38 replies to this topic

[thejohnnyq]

In many places in the US you pay taxes on the property but there are 'homesteader' rights. This is where the elderly get tax discounts and other benefits to lower their overall tax bill.

Very few places in the US will take your property for being 1 year behind on taxes any more. I know in Ohio there are people that are 10-15 years behind, with the information being published in the paper yearly. You can buy the property for taxes but they have the right to fix tax bill within 30 day, and you assume all debts assigned to the property.

The system works in the US as long as you keep the local government in check and stop them from nickle and dimming you for everything that comes up since it 'will only cost a home owner of a $100,000 a few dollars a year', but everybody wants there money and it is never enough.

[+giantsnyy]

thejohnnyq, on 21 January 2013 - 13:11, said:

The system works in the US as long as you keep the local government in check and stop them from nickle and dimming you for everything that comes up since it 'will only cost a home owner of a $100,000 a few dollars a year', but everybody wants there money and it is never enough.

Yeah... that's how it should be. In the town that I live in, property taxes range from $2,000 annually (the poorest sections) to $35,000 (the richest). Mine fit right around $13,000 for a house and property that really isn't that big.

My town needs to satisfy their almost $200 million school budget.

[M_Lyons10]

seta-san, on 20 January 2013 - 11:44, said:

absolutely. it's what funds education k-12 education

Which, if education weren't such an embarrassment, I would have no problem paying... LOL It's appalling the amount of money that goes into a system that just doesn't work.

[M_Lyons10]

giantsnyy, on 21 January 2013 - 13:25, said:

Yeah... that's how it should be. In the town that I live in, property taxes range from $2,000 annually (the poorest sections) to $35,000 (the richest). Mine fit right around $13,000 for a house and property that really isn't that big.

My town needs to satisfy their almost $200 million school budget.

Exactly. A lot of them see you as nothing more than an income generator... And rather than look at a school system that isn't working, they just throw more money at it, and then of course increase your taxes to do that...

[+sc302]

I personally like how our tax system works.
We have income tax (taxes on what we get paid)
We have interest tax (any money that you make outside of your income also gets taxed)
We have sales tax (taxes on what we spend)
We have property tax (taxes on our homes that we own)
We have school tax (taxes that goes to school which is usually lumped with property tax)
We have federal tax (taxes that we have to pay the federal government)
We have death tax (taxes on money that we receive that has already been taxed by the previous owner of said monies)

After all is said and done, the average American may get to keep about 20% of their money.

[M_Lyons10]

sc302, on 21 January 2013 - 14:27, said:

I personally like how our tax system works.
We have income tax (taxes on what we get paid)
We have interest tax (any money that you make outside of your income also gets taxed)
We have sales tax (taxes on what we spend)
We have property tax (taxes on our homes that we own)
We have school tax (taxes that goes to school which is usually lumped with property tax)
We have federal tax (taxes that we have to pay the federal government)
We have death tax (taxes on money that we receive that has already been taxed by the previous owner of said monies)

After all is said and done, the average American may get to keep about 20% of their money.

HAHAHA, it really is ridiculous. All to fund a government that can't be fiscally frugal to save their lives...

[Skin]

Yeah, I pay about 6.5k a year on my real estate taxes (and I'm not in a fancy part of the country in the least), just so the area can fund their poor over-budget schools.

Heaven forbid they just cut their budget and live within their means.

Also, like others have said, besides sales tax, and a city head count tax, I get taxed for my income at the fed, state, city and county levels... and to be honest, I'm not sure what they all provide me, as a citizen, that's worth how much they take from me. It seems I have to make at least 50k more than I need to survive, just so I can live after all the taxes are taken out.

[Colin McGregor]

americans pay high tax for everything. Its like the land of the raped when it comes to money over there. I won a bunch of money in vegas and had to give up almost half of it for taxes lol. Good thing we have places here in Canada to get it back but still.

[Packet1009]

Colin McGregor, on 21 January 2013 - 15:42, said:

americans pay high tax for everything. Its like the land of the raped when it comes to money over there. I won a bunch of money in vegas and had to give up almost half of it for taxes lol. Good thing we have places here in Canada to get it back but still.

i find it ironic that you did not mention the sky-high taxes in Canada for everything to satisfy the socialist lust our government (especially our provincial govt) has

[neufuse]

depends on where you are, a lot of property taxes pay for the local school districts, like mine does..... some towns don't have property taxes, it all depends on where you are what the local town has set up... this is not a federal or state thing, it's all local, so you can live somewere without a tax if you want to, you could also live somewhere without sales tax if you want to... some states don't even have state taxes... its all up to you what you pay based on where you live... the only thing that is a definite thing is the federal income tax

sc302, on 21 January 2013 - 14:27, said:

I personally like how our tax system works.
We have income tax (taxes on what we get paid)
We have interest tax (any money that you make outside of your income also gets taxed)
We have sales tax (taxes on what we spend)
We have property tax (taxes on our homes that we own)
We have school tax (taxes that goes to school which is usually lumped with property tax)
We have federal tax (taxes that we have to pay the federal government)
We have death tax (taxes on money that we receive that has already been taxed by the previous owner of said monies)

After all is said and done, the average American may get to keep about 20% of their money.

you forgot gas taxes, on all gas you use for travel
Utilities taxes for all the public utilities
some places like california now have eco taxes for recycling electronics....... blah
Capital Gains taxes for investments.......

[Colin McGregor]

Packet1009, on 21 January 2013 - 15:56, said:

i find it ironic that you did not mention the sky-high taxes in Canada for everything to satisfy the socialist lust our government (especially our provincial govt) has

its not that bad. No where near as bad as over in the US. Plus if you ever win the lottery you don't lose half of it to the gov. 14% is nothing considering our taxes earn us benefits. Sure I would love if welfare was controlled so I don't feel like some of my money is going to drug addled deadbeats (I know most welfare users need it but I also know ALOT of people that don't), but free healthcare is worth it (hell the free abortions alone has saved me ALOT of money) plus the fact our minimum wage is much higher evens it out. My friend in the states is making like $7 an hour, f that I would never work for less then 10 (with my degrees I wouldn't get outta bed for less then 25 but before that 10 was it).

[the evn show]

Packet1009, on 21 January 2013 - 15:56, said:

i find it ironic that you did not mention the sky-high taxes in Canada for everything to satisfy the socialist lust our government (especially our provincial govt) has

My tax burden in Calgary is less than it would be in St. Paul. Do the calculation of federal + provicial/state + property/school + sales tax for somebody in Calgary making $100k/year and you'll find the total tax load is around $33k/year. Doing the same for somebody living in a comparably priced home with a similar income in St. Paul and you'll discover the tax load is closer to 38%. I suppose the Canadian pays slightly more because of the dollar being worth slightly more but that varies up and down so much that it's just a rounding error.

Federal tax rates favour Americans if they make less than about $110k/year and Canadians if they make more than that. State/province level income tax typically favours americans (at $100k/year they'll suffer about $3,000/year less taxes). Property taxes tend to favour Canadians as we don't pay regional school taxes - that tends to be baked into other taxes. State Sales taxes very from place to place between 0 and 8% but there is no national tax. Canada has a nation wide 5% sales tax but not all provinces have a sales tax of their own.

For me it worked out that MN was about $5000/year more tax-heavy to work in. That was partially offset by the cheaper cost of living (houses are about 30% less expensive for something comparable). The question of health insurance is difficult to talk about because of how different the systems are. There's also the whole social security vs cpp/ei thing and the "hidden" taxes that you can somewhat avoid (ie: vehicle registration, stamps, fuel taxes, vacations…) which are all difficult to quantify because they depend on lifestyle and job. There's also the fact that raw tax burden only tells part of the story: deductions can reduce that substantially and that's another thing that is difficult to quantify (and tends to benefit the wealthy more than the poor)

Overall the burden isn't that different for a person or couple filing jointly making close to $100k/year. I can appreciate if you're living cheque-to-cheque that $2000-5000/year might be a big deal but for people making closer to the national average it's a pretty minor difference. Certainly not enough to be called "ridiculous".

[threetonesun]

We have a pizza tax here.

It could be worse, it would be perpetually renting from the state, as described in this thread, or Feudalism if we didn't pay property / estate taxes.

[Nothing Here]

We pay 0.8% per year on our. Which comes to just over 1300$ a year.

[PGHammer]

Mr Nom Nom's, on 20 January 2013 - 11:40, said:

Such a system is unworkable and broken - just look at the property bubble in China and the incentive for the local government to keep an unsustainable bubble going via the ever increasing one off taxes that roll in. Reminds me very much of the situation in Australia with their stamp duty to the point that when the housing market collapsed the results were pretty horrific to local government budgets. I also have to ask what problem is such a Chinese system mean to solve? As for local taxes - you pay council rates to pay for water/roads/etc. so these taxes are hardly onerous.

Whether it's centrally managed or locally/regionally-managed, ANY bureaucracy dependent on tax revenues will be somewhat dependent on the largest sources of those revenues.

That same dependence issue is why the housing-market collapse savaged so many states - it wasn't JUST mortgages winding up submerged that inspired walk-aways; it was tax liens in HPT (high property tax) states that inspired a few as well. (The Florida real-estate market - as was the Texas real-estate market when the thrift collapse happened - are cases in point.) It's also why the central theme of the Ryan Plan last year - elimination of the vacation-home deduction for AMT filers - was attacked by not JUST the NAHB and NAR, but the National Association of Counties - counties, townships, and municipalities (cities) depend the MOST on real-estate (personal-property) taxes for operations income, as most don't have authority to charge a piggyback sales tax.