JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon is confused about why people are considering constructing guillotines in Lower Manhattan.
“Acting like everyone who’s been successful is bad and that everyone who is rich is bad, I just don’t get it,” Dimon said. “Most of us wage earners are paying 39.6% in taxes, and add in another 12% in New York state and city taxes, and we’re paying 50% of our income in taxes.”
Isn’t it interesting that Mr. Dimon thinks he is still paying the same marginal income tax rate that he paid under President Clinton? Someone should tell him that he’s actually paying 35%, which is the highest rate under the Bush tax cuts. If he isn’t even noticing the difference then maybe he and his banking buddies can tell the Republicans to stop resisting the president’s efforts to return to the 39.6% rate for the wealthiest two percent of wage earners. But, let’s get real. Mr. Dimon was only paid a one million dollar salary last year. He received a $5 million bonus. He also got “nearly $8 million in stock awards and $6.2 million in option awards.” And, the best part?
When you take into account his salary and bonuses, then add in the stock options exercised in 2010 based on previous awards — that is, stock given to him at depressed valuations across 2008 and 2009 — Dimon pulled in around $42 million.
So, he made $42 million last year. And what percentage of that income was taxed at 39.6%? The answer is zero percent. What percentage was taxed at 35%? I don’t know the answer to that, but probably not much more than a sixth of it. The vast majority of his income was measured as capital gains, which have a 15% tax rate for investments held for more than a year.
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the Bush tax cuts blew a $2.2 trillion hole in the budget in the period between 2002 and 2010. That represents a third of all deficit spending. And the beautiful thing about it is that Mr. Dimon didn’t even notice that his tax rate had dropped.
Every day that goes by with the government looking to slash programs that help working people while people like Jamie Dimon complain about being demonized, brings us a day closer to when those guillotines actually get erected and put to use.
Maybe his accountant has been pocketing the missing 4.6%.
Exactly. He doesn’t get it. It would seem that the occupiers are upset about unprosecuted banksters, and not simply those who find financial success.
Well, they’re upset that people haven’t gone to jail, but they’re also upset that we’re trying to fix the budget deficit by gashing entitlements and goring programs that help people go to college or keep their food safe or reduce carbon emissions, etc.
It’s hard work running a global finance cartel, immune to prosecution for staggering and systematic fraud. Really, they’re stealing most of this money so they rightly think they shouldn’t have to pay any taxes at all.
Now, a tip of the cap for the petulant little strawmanism of saying that the rich are being demonized. Oh no, we’re not demonizing the rich you arrogant shithead. We’re demonizing useless empty suits like you who produce nothing of value and use your absurd financial credit and political power to render yourself above the law and beyond the terrible risks of the financial gambling you’ve enriched yourself with. We’re demonizing the 1% who generated a bubble and got filthy rich and then got to be bailed out by the fed’s infinite credit, which apparently can never ever be used to assist the average citizen only smug dicks like yourself, who in the mean time are nodding their heads to the supposed necessity for harsh austerity to fund endless tax breaks and havens and loopholes for the same 1%.
Yep.
Actually quite succinct.
Boo…
Nice Straw Man…
In reality, the vast majority of “one-percenters” are Professionals or Entrepeneurs whose income are mostly taxed at a Federal rate of 35 percent in addition to, in most cases, state rates ranging from six to twelve percent…
Ironically, the “Super Rich” like Buffet and Gates call for higher taxes because most of their “income” (i.e. dividends and capital gains) is indeed taxed at fifteen percent…They (super rich paying fifteen percent) want to tax Us (one-percenter Professionals and Entrepeneurs paying thirty-five–plus state income tax, plus sales tax, plus property tax) to pay more…why? We create jobs…they don’t
Have you ever asked yourself who pays for you Welfare State…where does the money come from? Who creates the wealth to pay for most Americans having a “middle-class” lifestyle?
Just curious.
Well, lately, it has been foreigners and our children paying for it.
The effective tax rate is now lower than at any time since the Korean War.
Under Eisenhower, the top marginal rate was over 90%. Then, as now, the truly rich never had to pay that rate on all their income, but it did convince Boards of Directors that it wasn’t worth it to pay their CEO’s absurd amounts of money, since that was just an effective way to turn corporate wealth into government spending.
“Effective Tax Rate”?
You mean total tax revenue as a percentage of GDP?
What about the effect of government tax rates on INDIVIDUALS?
You need to pull your head out and differentiate between corporate interests and entrepeneurs and innovators who move our society forward…
You’ve got a good heart…
Do Your Homework.
link
I’ve done my homework.
You have got to be kidding me…I thought you were more intellectually honest than that…
Of course the overall “effective tax rate” is lower…
Half of the country does not pay any income taxes!!!
Considering the entire population as a whole misses the point…
As we go down your Socialist Road…the poor will pay less and less…and the rich will pay more and more…
You have more votes…
What a Joke…
We pull the wagon…you ride in it… and you hate us for it…
Disclaimer…I am forty-five years old…for the first forty-three years, I was a 99 percenter…for the last 20 months, I am a one-percenter…
I was still a Libertarian in college having to donate blood-plasma to pay for groceries…as Arthur Gilroy would say…Wake the Fu.. Up!
Do you spend a lot of time listening to Fox News and right-wing radio?
I see you repeat these bizarre talking points. The whole idea behind a progressive tax code is that there is a threshold. You don’t tax people who don’t have enough money to take care of the basics because they’ll just turn around and ask for government assistance.
This isn’t a new idea or any different from the 1950’s. We just have a lot of broke people at the moment.