All this talk about taxes is beginning to get on my nerves. Along with many other folks, I paid a nauseating amount in Federal and State taxes last year. I am not rich nor am I wealthy. I live in one of the most expensive states that not only gets me for sales tax, gas tax, etc., but also a state income tax of almost 6%!
My opinion of rich or wealthy is anyone who has $1M in liquid assets and if you want to raise the taxes on them, I’m sure it would be just fine. To say that everyone who makes over $250K (or 200K or 150K) is rich is beyond naive.
We keep talking about jobs and all the jobs lost overseas. Well, here’s a newsflash…for the same reasons jobs are moving out of Massachusetts, jobs are leaving the U.S. – our taxes are too high! If you raise taxes on companies, they are going to build it into their operating plans and have to make up for it somewhere else and that is likely by reducing headcount. Or, they are going to outsource jobs where they can get cheaper labor and it’s not in the U.S. We have the best workers in the world, but we have to pay them well. We can do this if we don’t have a large tax burden to deal with. Study this closely before you buy the spin.
Here’s another news flash…more jobs are going to go away if taxes are raised on the people who spend all the money. There are many people like me who frequent Lowes, Target, Best Buy, and many other stores and walk out with things we never intended to buy. We also go out to eat more often than we need to. I can tell you that if my taxes go up anymore, I will buckle down and stop spending money. Who cares? Well, if I do that, so will many like me and ultimately, that will impact the local economies. When that happens, jobs get lost.
One final complaint and I will attempt to keep this blog positive – why should I pay higher taxes so someone who doesn’t pay taxes (40% of the 95% allegedly getting tax breaks) will get a check?! Yes folks – that IS welfare and we took far too long to figure out that didn’t work before. Let’s not go there again!
By the way, for those in Massachusetts, please vote in favor of repealing the state income tax (yes on Question 1). Look at your pay stub and that amount under state tax will be your extra money in every paycheck. That is a 6% raise in everyone’s (who pays taxes) paycheck TAX FREE! Don’t be fooled about all the services that will be lost. This will force the state to balance their checkbook and manage their money better like all of us have to do.
Vote yes on question 1 and see every other tax you pay rise dramatically. State Governement does not give back revenue nor does it work with less very well. They will find the revenue from other sources. I have learned to live with 5 percent of my paycheck automatically debited to the governement.
Your advice, thankfully, was ignored.