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Not bad, but doesn't that come with social services like free medical care and greatly subsidized education? Here in he US the middle income pays taxes and rec

Not bad, but doesn't that come with social services like free medical care and greatly subsidized education? Here in he US the middle income pays taxes and receives almost no directive social benefit, as most social programs are geared towards lower income and the rich can afford accountants and lawyers to keep their tax burden very light.

kareemm 10y ago
I'm not sure how you can say that the rich keep their tax burden light when the topic of this thread is how Musk paid tax amounting to 44% of his income totalling over half a billion dollars.
- CocaKoala 10y ago
  If it were common for rich people to pay 44 percent of their income in tax, it wouldn't be a newsworthy story.
  - jstelly 10y ago
    Are there people who receive millions of dollars in income via stock options who pay a lower rate? If so, how does that work?
    - CocaKoala 10y ago
      Here's a Bloomberg article from 2012 that lists ten techniques: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-04-17/how-to-pay-no-taxes-10-strategies-used-by-the-rich https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-04-17/how-to-pa...
      - jstelly 10y ago
        It's worth mentioning that none of these techniques actually apply to the case where you exercise stock options - other than the one that says basically "take options as compensation if you can because you don't pay taxes until you exercise them" which is true for everyone who gets options (because you don't get any liquidity) not just rich people with expensive accountants. The only techniques that apply to income taxes are the "borrow against stock technique" (has a big caveat about a rich person who lost in court when he used it) and the deferred compensation example (which is also zero liquidity; presumably you pay all of the income taxes when you actual get the money). The article makes a better case for ways to avoid death taxes or real estate taxes though.
  - bentruyman 10y ago
    I think the story here was the dollar amount, not the percentage.
TheGirondin 10y ago
>rich can afford accountants and lawyers to keep their tax burden very light. The top 5% in the US pay 55% of all Federal income taxes.

kareemm 10y ago

I'm not sure how you can say that the rich keep their tax burden light when the topic of this thread is how Musk paid tax amounting to 44% of his income totalling over half a billion dollars.

CocaKoala 10y ago
If it were common for rich people to pay 44 percent of their income in tax, it wouldn't be a newsworthy story.
- jstelly 10y ago
  Are there people who receive millions of dollars in income via stock options who pay a lower rate? If so, how does that work?
  - CocaKoala 10y ago
    Here's a Bloomberg article from 2012 that lists ten techniques: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-04-17/how-to-pay-no-taxes-10-strategies-used-by-the-rich https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-04-17/how-to-pa...
    - jstelly 10y ago
      It's worth mentioning that none of these techniques actually apply to the case where you exercise stock options - other than the one that says basically "take options as compensation if you can because you don't pay taxes until you exercise them" which is true for everyone who gets options (because you don't get any liquidity) not just rich people with expensive accountants. The only techniques that apply to income taxes are the "borrow against stock technique" (has a big caveat about a rich person who lost in court when he used it) and the deferred compensation example (which is also zero liquidity; presumably you pay all of the income taxes when you actual get the money). The article makes a better case for ways to avoid death taxes or real estate taxes though.
- bentruyman 10y ago
  I think the story here was the dollar amount, not the percentage.

TheGirondin 10y ago

>rich can afford accountants and lawyers to keep their tax burden very light. The top 5% in the US pay 55% of all Federal income taxes.