It's amazing how derogatory Andy can make my last name sound. I guess if you say it enough times, and in combination with enough cynical comments anything can sound bad.
Andy said: Does anyone of us really believe that wealth is not the result of *income*? Is there lying between Mr. Anderson's lines a suggestion that income, its pursuit and its increases, along with "a few assets" is actually *separate* from wealth or wealth-building? Response: There's a real big difference between income and wealth - can't you see the difference? And the most powerful people with the most wealth don't necessarily have a large income. Andy said: Whatever gave you the idea that progressive taxation was designed to "take wealth away?" That is pure misconception or purely misleading, depending on your motive. Power from wealth does NOT merely reside in property owned, especially real estate property. Response: I've rarely seen much discussion on the "why" of progressive taxation - and generally what I have seen is along the lines of "rich bad, poor good." I believe progressive taxation does make sense, both because each dollar is worth less to the rich than the poor, and because it helps mitigate the power of the rich. Under this rationale it makes more sense to tax property than income. Why do you think progressive taxes are good? Andy said: Wealth lies in a combination of very large current incomes - perhaps as a corporate executive (and we need not detail those horror stories here) or a well-to-do doctor, lawyer, dentist, broker, etc., and their portfolios of stocks, bonds and other investments. That's wealth, Mr. Anderson. That's the income that should be taxed. Response: You're mixing up wealth and income again. I think your average well paid doctor, lawyer, etc. has little political power, because he/she generally has very little time to be part of the process. The rich with the power are those with lots of wealth and lots of time to use their wealth for political purposes. An example is Senator Dayton. He certainly has more income than most of us, but it is not commensurate with his level of wealth. Executives of large corporations may have quite a bit of power, but not because of their personal income, but because they have power over the corporation's wealth. My previous comment: "...So those that "got theirs" can keep it, but those that may have few assets but are working hard to get more should get hit heavily by taxes." Brought on this from Andy: Now, which will it be? Those who got "theirs" only got their through property ownership? And they're not taxed enough? Or those who got theirs got it through income and they would be let off the hook by increased income taxes? Or vice versa? Or tuned around? What do you mean by "keep it?" Mr. Anderson? Keep what? Their property? Their wealth? Their property wealth? Their wealthy property? Their income? Their outgo? Response: I don't understand what you're getting at here. What I mean by "keep it" is they don't lose it - the usual definition of "keep." In particular, those that accumulated wealth in some previous times apparently shouldn't be taxed at all in your opinion - except to the extent they may be making income at the current time. Andy said: This is is an example of what happens when middle-class and middle-upper middle class folks think that an income tax will fall more heavily on them than it would on the wealthy. That simply doesn't compute. Or, maybe you don't want it to. Response: So it all comes back to what's good for me? Maybe I should argue that you are only pushing for no property tax because you are one of the indolent rich - little income but lots of property. For the record, I would not be affected particularly one way or the other whether tax was focused on income or property. Andy says: Property taxes essentially ignore income, so the aging woman living next door to Mark Anderson, or that young couple down the block from Mark Anderson want their independence from rentals (which also tag them big time for property taxes through their rent), but don't have the income level Mark Anderson enjoys, are still obligated to pay what will be property taxes much closer to his than they would have to pay if only their incomes were taxed. That's what makes the property tax so regressive, as if Mr. Anderson did not know this: it's levied evenly across income levels against all real estate owners in similarly valued properties. Response: Yeah, yeah, I got that, if progressivity is based only on what ones current income is, then a tax on property tax won't necessarily be progressive. A property tax will only tax those that have assets. Income taxes will charge the same tax on someone who has a $10 million mansion and another who has zip, if they are earning the same amount. Is that fair, Andy? Andy says: How will he feel when the property tax increases are such that it would dwarf any increase in any income tax he'd pay were the state to bump those instead? Response: This makes no sense. Now you are saying that more property tax than income tax is required to get the same amount of revenue? Andy says: It is isn't popular opinion. If it were, we'd have gone back to the Minnesota Miracle a long time ago. Response: Actually we've used the "Minnesota Miracle" model several times; in fact we just did it again last year in our latest "tax reform." Have you already forgotten? It's just that when the State takes over the taxes for localities, the local folks keep finding new ways to spend money, so property taxes never go down. Mark Anderson Bancroft _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
