up getting the last laugh, if the mega monster truck buyer doesn't do some research and business planning before he claims all that depreciation.

 

Quick question: Can "rich" ONLY be defined in terms of income?

What if the likes of a Bill Gates flat out retired, liquidated everything he owned, and invested all of it in non-dividend paying equities or some other non-income producing property?