Stop Coddling the Super-Rich

[Kasz216]

mrstickball said:

badgenome said:

I guess, but every time the guy pokes his head up and bitches about how he's not paying enough taxes, he becomes the toast of the liberal blogosphere and media. This particular op-ed was the entire front page of the Puffington Host, and the first page of this thread reads like the Official Warren Buffett Fan Club. But if he really does feel so bad about not paying "his fair share", he can just cut a check to the Treasury right now for whatever he thinks he owes. He won't, though. His being wracked by guilt doesn't stop him from taking every deduction and exploiting every loophole he can, and since he even came out in favor of the private jet deduction Obama has been demagoging, I guess you'll have to pry those write-offs from his cold, dead hands.

Also, it occurs to me that his do-gooder billionaire pals are leaving their fortunes to philantrophic organizations and not to the feds. I suspect that's because they know it will be put to good use this way, instead of being blown in the span of a month on Medicare fraud and waste.

Exactly.

Why isn't Bill Gates nor Warren Buffet giving their money away for social welfare administrated by the government? Rather, you have Warren Buffet giving away his entire fortune upon his death to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, not HUD. Not Medicare. And with good reason: The Bill & Melinda Gates foundation are going to help a whole lot more people than HUD or other American social welfare programs ever have. Our poverty rate continues to stay stagnant and rise at times, despite the fact that 50% of all federal expenditures are redistributive in measure (taking from one person and giving to another).

Warren Buffet would agree with you.

Becky: OK, there were a couple of emails that came in that people that said if you think the government should be able to tax more money, why don't you just give your money away to the government instead of charity.

Buffett: Well, that's a choice and it's an option that... If I had to give it to a single individual, or make some young Buffett a multi-billionaire, or give it to the government, I'd absolutely give it to the government. I think that on balance the Gates Foundation, my daughter's foundation, my two sons' foundations, will do a better job with lower administrative costs and better selection of beneficiaries than the government.