patrick.net

david1 says

This chart is Total tax revenues as a percentage of GDP, including Property taxes and employer FICA contributions. I am not sure where you found that these were excluded. Please provide link.

Go to the original chart you posted, look at the bottom. There is a link to the methodolgy. Only fica for the employee is included as per that link, property taxes are not mentioned as included at all. The next chart you post doesn't allow me to look at the methodology without being a member of the OECD, so I have no way to know. which OECD methodology and documents are correct? You are also saying there is a third chart showing Canada at 38% somewhere also? And another chart showing the US as 28% Yet all these charts include all the taxes? I'm sorry but now I'm confused.

I would agree that you wouldn't quibble over minor services, but of course you would back out a major service that isn't included. Health care is a big percentage of every countries gdp. Why wouldn't you? You pay for the health care, it's a burden on your income no matter if the money goes to the government or the insurance companies. Canada has a military so I don't see the point.

I lived in Canada 15 years ago and currently live in NZ. Both are high tax countries as per the OECD. Yet at the end of the day when everything is said and done my personal bottom line as an upper middle class taxpayer is that I actually payed as much or more taxes in the US when I added everything up. But I personally include the cost of health care since the money is gone from my pocket. That's the street level view. Every American I know overseas says the exact same thing. The US spends more for military/security than the rest of the world put together and the military is over half the general budget. That money isn't coming from the tooth fairy.

So something is distorting the statistics somewhere. Probably the fact that corporate taxes COLLECTED are about 13% (please don't bother to quote me the corporate tax RATE, it's meaningless) and taxes COLLECTED on people with over a million dollars a year income is about 20% are at the very low end in the OECD norms. Someone has to be picking up the slack for the dramatic reduction in taxes paid by the wealthy and corporations in the last 30 years.

So I will graciously amend my statement to say that for the vast majority of people excluding corporations and the wealthy, the tax burden can be as high or higher in the US than many of the "high tax" countries. Good enough?

leoj707 says

Bap33 says

I happen to think polls are crap. That's pretty much it.
There is nothing about these polls that would keep my example above from being true. Is there?

leo says,
"Yes, there is. Polling is a rather complex science and your concerns are concerns of the polling community as well. Issues like lying on polls has been studied pretty extensively and is not as big of an issue as you may think. A poll is much more frequently corrupted by the people running it. That is why seeing the questions and methodology is important. Polls can be written to elicit a desired response to fill an agenda (see Rasmussen). Also, polls can be designed not to gather info, but used to change the minds of those polled. The Bush v. McCain push-poll in 2000 is a good example of this."

leo, I said there is no way (for regular folks like us) to know that polls are square or not. You said that there is a way to know, but you didn't share the "how" part so we can discuss it. How can anyone know if a pollster's next question is generic or if the last answer dictates the next question? How can anyone know if a pollster marks the answer given by the polled. And, lastly, how can a pollster know the polled is reponding honestly? If the answer is where you said that lots of work and science goes into polls because they see the same potential I do, that is cool, but that does not improve the validity of a published poll in my opinion.

rootvg says

If you want to go back to 1950, you'll need tariffs and it WON'T happen.

Probably true. The cat (globalization) is out of the bag.

robertoaribas says

Because fighting for equal rights for blacks is so different than fighting for equal rights for gays?

Yes, and I think one of the biggest lessons we -- at least should have -- learned from the civil rights movement is that there is no such thing as separate-but-equal.

A civil union does not = a marriage.

CaptainShuddup says

But really I'm not the least bit surprised that Fox news viewers aren't with the Liberal agenda.

Typical of an ignorant commentator. If you read the article you would know the questions that were asked. Reality is measured by things like "who won the Republican Iowa primary". From your somewhat less than brilliant analysis, you've concluded that knowing the answer to this puts you with the "Liberal agenda". Frankly, that's just stupid. Sorry, "no insult" policy. Let's just revise that to illogical.