67% of Wealthy (>$450K) support taxing THEMSELVES MORE -

[Bill USA]

[font size="+1"]"67 percent of the top one percent of American earners support higher income taxes. Their support has grown since the election."

"The top one percent consist of people making more than $450,000 a year."[/font]


http://www.cnbc.com/id/100335218/Majority_of_Wealthy_Support_Taxing_Themselves_Poll

House Republicans are opposing tax increases on anyone – whether it's Americans making $250,000 or $1 million or more a year.

But a new survey shows that they might be opposing the very people they claim to protect.

American Express Publishing and The Harrison Group found that 67 percent of the top one percent of American earners support higher income taxes. Their support has grown since the election. This summer, 62 percent of them supported higher taxes.(Read more: Why 'Plan B' Would Actually Raise Taxes on Low Earners)

Some might say the rich are hoping to tax people richer – or poorer -- than themselves. The top one percent consist of people making more than $450,000 a year. [font color="red"]But the survey clearly shows most One Percenters favor taxing themselves[/font]. More than half say that they support taxing those making $500,000 or more.
(more)

Yet the Republicans insist on taking us over the Austerity Cliff because they want to preserve the Bush tax cuts for the top two percent. Even though the very well off are supportive of increasing taxes on them to reduce the deficit and to help the country dig out of this REPUBLICAN (ECONOMIC) DYSTOPIA.

I guess they recognize that while their income went up about 275% over the last 30 years their income taxes were reduced to about half what they paid in 1980. So, they feel paying about 4% points more won't kill them. So what is the GOP's purpose in taking the country into an Austerity Recession?

[Turbineguy]

1. That may be because so many people

that the repubs want to screw over are heavily armed. Ironic really.

[PoliticAverse]

2. Perhaps, or perhaps the survey participants are giving the answer they think makes themself

look good while in reality they support candidates that will vote for decreasing taxes on the 1%.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_desirability_bias

[AverageJoe90]

3. Very good news indeed, Bill.

I sincerely hope more wealthier people continue to awake to the truth.......

[mainer]

4. Not surprised. Blue states are wealthier

And wealthy blue state voters tend to be well-educated, and knew that Obama supported higher taxes.

[meow2u3]

5. It's primarily the superrich rethugs, e.g., the Kochs et al, who want zero taxes

Most of the rich are willing to contribute more because they can afford to do so. It's the radical "libertarians" (read: fascist pigs) who want the shift the tax burden onto those who can least afford to give up any more.

[cbrer]

6. Majority of small business owners

are sane. If we can get this done, and end corporate welfare, we can move on to the next goal. The MIC.

[dkf]

7. I support taxing myself more even though I am not anywhere near the 1%.

I don't see how anyone who can read a chart who has any concern for this country doesn't see taxes need to be raised pretty much across the board.

I think Democrats are crazy to assert the country can be supported at these spending levels without taxing the middle class more.

[Bill USA]

10. top 1%'s after tax income was up 155% over last 30 yrs. The middle 60% ATI was up about 37%

Since 1980 everybody's tax rates have gone down about half. However, since 1980 the top 1%'s after-tax income (real, adjusted for inflation) has gone up about 155% while the income gains (after tax) for the middle 60% are about 37% over that period.


http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3629

U.S. Income Distribution and Mobility: Trends and International Comparisons

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42400.pdf

"Another indicator of the degree of inequality is the Gini coefficient. It is a single number that can
range between zero (a perfectly equal distribution) and one (a perfectly unequal distribution).9
The historical trend in the United States is one of almost steadily increasing income inequality
(from 0.386 in 1968 to 0.477 in 2011), as depicted in Figure 1. During the 2007-2009 recession,
the Gini coefficient fell slightly from its previous peak in 2006 of 0.470. Its level since then
indicates an income distribution that is much more unequal than in most years since 1968."

In a comparison of Gini coefficients of 18 countries, the U.S. came in third from the botton (that is the third highest) with only Mexico and Columbia coming in worse than the U.S. Among the countries with better Gini Coefficients were most of the economically developed nations and Slovenia and Poland... and Greece.

GINI coefficient international comparison


__ also, income taxes are not the only taxes people pay to the government. Payroll taxes hit lower and middle income groups and when this is included the tax rate applied to all income groups comes out to being pretty much the same - that is, it is not progressive.

[dkf]

11. Something I'm wondering about the top 1%...are they tracking whoever enters the top in that one year

Are they linking lottery winners together? Or is that a measurement of the top 1% of the wealthiest, tracking their income from year to year?

In other words, are they one hit wonders?

[Bill USA]

12. 1.2 million households in the top 1%.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2012-10-02/top-1-got-93-of-income-growth-as-rich-poor-gap-widened.html

The divergent fortunes of Reyes and Hemsley show that the U.S. has gone through two recoveries. The 1.2 million households whose incomes put them in the top 1 percent of the U.S. saw their earnings increase 5.5 percent last year, according to estimates released last month by the U.S. Census Bureau. Earnings fell 1.7 percent for the 96 million households in the bottom 80 percent -- those that made less than $101,583.

The recovery that officially began in mid-2009 hasn’t arrived in most Americans’ paychecks. In 2010, the top 1 percent of U.S. families captured as much as 93 percent of the nation’s income growth, according to a March paper by Emmanuel Saez, a University of California at Berkeley economist who studied Internal Revenue Service data.

[Bill USA]

13. here's and interesting interactive graphic about professions, positions of those in top 1%

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/newsgraphics/2012/0115-one-percent-occupations/index.html

[Bill USA]

14. here's what I was looking for , a list of occupations in the top 1%

click on image to go to article in Forbes

[samsingh]

8. agreed - higher taxes is not a bad thing here

[Doctor_J]

9. 70% of Americans support Medicare for all

it's not even up for vote. 60% are against ANY cuts to SS and medicare, yet that IS going to happen.

Face it, if the will of the people held any sway at all, the wars would be over, and we'd have universal health care, functioning public schools, minimum wage = living wage, and lots of bankers and Bush family members in prison. But it doesn't. The Cock Bros and their inner circle make all of the decisions

[Kablooie]

15. Certainly seems preferable to the fiscal cliff.

Which would tax them at an even higher rate and could collapse the stock market and economy.

[Doctor_J]

16. About the same % of Americans support universal HC

which is why good governance is also good politics, except in a completely broken system like ours.