05/05 Các nền kinh tế châu Á: Khó khăn trong quản lý và sử dụng vốn


THỨ NĂM, 05 THÁNG 5 2011 15:15 SGGP

Hôm qua 4/5, trong khuôn khổ Hội nghị thường niên lần thứ 44 của Ngân hàng Phát triển châu Á (ADB) tại Hà Nội, đã diễn ra hội thảo của các thống đốc ngân hàng trung ương khu vực châu Á với chủ đề “Châu Á năm 2050: Hướng tới tăng trưởng bền vững và thịnh vượng”.

3 tỷ người châu Á sẽ sống sung túc 

Tại hội thảo, ADB đã công bố tổng quan dự thảo báo cáo “Châu Á 2050 - Xây dựng một thế kỷ châu Á”. Báo cáo hoàn chỉnh dự kiến sẽ được xuất bản vào tháng 8/2011 sau khi được thảo luận tại hội nghị lần này. Dự thảo báo cáo cho biết trọng tâm của nền kinh tế toàn cầu sẽ chuyển sang châu Á, với 2 kịch bản: Thế kỷ của châu Á và bẫy thu nhập trung bình.

Theo kịch bản lạc quan, thế kỷ châu Á, đến năm 2050, GDP của khu vực sẽ đạt 148.000 tỷ USD, chiếm 51% sản lượng toàn cầu. Theo cơ sở sức mua tương đương, GDP theo đầu người tại châu Á sẽ lên tới 38.600 USD, so với mức dự kiến trung bình năm 2050 của thế giới là 36.600 USD.
  • Ảnh bên : Hầm chui đường Nguyễn Hữu Cảnh tại TPHCM (Ảnh: Thái Băng) 
Kịch bản thứ hai giả định rằng những nền kinh tế lớn của châu Á như Trung Quốc, Ấn Độ, Indonesia và Việt Nam sẽ rơi vào “bẫy thu nhập trung bình”, khi mức tăng trưởng chậm lại và sự trì trệ trong thu nhập của 5 hay 10 năm tới. Trong khi đó, những nền kinh tế còn lại không thể thúc đẩy được tỷ lệ tăng trưởng trong kịch bản này. Nếu những dữ kiện này xảy ra, GDP châu Á sẽ chỉ đạt 61.000 tỷ USD, chiếm 32% sản lượng toàn cầu vào năm 2050. Theo cơ sở sức mua tương đương, GDP đầu người của khu vực sẽ đạt 20.300 USD.

Chủ tịch ADB Haruhiko Kuroda nhận định: Hai kết quả dự kiến ở 2 kịch bản là khác nhau và vì vậy chi phí cơ hội nếu không thực hiện kịch bản một thế kỷ châu Á là rất lớn, đặc biệt trên khía cạnh con người. Theo kịch bản một thế kỷ châu Á của ADB, sẽ có thêm 3 tỷ người châu Á có thể tận hưởng thành quả của sự thịnh vượng ít nhất cũng sớm hơn một thế hệ so với kịch bản “bẫy thu nhập trung bình”.

Bản dự thảo cũng đề ra 6 động lực chuyển đổi tại khu vực: sự tiến bộ kỹ thuật, tích lũy vốn, nhân khẩu học và lực lượng lao động, sự gia tăng tầng lớp trung lưu, giảm thiểu biến đổi khí hậu và cuộc cách mạng thông tin.

Cần hàng ngàn tỷ USD vốn đầu tư 

Thảo luận các vấn đề chung, Bộ trưởng Bộ Tài chính Bangladesh Abul Maal Abul Muhith cho rằng, 30 năm qua châu Á đã có bước phát triển tuyệt vời với tốc độ tăng trưởng kinh tế cao, đầu tư của khu vực tư nhân phát triển mạnh. Tuy nhiên, đằng sau những thành tựu này là những sự trả giá không nhỏ: bất bình đẳng xã hội, tham nhũng gia tăng...

Theo dự báo của ADB, nhu cầu vốn phát triển mỗi năm cho khu vực châu Á trong giai đoạn từ nay đến 2050 có thể lên tới hàng ngàn tỷ USD. Tuy nhiên, khó khăn lớn nhất của các quốc gia châu Á không phải là thu hút vốn mà nằm ở việc quản lý và sử dụng số tiền nói trên sao cho hiệu quả. 

Theo Bộ trưởng Tài chính Ấn Độ Pranab Mukherjee, mấu chốt để giải quyết vấn đề này là các chính phủ phải xác định đâu là lĩnh vực đầu tư có hiệu quả nhất để sử dụng vốn. Trong điều kiện của châu Á, các lĩnh vực này bao gồm nguồn nhân lực và cơ sở hạ tầng.

Bên cạnh đó, để phát triển bền vững, các quốc gia châu Á cần đầu tư mạnh cho kinh tế tri thức. Phát biểu kết thúc phiên thảo luận, Chủ tịch ADB Haruhiko Kuroda nhấn mạnh việc nâng cao chất lượng và hiệu quả sử dụng vốn sẽ giúp các nước tránh được “bẫy thu nhập trung bình”.

Trao đổi với báo chí sau hội thảo, ông Rajat Nag, Giám đốc điều hành ADB, cho biết nhiều vấn đề mà dự thảo báo cáo “Châu Á năm 2050 – Xây dựng một thế kỷ châu Á” đã được các đại biểu tham dự hội thảo làm rõ như thúc đẩy công nghệ, hợp tác công tư, cân bằng hệ thống tài chính, xây dựng lòng tin về dân chủ, quản lý đô thị và vượt qua bẫy thu nhập trung bình…

“Nước nào muốn vượt qua bẫy thu nhập phải có khả năng sáng tạo và nâng cao năng suất lao động. Lợi thế về nguồn lao động dồi dào không thể phát huy tác dụng nếu các nước không đào tạo một đội ngũ nhân lực có kỹ năng tốt” – ông Nag nói.
Bảo Minh
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31/05 Are Taxes in the U.S. High or Low?


May 31, 2011, 6:00 AM
By BRUCE BARTLETT
Today's Economist
Bruce Bartlett has served as an economic adviser in the White House, the Treasury Department and Congress.
Historically, the term “tax rate” has meant the average or effective tax rate — that is, taxes as a share of income. The broadest measure of the tax rate is total federal revenues divided by the gross domestic product.
By this measure, federal taxes are at their lowest level in more than 60 years. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that federal taxes would consume just 14.8 percent of G.D.P. this year. The last year in which revenues were lower was 1950, according to the Office of Management and Budget.
The postwar annual average is about 18.5 percent of G.D.P. Revenues averaged 18.2 percent of G.D.P. during Ronald Reagan’s administration; the lowest percentage during that administration was 17.3 percent of G.D.P. in 1984.
In short, by the broadest measure of the tax rate, the current level is unusually low and has been for some time. Revenues were 14.9 percent of G.D.P. in both 2009 and 2010.
Yet if one listens to Republicans, one would think that taxes have never been higher, that an excessive tax burden is the most important constraint holding back economic growth and that a big tax cut is exactly what the economy needs to get growing again.

Just last week, House Republicans released a new plan to reduce unemployment. Its principal provision would reduce the top statutory income tax rate on businesses and individuals to 25 percent from 35 percent. No evidence was offered for the Republican argument that cutting taxes for the well-to-do and big corporations would reduce unemployment; it was simply asserted as self-evident.
One would not know from the Republican document that corporate taxes are expected to raise just 1.3 percent of G.D.P. in revenue this year, about a third of what it was in the 1950s.
The G.O.P. says global competitiveness requires the United States to reduce its corporate tax rate. But the United States actually has the lowest corporate tax burden of any of the member nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Revenue Statistics of O.E.C.D. Member Countries, 2010
If taxes are low historically and in comparison with our global competitors, how are Republicans able to maintain that taxes are excessively high? They do so by ignoring the effective tax rate and concentrating solely on the statutory tax rate, which is often manipulated to make it appear that rates are much higher than they really are.
For example, Stephen Moore of The Wall Street Journal recently assertedthat Democrats were trying to raise the top income tax rate to 62 percent from 35 percent. But most of the difference between these two rates is the payroll tax and state taxes that are already in existence. The rest consists largely of assuming tax increases that no one has formally proposed and that would be politically impossible to enact at the present time.
Ryan Chittum, in Columbia Journalism Review, responded with a commentary that called the Moore analysis “deeply disingenuous.”
Nevertheless, one routinely hears variations of the Moore argument from conservative commentators. By contrast, one almost never hears that total revenues are at their lowest level in two or three generations as a share of G.D.P. or that corporate tax revenues as a share of G.D.P. are the lowest among all major countries. One hears only that the statutory corporate tax rate in the United States is high compared with other countries, which is truebut not necessarily relevant.
The economic importance of statutory tax rates is blown far out of proportion by Republicans looking for ways to make taxes look high when they are quite low. And they almost never note that the statutory tax rate applies only to the last dollar earned or that the effective tax rate is substantially lower even for the richest taxpayers and largest corporations because of tax exclusions, deductions, credits and the 15 percent top rate on dividends and capital gains.
The many adjustments to income permitted by the tax code, plus alternative tax rates on the largest sources of income of the wealthy, explain why the average federal income tax rate on the 400 richest people in America was 18.11 percent in 2008, according to the Internal Revenue Service, down from 26.38 percent when these data were first calculated in 1992. Among the top 400, 7.5 percent had an average tax rate of less than 10 percent, 25 percent paid between 10 and 15 percent, and 28 percent paid between 15 and 20 percent.
The truth of the matter is that federal taxes in the United States are very low. There is no reason to believe that reducing them further will do anything to raise growth or reduce unemployment.
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  • Who Doesn’t Pay Federal Income Taxes (Legally)
  • The Legend of Margaret Thatcher
  • Are Taxes High or Low? A Further Look
  • What Your Taxes Do (and Don’t) Buy for You
  • The Case for Higher Taxes


    1.
    Bruce Eshbaugh
    Plymouth, MA
    May 31st, 2011
    7:45 pm
    Quite right Bruce.

    Still, Democrats are inclined target the investor class, and are the party of redistribution.

    And if all this is so modest, why am I paying federal and municipal corporate taxes, twice FICA (because I've got my own business) before I pay my 'effective' taxes?

    Half the country pays nothing. Zero. I have no problem with the weathly actually paying taxes... But everyone.... Or near everyone must pay. Those taxes represent ownership in our country.

    Bruce Eshbaugh, CFA
    2.
    Matt P
    Brookline, MA
    May 31st, 2011
    8:10 pm
    Thanks for Bruce Bartlett for pointing out the facts. As the first comment shows, however, people will continue to ignore those facts in their own self-interest, and assert falsities as if they were true.

    No one pays "twice FICA". If you are a business owner, and have the advantage of deducting business expenses from your income, should you not also be treated as a business for purposes of social security tax? Or should the rest of us carry that burden for you?

    And almost no one pays "nothing". The commenter conveniently ignores the social security taxes he cited in the previous paragraph. He ignores medicare taxes. He ignores state and local sales taxes. These are all taxes paid by low-income Americans who make to little to pay income tax.

    I'm tired of the well-off complaining about how rough they have it, in order to force others to pay instead.
    3.
    PR
    nyny
    May 31st, 2011
    8:14 pm
    I find it frustrating to see articles like this that ignore the ignore the multi-tiered tax system that exists in the US, but is virtually non-existent in most of the other countries listed in the included table. Living in NY I pay income taxes to the city, state and federal government. When I lived in London, I payed income taxes to one national entity only. And while we enjoy a low sales tax rate (less than 9% in NY compared to about twice that amount in London), there is no mention of the web of special taxes on select goods/services that bring the effective rate to more than 20% on things like phone service, rental cars, air travel ... even my utility bill!

    Then there is the is the weighty burden of property tax. I pay 30 times the rate in NY than I did on a similarly priced property in London.

    Bottom line for me, is that I suffer a much heaver obligation to the government in the US than I ever did in the UK, but that doesn't show up in your table since it only compares Federal level income taxes.
    4.
    Chris
    Florida
    May 31st, 2011
    8:14 pm
    The government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it. ~Ronald Reagan
    5.
    Colin
    Washington, DC
    May 31st, 2011
    8:15 pm
    Sorry Bruce, but this is a distortion. The US in fact has high nominal tax rates -- our corporate rate is the highest in the developed world -- which are then riddled with myriad credits and deductions which bring down the effective rate. Basically we get the worst of both worlds -- the economic drag from high rates combined with the revenues of much lower rates. As another commenter noted, we also have 50% of the population paying zero federal income tax.

    Republicans are correct that tax rates should be brought down. This, however, should be accompanied by the elimination of tax credits and deductions which serve to distort economic decision making and reduce revenues.
    6.
    rohit
    New York
    May 31st, 2011
    8:20 pm
    I agree with some of the things which Bruce says, but I still feel the article is a bit biased. My understanding is that tha middle class in Europe pays much higher taxes than the middle class in the US and the proportion of people who pay NO taxes is higher in the US. Bush lowered taxes in the lowest income bracket from 15% to 10%. I almost never see this figure mentioned by Democrats. So the simple statement "Bush favoured the rich" is a bit deceptive.

    One of the problems we have in the US is that a large proportion of intellectuals (broadly speaking) are Democrats. Thus we hardly ever get unbiased analysis. What we get is mix of analysis with Democratic partisanship. This article is an example. It leaves out facts which would be part of a full analysis and confines itself to those which reflect badly on Republicans.

    I favor raising taxes. But I am therefore sympathetic to those Republicans who say that when nearly half of the population pays NO taxes, that is dangerous and unfair, especially since those who pay no taxes receive the lion's share of federal largesse. It divides the US into two countries.

    The rich living off the poor through exploitation and the poor liviing off the middle class and the rich via income transfer.
    7.
    Ace Tracy
    New York
    May 31st, 2011
    8:30 pm
    Comment by PR is exactly right. The rising burden for middle class families in the US has been on the local level: sales tax, state income tax, real estate tax, and various excise taxes.

    What the article also overlooks is that the middle class families have seen their social security taxes triple in 25 years while the top 0.5% saw a drop from 70% in the 1970s to below 20%. And we wonder why the disparity between rich and middle class is growing so fast in the US?!!

    Taking PR's argument, I estimate my total tax burden (federal, social security, state, local, etc.) is about 56% of my gross income!! Compare that to my counterpart in Germany or France where higher education is free, pensions are secure, and healthcare is practically free.

    As to corporate taxes, we all know that the Republicans keep on saying that the US has the highest corporate income tax rate, yet effectively our largest corporations are enjoying a tax rate under 5%. And this low tax rate is not creating jobs or helping the economy.
    8.
    Steve B.
    USA
    May 31st, 2011
    8:35 pm
    Although Republicans seem always more interested in saving the wealthy than in saving the country, taxes as a proportion of GDP is not a particularly useful measure by which to compare annual rates. For one thing the way GDP is measured today results in a far greater number than in the past, especially now that items not produced in a given year are counted as being produced each and every year, like imputed rent for a home that is paid for, and has been for years. Which means that the same federal receipts years ago simply looks larger because of the difference in the way GDP is counted. If the definitions of GDP were held constant, what would the comparison look like? Mr. Barton, one who contrives numbers for a living, wouldn't say, yet that is the only way to compare apples to apples in the real world.

    Taxes as a percentage of median income would likely tell a better story, for that's where most people feel the burden of taxes, on their own incomes. And the standard deduction years ago as a percentage of median income actually meant something about the costs of living then. That's not true today either. Again, if apples to apples counting is intended, that difference should be noted. Mr. Bartlett chose to ignore that obvious difference as well.

    So when will someone look at the median wage, use constant values across the decades, and then calculate the typical income tax burden on individuals as compared to the 1950s? Is that so hard to do?
    9.
    Michael
    Va
    May 31st, 2011
    8:35 pm
    Mr Bartlett is negligent in not including ALL taxes Americans have to pay, not just the Federal tax rate. The Federal government levies millions of dollars in fees and taxes, many aimed at specific businesses, that large swaths of the public is not even aware of. Further more, all individuals and businesses are required to support state, local, and national governments. Local governments in particular have become quite voracious in the last few decades. Either Mr Bartlett is unaware, or is simply indifferent to, the myriad ways multiple branches of government are constantly barraging businesses large and small with demands for ever higher revenues.
    10.
    AHF
    Potomac, MD.
    May 31st, 2011
    8:55 pm
    None of, the tablef these comments addresses all of the factors reflecrted in the table. For example, state and local income taxes or sales taxes are deductible from federal income tax income. Also, many small businesses are subchapter S corporations avoiding taxation of parts of corporate or personal income. No single figure can reflect the total complexity of the economic system and the tax codes. Nevertheless, the table does present one significant measure of the relative tax burden on national economies
    11.
    LV
    New Jersey
    May 31st, 2011
    9:00 pm
    Bruce, "CFA" (#1), it is not true that half of Americans pay "no tax." This has been debunked again and again. This only pertains to federal "income" tax, not to the other big federal tax, the federal payroll tax.

    Almost everyone pays payroll taxes to fund Medicare and Social Security (that is, the biggest government programs). This is big a portion of income for those people that don't pay income tax. In fact, because the payroll tax is not structured in a progressive way, many of the people paying payroll tax have little left over the income tax, and receive credits instead.

    And when you include all taxes (federal, state, and local), people at most income levels actually pay about the same percentage of their income in taxes to the government.

    Read about it:

    http://www.ctj.org/pdf/taxday2011.pdf
    12.
    Tom
    Midwest
    May 31st, 2011
    9:00 pm
    It is good to see some facts on the tax argument. Republicans complain about the Mediscare campaign from the left but that doesn't even come close to the false argument they give about taxes. Almost 100% of the boogie man stories from the right quote statutory rates instead of effective rate, misleading the public and the voters. I f totally eliminated all the credits and deductions in the tax code, that would end the argument about 50% paying no taxes, and eliminate the statutory versus effective argument The other argument we hear all the time is you didn't include state, local or SS taxes. So what, the discussion is about the federal tax burden in the US compared to other countries, the exact point being pushed by the right. As to state and local taxes being a burden, yes, they are, and guess what, they are going to be much worse in the near future when federal and state payments are cut. You haven't seen anything yet. Further, depending on your state, those 50% not paying federal income tax are paying state, local, sales, social security and medicare taxes, just like the rest of us. Sorry, compared to 10, 20 or more years ago, we ARE paying much less. Most people's memories are selective and don't remember when we had much higher taxes.
    13.
    Nick
    Montana
    May 31st, 2011
    9:15 pm
    As long as there are politicians, there will be always be tax breaks to be doled out and tax increases to punish others. How one sees who is getting a break and who is getting a tax hit just depends on one's political and economic point of view.

    How does one account for this paradox: last year GE had a profit in the billions but paid no income taxes. On the other side, more and more of the middle class are getting caught in the alternative minimum tax trap.

    Other than argue over what actually is the true tax rate is, what if the federal government reallocated the revenues is currently is bringing in toward expenditures that would create jobs and support long economic expansion: repairing our infrastructure, renew investment in research and development, and increase educational opportunities? Historically, government investment in these areas sustain economic growth and diversification, to wit: the Interstate highway system, government and university partnership research leading to product innovation (internet anyone?), GI Bill and government-backed student loans. Only by stimulating the economy will tax revenues revive to the point where we as a country can actually begin chipping away at the deficit.

    Like it or not, government is the only entity large enough to create enough stimulus to help revive a recessionary economy (see long term Cold War projects), or prolong it (see Japan of the last 20 years).

    Arguing over tax rates as opposed to how to spend current tax revenues delays while the US economy sputters and our infrastructure decays serves no one except politicians and the parasitic lobbying class.
    14.
    May 31st, 2011
    9:25 pm
    This comment has been removed. Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive. For more information, please see our Comments FAQ.
    15.
    mikeoshea
    Hadley, NY
    May 31st, 2011
    9:30 pm
    Talking about taxes in general, #1 says that "half the country pays nothing. Zero." Well, this is not just untrue, but, quite simply, either a deliberate lie or total ignorance.

    Everyone pays Medicare and Social Security taxes on every dollar they earn. It's taken out of our paychecks at the amazing low rates of one and a half percent for Medicare and about six percent for Social Security. And we all pay federal and state taxes every time we get a paycheck. Those unfortunate Americans who work in low paying jobs, and there are millions of them, don't get off scot-free, because the federal tax rate on those who earn less than $8,375 a year is still ten percent. And, of course, there are state taxes which differ from state to state, but no one gets off without paying something. It is true that many people, including the ultra-rich, pay no ADDITIONAL TAXES when they file their taxes in April, but that's because they've already paid what they owe before they file. It is also true that many people think that their property taxes are too high, but folks with money have the choice of buying a house or renting an apartment - this is a choice not available to most poor people. In any event, those Republicans who claim that "half the country pays nothing" should have their mouths washed out with a strong soap.

    The poor and middle classes have been taken advantage of by the rich and powerful when it comes to Social Security. While we pay SS taxes on EVERY DOLLAR we earn, the rich and powerful pay only on the first $106,000 of their earned income. That's chump change for most of them. If, as #1 asserts, "...taxes represent ownership in our country", then the rich and powerful shouldn't be the ones who make decisions which affect the lives of the rest of us because they've stacked the deck in their favor.
    16.
    kate
    NYC
    May 31st, 2011
    9:35 pm
    With federal, state and city tax in NYC I pay almost as much in taxes as if I had stayed in Germany. Yet over there you have free universities and universal health care and an overall social safety net. Taxes are spent to maintain infrastructure. I think Americans just got a bad deal on how their taxes are spend (wars, military and overpriced health care system that doesn't even show the best results and with millions of people still unable to obtain coverage). It is outrages that some corporations don't pay any taxes in the end. The tax code is written by the rich for the rich. The argument that so many poor people don't pay any taxes I find strange. In fact I think it is more of a worry to actually have so many poor people in the richest country in the world than.
    17.
    JB
    Miami
    May 31st, 2011
    9:40 pm
    The comparison is an over-simplification: in addition to ignoring big chunks of tax listed by PR in comment number 3, it also omits more obscure but critical differences, which may work for or against the author's argument, such as capital gains, inheritance tatx, and worldwide taxation.

    More complicated still, would be to measure what taxation does or did in other countries/periods, such as pay for pensions, education, health, unemployment subsidies, etc. all of it measurable against GDP, and all of it peculiar to each period/country compared to.

    Finally, tax revenue as compared to GDP,does ignore what we could call the political corruption bias: how both taxes and expenditures are biased in this country/period, as compared to past periods and foreign countries, by money in politics that distorts generic application of tax laws in favor of relatively favorable treatment for taxpayers with money vs. taxpayers without money: prime examples of which would be the mortgages interest deduction (up to two residences), or the oil exploration tax exemptions.
    18.
    Simon
    Ithaca, NY
    May 31st, 2011
    9:45 pm
    People are correct to point out that state and local taxes should be included in the total tax rate. However, these taxes in the US are low compared to other federations. OECD data for 2005 put the tax revenues over GDP at 25 % in the US, compared to 32 % in Canada, 35% in Germany, 36 % in the UK and 44 % in Finland.

    As mentioned, these higher tax rates in large part finance essential services that people pay one way or the other, like public healthcare and education. Canada spends 10% of GDP on healthcare vs 15 % in the US. Given similar per capita spending by governments, that extra 5 % comes straight out of people's pockets. Yet, that extra 5% does not result in better overall health outcome here.

    There's no such thing as a free lunch, the only question is how you pay for it. Here it's been somehow decided that essential services are to be paid in large part by individuals and their employers, whereas most developed nations decided that the whole of society would contribute in proportion to their means. To the dismay of supply-side proponents, many countries that chose the latter have maintained solid economic performance while the US struggled.
    19.
    masayaNYC
    Harlem, New York
    May 31st, 2011
    10:08 pm
    Half the country pays nothing because, Bruce (@1), they effectively make nothing. Do you know how little you have to make in order to qualify for the exclusion? Your right it's about ownership of the country--but you have to be able to afford basics like food and rent before you can talk about owning anything.
    20.
    pm
    brooklyn
    May 31st, 2011
    10:08 pm
    I have a small S-Corp business and run a 10K payroll once a month, and pay 38% in Fed, NYC and NY State Taxes. This graph is incorrect.

    I'd rather pay Danish-style taxes and actually receive something like Healthcare or Education in return.
    21.
    Einstein
    America
    May 31st, 2011
    10:08 pm
    The numbers are deceiving.

    It's not how much you pay, it's what you get for your taxes.

    Let's see a full accounting.

    Let's compare taxes actually paid and then let's compare safety nets and quality of life for the general population in each and every country.
    22.
    Bruce Eshbaugh
    Plymouth, MA
    May 31st, 2011
    10:09 pm
    Unbelievable.

    Half of the country pays no taxes. Marginal rates mean nothing.

    See any reference whatever.

    Here's an MSN reference.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36226444/ns/business-personal_finance

    They're exempted.

    And you call us ignorant? Lying?

    Unbelievable.
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