There IS a legal way to avoid paying income tax, if you can afford it. Just buy Chevron, Netflix, or Salesforce. According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, Netflix and Chevron took legal tax breaks in 2018 that, combined, added up to $200 million, and none of the three corporations paid any income tax at all that year.
Mmmmm…I wonder if I could do a GoFundMe….
Where we live REALLY does matter…in terms of how rich/poor our salary makes us. I thought this report was interesting in general, then revealing after I clicked the “View Interactive” button and selected my state. Try it. Find out where the money you make for working hard at your job places you. The new gilded age–Income inequality in the U.S. by state, metropolitan area, and county.
What is both a national disgrace AND costing our country a bundle of money? Racism. Read the article Racism costs U.S. billions every year. Part of it says,
“Closing the income gap between whites and minorities, would boost earnings by 12 percent, an economic windfall of $1 trillion, for a nation burdened by debt and an anemic job market, according to a recent study by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Altarum Institute…..
“Minorities make up 37 percent of the working age population now, but they are projected to grow to 46 percent by 2030, and 55 percent by 2050. Closing the earnings gap by 2030 would increase GDP by 16 percent, or more than $5 trillion a year,” stated the report. Federal tax revenues would increase by over $1 trillion and corporate profits would increase by $450 billion.”
Rents vary greatly from state to state. Where does your state stand in comparison to others? Look at this map, which tells how much per hour a person must earn–working a 40-hour week and 52 weeks a year–to afford a two-bedroom rental unit and still not spend over 30% of their income. It’s an eye-opener. And something to check out if you’re thinking of moving.
The average single black or Hispanic woman has about $100 IN NET WORTH.
The Insight Center for Community Economic Development reported that median wealth for black and Hispanic women is a little over $100. That’s much less than one percent of the median wealth for single white women ($41,500).
Other studies confirm the racially-charged economic inequality in our country. For every dollar of NON-HOME wealth owned by white families, people of color have only one cent.
[Paul Buchheit, Common Dreams, 11/19/12]
The economy may be improving, but the rich are getting richer and the rest of us? Well…. Here’s an unnerving statistic: the gap in income is currently the largest that it has been since the early 1930s–yes, the Great Depression. Today, 1% of the people are getting 95% of the income.
This is having an effect on all of us, but especially the poor who are trying to climb up out of the well the recent bad economic years have put them into.