Here is one important fact about Romney's claim for a 20% avg fed tax rate from 1990 to 2009: Mark Schmitt @mschmitt9 Romney tax rate avg 20% 1990-2009. Why? Avg includes 8 yrs when cap gains rate was ~30% (90-97) & 5 yrs at ~21% (98-02) bit.ly/TfI1VH Also, his campaign has admitted that they got the avg by adding up each year's % and divided by 20. They didn't weigh it by income he had each year, so he may well have paid far less than 20% of his income in federal taxes depending on whether most of the income happened in low tax rate years (when capital gains rate is at 15%) or the higher rate years. The way they did the math is very misleading. It is like calculating a guy's FG% without accounting for how many shots he attempted each game. In any case, his tax liability for the most recent years, 2003 on, is likely far less than the 20% number, and closer to 13 or 14%.
One more thing: The fact that capital gains tax was 30% during the 1990/ sure didn't seem to have demotivated Romney and Bain from working very hard to make money and "create jobs."
I'm fine with him giving to charity. But even middle class people give to charity, and they write off their donations as well. But they still end up paying more of a percentage than Mitt Romney. If anything the amount of Charity he's given just goes to show that there is no problem for the wealthy paying more. They can afford it and will still be wealthy.
The reason that 47% of the population do not pay taxes are endless tax cuts by the GOP. Do you support Romney's tax proposal that would increase that portion of the country? The only way to lower that number is to raise taxes on the middle class.
So what is the fair share for these folks then? Most of whom consist of retirees and the working poor for whom their payroll taxes are regressive. What's the form of retiree tax do you want to implement and what's the plan for eliminating the EITC?
I'd be happier if we had a tax code that was progressive and not regressive. His tithe isn't the issue here and not why he pays embarrassingly low taxes- its the fraud that is the carried interest exemption. Oh and as others have stated, if you think it's amazingly sad that I'm not impressed by somebody being charitable by forking over a few million to keep in good with the magic underwear elders of the multi-billion dollar LDS enterprise- it's really not. It's about as high on the charity scale as donating a building at a business school. Sure its generous...charitable? Buying your way into LDS heaven = BFD
And to add to the charitable contribution discussion, part of his "charitable contributions" included donations of stock holdings in Domino's Pizza, Dunkin Donuts and Warner Chilcott, to a family trust.
Obviously Romney felt otherwise which is why he intentionally overpaid. Do you blame Romney for wanting to make the tax code even less progressive than it is- which in his case is not very?
I like the part where he hid his money overseas to avoid taxes. We need another president who will do anything for a buck, haven't seen one in 4 years
So Romney only releases two returns, the last after increasing his charitable deductions to insure that his rate wasn't below 10%, then has his tax firm release a "20 year average" of his taxes. Big hairy, freakin' deal. Had it been an average of the last 10 years, maybe, just maybe, it might have meant something, but this doesn't. Why? It includes years of income taxed at over 30% in order to bring his "average" up. Completely obvious to anyone who cares to spend a couple of minutes thinking about it. I guess Romney just can't help being dishonest. Some people are like that.
He should release 2008 and 2009. A four year release is a fair compromise and would give us a clearer picture. Don't ya think?
"Romney might have shady tax dealings" "Well Obama might have gotten a couple of C's in college!!" LoL keep reaching brah.