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Zug

Submitted by Roanman on Mon, 08/29/2011 - 10:31

 

Here's just another in a long line of examples having to do with why that "Tax the Rch' idea never works.

Sneaky bastards just up and move away ..... take their money with em.

Someone else gains access to their disposable income and you of course, don't get squat.

As usual click on the photo for this Wall Street Journal story.

 

Tax Haven's Tax Haven Pays a Price for Success

By DEBORAH BALL 

 

 

ZUG, Switzerland—Developed nations from Japan to America are desperate for growth, but this tiny lake-filled Swiss canton is wrestling with a different problem: too much of it.

Zug's history of rock-bottom tax rates, for individuals and corporations alike, has brought it an A-list of multinational businesses. Luxury shops abound, government coffers are flush, and there are so many jobs that employers sometimes have a hard time finding people to fill them.

But when Stefan Hurschler, a man who works with the disabled, and his schoolteacher wife decided to expand their family and wanted a bigger house, they found nothing in Zug they could afford. They moved to Zurich, and Mr. Hurschler now commutes back to the town he grew up in.

"There are older people who still live [in Zug] because they bought their homes in the 1960s," said his wife, Lilian. "Or there are the very rich. But there isn't much of a middle class."

If Switzerland is the world's most famous tax haven, Zug amounts to a haven within a haven. It has the highest concentration of U.S.-dollar millionaires in Switzerland, a country where nearly 10% of households meet that standard, according to Boston Consulting Group. The highest personal income tax anyone in Zug has to pay is 22.9%, and companies pay an average of just 15.4%—rates lower than Switzerland's average and far below top rates in the U.S.

 

How They Keep Us Apart, part three

Submitted by Roanman on Sat, 05/14/2011 - 18:08

 

Distractions abound in this country.

Cynical Roany thinks that this is by design.

The example of this that best speaks to me has to do with taxes.

Your "Silly Little Democrats ............." are always whining about tax cuts for the "The Rich".

Your "Formerly (although still mostly) Feckless Republicans ............." counter that "The Rich" pay almost 90% percent of all the income taxes paid in this country.

The American people pick a side and go to arguing and finger pointing.

Anger and upset are the only outcome.

Media is complicit.

Everybody benefits except the citizenry.

Democrats have their union and legal haters pumping up the masses.

Republicans have their wealthy and middle class constituents feeling themselves to be under siege.

The media get their ratings and sell their advertising because promoting drama is good for business.

As for me?

I got questions.

First of all, who the hell is "Rich"?

As opposed to, who the hell is Rich?

I would truly love to hear the debate where "Rich" finally gets defined.

Is "Rich" a function of income?

Are you "Rich" if you made $250,000 last year?

What if you've never made anywhere near that number ever before?

What if you're unlikely to ever make that much again?

That doesn't happen you say?

I know a raft of guys in the real estate business who had a big year that they have never duplicated.

How about if you're only making $60,000 a year, but it's from a $1,800,000 in CDs or treasuries, and you happen to be living in a nice little, paid for condo in Destin.

"Rich"?

What if you're 62 years old and have a defined benefit retirement plan from a pair of government entities paying $86,000 a year with escalators for inflation until the day you die, plus Social Security, plus all the health care you can eat for $142 a month, and you happen to be living in the nice little paid for condo in Destin right next door to the one mentioned above?

The reason I ask is that my HP 12C (financial calculator) is telling me that the above deal has a "Present Value" of $1,292,228 if capped at 3% (That there is real estate guy talk. Capped is short for cap rate which is an assumed rate of return for some specified investment, which in this case it is arbitrarily set by me at 3% because there is almost negligible risk in a defined benefit government retirement plan.  The less risk, the lower the cap rate.) and amortized over 20 years.

That $1,292,228 is before you even begin to figure for the Social Security benefit, and the true cash value of the health care.

"Rich"?

 

To quote William F. Buckley Jr. again and again

Submitted by Roanman on Thu, 05/06/2010 - 06:17

 

“I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.”
 
 “The academic community has in it the biggest concentration of alarmists, cranks and extremists this side of the giggle house.”
 
“Scientists are people who build the Brooklyn Bridge and then buy it.”
 
“Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.”
 
“Liberals, it has been said, are generous with other peoples' money, except when it comes to questions of national survival when they prefer to be generous with other people's freedom and security.”
 
“Conservatives should be adamant about the need for the reappearance of Judeo-Christianity in the public square.”
 
 “Back in the thirties we were told we must collectivize the nation because the people were so poor. Now we are told we must collectivize the nation because the people are so rich.”
 
“Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could.”
 
“It had all the earmarks of a CIA operation; the bomb killed everybody in the room except the intended target!”
 
 “I get satisfaction of three kinds. One is creating something, one is being paid for it and one is the feeling that I haven't just been sitting on my ass all afternoon.”
 
“Idealism is fine, but as it approaches reality, the costs become prohibitive.”
 
“The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry.”
 
 “One must bear in mind that the expansion of federal activity is a form of eating for politicians.”
 
“I would like to electrocute everyone who uses the word "fair" in connection with income tax policies.”
 
“The more complicated and powerful the job, the more rudimentary the preparation for it.”
 
 “You cannot paint the "Mona Lisa" by assigning one dab each to a thousand painters.”
 
 “Mr. Bush is in the hands of a fortune that will be unremitting on the point of Iraq. If he'd invented the Bill of Rights, it wouldn't get him out of his jam.”
 

 

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