ASU2003

Stimulus measures that may help your wallet - Feb. 12, 2009


I thought that this was attempted before, and it hasn't turned out too good in the past. It has been done a few times in the past 8 years, with the only thing it accomplishes is a higher national debt. And with the large majority of democrats in the congress, I thought that things might change. And while it may make things better in the short run, we will have serious problems if the value of the dollar collapses because Asia and the Middle East can't buy up American debt because we are printing more money than we are actually producing in goods.

And why are the Republicans not behind this bill 100%. They couldn't get rid of this tax that taxes a larger percent of republicans than democrats during their time in power. And there were a bunch of attack ads about redistributing wealth to the poor and non-working (who would spend it, mostly on paying CC bills, food, rent, etc.),, and how if Obama won that taxes on the people making more than $250,000 would go through the roof. Yet this is going to give back the tax money to people making $150,000-$400,000 (or something like that). You can argue whether the AMT is good or bad all day based on where people live and cost of living, inflation, etc. But wouldn't it be better to put 60% of the stimulus toward paying off the national debt instead before getting rid of the tax money? And before the government is going to spend a lot of money?

It's true that lower and middle-income workers are getting $400, but still why don't they just modify the income tax rates instead? Or build large infrastructure projects that a bunch of individuals wouldn't be able to do. Like build a bunch of wind power sites in the midwest, and solar sites in the southwest, pay money for banks to repair damaged homes (and pass laws to send people to jail if they trash a place after it gets foreclosed on), etc. We always say that individuals know better what to spend the money they earn for themselves, but if the government can build bigger projects that the people own, I would rather have that. I bet most of this tax rebate will get spent the same way as before, on HDTVs made in Taiwan, cell phones made in Korea, and at Wal-Mart on plastic things made in China.

Throw in the auto sales tax rebate and 75%+ of this is going towards tax cuts. Yet it is being touted as a spending bill?

dippin

I think that the AMT part is a typo, and its millions as opposed to billions.

ASU2003

That's a pretty serious typo. I didn't make it. You would hope that CNN would have fixed it in the past two days.

dippin

Well, it is a typo, but a different one: its 70 billion, not 470.

Washington Wire - WSJ.com : Hoyer Predicts AMT Patch Will Stay in Stimulus Bill

ASU2003

Maybe I was mistaken that the previous administration didn't do something to keep people from paying AMT. But if this graph is accurate and 30 million taxpayers will have to pay it, that could be a lot of money. Are they estimating the 70 billion as about $2500 for every taxpayer in the $150k-$450k bracket, or could it get to an average of $15,000 per taxpayer in that bracket?

-----Added 14/2/2009 at 06 : 02 : 51-----


I guess here is a better graphic and overview of the current breakdown in the stimulus bill. There are still quite a lot of tax cuts in there, I wonder if they will have the intended effect this time around?

ngdawg

This whole thing has me befuddled. If spouse makes twice as much as I do, how do they figure what goes back into a paycheck, if that's how I'm reading it in the first place.
And when I'm unemployed, is it all his?

Just send me a freakin check, already. Why does it have to be so convoluted?

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