re: #426 Walter L. Newton

James… you misspoke and now you are stretching… if you don’t work, you don’t pay federal anything… state and local yes, federal… no.

Okay, I will give you that if you don’t work you don’t pay federal taxes. But on the other hand at the moment about 10% (well lets say 10 to 15% or so to include those people who don’t work but are no longer “unemployed” since they aren’t actively looking for work) of the people don’t have jobs and so they don’t pay federal taxes.

However in 379 when lostlakehiker said “They object to the current trend to entirely exempt from the FIT a large fraction, and in their view, eventually a majority, of the population. The thinking is that if a voting majority pays no taxes, that majority will see no reason not to raise rates on the minority who do pay.” To me that sounded like lostlakerhiker was suggesting that if you don’t pay the FIT you don’t pay any sort of taxes to the federal government and that is demonstrably false that while say, 47% may not pay income tax, I bet most of those 47% do still contribute money to the federal government.

That was the point I was trying (and evidently failing) to make…