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Group9 · 07-11-2021, 06:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Yes but it’s a form of mutualised fund. Those that may make low payments will get back proportionately more and those paying more will get back proportionally less. Otherwise the poorer sections of society wouldn’t get enough and the wealthy would get wealthier.

That's beside the point. The point is that your rate of return on social security, to use a technical term, "sucks balls".

Everyone, the poor and the wealthy, would be better off if the fund were managed better.

And, as the previous poster pointed out, income is capped, so no, the wealthy are suffering like everyone else as far as return.

valhalla360 · 07-11-2021, 07:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by JBP

The wealthy don't pay much more than everyone else. Once you make over $142,000, you no longer have to pay into social security.

Run the numbers per $1 contributed to SS against the return.

At around $1000/month (calculated average income), you get a check equal to 90% of your monthly average.

At the upper end, it works out to be around 28%.

But in many ways it's worse because if you work more than 35yrs, the taxes you pay in years more than 36, gain you nothing in terms of increasing your SS check.

It's very much a wealth redistribution system.

I would recommend to anyone who cares, to run the calculation yourself. Particularly if you are retiring early or will be dropping back to lower earnings when you head out cruising. SSA uses assumptions based on you continuing to work until full retirement age (67 for most) and that your income will match your highest earnings. By running the calcs yourself, you can make assumptions that better match your plans.

Of course, this is very much getting into thread drift.

donradcliffe · 07-11-2021, 08:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by garyfdl

"Allegedly" owed...

One of the US tax 'problems' is: the wealthy can afford expensive accountants and lawyers to defend themselves from the IRS. As a result, the agency had (has?) an unspoken policy to go after the 'little fish' - people and businesses that are unable to afford a costly defense.

Not true in my experience.

I have a BIL who supported himself for 20 years remodeling houses, and never filed a tax return. The IRS caught up with him when he got a real job. They quickly reached a reasonable settlement (he had no assets).

OTOH, I worked for a guy who was a tax partner at Arthur Anderson. One of his clients had a IRS agent assigned to his case FULL TIME FOR TWO YEARS! They followed the big money, but failed to score.

capn_billl · 07-11-2021, 08:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

3 of them including a pistol and a rifle with a silencer

cool. Which country?

We aren't even allowed silencers in the USA.

ShinyHappy · 07-11-2021, 15:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by capn_billl

cool. Which country?

We aren't even allowed silencers in the USA.

For a $200 NFA stamp you can.

ShinyHappy · 07-11-2021, 15:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Yes but it’s a form of mutualised fund. Those that may make low payments will get back proportionately more and those paying more will get back proportionally less. Otherwise the poorer sections of society wouldn’t get enough and the wealthy would get wealthier.

Exactly. And if they didn't have enough we would be paying for it in another way through some other subsidies or housing arrangments.

**skipmac** · 07-11-2021, 20:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by JBP

The wealthy don't pay much more than everyone else. Once you make over $142,000, you no longer have to pay into social security.

I think you have that a little confused. You still pay SS no matter how much you earn. But the amount you pay in is capped based on a maximum earning of $142.800. That amounts to a bit over $9,000 out of your check but if you're self employed you pay the employer's matching amount which then totals over $18,000 out of pocket.

**GordMay** · 08-11-2021, 05:02

Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, should sell 10% of his stock in the electric-car maker he founded, in order to pay taxes, according to the results of a poll, he posted to Twitter on Saturday.
Nearly 58%, of the more than 3.5 million people who took part in the poll, voted for the stock sale, by the time the poll closed on Sunday.
➥ https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1457064697782489088

In June, investigative site ProPublica got hold of a cache of IRS documents, and reported [1] that Musk and other moguls, by structuring their pay to avoid income, built their wealth into the high billions, while paying almost nothing in federal taxes.

The activity wasn't against the law, ProPublica said, but the tax records reveal how the uber-wealthy minimize taxes, sometimes by taking out loans, using their stock holdings as collateral.
By comparison, wage earners live primarily off their paychecks, which are taxed as income.

The 25 richest people in the US amassed wealth of $1.1 trillion as of 2018, according to ProPublica's analysis of the tax records. It would have taken the wealth of 14.3 million average US wage earners to equal that amount, the publication said.

Those wage earners would have paid an estimated $143 billion in taxes, 75 times as much as the $1.9 billion the 25 wealthiest Americans paid in 2018.

[1] “The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income Tax” ~ by Jesse Eisinger, Jeff Ernsthausen and Paul Kiel, for ProPublica
➥ https://www.propublica.org/article/t...oid-income-tax

Pelagic · 08-11-2021, 05:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by GordMay

Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, should sell 10% of his stock in the electric-car maker he founded, in order to pay taxes

In June, investigative site ProPublica got hold of a cache of IRS documents, and reported [1] that Musk and other moguls, by structuring their pay to avoid income, built their wealth into the high billions, while paying almost nothing in federal taxes.

The activity wasn't against the law, ProPublica said, but the tax records reveal how the uber-wealthy minimize taxes, sometimes by taking out loans, using their stock holdings as collateral.
By comparison, wage earners live primarily off their paychecks, which are taxed as income.

Musk could always sell 100% of his controlling stock in his companies to China and retire early.

barnakiel · 08-11-2021, 08:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by garyfdl

"Allegedly" owed...

One of the US tax 'problems' is: the wealthy can afford expensive accountants and lawyers to defend themselves from the IRS. As a result, the agency had (has?) an unspoken policy to go after the 'little fish' - people and businesses that are unable to afford a costly defense.

Yep. Not a US specific problem. It pays to be rich.

b.

**Tellie** · 08-11-2021, 09:04

I thought we had the answer two thousand years ago. "Give unto Caesar"

garyfdl · 08-11-2021, 14:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

Not true in my experience.

I have a BIL who supported himself for 20 years remodeling houses, and never filed a tax return. The IRS caught up with him when he got a real job. They quickly reached a reasonable settlement (he had no assets).

OTOH, I worked for a guy who was a tax partner at Arthur Anderson. One of his clients had a IRS agent assigned to his case FULL TIME FOR TWO YEARS! They followed the big money, but failed to score.

LOL You disagree? I think you proved my point!(Albeit indirectly.)

Your asset-less b-i-l wound up paying while the the rich guy they chased for years didn't. Which was more 'profitable' for the IRS?

I have personal experience. Four years into being self-employed the ice broke and I had a real profitable year (paid 5 figures in Fed income tax). The IRS decided to audit me anyway, and disallowed a chunk of my claimed mileage, raising my tax by $1500, even though I had kept meticulous records and could justify each and every mile. After 3 'visits' with the IRS and contesting it up their 'food chain', I hired an ex-IRS tax lawyer. He negotiated a settlement for half ($750) plus his fee of $200. His advice was to take that deal, even though (in his opinion) we could have won the whole thing, but not before he burned through the remainder of what I was over charged. It was a simple and prudent matter to 'cut my loss' and settle, rather than push the issue and lose money just to prove I was right.