Trump came out against AT&T tonight which is good for us users....

Every analyst I have read will tell you the middle-class gets what's left after the rich spend their tax savings... trickle down .....even Trump's own people have no ideal what the tax plan means to the middle class....


"But when the chairman of the president's Council of Economic Advisers, Kevin Hassett, was asked by reporters to define the middle class that Trump's tax bill would target, he said that it was up to tax-writing committees in Congress, which will set the income levels for the proposed tax rates of 12%, 25% and 35%.

And House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady, R-Texas, was equally vague when asked last week to define a typical middle-class household.

"I can’t, because it really depends on the cost of living," Brady said. "If you live in states where state and local governments just hammer people with high taxes and drive up the cost of housing, and food and other elements, middle class is much different there, or the standard of living, than it is perhaps in my part of Texas."

This plan does not simplify the tax code. It just shifts the burden around. For more fun check out what the tax plan will do to stocks and not mutual funds.

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"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do."

AT&T lost one and won one:



Get ready to pay more for Netflix.

It just won't be Netflix you pay more for...This entire idea is a giant ripoff by AT&T et al. Think about any site you visit. They could be forced to pay for bandwidth which of course would cost you more. Small business users could get screwed royally while Netflix/Amazon et al would probably lose customers. Can you see us all going back to dvd's by mail/red box?. No rentals via you internet provider because the cost went up up up..

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"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do."

Thought they voted the orange carny in ? Despite losing popular vote. Somehow this just doesn't seem like maga imo.

Duh! Those who elected Trump.

Here's your middle America graphic:

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"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do."

Think heartland trump voters understand this yet or do they watch fox?

Would it be legal for ReMax or someone like that to pay AT&T and Verizon to serve up only it's listings faster? So if you're looking for real estate one company's listings would pop up much quicker because they were served at a faster speed? Or could they go as far as to negotiate a faster linkage to the MLS so their agents can find out about listings first?

The tax proposals aren't finalized, but as they currently stand it looks like we will move to a lower bracket and benefit quite a bit. We won't count on getting the benefit until it gets passed though. I think this will vary substantially depending on where people live and the state and local taxes they may incur. People that live in low tax areas who haven't been able to itemize may see a good benefit from the proposed increase in the standard deduction especially if it pushes them into a lower bracket.

Whether or not the wealthy benefit more doesn't concern me as long as we see a benefit at my level. It appears the left is fervently against this because the middle class in the high tax leftists states won't see as much of a benefit.

Truth be told though, IMO the whole tax code should be scrapped. It's already at least 74,000 pages and inherently plays favorites while screwing over many others.

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Don

Tri-ing to have fun. Anything else is just a bonus!

Good for you short term I guess. Long term uncertain due to debt increase. If I were in a high tax state and looked at pay in and get back in federal dollars I wonder if those get back states ought to pay in more or lose some benefits which then may translate to perhaps folks like you.

Other than removal of the estate tax, I'm not sure how the wealthy really benefit from the plan. They were impacted a few years ago when the top bracket went to 39%, then they were impacted under the ACH by an additional Medicare surtax plus they tacked on 3.8% higher surtax on unearned income. Most wealthy couples are paying 24% on their capital gains. Most middle income earners are paying 15%, probably lower in most cases.

When I look at the number, most middle income earners will hardly be impacted. If you make over $250,000 to $500,000, which I would term upper middle class, you will likely lose some deduction benefits and with the change in brackets, it's pretty much not going to move the dial. There are always exceptions that you can point towards.

I seem to be getting hit with more "fee" increases than taxes over the past few years. My car registration is close to $800/year and I pay capital improvement "fees" from water to sewer to park entrances.

As for net neutrality, If I build a pipe and a few users are trying to monopolize the pipe and use the majority of capacity, then I should have the right to charge them more. The companies that built the internet pipes should not be regulated by old utility type communication rules. No wonder Google sucked up to Obama's butt over the past few years.

Why should people like me be concerned with the debt when no one in either party does anything to seriously balance the budget? And we should all be more concerned with the short term anyway because these long term projections are meaningless since much of this stuff changes depending on the whims of whoever is in power at any given time.

My gut feeling already is that people living in the high taxed states where real estate is often skewed out of touch with reality, is these people get to reduce their AGI by a larger percentage. IOW these people are benefiting more under the current system while people like me get shafted.

As I already indicated, the current system is excessively convoluted. It already inherently picks winners and losers. The proposals on the table could make me a winner, so of course those who may become losers are going to protest. Nothing about our tax system is really fair though.

It would certainly be nice to get a tax benefit for a change. It would help pay for the massive healthcare increases of the past 8 years.

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Don

Tri-ing to have fun. Anything else is just a bonus!