Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

Do you understand the difference between revenue and income?

Congratulations! You are too smart to work at CNBC!

From Media Matters comes this report:

During the February 26 edition of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, CNBC host Maria Bartiromo asserted that among the “unintended consequences” of President Obama’s proposal to let the Bush tax cuts on wealthy taxpayers expire is that “the bottom line is small businesses … are putting $250,000 in revenue out there, and they’re going to get impacted, and this is the single largest creator of jobs.”

Obviously, this is incompetently erroneous at best. The Obama tax plan focuses on raising marginal income tax rates and reducing income tax deductions for individuals earning more than $200,000 per year and for couples earning more than $250,000 per year.

Moreover, Bartiromo’s suggestion that doing so would be a tax increase for most small businesses is also false: as Media Matters for America documented, according to the Tax Policy Center’s table of 2007 tax returns that reported small business income, 481,000 of those returns — about 2 percent — are in the top two income tax brackets, which include all filers with taxable incomes that would be affected.

Two percent? My God, this man is history’s greatest monster, somebody stop him! I only hope that someday soon, these news folks will understand how many bloggers there are out there with OCD and too much time on their hands, willing to hunt down details like this and nail ’em for it.  


Categories: Uncategorized.

/ 13 Comments

13 comments

  1. Hollede

    I saw this bs this morning and my head almost exploded. CNBS has completely gone off the rail. A year ago anyone warning of this crisis was laughed off as insane, and now all of their hair is on fire. They need to get some perspective and take some fracking classes.

  3. Chris Blask

    I only hope that someday soon, these news folks will understand how many bloggers there are out there with OCD and too much time on their hands, willing to hunt down details like this and nail ’em for it.  

    Oh yes.  We will.

  5. Michelle

    I watched the CNBC clip.  I went to Media Matters and searched out the article and all the previous articles attempting to address this claim.  I read the MyDD FP entry about it along with the AP’s attempt to clarify.  All of it seems inadequate for anyone’s understanding, though Bartiromo did a decent job of sounding like she knew what the hell she was talking about, even though she has no clue.

    Obama explained this to Joe the Plumber as well, but Joe’s such an asshat and drunk on the Republican koolaid that he wasn’t listening anyhow.  He was just trying to play Stump the Democrat and ended up FAIL.

    The difference is not so much “revenue” and/or “income” as it is revenue/income and TAXABLE income.  The mixing of individual income taxation and small business taxation is not helping either.

    The point is this:

    20 something million small businesses are sole proprietorships, meaning that the income generated from those businesses goes on a person’s income tax returns.  Those same people take a whole host of business deductions against that business’s income.  For example, a dude who owns a lawn care business can deduct the cost of the lawnmower, trash bags, mileage, fuel, etc. against all the payments he receives for his work.  Once the deductions are taken into account, along with any other allowable deductions and/or credits for the business AND the individual, the remaining income is what is called “taxable income.”  Based on the marginal tax rates for that individual, she will pay that percentage over in tax.  Only 2% of individuals (including those that own sole proprietorships) are left with $200,000 in cash or more for ONE tax year. (It is $250,000 for households)

    Who would these people be, you might ask?  Doctors, lawyers, investment bankers who made millions off the housing bubble, CEOs of banks who take millions in bonuses, ya know…the “little” people.

    The median household income for the U.S. is $48,000.  The top 2% of our country are the ones with the big bucks, and they will be the ones paying more in taxes.  The point of raising taxes on the rich is that they can afford it.  If after all the deductions/credits are taken and a person is sitting on $200,000 or more in cash, that person can AFFORD to pay 37% (or whatever the top rate will be).

    After all $100 to that person is not the same as $100 to someone making $48,000 a year.

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