General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe rich get government handouts just like the poor. Here are 10 of them.
In case you are still skeptical that many of the non-poor and, in fact, a lot of the rich receive benefits from government, too (for which we don't make them pee in a cup or promise not to buy luxuries), we've rounded up some more examples below.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/04/09/the-rich-get-government-handouts-just-like-the-poor-here-are-10-of-them/
Thanks to this tax break, the 5 million households in America making more than $200,000 a year get a lot more housing aid than the 20 million households living on less than $20,000. Deductions for mortgage interest incentivize people already capable of buying big homes to buy even bigger ones. This tax break applies as well to second homes (you only get one second home though!). Note: In the eyes of the Congressional Budget Office the official word on this in Washington the mortgage interest deduction is equivalent to the government offering you money, not you keeping your own money.
2. The yacht tax deduction.
If youve got a boat and youre paying interest on it, that interest is tax-deductible provided your boat is really, really big. If it has sleeping quarters, a kitchen and a toilet e.g., it is a yacht then it can be considered a second home and any interest you pay on it is deductible. But if you just have a garden-variety fishing boat or canoe, sorry no deduction for you.
Beyond that, if you have a yacht you can loan it out to a charter business for part of the year, and keep it for personal use the rest of the time. This allows you to deduct the purchase price, insurance, maintenance and slip fees too.
3. Rental property.
If you're a landlord, which you probably aren't if you're very low-income, you can deduct many of the expenses you incur renting a home, including repairs, advertising, HOA fees and again mortgage interest. If you happen to rent out either your first or second home for 14 days or less because, for example, Augusta National Golf Club is hosting the Masters nearby you get to just pocket all that income without paying taxes on it at all.
4. Fancy business meals.
Talking business over an expensive dinner? That's tax deductible, too, a fact that puts taxpayer spending on food stamps into relief. This is a good deal for, say, a CEO presiding over actual filet mignon at a five-star restaurant. Scott Klinger, now the director of revenue and spending policies at the Center for Effective Government, explains how this works here:
Imagine that the tab for dinner and drinks for 10 executives comes to $1,600. Current tax law allows companies to deduct half of the cost of business meals in this case, $800. With a corporate tax rate of 35 percent, each dollar of deductions yields 35 cents of tax savings so that $800 deduction saves $280 in taxes. This means one dinner for 10 people provides more public food assistance than the $279 an average household receives in food stamps for the whole month.
[Missouri Republicans are trying to ban food stamp recipients from buying steak and seafood]No steak, no seafood, no strip clubs: Theres a logical gap in the recent laws that bash the poor who receive government welfare and food stamps. (The Washington Post)
Link to tweet
Midnight Writer
(25,738 posts)If we gave like this to the poor, we wouldn't have any poor.
FFS, we can't even get a minimum wage increase.
Autumn
(49,019 posts)WyattKansas
(1,648 posts)Was their inability to inform voters how those Republican tax cuts and welfare for the wealthy elite and rich got replaced by the voters' federal, state, and local tax increases on them along with their reduced government services... That kept burdening them more and more over the years.
Why hasn't the Democratic Party browbeat the media into demanding a reckoning?
Autumn
(49,019 posts)Hermit-The-Prog
(36,631 posts)BainsBane
(57,780 posts)and shows a deeply disturbed and corrupt government.
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