The unions have defeated the concessions in part, from what I have seen reported, because the wealthy should be "paying more." I have written elsewhere that the poor always will carry the heaviest burden of an increased tax load as the wealthy do have choices! Such as purchasing gas out of state or alcohol, or cigarettes, or moving and we can go on.
Today I read in the Hartford Courant that SS&C, a Windsor company, is being courted to move. It is reported: "We are being recruited heavily by other states... my guess is, our headquarters will move... highly paid corporate executives will relocate [out of Connecticut]..." [http://articles.courant.com/2011-06-22/business/hc-ssc-plans-500-jobs-in-indiana-20110622_1_ss-c-technologies-holdings-dannel-p-malloy-business-growth]
Connecticut is no longer a low cost State relative to New York. The economic differences are no longer meaningful. "... UBS is seriously considering a reverse migration that would bring its investment banking division and up to 2,000 bankers and traders back to Wall Street ... [http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/09/nyregion/ubs-may-move-back-to-manhattan-from-stamford.html]. This means a bunch of high earning and more importantly -- for the State and all of us left -- tax payers are moving away from Connecticut.
Find out what's happening in Windsorwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
The Democratic/Union/Liberal ideal of taxing the rich will backfire in the long run on the poor as the burden gets shifted to those that are left. As rates are raised more leave and the cycle continues. I agree we must all pay our fair share but we must also keep expenses under control, which we on a local level do our best to control.
On the State level they are using budgeting tricks and sleight of hand to balance a budget. A suggestion box will save the State 10's of millions of dollars thus balancing the budget. Making people go to a doctor annually will save more, yes maybe in the long run, not in a year. Please, do they take us for fools? I guess they do. Then we read the Office of Fiscal Analysis, the Democratically controlled General Assembly’s budget agency, has also been critical of the estimated value of the concession package.
Find out what's happening in Windsorwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Take a minute and read How Taxes Work: (This was originally attributed to a SD Professor T. Davies, who I called and he informed me he had not written it, thus Author Unknown)
Read on -- it does make you think!!
The story of ten men going out to dinner representing how our tax system in the U.S. works... and why its not smart to continually overtax the rich?
Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner. The bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:
The first four men — the poorest — would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man — the richest — would pay $59.
That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement — until one day, the owner threw them a curve (in tax language a tax cut).
"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20." So now dinner for the ten will only cost $80.00.
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six — the paying customers? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his "fair share?"
The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, Then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being paid to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free.
But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man who pointed to the tenth. "But he got $7!"
"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man, "I only saved a dollar, too . . . It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!".
"That's true!" shouted the seventh man, "why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!"
"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!"
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered, a little late what was very important. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill! Imagine that!
The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Raise the taxes and the rich also pay the most. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore, or in real world speak, move to NY or relocate their headquarters.
Where would that leave the rest?
What are your thoughts.
