President Obama's tax plan to demand more of millionaires

[cal04]

Source: New York Times

Populist 'Buffett Rule' seeks to ensure rich pay at least same share as middle class

President Obama on Monday will call for a new minimum tax rate for individuals making more than $1 million a year to ensure that they pay at least the same percentage of their earnings as middle-income taxpayers, according to administration officials.

With a special joint Congressional committee starting work to reach a bipartisan budget deal by late November, the proposal adds a new and populist feature to Mr. Obama’s effort to raise the political pressure on Republicans to agree to higher revenues from the wealthy in return for Democrats’ support of future cuts from Medicare and Medicaid.

Mr. Obama, in a bit of political salesmanship, will call his proposal the “Buffett Rule,” in a reference to Warren E. Buffett, the billionaire investor who has complained repeatedly that the richest Americans generally pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than do middle-income workers, because investment gains are taxed at a lower rate than wages.

Mr. Obama will not specify a rate or other details, and it is unclear how much revenue his plan would raise. But his idea of a millionaires’ minimum tax will be prominent in the broad plan for long-term deficit reduction that he will outline at the White House on Monday.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44563075/ns/politics-the_new_york_times/

[Pirate Smile]

1. Nice

[bluestateguy]

2. Maybe that could be the swap for abolishing the AMT outright

As it stands now Congress has to pass a one year patch on the AMT every year, which ends up including more and more people each year. I think some people making like $74,000 can get caught up in the AMT.

[on point]

6. That's a nice simple swap that also cleans up the code and process

Nice suggestion!

[cal04]

3. Obama to propose "Buffett tax" on millionaires

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/17/us-usa-debt-obama-idUSTRE78G2K320110917?feedType=RSS&feedName=politicsNews&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Reuters%2FPoliticsNews+%28News+%2F+US+%2F+Politics+News%29

President Barack Obama, in a populist gesture designed to appeal to voters, will propose a "Buffett Tax" on people making more than $1 million a year as part of his deficit recommendations to Congress on Monday.

Such a proposal, among suggestions to a congressional Super Committee expected to seek up to $3 trillion in deficit savings over 10 years, would appeal to his Democratic base ahead of the 2012 election but likely not raise much in revenues.

White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said in a tweet on Saturday the tax would act as "a kind of AMT" (Alternative Minimum Tax) aimed at ensuring millionaires pay at least as much tax as middle-class families.

(snip)
Obama will lay out his recommendations in White House Rose Garden remarks at 10.30 am on Monday and is expected to urge steps to raise tax revenue as well as cuts in spending.

[Cool Logic]

13. "would appeal to his Democratic base ahead of the 2012 election but likely not raise much in revenue

Indeed, the 1% club is only 1%.

Even so, the collectors of sacrificial offerings will be pleased.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

15. 1% of the population. 60% of the wealth.

[reformist2]

4. I want him to comment on the Spanish wealth tax!

That's the way to go, imo.

[on point]

7. Now to stay competitive, we will have to RAISE the tax !!

Isn't that how it is supposed to work?!

Perhaps the OECD should get together and raise it all together to help pay down the debt these people have run up and to avoid any possibility of them shopping around for bettter tax deals or playing one country off against another in the race to the bottom.

[BlueJazz]

5. Oh Boy...I can hear the squeals now. Next will come the ads. >>

Woman's sorrowful voice: "Obama wants to tax the VERY people who provide jobs for Americans"
"These actions will kill the jobs that Americans.....blah...blah....

[bluestateguy]

8. These rich folks have had 10 years to create jobs with the tax cuts they have been given

They failed to do so.

SO, they lose the tax cuts.

[OKDem08]

9. election is nearing....

[Left Coast2020]

11. I hate to be a thorn in peoples side, but....

...he can't be serious can he? A brain-cell is telling me he's just using campaign hot-air to excite the base. I'm sorry I'm being grummpy but history is not on his side for standing up to anybody. Well, maybe kinda sorta during HC debate.

[BumRushDaShow]

14. Do you understand how a bill becomes a law?*

*hint - it has to make it out of Congress first.

[valerief]

10. Congress will pass it and give them double that in tax cuts. nt

[No Elephants]

12. We'll see. He's called for taxing the rich since at least 2007.

It should have been a relatively easy thing for him to pull off early in 2009.

[TomCADem]

16. This Sunday - Expect The Corporate Media To Play The Job Creator Talking Point A Million Times...

...A Republican can say without any challenge that laying off thousands of local government employees in response to budget cuts to save tax cuts to the rich helps employment! And, who ever is interviewing the Republican will just nod happily like a dumb ass. Watch it for yourself on the Sunday news.

[Omaha Steve]

17. Obama to offer his own debt reduction package (will not offer any proposals to reduce Soc. Security)

Source: AP-Excite

By JIM KUHNHENN

WASHINGTON (AP) - Even as President Barack Obama prepares his opening bid on long-term debt reduction, the White House wants to keep the focus on jobs and is determined to avoid getting sucked into another budget fight with lawmakers.

Administration officials see the task of attending to deficits as necessary but not necessarily urgent, compared with the need to revive the economy and increase employment.

The White House also sees this as the time to draw sharp contrasts with congressional Republicans, whose public approval ratings are lower than Obama's.

As a result, when Obama announces at least $2 trillion in deficit reduction measures Monday, he is not expected to offer all the compromises he reached with House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, in July before those talks broke off.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20110918/D9PQVCIO0.html

---

President Barack Obama gestures as he speaks on his American Jobs Act legislation, Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011, at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, N.C. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

[whosinpower]

18. The president works

Congress says no.

It is no wonder that the polls show congress at historic levels of 12 % approval.

Just like the American Jobs Act he developed, worked on, created. Thoughtful, and mindful of what was possible with a rebellious congress. Not perfect, but actually pretty good under the circumstances.

Some wingnut teapartier finds out that the democrats did not table the act quickly enougyh, so he quickly tosses out at two page thing written on the back of a napkin and tables it - for the sole purpose of taking the name away. HOO HA! Stick that in yer craw Mr. President. Ah'm werkin herd, see? The monkeys crow, and beat their chests in glee.

[jwirr]

20. And for that reason he needs to put together a comprehensive

package of goals with specific actions for the future of our nation in the economy, the environment, the peace process, etc. He needs to do this without his centrist leaning advisors and he needs to stick with it. If there is no hope of creating this program with the rethugs in control of the house so be it but he has to show that he will continue to fight for anything he can get and that if and when he gets them out of the way he will work to fulfill the goals of his plan.

Right now I don't think people know what he wants and they need to be continually reminded that the rethugs will go so far as to destroying the nation to get rid of him.

[JTFrog]

19. K&R

[BenzoDia]

21. I'm happy he keeps defending Social Security. Keep it up, Mr. President!

[No Elephants]

23. Where in that article did you see Obama defending Social Security?

"The White House also has said that Obama will not offer any proposals to reduce long-term spending in Social Security, even though Obama had suggested to Boehner reducing annual cost-of-living adjustments for Social Security recipients. The idea drew loud objections from Democrats.


Now Democrats are waiting to see what Obama proposes to do with Medicare, the government health care program for older people.

In his talks with Boehner, Obama was willing to go along with gradually increasing the eligibility age for Medicare beneficiaries from 65 to 67. That idea has run into opposition from Democrats, and the White House was deciding whether or not to leave it in the president's new deficit plan.

Obama appointed the Cat Food Commission very early in his term. The recommendations from that Commmission were slated to become law, subject only to an up or down vote from Congress, no negotiation, no amendments, just as the DLC had recommended.
http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=254871&kaid=85&subid=65

However, but the Senate refused to vote in favor of tying its own hands.


Obama was the one who put adverse changes on the table with Boehner during the deht ceiling talks, not Boehner or Republicans. It says that in the quote above from the OP article and Conyers said it at the time.

And, lo and behold, miraculously, from the debt ceiling talks emerged the Super Committee, whose recommendations will become law, subject only to an up or down vote from Congress, as Obama (and the DLC) wanted for the Cat Food Commission.

Obama is not defending Social Security and Medicare. As to Medicare and Medicaid, he has said he wants cuts. As to OASDI, He just wants the adverse political impact for the cuts to fall on the Republicans or a Republican-led Commission or, failing those, a bi-partisan Committee, rather than on him.

Now, the cuts to OASDI may never be called cuts. They may take the form of fiddling with cost of living adjustments so that recipients get even fewer than they do now (none since January 2009, based on 2007-2008 cost of living). Nancy Pelosi has already declared that would not be a "cut."

Or they may take the form of raising the age. But, somehow, the projected amount needed for Social Security will, in reality, be cut, no matter what name you want to give the ax.

[BenzoDia]

26. Right in your first paragraph.

It says his new announcement is not reducing long-term spending in Social Security. As for the grand-bargain deal, everything was open to discussion as it should be. It'd would be incredibly closed-minded to cross your arms and say "no" at the very suggestion of something you dislike. I'd hope in a professional environment, any problem solver would be willing to hear out any idea.

Press Briefing With Jay Carney:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/07/07/press-briefing-press-secretary-jay-carney-772011

Q In your statement today about Social Security, you assured that benefits would not be cut. And the House progressives spoke today and said it’s going to be a tough sell to seniors. What don’t they understand about the President’s proposal?

MR. CARNEY: Again, the President’s position on Social Security and addressing Social Security has been explicit since he uttered it in front of millions of viewers in the joint session of Congress at the State of the Union in January. And that is the position that I repeated today in my statement, and that is the position he holds today.

The reason why I issued the statement is because there was a misperception created by some reporting about what -- like the idea that the President put forward some plan related to these talks affecting Social Security, and that’s simply not the case. The President’s position on Social Security is today what it was in January. And I think the most important point to understand is that his position is the position held by many, and I would say most, credible economists that Social Security is not a contributor to our short- and medium-term deficit problem.

So when you’re building a plan to deal with our short- and medium-term deficit problem, Social Security is not an issue. So when we talk about entitlement savings and the kinds that the President has put forward, in addition to the ones he found in the Affordable Care Act, we’re talking about savings from Medicare and Medicaid to the cost of health care, and not savings that put added burdens on beneficiaries.

Q So why is it involved then?

MR. CARNEY: You were here, right? I just went through this where we have said that everything -- any issue that any participant in these negotiations who is there in good faith -- and we believe they have been there in good faith -- wants to bring into the room for discussion and to raise, they are welcome to do so. Just -- but that does not make them viable options for an outcome or something that the President is going to agree to or necessarily other members might agree to. But we have not put restrictions on what can be brought into the room or put on the table to use the variety of sort of --

[Imagevision]

22. Even Warren Buffet says; "tax us already!"

[No Elephants]

24. No one is stopping him from donating to the USA, yet he hasn't.

Until he starts doing that, I'll take him with a grain of salt.

[panzerfaust]

25. Grammer Police: "Obama" and "Demands" cannot occur in same sentence ...

...unless the word "accedes" also occurs: For example "Obama accedes to Republican demands;" or "Once again, Obama accedes to Republican demands;" or "Once more acceding to Republican demands, president Obama ..."


Obama demands, the rulers command.
And so too it will come to pass once again
that Obama will Cave on this latest "Demand."



'twas not always thus