…and elimination of deductions.

Let’s start with:

-eliminating the mortgage deduction (A brilliant move during a housing slump)

-eliminating deductions for charitable donations

-eliminating deductions for health care (exempting unions of course. Is that fair? Obama has to pay back the unions that supported him though)

-cap and trade (not a tax per se but will have the same effect. Do you think businesses will pass the increase on to you?)

-VAT tax (A federal sales tax on all purchases)

What else you got?
Oh yeah. Letting the top tax rates go back up for individuals earning over 0,000.

And raising the corporate tax rate.

…and elimination of deductions.

Let’s start with:

-eliminating the mortgage deduction (A brilliant move during a housing slump)

-eliminating deductions for charitable donations

-eliminating deductions for health care (exempting unions of course. Is that fair? Obama has to pay back the unions that supported him though)

-cap and trade (not a tax per se but will have the same effect. Do you think businesses will pass the increase on to you?)

-VAT tax (A federal sales tax on all purchases)

-Letting the top tax rates go back up for individuals earning over 0,000( Bush tax cuts expire)

-And raising the corporate tax rate.

What else you got?
Melissa you have your head so far in the sand it’s amazing you can come up and use a computer

Both McCain and Obama will have to raise taxes to pay for programs for which the public is clamoring, whether those programs are universal health insurance, expanding the military, trying to retire the national debt, or simply trying to balance the budget.

McCain proposes to increase your tax exemption for children by something like 5/year. That’s it, if you have children you get something, otherwise not. This will increase the deficit.

McCain proposes a 00-00 "refundable" tax credit for the purchase of health insurance while apparently proposing, as I understand it, eliminating the deduction for employer provided health insurance. This is a tax increase for business to pay for a tax benefit to the public. This is, ostensibly deficit neutral.

McCain will cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 25%. This is proposed to keep American companies on shore and to stimulate the economy. This will not keep companies on shore because the 10% tax savings on profits is miniscule compared to the as much as 80% operating cost savings of exploitation of cheap foreign labor. And since most corporations do not pay any taxes due to loopholes it is ridiculous. All that will happen is that those that are paying taxes domestically will pay less and increase the deficit.

All of this tinkering with tax cuts will result in a net tax increase because a higher percentage of the operation of government will be placed on your credit card.

Obama’s plan, a tax cut for the middle class, should be offset by rolling back the Bush 43 tax cuts for the wealthy. Curtailing tax loopholes for companies operating offshore will have far reaching effects including reducing the deficit. As far as funding for new programs goes, there is little doubt that these, like universal healthcare or improving public education and tuition programs, will go on your nation’s credit card.

What’s in it for me? After all, I’m paying for it.

Your taxes are going to go up with either Obama or McCain. For whom you vote, if that is your issue, depends entirely on how much they will go up and/or what you will get in return

In his new healthcare proposal?

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/02/23/john-kartch-health-care-obama-taxes-family/

No New Taxes, Mr. Obama?
By John Kartch
– FOXNews.com

On Monday, the White House unveiled a health care plan with a net tax hike of at least 0 billion over the next ten years. What happened to the promise that no family making less than 0,000 will see their taxes increase?

One year ago, President Obama addressed a joint session of Congress and restated his central campaign promise: “If your family earns less than 0,000 a year, you will not see your taxes increased a single dime. I repeat: not one single dime.”

But on Monday, the White House unveiled a health care plan with a net tax hike of at least 0 billion over the next ten years. Not only does the plan increase taxes more than the House and Senate bills already roundly rejected by the public, several of the tax hikes in the plan violate Obama’s tax pledge. Let’s look at a few examples:

Individual mandate excise tax: The White House gets creative with its terminology here, preferring to call this tax a “payment” or an “assessment.” This provision would require all Americans to purchase health insurance – as a condition of lawful existence – or pay an excise tax.

This tax was also a pillar of the House and Senate health bills, both endorsed by the White House. In a famous exchange with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos last September, Obama refused to admit that the tax was actually a tax, forcing Stephanopoulos to read aloud the dictionary definition of the word “tax” to the President.

Employer mandate tax: If an employer does not offer health coverage, and at least one employee qualifies for a health tax credit, the employer must pay an additional non-deductible tax for all full-time employees. This would apply to all employers with 50 or more employees. Small business owners pay their taxes on their owners’ 1040 forms, and there is no exemption for employers making less than 0,000.

Special needs kids tax: This provision caps pre-tax Flexible Spending Account (FSA) contributions at ,500 per year – currently, these accounts are unlimited. There are 30 million American families using FSAs for everything from deductibles to eyeglasses, but hardest hit would be families with special needs children. These families often rely on their FSA for special needs education, which can cost thousands of dollars per year.

“Haircut” for medical itemized deductions: Currently, those facing high medical expenses are allowed a deduction if the total cost of the expenses reduces the filer’s income by 7.5 percent. The new White House provision would raise that threshold to 10 percent.

Excise tax on indoor tanning services: Leaving no stone unturned in its hunt for revenue, the White House adopted the Senate’s “tanning bed tax”. Those using indoor tanning services will be hit with a 10 percent excise tax.

None of the provisions above include exemptions for families making less than 0,000.

Take a look at the plan yourself at the White House Web site, then click over to Obama’s Change.gov site. Under the “Taxes” category, it still reads as follows: “no family making less than 0,000 will see their taxes increase.”

Somebody has some explaining to do.

John Kartch is director of communications for Americans for Tax Reform and a Fox Forum contributor.

How is this "pushing back the undue influence of special interests" when this bill had RECORD LOBBYING by multiple special interests?

"Tonight," President Obama intoned near midnight Sunday, after the House had passed two health care bills, "we pushed back on the undue influence of special interests. … We proved that this government — a government of the people and by the people — still works for the people."

But even before the president spoke, the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers of America — whose .1 million lobbying effort in 2009 was the most expensive by any industry lobby in history — hailed the health package as "important and historic."

The second-biggest industry lobby in America, the American Medical Association, also cheered, as did the American Hospital Association, the No. 5 industry lobby. Throw in the goliath senior lobby AARP and Beltway powerhouse General Electric, and you realize Obama’s underdog tale is all bark and no bite.

The health care bill Obama signed into law Tuesday is a triumph for the special interests. It will benefit the biggest businesses, and by injecting more government into the economy, it will permanently stimulate K Street.

Yet all along Obama has claimed the opposite. The Democrats’ party-line Senate vote for the bill represented "standing up to the special interests," Obama said in December — just before the health care lobbyists and pharmaceutical political action committees hosted fundraisers for Martha Coakley to try to preserve the Democrats’ 60-vote supermajority.

Throughout March, as momentum built for passing the bill, and as Democrats adopted the mantra, "You’re either with the American people, or you’re with the insurance companies," health insurance stocks climbed in tandem with the bill’s odds of passing. The health sector outperformed every other sector in the S&P 500 over the last month.

And once the bill passed, health care stocks rallied. Insurance giant Aetna — whose product you are now required by law to own — hit its 52-week high the morning after. Drug maker Pfizer rose 4 percent Monday and Tuesday, increasing its market capitalization by .8 billion — almost a two-hundredfold return on the company’s .9 million lobbying effort.

In Washington, talk of who’s getting rich or taking a hit often distracts pointlessly from substantive issues. But it’s important here for two reasons.

First, there’s the unsettling but unavoidable conclusion that our president is willing to deceive us if he thinks he can get away with it. He knew the drug makers were on his side — after all, he cut a private deal with top drug lobbyist Billy Tauzin. He also knew that the media would consider any big government proposal a blow to big business.

Second, showing who benefits most makes clear that this "reform" wasn’t designed to "work for the people," as Obama claims. It works for the deep-pocketed companies who wrote it. Come January, you will no longer be able to buy over-the-counter medicines with your health savings account money — if you want the tax deduction, you’ll need to get more costly prescription drugs. That hurts customers and taxpayers while driving up health care spending — but it profits Big Pharma.

The bill is loaded with sugar plums for the drug industry:

o Taxpayers will subsidize drug makers even more. o Employers will be forced to give prescription-drug insurance to workers. o Generic versions of biologic drugs will be kept off the market for 12 years. o States will be forced to subsidize drugs through Medicaid. o Americans will still be prohibited from importing cheaper drugs from China. o Medicare will continue overpaying for drugs.

If the bill’s actual provisions paint a different picture from Obama’s rhetoric, so does the money trail.

Standing behind Obama at the bill signing Tuesday were Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., the leading Senate and House recipients, respectively, of health-sector political action committee money in this election cycle. The 2008 champs of health PAC fundraising, Max Baucus and Charlie Rangel, were also on stage.

And the man with the pen in his hand had received more money from drug companies and health insurance companies than any politician in the history of the country.

We won’t know for years whether Obama was right about the effects of this law. But we already know that Obama’s story of how we got here — the people triumphing over the special interests — is a tall tale.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Obama-gives-sugar-plums-to-the-special-interests-88958037.html#ixzz0j93bEWth
Benito – you should read this. You ignorance is showing.

I am not going to cheer or condemn. You be the judge. This is an official list of the upcoming increases in taxes for various individuals and businesses in Pres. Obama’s budget. Pull them apart and give us your thoughts. Good or not good…and why?

President Obama’s budget proposes 9 billion in new taxes over the course of the next 10 years, starting fiscal year 2011, most of which are tax increases on individuals.

1) On people making more than 0,000.

8 billion – Bush tax cuts expire
9 billlion – eliminate itemized deduction
8 billion – capital gains tax hike

Total: 6 billion/10 years

2) Businesses:

billion – Reinstate Superfund taxes
billion – tax carried-interest as income
billion – codify "economic substance doctrine"
billion – repeal LIFO
0 billion – international enforcement, reform deferral, other tax reform
billion – information reporting for rental payments
.3 billion – excise tax on Gulf of Mexico oil and gas
.4 billion – repeal expensing of tangible drilling costs
million – repeal deduction for tertiary injectants
million – repeal passive loss exception for working interests in oil and natural gas properties
billion – repeal manufacturing tax deduction for oil and natural gas companies
billion – increase to 7 years geological and geophysical amortization period for independent producers
2 million – eliminate advanced earned income tax credit

Total: 3 billion/10 years

The first few paragraphs in this opinion piece made an interesting observation.

The news media (whose job it is to fact check the people making the laws) gets most of their advertising dollars from major drug companies. These major drug companies are represented PhRMA. PhRMA protects the interests of the industry. The White House cut a deal with PhRMA in 2009 that basically insured no cheaper prescription drugs in the near future (protect their profits) in exchange for PhRMA’s support of this "reform" bill.

Interestingly, the MSM seems to have selective memory when it comes to backroom deals included in this bill. Isn’t it odd they never mention the price of prescription drugs during a debate about "health care reform" ??

Could this be a primary reason why??

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rory-oconnor/health-care-reform-needs_b_504352.html?view=print

American broadcasters, magazines, newspapers and other publishers take in more than four billion dollars a year in drug advertising. The drug money is a rare bright spot in an otherwise dismal downward revenue spiral for media of all types. Last year was a horrible year for advertising spending in this country, which fell 12.3 percent. Spending in seven of the top ten leading ad categories fell compared with 2008. The only exceptions were in the industry categories of telecommunications, food and candy, and pharmaceuticals, which showed the largest increase of all.

Wonder why? Perhaps it’s because the US is one of only two countries in the world — along with New Zealand — that permits direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising of prescription drugs. Yes, your country is one of only two outliers when it comes to allowing those incredibly annoying and ubiquitous "ask-your-doctor" spots. But if you were hoping a modicum of media reform, aimed at reducing health care costs and delivering better services, might be packaged among all the other goodies and giveaways in the Obama Administration’s forthcoming health care reform bill, you can forget it. Lobbyists long ago succeeded in turning back all efforts to end the special interest business-tax deductions that Big Pharma drug makers can take for advertising.

In an early round of reform negotiations, the drug industry actively considered giving up the advertising deductibility as part of the billion dollar deal they made with the Obama crowd to reduce pharmaceutical spending over ten years. But media lobbyists quickly swooped in and killed the idea, turning back nascent efforts in both the House and the Senate. "Advertising deductibility safe!" American Advertising Federation executive Clark Rector wrote in a press release late last year, when the deal went down. Ending the tax break for drug spots "would be a disastrous choice, both economically and politically."

The top 35% marginal income tax rate rises to 39.6%; adding the state income tax, the Medicare tax, the effect of the deduction phase-out and Mr. Obama’s new Social Security tax (of up to 12.4%) increases the total combined marginal tax rate on additional labor earnings (or small business income) from 44.6% to a whopping 62.8%. People respond to what they get to keep after tax, which the Obama plan reduces from 55.4 cents on the dollar to 37.2 cents — a reduction of one-third in the after-tax wage!
Mr. Obama has also opposed other important free-trade agreements, including those with Colombia, South Korea and Central America. He has spoken eloquently about America’s responsibility to help alleviate global poverty — even to the point of saying it would help defeat terrorism — but he has yet to endorse, let alone forcefully advocate, the single most potent policy for doing so: a successful completion of the Doha round of global trade liberalization.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121728762442091427.html?mod=opinion_main_commentaries

One part of Obama’s new economic stimulus idea is that businesses get a ,000 tax deduction for each new employee they hire.

ANYONE who has been or is in business for themselves know this is really stupid. New staff is hired because the business requires another person and when the income can pay this persons salary. Why in the world would any business owner hire on someone the company doesn’t need, for say ,000 a year just for a ,000 tax cut? This is just plain ignorance on Obama’s behalf.

The second part of his stimulus idea is to put money into upgrading, rebuilding, etc. our infrastructure, bridges, roads, etc.

Obama is obviously extremely out of touch because what do you see when you drive by construction sites? Illegals of course. They’re on the street corner waiting for that pickup to pull up and hire them for the day. Obama is ignorant to what real America is like. This plan of his will send money to Mexico, it will do NOTHING for our economy.

Seriously, is Obama this stupid and out of touch with reality?

Isn’t this the biggest rip you’ve seen??

Got this in the company mail today:

Dear Valued Employee:

As you know, President Obama has asked Congress to pass the beginning of his health insurance plan for all Americans. The starting plan will cost some billion a year, of which the President has proposed billion in higher taxes for firms doing business overseas, which is half our company’s business. He asked Congress to find the rest of the money.

Congress has said the other billion a year will come from disallowing corporate tax deductions for employee health insurance, as well as raising the general corporate income tax rate to 35%.

The company will absorb the higher taxes on our foreign operations and the tax increase to 35% even though we expect this to eliminate our currently low net income.

Our corporation pays approximately ,000 per year per single employee and ,000 per year per employee family for the health insurance coverage you presently have.

This means that Congress has decided to raise our taxes by 00 per employee with single coverage and 50 per employee with family coverage.

As you know, our company’s sales have recently fallen by more than at any previous time in our company’s history. Our company is paying no dividends to the owners and may soon be in danger of not earning the interest cost of our debts.

Accordingly, we must pass onto our employees the entire added tax that Congress will impose on your health insurance plan. It is either this, go out of business, or move operations and most jobs overseas.

Effective the first of next month, all US employees electing single coverage health insurance will have their monthly contribution increased by 175 dollars and those electing family coverage will contribute an added 262.50. For hourly employees paid every two weeks, this is .75 and 1.15 respectively.

Thank you for your continued efforts to make the company profitable,

Human Resources Department