I'm Sick of Congress

[des1954]

It's nice to blame the democrats, but CRA had very little to do with this, Fannie & Freddie did have a lot to do with it but so did the deregulation of Wall Street and the artificially low rates that the Fed introduced the investment banks and mortgage brokers/originators.
Consumers had a lot to do with it too. How many people do you know who are in McMansions that they over bought? Maybe not too many, but people who kept trading up and bought expensive 2nd & 3rd homes for speculation are another big part of this.

OMG!! For once, I have to agree with my brother!! Actually, we can look back to Reagan and thank him for the start of deregulation of industries. One I can definitely cite is the telco industry. Before dereg, you didn't have $11 or $12 monthly fees and surcharges tacked on to your monthly service. Oh yeah, you have the freedom to choose carriers now, but you will not avoid any FCC charges (which actually goes into telco pockets) and all the other absurd fees. How many of you have a monthly fuel surcharge tacked on to your power bill that you never saw in the 1980's? When we moved to our second home in 1987, the best mortgage interest rate we could get was from our Credit Union, and that was 11.87%!! Could it be that 20 years later we are finally feeling the effect of "Reaganomics"?

 

[big kahuna1]

It looks like I have 3 or 4 people here who if they truly believe what they are saying then I should have 3 or 4 addresses in my mail box. I will go check. Well, I am very disappointed...No addresses?

Yes, many and you may be able to even say most business can pass these costs on but not all so my offer still stands. BETTER YET I will even sweeten the offer. I will pay your gas and hotel costs to come to my business for ONE DAY so you can try and pass those charges on to my customers. I will even buy your luch and dinner. BUT, you will have to sign an agreement to pay ALL my taxes for this year when you FAIL! So, like I said before, if you truly believe what you said to be true then I expect several names and addresses/offers in my mail box by days end.

I am not trying to belittle anyone or be mean or anything else. I just want to insert a little reality into the business/corporate world of taxes...for at least my business.

I will be checking my mail box through out the day.

Also, in my opinion, deregulation had nothing to do with the fannie/freddie crap. Corruption of our politicians and the CEO's of Fannie/Freddie is what brought on this financial boondoggle that is upon us. But not to worry, they will go scott free and will even be relected to office by their respective districts.

 

[ftwildernessguy]

In my situation, my fees are very much dictated by insurance companies, who care little about my overhead or the amount of taxes I pay. So while you may look at my taxes being paid by the insurance companies, the reality is my taxes come out of that ever shrinking part of my balance sheet called profit. So I pay my taxes from my personal gross, just like everybody else. I think, though, what we are seeing here is the difference between small/micro businesses and big business.

 

[RvUsa]

Jim, and Steve, I guess I may have over simplified, but Jim put it well. I should have said that no company or corporation has ever paid 1 cent of taxes, it is only paid by INDIVIDUALS. If you are a small company, either by yourself, or a couple of people, the taxes are coming out of an Individuals pocket. If you are a small company with a couple people working for you, then if you didn't pay taxes, then those INDIVIDUALS that are working for you may even get paid more. LOL

Steve, I understand what you are saying, like I said I don't know what you do, but if you are getting your companies income from someone other than yourself, then you have to agree, that they are paying your taxes for you. You DEFINITELY have less money in your pocket after you pay them, but when you set the price for your widget, or service, you had to factor in the amount of taxes you expected to pay, and adjusted the price of the service or widget to at least partially cover the cost of those taxes. If your taxes aren't being paid by your business's income, then you are paying your taxes with the income from a second job, or your wife's Job, either that or you are independently wealthy LOL and then why do you have a company anyway? So yes YOU pay the tax bill, you may even pay it with your personal checking account like I did... but the money in that checking account came from your customers, and the price they paid you was effected by the amount of taxes you expected to pay. You can send me your tax bill, but you will have to send it postage prepaid, cuz I am broke, I don't have a company anymore because I am now disabled. LOL

Jim you are in a unique situation, where your income is SET by another person or company and like you said, you can't change that. But what you do have control of is whether or not you continue to do what you do. Any change in your taxes don't effect what you charge, they effect if you are going to keep doing what you do or not.

 

[big kahuna1]

John,

I am in the same business as Jim. My offer still stands but I have yet to receive any volunteers.

 

[RvUsa]

Fine, there always has to be that 1 guy who totally messes up my perfectly good argument.... Well in this case it is 2 you and Jim. But I will stick by it to the bitter end!! I am stubborn like that!

 

[ftwildernessguy]

John,

I am in the same business as Jim. My offer still stands but I have yet to receive any volunteers.

You mean you sit at a messy desk and write on this board all day, too?

 

[big kahuna1]

Fine, there always has to be that 1 guy who totally messes up my perfectly good argument.... Well in this case it is 2 you and Jim. But I will stick by it to the bitter end!! I am stubborn like that!

Your argument is perfectly good for the majority of businesses...just not mine.

You mean you sit at a messy desk and write on this board all day, too?

You made me look at my desk. That was not nice. I was really trying not to look at all the files sitting there. Now I'll have to do some work...so I can pay the tax man

 

[ntsammy5]

OK. I'll agree with you guys - in theory it should work, but in practice it rarely does because not everything can be passed along to the consumer which means the business owner makes less because he's paying more to Uncle Sam. Sucks big time.