Obama: Payroll tax on incomes above $250,000

**LogansPapa** · 06-13-2008, 01:53 PM

Jun 13 12:24 PM US/Eastern / By CHARLES BABINGTON / Associated Press Writer

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - Democrat Barack Obama would apply the Social Security payroll tax to all annual incomes above $250,000, which he says would affect the wealthiest 3 percent of Americans.

The presidential candidate told senior citizens in Ohio on Friday that it is unfair for middle-class earners to pay the Social Security tax "on every dime they make, while millionaires and billionaires are only paying it on a very small percentage of their income."

The payroll tax is now applied to all income up to $102,000 a year, which covers the entire amount for most Americans. Under Obama's plan, the tax would not apply to incomes between that amount and $250,000. But all annual income above the quarter-million-dollar amount would be taxed under his plan.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php...show_article=1

**LogansPapa** · 06-13-2008, 01:54 PM

Oh Good, increase taxes on those folks that start and maintain small businesses. Brilliant.

**linda22003** · 06-13-2008, 01:55 PM

I don't see why any amount is exempted, frankly.

**Phillygirl** · 06-13-2008, 02:01 PM

Originally Posted by linda22003

I don't see why any amount is exempted, frankly.

I don't see why I have to pay social security tax if I am self-funding my own retirement.

**linda22003** · 06-13-2008, 02:16 PM

So am I. Let's face it, SS is the only thing standing between us and people who are NOT saving for retirement voting to take all of our savings away from us. And there's no guarantee they won't do it anyway.

**Lager** · 06-13-2008, 02:30 PM

The payroll tax was set up, I believe, to correspond to the maximum amount of benefits you could recieve from the programs that you pay to fund. So therefore, since the benefits are capped at a certain amount, those who make a lot more money will be forced to pay quite a bit more for the same amount of compensation as those whose taxes are quite a bit less. Obama must feel pretty confident that there are enough people who won't figure this out, to risk floating such an unfair idea. It's time we told the truth. The dems idea of Social Security is not a retirement fund, it's a tax designed to transfer wealth.

**lacarnut** · 06-13-2008, 02:24 PM

Originally Posted by linda22003

I don't see why any amount is exempted, frankly.

I have a problem with the dollar limit being raised, and I have never made over the threshold amount.

The Democrats and Republicans have stolen, raped and pillaged the money that was supposed to go into the S.S. fund; it was transferred into the general fund and spent. There is no money in the S.S. fund; only IOU's.

I will do a little math here for ya:

If you work 40 years under civil service and make $4,250 per month, you get a retirement check of $4,250 per month. A 100% retirement check which is funded by a retirement system that invests the money and earns an average of 8% per year. Investing the money assures that the system will be solvent.

If you work 40 years in the private sector, you will be lucky if you get 1/2 (50)% or $2125 per month because the politicians have screwed the pooch and spent it as fast as it is sent in. The system will pay out more than it takes in in 15 years and become insolvent unless rates are increased and/or age is increased.

**megimoo** · 06-13-2008, 03:12 PM

Originally Posted by lacarnut

I have a problem with the dollar limit being raised, and I have never made over the threshold amount.

The Democrats and Republicans have stolen, raped and pillaged the money that was supposed to go into the S.S. fund; it was transferred into the general fund and spent. There is no money in the S.S. fund; only IOU's.

I will do a little math here for ya:

If you work 40 years under civil service and make $4,250 per month, you get a retirement check of $4,250 per month. A 100% retirement check which is funded by a retirement system that invests the money and earns an average of 8% per year. Investing the money assures that the system will be solvent.

If you work 40 years in the private sector, you will be lucky if you get 1/2 (50)% or $2125 per month because the politicians have screwed the pooch and spent it as fast as it is sent in. The system will pay out more than it takes in in 15 years and become insolvent unless rates are increased and/or age is increased.

They pay for it with a special bond issue, a sort of national IOU, that will never mature and sits in a file cabinet some where !

The Fiction of Social Security Bonds
How is Social Security different in kind from any other government program? Charles Rounds argues that it is not different at all. It is a spending program funded out of revenue. It can be abolished anytime.

When the government speaks of "bonds," it is merely is engaging in non-binding musings with itself about paying itself back for certain monies it has spent out of general revenues for purposes other than social security. They are not assets.
snip
Yes, the social security statute provides that on the face of the "bonds" memorializing the spent surplus there shall be a notation that they are "supported by the full faith and credit of the United States." But this provision can only kick in if the bonds are actually issued by the U.S. to another party. The statute, however, does not provide for this. In other words, the "full faith and credit" language is illusory.

As mentioned, for a bond to be a real bond, there needs to be at least two parties, for example, the U.S. and a citizen who owns a U.S. treasury bond, or the U.S. as owner of a German bond and Germany. The U.S. cannot issue "bonds" to itself and have their terms bind future Congresses. Bottom line: These social security "bonds" are neither assets of the U.S. nor property of workers and their families.

Whichever side one is on in the social security personal account debate, or whether one advocates abolishing social security altogether, there needs to be a common understanding of how the current system is structured, to include an appreciation that the social security "bonds" are not real bonds. As long as general confusion reigns about the law and facts currently applicable to social security, advocates of the status quo will have the upper hand over the reformers and the abolitionists.

http://www.mises.org/story/1820