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It's really hard to imagine a trillion dollars, but it's also hard to imagine 7 billion people or 300 million Americans. Usually when we're talking about trilli
by rm999 14y ago
It's really hard to imagine a trillion dollars, but it's also hard to imagine 7 billion people or 300 million Americans. Usually when we're talking about trillions of dollars we're talking about something at a national or international level, i.e. shared among a large group of people. Dollars per capita is often a better metric because it's normalized to something more tangible.
A trillion dollars is about 3200 dollars per American or 12000 dollars per American taxpayer. It's still a lot of money, but much easier to think about.
- rogerbinns 14y ago> ... per American taxpayer Isn't everyone a taxpayer? Or did you only mean "federal taxpayer"? Even then anyone who has a phone is paying federal taxes on the service. And people pay tax on consumption (sales and service taxes), city, county and state taxes, fuel, and the list goes on. I suspect that the vast majority pay taxes several times a month rather than the 1 in 4 you imply!
- crgt 14y agoMy daughter doesn't pay taxes. She doesn't earn any money. She's 6.
- mistere 14y agoBad news: if she's a US citizen then at age 6 she already owes about $215,000. As a US citizen she will pay taxes. She'll start out by paying for part of your debt (and your parent's debt.) Then, she'll pay for her own debt. I've apologized to my daughter (now 24 years old) for the burden. It's unconscionable but it's the will of the majority so I have no choice.
- pkulak 14y agoThe majority of American debt is held by Americans. So buck up. Maybe some other schmuck will just be paying out to your daughter.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- jgreen10 14y agoI had never really thought about that, but most countries have some form of federal VAT, so you pay your first taxes when you buy your first ice cream, but American kids don't pay federal taxes until they have a job, which is way less fun than eating an ice cream. Maybe that's why Americans hate federal taxes so much.
- rogerbinns 14y agoThe US doesn't have a federal VAT style tax although there may be some shenanigans with imports. However most (but not all) states have sales taxes. Its actually worse than that - depending on where a sale happens it can be a combination of state, county and city taxes! For example in California here are the rates for purchases made in cities beginning with H (randomly picked letter) http://www.boe.ca.gov/cgi-bin/rates.cgi?LETTER=H&LIST=CITY http://www.boe.ca.gov/cgi-bin/rates.cgi?LETTER=H&LIST=CI... As is usual in the land of the free, there is corporate welfare going on and car purchases are taxed based on where the consumer lives not where the purchase is made as for all other purchases. Here is the California sales tax FAQ http://www.boe.ca.gov/sutax/faqpurch.htm http://www.boe.ca.gov/sutax/faqpurch.htm - note how section 8 says barter is covered so possibly a kid swapping stuff may be covered. Here is the list of exemptions (PDF) http://www.boe.ca.gov/pdf/pub61.pdf http://www.boe.ca.gov/pdf/pub61.pdf but that is only at a California level (my city charges a tax for utility usage of phone, gas and electricity). I'm a foreigner living in the US and cheating on taxes seems very pervasive here. I don't know anyone who reported their Amazon purchases even though they needed to. The resentment mainly seems to be because they think others are doing a better job at finding loopholes and undetected cheats, with consequent resentment being a "sucker" for paying more as a consequence.
- rm999 14y agoI didn't have a sinister "53 percenter' motive behind using the number of federal income taxpayers; I simply believed it was the relevant statistic when discussing federal government spending. That said, you're right than 1/4 seems low (even after taking into account minors). Certainly it's fair to count people who don't owe federal income tax but owe payroll taxes as a federal taxpayer, for example,