Um, the Fox one picks 2000-2004 years for Obamas and 2010 year for Romney. At least pick the same year if you are going to compare % of income to charity. Let's not beat around the bush, prospective politicians will probably ramp up their charity donations before campaigns to seem more 'friendly'.
We're in the same boat on this one, I wouldn't vote for Romney, I don't even vote GOP. But to say he's a bad guy because of his tax rate or what he earns is embarrassing. If I could do exactly what Romney has done to get to where he stands financially today I'd do it in a heart beat.
While it is commendable that Mr Romney gives a 14% of his earnings away. 10% of that is a tithe, that he apparently has to give to his church to remain a member in good standing. In Romney's tax returns, details on Mormon tithe By RACHEL ZOLL, AP Religion Writer – 1 hour ago Mitt Romney's newly released tax returns provide more than an accounting of the Republican presidential candidate's remarkable personal wealth. The documents also give a rare glimpse into tithing to the Mormon church by one its most prominent members. Romney reports he will give a total of $4.13 million to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints over two years as part of his overall charitable donations. The former Massachusetts governor reported income of about $43 million for the two years. Separately, over the past decade, Romney and his wife, Ann, have given more than $4.7 million to the denomination through the Tyler Charitable Foundation, a multimillion-dollar trust the couple leads. The LDS church famously seeks a high level of commitment from its members — in prayer, study, service to others and charity. A lifelong Mormon, Romney served as a missionary in France as a young man and as a top Latter-day Saint leader in the Boston area. However, the Republican candidate's commitment to the church is a double-edged sword in the contest for the presidential nomination. Many GOP voters are Christians who do not consider Mormons to be part of historic Christianity. Romney supporters worry that details of his church donations contained in the tax returns could fuel opposition to him based on his religion. "I feel it can be misconstrued if the sums of money he's giving to the church struck observers as unusual or as indicating some particular loyalty that threatens his independence as a politician," said Terryl Givens, a professor at the University of Richmond and author of several books on Latter-day Saints. The annual 10 percent donation is a Bible mandate taught throughout Christianity. (Evangelical pastor Rick Warren, author of the bestselling book "The Purpose Driven Life," is known to "reverse tithe," keeping 10 percent of his earnings for his family while giving away 90 percent.) Particular to Mormon teaching, Latter-day Saints must pay the tithe to remain a church member in good standing and participate in temple rituals. The Doctrine & Covenants, a collection of revelations from church founder Joseph Smith, says of tithing that Mormons "shall observe this law, or they shall not be found worthy to abide among you." Nearly 80 percent of Latter-day Saints said they paid a tithe in a recent survey by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life. Mormon giving is shaped by an ethic of self-reliance from the church's pioneer heritage, and by the history of anti-Mormon persecution over religious beliefs and past support for polygamy, which the church renounced in 1890. Smith was assassinated by a mob in 1844. The earliest Mormons were driven from their homes, often under violent attack. Settlers in the Salt Lake Valley faced food shortages, disease and other hardships. Out of these experiences, the church developed its own massive welfare system, which it still operates today, providing food and other goods from its own factories and farms. "They had to learn very early on in their history to provide for the material needs of their own people," Givens said. In addition to the tithe, Mormons also give what they call a "fast offering." One day a month, Mormons fast, then donate the money they would have spent on the food to their local church leaders. The funds are used to help anyone struggling in the community because of unemployment, illness or other difficulty. In addition, Latter-day Saints are expected to donate to a variety of church charities, including a low-interest education loan fund, a publishing fund for the Book of Mormon, and the church's international disaster relief and aid fund — the denomination's equivalent to the Red Cross — which responds to tragedies such as the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. The giving process is private, making the details of Romney's charitable donations that much more noteworthy. No collection plates are passed during worship services. No financial records are used. Mormons are expected to give according to their conscience. Once a year, local LDS bishops hold tithing settlement meetings with families to ask if they've paid their full 10 percent. The church, based in Salt Lake City, releases no specifics of what it collects in tithes annually, although the amount by some estimates is several billion dollars. On his tax returns, Romney reported that he gave the church $1.53 million in 2010 on income of $21.7 million, and in 2011 estimates he'll donate $2.6 million to the church, on expected income of $21 million. The 2010 amount is less than 10 percent, while the 2011 figure is higher than the expected tithe. A campaign official said the governor bases his tithes on estimated income, since he donates to the church at the end of the calendar year before his taxes are finalized. He plans to pay above the 10 percent in 2011, to make up for the underestimate the year before, the campaign official said. For many Mormons, the percentage of tithing varies from year to year. "In one given calendar year, I might actually 'pre-pay' some tithing and then the next year, I'll kind of work that into my calculation," said Paul Edwards, editor of the Deseret News, which is owned by the LDS church. "I think that most Latter-day Saints can recognize it looks like he's giving roughly a 10th, whether it's one calendar year or over an extended period of time." In an interview on "Fox News Sunday," one day after his loss in South Carolina, Romney said he'd be surprised "if people want to discriminate against someone based upon their commitment to tithe." "The Bible speaks about providing tithes and offerings. I made a commitment to my church a long, long time ago that I would give 10 percent of my income to the church. And I followed through on that commitment," Romney said. "And, hopefully, as people look at various individuals running for president, they'd be pleased with someone who made a promise to God and kept that promise." http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap...yp_Oig?docId=ea5c1fccd15549e18f74d354d046dec0
it shouldn't be affected at all by how much you make, it should be dependent on how much you spend (sales tax). The government shouldn't tax income when it's earned, it should tax income when it's spent. Also there should be no double taxation for investing/saving.
So you are proposing of getting rid of income tax and having sales tax to replace it. That means poorer people will pay a higher proportion of tax than richer people (consumption being a higher proportion of their budgets than richer people). And you somehow think this will ever make it to the floor? Interesting
Not if there is a prebate such as in the Fair Tax. 'poor' is a matter of income so it doesn't make sense in the context of a sales tax since a sales tax is dependent on what you spend not what you earn, but those that spend below a certain level would make money overall due to the prebate (presumably the poor would be in this group).
We are supposed to have a progressive income tax, the definition of which is that the tax rate goes up with income.
ALL money has "already been taxed." Investment income is still income and should not be taxed less than money earned through wages. Why should someone who does nothing but collect dividend checks pay a lower tax rate than someone who goes to work every day?
amateurish, but expected. sigh. I guess your going in assumption is that we, as morally good people, owe it to the government to just give them our money in the form of taxes, and that anybody who doesn't see this as fair is a dullard and not pulling their weight. Sigh, again. Then you play the class warfare card by likening those who receive dividends as "do nothings rich fat cats who deserve to pay the government". Triple sigh. a few thoughts on your point about why dividends should be taxed at a different rate. I'll leave it to you to educate yourself further on these topics, because frankly, you're ignorant on them right now. 1. Asymmetric treatment of debt and equity 2. Double taxation of dividends -- to the corporation and the individual. 3. Treatment in other countries -- why do countries like Canada, the UK and even FRANCE provide tax relief on dividends? now go educate yourself, moon. I've done my good deed for the day in providing you this lesson.
You catch Daily last night? Not only is Mitt only paying 14% but a few years ago there was legislation to eliminate various loopholes for investment firms that would have increased Mitt's rate up to 30 or 35%. At that point a massive lobbying effort was launched, co sponsored by Bain (Mitt's company) to kill the bill. The frustrating part was Mitt made a public speach at the same time period indicating the low income earners have to pay their fair share in taxes like the rest of us do. So Mitt apparently thinks poor folks have to pay more than rich people.
No. He was not previously taxed on his capital gains. The tax is only applied to the gain, not to the original investment. For example, if you bought a stock for $10 and sell it for $110, you pay taxes on $100. You do not pay taxes on the $10 because that has already been taxed. I think what is most interesting is Romney's IRA. How does he get to that outrageous value when annual contributions are small? Even if he rolled over a 401K, a $100,000,000 IRA is incredible.
Yes, but the company that pays the dividend or undergirds the value of the stock value appreciation is also taxed. So, say a company that Romney invested in pays a $1/share dividend itself pays a 10% effective tax rate on its income. If it paid no tax, it could have paid Romney $1.10/share. If you really wanted to do an apples-to-apples comparison of investment income to earned income, you'd include the prorated share of the tax burden of the companies invested in. In other words, Romney's reported income has already taken an implicit hit from taxation that isn't calculated in his nominal effective tax rate. But, I don't have an objection to double-taxation. I also would object to saying the fat cats don't do anything. They're taking on risk by giving money to companies to do business and are compensated for taking the risk. Without the investment money, companies wouldn't have the cash to build stuff, hire people, and generally make the economy go. Romney is not working, but he's letting people use an important resource that he owns. (it just so happens that the 'risk' he takes is assymetric and it pays off much more often than it loses.) Finally, taxing capital gains at a different/lower rate than earned income makes sense in that you want to encourage people (and it's not just fat cats anymore, many many people participate in investing now through brokerage accounts, 401(k)s (though tax is deferred), and other financial vehicles) to put their money to use so that businesses will have access to capital to build stuff, hire people, etc. When a person puts their money at risk, they want to get a certain return for taking the risk. A high tax rate will make more of those propositions not worth the risk, so the capital won't be invested. I just think 25% was fine. (And taxing it like earned income wouldn't be the end of the world either.) I think there are very good reasons why we do things this way. And, it's unfair that Romney is getting blamed for it all. I don't really want to change the methods here, but I do think adjusting the coefficients makes sense.
No were not. If that were the case our tax code wouldn't be billions of lines long and riddled with special breaks for those that are in with the in-crowd.
The value of a stock, however, is based on a company's projected future earnings combined with some psychological value attributed to the brand and a bunch of other artificial things not directly tied to last year's income. So if I buy $10000 worth of stock and sell it for $15000, that $5000 I made was not taxed anywhere before. The stock is bought and sold on the secondary market, so that money didn't come from the company. And the gain on the stock may or may not be tied to anything the company actually did vs just some random confidence in the US economy or takeover rumors or any number of other things.
dividends also factor into the valuation of a stock you're blurring taxation on dividends and capital gains
Sorry - I'm not referring to dividends at all. I think that's a different issue. I'm just referring to capital gains, which only indirectly benefit a company by letting them raise more capital with their stock. People making money on Apple stock today doesn't actually benefit Apple the company or help them hire people or anything like that except to the extent that they sell more stock down the line. It looks like I quoted the wrong part of the post, though.
Many (most?) countries tax cap gains preferentially to other income. There are many -- mostly boring, but legit -- reasons for this. Mitt's problem is that much of his wealth was accumulated under these rules even though his earnings were really a fee for managing other peoples money. And he's actively campaigned to keep this so, and seems completely disconnected (even projecting a sense of entitlement) over why this sits wrong with people. For a guy campaigning on Obama being out of touch -- this doesn't play well.
