Billionaire Complains About His Taxes

Recently (today). Businessman/Billionaire/Former Owner of The Buffalo Sabers  Tom Golisano went on Fox & Friends to complain that his taxes were too high.

To watch the video and read how absurd what this guy is actually saying, click the jump.




I decided to check the man's net worth. In 2006 he was the 204th richest American according to Forbes . And was still worth $1.2Billion in September 2011. This guy is complaining about taxes. I can understand someone making $250K. With a net worth of $1.2Billion I can sit around the house all day naked, playing PS3, Listening to the HandGunzHigh Mixtape on repeat, and putting diamonds in my food.



This guy complains about fair. Because the top 1% pay over 40% of the taxes. What he doesn't tell you

from USC.edu   by G. William Domhoff

Look at the disparity of pay. Since 1990 the average CEO pay has increased 298.2%  double what the S&P 500 has increased. Corporate Profits have more than doubled. But regular worker's pay has only increased 4.3% in that same span of time.

For example if a CEO was getting paid $2million in 1990, He was making $5,964,00 in 2005. By the way the CEO pay numbers have increased to over 400% from 2005-2010. Which would be $8,000,000 a year for the same job that was making $2,000,000 in 1990. This is not including cash incentives like stocks, pensions, private jets, golden parachutes (money for when you get fired or quite, normally in the millions of dollars).

Now let's look at worker's pay.  If you made $20,000 in 1990. Don't look now in 2005 your income may have reached $25,000 (that's if his income rose 25% instead of the 4.6% average).

So Corporations are making double from 1990-2005. CEO's are getting triple their original salary. And a worker may get a measly $5,000 more, and that's if they are prospering..

Once again he complains about the top 1% paying over 40% of the taxes. In 2007 before the economic crash, the top 1% owned 33.8% of the income. Which means that the top 1% in 2007 earned more than the bottom 50% combined.  So 3 million or so people made more than 150 million people. So spare me with the bullshit that your taxes are too high when you are making millions a year. Most families will be lucky if they see $2 million combined in a lifetime.


Furthermore he talks about moving from New York to Florida because of taxes. It is true there is no income tax in Florida, and their Corporate tax is even more comically low. Florida Governor Rick Scott recently said he will take the 5.5% corporate tax, cut it to 3.5%, and in the next decade hope to cut it to 0%. Ignoring the fact that Florida is in bad economic standing. A $100million dollar a year company currently pays $5.5million in Corporate tax. That is now $3.5million a year with the original cut. Governor Scott is proposing that they pay $0 in corporate tax in the next decade. In a 10 year span of 0% tax rate is $55.5million in lost revenue for the government, and that is just 1 corporation. Guess who is paying for that... You guess it poor people who will have things like medicare cut to the bone. So while poor people are getting sick and dying, Corporations can worry about 0% tax. Scott also suggested over $3 billion dollar cut in Medicaid. I wonder what that is going to help pay for. Middle Class will also suffer. To help for all his ridiculous tax breaks for corporations, 1 of the 100's of cuts is a 10% cut for students. So while parents struggle to put their kids through school, a corporation can have money to pay it's CEO 4x times more of what he would have made in 1990.

This leads to the point in the first video of Golisano talking about moving to Florida. According to Institution on Taxation & Economic Policy study in November 2008,  the top 1% pay 2.8% state and local tax (i.e. $28,000 on $1million dollars). Where as, a single mother with kids, maybe working 2 jobs is getting taxed at 13.5% (i.e. $3,375 on $25,000).  How is that at all fair Mr. Golisano, who is worth 120,000% more than $1,000,000?

More video of the Florida Governor's budget to punish the poor and help the rich.