Obama bad for Broadway??- Page 3

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 11/4/08 at 6:02pm

The democrats have been playing class warfare for quite sometime. Is it fair that almost 1/2 the people pay no taxes & yet many get a rebate?

Taxes take money out of your pocket plain & simple.The more taxes are raised the more Broadway will be hurt. If something has to go in a budget, Broadway goes over food & rent.

To Theater, if you say anything bad about any DEM but especially Obama you commit heresy & will be boiled in oil. Watch the crap that will now be thrown at me. A pity is that it is wasted as I will not come back to this thread to see the BS
Knock yourself out guys.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 11/4/08 at 9:07pm

Roxy doesn't know what he's talking about. And he's stupid and he's old and he smells.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 11/4/08 at 10:59pm

OMIGOD! Mr Roxy is John McCain?

[Patash]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 4:52pm

The top 5% of the target audience -- upper middle class families on vacation? HUH? Where do you get such nonsense?

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 4:56pm

almost 1/2 the people pay no taxes

That's not even remotely close to being true. The number of taxable units that do not pay income taxes is closer to a third, and many of those still pay payroll taxes.

Is that what's considered "throwing crap"? Pointing out an utter falsehood?

LOLARE! Updated On: 11/5/08 at 04:56 PM

[StockardFan]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 5:03pm

"OMIGOD! Mr Roxy is John McCain?"

OK, that cracked me up.

[Schuyler]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 5:21pm

Well, he is certainly bad for Wall Street and in turn the economy

[Live2Sing2]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 6:37pm

agreed. We need to worry about the economy, nothing else. We need to encourage people to get out and go see theatre.

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 6:49pm

The whole point of taxes is redistribution of wealth, or at least it's inherent in the concept. Even if everyone payed an equal percentage of their income, different people benefit to different degrees from government-run and government-subsidized services.

And different states benefit differently. Look at the huge amount of money that Alaska gets, for example, in comparison with how much it gives.

In general, historically, states like New York have fared badly in terms of how much they get back for how much they give. That's one of the ironic things about how people in some smaller and less-affluent states hate people in New York, Massachusetts, and some other more affluent states. We're actually supporting them. Do those states want to change that? I'd guess not.

One important point about corporate taxes: One misleading statement that McCain made but that wasn't much questioned was when he said (twice in the debates) that America has the second highest corporate tax rate among the major industrial countries. (And yet, he screamed, Obama wants to raise it!)

What he left out is that because of loopholes, America collects the second LOWEST amount of corporate tax as a percentage of GDP. (Actually, in the debates, Obama should have responded by pointing this out.) And McCain wanted to cut corporate taxes more.

A lot (though not all) of the people who scream about taxes were the people who supported the war. I believe this was the first time in American history that we've cut taxes while we were at war. And McCain wanted to keep us at war, but cut them more. You know, it just don't work. And the experience of the last eight years should have proved it. Insanity is when you keep doing the same thing but expecting different results. So I think the idea that the answer was to cut taxes for everyone even more was insane. (And, of course, Obama's tax plan cut taxes for people who make less than $125K more than McCain's did. But at least overall he was moving toward more tax revenues.)

These charts may be of some interest:

http://www.ntu.org/main/page.php?PageID=19

http://www.visualizingeconomics.com/2007/11/03/nytimes-historical-tax-rates-by-income-group/

[AvenueQPat]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 8:13pm

TAX RANT

I don't know WHY this country can't have a flat tax. I just don't know why - and if people want to PM me their opinions on that instead of posting here, I would welcome it.

The government knows what people make who file taxes. Figure out what programs are important for everybody and make it work. Then the PROGRAMS would be up for debate, instead of all the nonsense.

I would be happy to pay 20% of my income is the person make $250,000 a year paid 20%, and the kid out of high school who makes $1,000 a year pays his 20%. It is as fair as you can get in this country - people who make more pay more, but at an appropriate percentage of what they make.

BROADWAY RANT

As others have pointed out, people have a need for entertainment. I went to Disney world for the first time this past April and I am 26 years old. There were a few weeks after that which were tight financially, but I made it work.

Same thing as when I moved to NYC - I can't see a show every night, but I managed to average one a week, paid my rent, and had food and clothing.

Some people make less than me, and some people make more. Regardless of taxes - Broadway theater will always be supported until it turns into total crap.

[Calvin]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 8:24pm

Pat, I'd love to send you a PM about why a flat tax isn't really a fair tax, but you don't accept PMs!

But here it is in a nutshell. Progressive taxes, as opposed to a flat tax, are more designed to tax discretionary income rather than pure income.

Say one person makes $20,000 a year and another makes $100,000. The first person defines their needs -- food, shelter, etc. -- as costing $18,000 a year, leaving $2,000 in discretionary income.

The second person lives a more extravagant life and defines their needs as $50,000 a year, leaving $50,000 in discretionary income.

Therefore, if you impose a 10 percent flat tax, the first person is paying 100 percent of discretionary income in taxes, while the second person is paying only 20 percent. Also keep in mind that both people already are paying sales taxes on goods regularly and the first person already is paying a much larger percentage of income toward that than the second.

[bethnor]

Posted: 11/5/08 at 10:15pm

As I said in another thread, someone may be making $250,000 a year, have 3 kids in college, have a family member in the hospital, and live in New York?

how many families like this do you know? i grew up in the fairfax, va, area. i can tell you life there is pretty much the same as it was before the crisis. the fact of the matter is, it's not the families in the $250K bracket that are gonna get hurt by this--it's further out, where incomes are much lower, where the folks are sweating it. of course everyone can sit on here and concoct scenarios under which laws become unfair.

A lot (though not all) of the people who scream about taxes were the people who supported the war. I believe this was the first time in American history that we've cut taxes while we were at war. And McCain wanted to keep us at war, but cut them more. You know, it just don't work.

i don't get this either. in one breath, palin condemned obama for raising taxes as well but promised to start new programs to support disabled children, to a cheering crowd. how was that supposed to work? the money for those services doesn't fall from the sky.