2 ms·

I live in a former socialist country, with current "left" (red star in the logo) parties, who scream a lot about "tax the rich". In reality, if you look at the

I live in a former socialist country, with current "left" (red star in the logo) parties, who scream a lot about "tax the rich". In reality, if you look at their proposed policies: * nothing happens to the poor (since they already pay almost zero taxes) * nothing happens to the rich, because they start a company in bosnia, or delaware or panama (I have no idea how the panama papers were forgotten by the people and the media), funnel the money, and again pay (almost) zero tax * and me, an engineer with an above-average paycheck, but way below "rich"? I get fucked with the higher taxes. I don't need the rich to have higher taxes, I'd be happy if they atleast paid the current ones, or atleast the same percentage of income (in real sense, not accounting sense, since there are many ways to earn very little on paper, but buy a lot of stuff with that) as I do.

naveen99 5y ago
Someone is employing you. The tax burden is effectively split between you and them, even if nominally you are paying it. You pre tax salary is an expense to your employer, which if not expensed, would likely get taxed at the highest tax rate. Wealth is again, mostly just leverage on the working class future product. in that sense they already own atleast half of it, just defining it as income instead of wealth.
- ajsnigrutin 5y ago
  What I'm saying is, that I, in slovenia, pay around a half of my gross income in different taxes and "benefits" to the government. If my income is around the slovenian average (average is a bit below 2k eur montly, but i'll round it up), my "gros-gross" from 2k(what my employer has to pay, because of additional taxes) is 2.322eur, and I get 1300eur net to my account (55%) - the rest goes to the government. (employer pays 27.864 yearly, and you get 15.600 yearly) If you're average, or a bit above average, you pay around a half of what you make to the government. Due to income tax brackets, this percentage changes (eg, my 10k gross, means 11.610eur the employer, and I'd get 5176eur (~45%) into my account)... 10k is basically "rich" here. (Employer pays ~140k yearly, and you get ~62k net yearly) But, if your employer is willing to pay 11.610eur per month for you, and you want to get more out of that, you can become an independent contractor in slovenia (to have medical and pension insurance), and this will cost you ~500eur per month (including the costs of minimum accounting and a new bank account), so ~6k per year. Then you open a LLC in bosnia, which will cost you a smiliar amount of money (paperwork, accounting,...), so another 6k eur. Then your bosnian company charges the 140k for your work to your employer, and get taxed by bosnian rates, at only 10% on the first 100k of profit (so 140k-12k is 128k, so the first 100k is taxed at 10%, and i'm not sure about the next bracket, but let's say 30%, so 90k net from the first bracket, and ~20k from the second one), which means you get ~110k net income, or a bit over 9k monthly (almost 80%) So, if you don't earn a lot, you're stuck with high taxes. If you earn a lot (by slovenian standards, 10k is a lot), you can avoid most of the taxes, by starting a company in bosnia. If you earn a lot-lot (millions), you have even more posibilities of avoiding taxes, and pretty much every rich person does this to minimize their taxes. So, I don't want the current 55% (sum of all) taxes to be raised to 90% (or whatever) for the rich, I just want them to pay the current 55% at all, and not be able to avoid them and pay only 20% (which is less percentually than a minimum wage worker pays).
  - naveen99 5y ago
    My point is the employer already effectively pays the 55% tax rate for the minimum wage worker. The employer has to budget for the pretax gross pay of the worker. From the point of view of the rich, poor people’s income tax is rich people’s consumption tax. rich people consume poor people’s labor.

naveen99 5y ago

Someone is employing you. The tax burden is effectively split between you and them, even if nominally you are paying it. You pre tax salary is an expense to your employer, which if not expensed, would likely get taxed at the highest tax rate. Wealth is again, mostly just leverage on the working class future product. in that sense they already own atleast half of it, just defining it as income instead of wealth.

ajsnigrutin 5y ago
What I'm saying is, that I, in slovenia, pay around a half of my gross income in different taxes and "benefits" to the government. If my income is around the slovenian average (average is a bit below 2k eur montly, but i'll round it up), my "gros-gross" from 2k(what my employer has to pay, because of additional taxes) is 2.322eur, and I get 1300eur net to my account (55%) - the rest goes to the government. (employer pays 27.864 yearly, and you get 15.600 yearly) If you're average, or a bit above average, you pay around a half of what you make to the government. Due to income tax brackets, this percentage changes (eg, my 10k gross, means 11.610eur the employer, and I'd get 5176eur (~45%) into my account)... 10k is basically "rich" here. (Employer pays ~140k yearly, and you get ~62k net yearly) But, if your employer is willing to pay 11.610eur per month for you, and you want to get more out of that, you can become an independent contractor in slovenia (to have medical and pension insurance), and this will cost you ~500eur per month (including the costs of minimum accounting and a new bank account), so ~6k per year. Then you open a LLC in bosnia, which will cost you a smiliar amount of money (paperwork, accounting,...), so another 6k eur. Then your bosnian company charges the 140k for your work to your employer, and get taxed by bosnian rates, at only 10% on the first 100k of profit (so 140k-12k is 128k, so the first 100k is taxed at 10%, and i'm not sure about the next bracket, but let's say 30%, so 90k net from the first bracket, and ~20k from the second one), which means you get ~110k net income, or a bit over 9k monthly (almost 80%) So, if you don't earn a lot, you're stuck with high taxes. If you earn a lot (by slovenian standards, 10k is a lot), you can avoid most of the taxes, by starting a company in bosnia. If you earn a lot-lot (millions), you have even more posibilities of avoiding taxes, and pretty much every rich person does this to minimize their taxes. So, I don't want the current 55% (sum of all) taxes to be raised to 90% (or whatever) for the rich, I just want them to pay the current 55% at all, and not be able to avoid them and pay only 20% (which is less percentually than a minimum wage worker pays).
- naveen99 5y ago
  My point is the employer already effectively pays the 55% tax rate for the minimum wage worker. The employer has to budget for the pretax gross pay of the worker. From the point of view of the rich, poor people’s income tax is rich people’s consumption tax. rich people consume poor people’s labor.