Subscribe to download
Income Tax Brackets ["Large Update" update]

This mod is overpowered for what it does. Good idea, but poorly executed

i posted this on another tax bracket mod but I figure it bares to be reused here:
normally tax brackets works like this:
You earn an income in the lower let's say 25% bracket you pay taxes according to that rate.
You earn an income in the middle say 50% bracket you pay the rate for that on any money above the previous bracket. and so on.

example: If you have a regular income tax of 10%, for simplicity the average income is $100k
if you make $100k a year you pay $10k.
now let's say you get a "wealth" bracket that's anything above average income+50% where you pay 25% and you make $151k a year. You pay $15k in regular tax (10%), plus $250 in the wealthier bracket on everything above the average+50%. You don't pay $37750 as most people think.

Of course if you make a ton more money than the average it gets real expensive fast.

Joe, the fact that you think wealthy people pay less in taxes than poor people do tells me you know absolutely nothing about this subject. You also say wealthy people work less than poor people? That may be true in some cases but not most, just because they might not be doing hard labor does not mean someone isnt working hard.

Might want to read that all bottom to top if you care... I'm out of it after a 13 hour workday

Too much equality in outcome is a utopia and leads to those who thrive leaving or not trying as hard so it is impossible to work unlike too much opportunity which just creates a brutal emotionless system like Britain in the industrial revolution (i.e. it's not that people purposely tried to hurt eachother but most people were in a state of learned helplessness or outrage. Then inequality of opportunity started to increase since some people are born into better situations naturally). It all just depends on your own perception and the answer is normally in the middle somewhere but it moves around and is never clear; it changes with every person, event, and day that passes.

Also I see some arguments about how fair/unfair it is to tax people different. There is no right answer, it just depends on where your personal balance of opportunity and outcome are. If everyone is given the same benefits then some will fail while others thrive, some may or may not need what help you give and this is equal opportunity because everyone has the same resources. Equality in outcome is when you take from those who can thrive and give to those who fail to achieve the same results across the board. Opportunity is more "fair" to those who are purely competitive but most people want to help those who need it and for a government you want to have more stability in everything (education, employment, taxes, ect) so you need some equality too; too much though and you collapse like it's 1991.

They do have loopholes but there is something called the alternative minimum tax which forces them to pay at least a certain percent if they make over X amount and that is always higher than the average tax rate. In effect any tax breaks you give in the system is a tax break to the rich because they pay the majority of taxes and most of them don't ever collect on the programs they are forced to pay into like social security, unemployment, medicare, ect. Also you can't tax yourself out of debt either, every single tax increase imposed decreases the government's revenue in the longterm (except the taxes on systems already owned/run by the government like social security which proves how inefficient they are). With 25% of a cow will get you a lot more and better hamburgers than 60% of a newborn calf so if you leave it alone for a couple years and let the money grow you can get more money and take a smaller bite out of the cow er i mean economy but still get better results.

Sales taxes and flat taxes are both effectively tax lower income people more (although they are more "fair") because you are taxing on both disposable and none disposable income at the same rates. In the USA when you net out benefits gained from taxes vs taxes paid more than half of the country already doesnt "pay" taxes each year because they receive more in tax funded benefits than they pay.Tax brackets are the correct way to collect but the current system effectively only taxes the top 40% or so while the rest receive a greater benefit over their lives than they pay into. The highest earners pay around 30% in taxes in the USA whereas the lowest earners pay an effective -55 -60% (receive more than they ever pay) and middle income tends to roughly break even when you net out social security and other benefits they do/will receive. In effect the top half of the earners pay more than their fair share while most of us complain they dont pay enough while receiving their money.

@Wayne, actually no, tax brackets allow for lowering taxes for the lower class, which is something that gives them more spending power than they'd otherwise have. Poor people spend greater percentages of their income than rich people do, so why should they both pay the same

well Wayne, because your comment is factually false, where did your ideas come from if not emotion?

As for the fair tax that would be a national sales tax. So you don't even have to see an accountant for it. When you buy a $10 hair brush you'd be paying $0.10 in taxes where if you buy a $1,000,000 boat you'd be paying $10,000 in federal taxes. The people making the most money still pay the most in taxes and one great thing about either of these taxes is you can't evade them.