{"id":1368,"date":"2010-10-07T15:26:06","date_gmt":"2010-10-07T20:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/?p=1368"},"modified":"2010-10-07T15:26:16","modified_gmt":"2010-10-07T20:26:16","slug":"tax-cuts-for-the-rich","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/2010\/10\/07\/tax-cuts-for-the-rich\/","title":{"rendered":"Tax Cuts for the Rich?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>GSFTC claims that the &#8216;rich&#8217; in NH are not paying their &#8216;fair share&#8217;. This story will show that their logic, as well as their math, is incorrect.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Bar Stool Economics<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and  the bill for all ten comes to $100 and If they paid  their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something  like this: <\/p>\n<p>The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.<br \/>\nThe fifth would pay $1.<br \/>\nThe sixth would pay $3.<br \/>\nThe seventh would pay $7.<br \/>\nThe eighth would pay $12.<br \/>\nThe ninth would pay $18.<br \/>\nThe tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.<\/p>\n<p>So, that&#8217;s what they decided to do.<\/p>\n<p>The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed  quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the  owner threw them a curve. &#8220;Since you are all such good  customers,&#8221; he said, &#8220;I&#8217;m going to reduce the cost of  your daily beer by $20.&#8221; so drinks for the ten now cost  just $80. <\/p>\n<p>The group still wanted to pay their bill the way  we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected&#8230;They   would still drink for free&#8230;But what about the other   six men &#8211; the paying customers? How could they divide   the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his &#8216;fair   share?&#8217;&#8230;They realized that $20 divided by six is   $3.33&#8230;But if they subtracted that from everybody&#8217;s   share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each   end up being paid to drink his beer..So, the bar owner   suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man&#8217;s   bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to   work out the amounts each should pay. <\/p>\n<p>And so:<br \/>\nThe fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).<br \/>\nThe sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).<br \/>\nThe seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).<br \/>\nThe eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).<br \/>\nThe ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).<br \/>\nThe tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).<\/p>\n<p>Each of the six was better off than before&#8230;And  the first four continued to drink for free&#8230;But once  outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I only got a dollar out of the $20,&#8221;declared the  sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,&#8221; but he got  $10!&#8221; &#8220;Yeah, that&#8217;s right,&#8221; exclaimed the fifth man.  &#8220;I only saved a dollar, too. It&#8217;s unfair that he got  ten times more than I!&#8221; &#8220;That&#8217;s true!!&#8221; shouted the  seventh man. &#8220;Why should he get $10 back when I got  only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!&#8221; &#8220;Wait a minute,&#8221; yelled the first four men in unison. &#8220;We didn&#8217;t get  anything at all. The system exploits the poor!&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.<\/p>\n<p>The next night the tenth man didn&#8217;t show up for drinks,  so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But  when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something  important. They didn&#8217;t have enough money between all  of them for even half of the bill! <\/p>\n<p>And that, ladies and gentlemen, journalists and college  professors, is how our tax system works. The people  who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from  a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for  being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore.  In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the  atmosphere is somewhat friendlier. <\/p>\n<p>David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.<br \/>\nProfessor of Economics<br \/>\nUniversity of Georgia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>GSFTC claims that the &#8216;rich&#8217; in NH are not paying their &#8216;fair share&#8217;. This story will show that their logic, as well as their math, is incorrect. Bar Stool Economics Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100 and If they paid their bill [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles-nh","category-broadbased"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1368"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1370,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1368\/revisions\/1370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cnht.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}