Recently,
Warren Buffett released his tax data to the media to refute Trump’s claims of
his being a “tax avoider,” (tax avoidance is a moral obligation, tax EVASION is
a crime) and he challenged Trump to meet him “any place, anytime” to share tax
returns and answer questions.
But
Warren should be among the LAST people on earth capable of challenging Trump’s
use of existing legal deductions, as Buffett uses the very SAME deductions (and many MORE) himself and
his own tax returns prove that.
Few,
if ANY (and absolutely no actual working Americans) accept the Marxist idea
that our earnings, somehow, belong to the government. What we earn belongs to us.
It’s not a gift from any “benevolent rulers” in Washington, D.C.
The
moral imperative is not for citizens to give more of their hard-earned money to
government to waste and use for nefarious purposes, quite the reverse.
At
its core, taxation is coercive theft. It’s collected through force, not any exchange
or persuasion. So the moral duty is on the government to keep it to an absolute
minimum.
The
last person who should be arguing otherwise is an overt hypocrite like Warren
Buffett.
For
years, Buffett has signaled his own virtue by calling for tax increases on
wealthy Americans...all the while using the tax code to pay ridiculously small
amounts in federal taxes himself.
According
to Michael Covel, of The Daily Reckoning, “Much
of Buffett’s $64 billion fortune is tied up in his company, Berkshire Hathaway.
“Berkshire Hathaway hasn’t paid any cash
dividends in decades. Instead, it uses all of its income to acquire other companies.
And when it does, it stops any dividends those companies once paid and adds
that money to the stockpile used to buy more companies.
“For example, Berkshire acquired Burlington
Northern Santa Fe in 2010. At the time, Burlington paid roughly $550 million in
dividends to shareholders. But Berkshire stopped that and kept that cash
in-house.
“That nails retirees who rely on dividend
income. But it’s great for Berkshire and Buffett.
“Barron’s reported that had Berkshire
paid out the average of the S&P 500 companies in 2014, it would have
distributed roughly $6 billion in dividends.
“Buffett would have received $1.2 billion of
that, for a tax bill of $280 million.
“But estimates have him paying roughly 1/40th
of that amount by keeping his wealth in the company and immune from the income
tax rates we regulars in the peasant class are burdened with.
“And that’s just one transaction. Berkshire’s
business model is built on scores of tax-advantageous deals and operations.
“Barron’s reporter Morris Propp nailed
it when he wrote:
“It seems that Buffett and his businesses are
serial deprivers of tax revenue to the U.S. Treasury. Yet that does not deter
him from loudly advocating higher income tax rates for others.”
That makes Buffett the worst kind of “rich guy,” the
kind that builds nothing, raids companies, kills tens of thousands of jobs and
costs American taxpayers in higher rates because he’s able to shield the bulk
of his own wealth through tax loopholes that he has fought hard to forge and
maintain.
Yet HE’S the poster-child for American Democrats!
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