Before giving up your citizenship you have to acquire another one which is a lenghty process.( and have fun when you want to visit relatives in the US and have to be treated the way every foreigner visiting the US is)

Secondly US is the western country with the lowest tax rate so if you wanted to leave the US you would have to go to a non western modern country.

And most rich US citizens would balks at the notion of having to become a Jamaican or an Angolan citizen just to lower their taxes ( and whatever they would win in taxes they would loose in higher prices on most everything else, when the item they want to purchase is actually available....).

+ pretty much any job they are doing in the US would pay less in other countries, most people would rather pay 30% taxes on 250k income than 20% on 100k.......

So in practice this is not an available move to US citizens ( but is actually something done a lot more commonly in Europe due to ppls being taxed on soil income and not worldwide).

Oh and bye bye medicare and social security if you drop your citizenship and leave the country. And the fun part is that if you move to a country like France you will be screwed out french retirement too ( because it's based on having worked your whole life in France, not part of it). It's the same for a lot of Western countries by the way...

except you missed my latest edit where I added something in bold.

Here's the official text from the federal site about citizenship :

P.L. 104-191 contains changes in the taxation of U.S. citizens who renounce or otherwise lose U.S. citizenship. In general, any person who lost U.S. citizenship within 10 years immediately preceding the close of the taxable year, whose principle purpose in losing citizenship was to avoid taxation, will be subject to continued taxation.

The determinging factor to determine if you are trying to avoid taxation being whether you make over 100k/year or have a net worth of over 500k..

So nope, you will not evade ;)

So when they say top 1% they mean "top 1% of those who earnt at least a single cent in the year'? I honestly did not know that. Regardless, I would still include 20% as a dent.

I don't have to evade, I'm a Canadian and pay lower taxes than my equivalent American ...

I do find it interesting though, that progressives in the United States always call for Americans to follow Canada's example; but are completely unwilling to follow Canada's taxation or budgetary policies.

From what you are telling us I somehow doubt that your dad is making over 250k over a year. So I don't see how raising taxes on people that make more than that amount would affect him. And remember noone is speaking of raising taxes on business, only on personal income, those are two different things...

As to your question, I woudn't create jobs if my taxes were raised, I woudn't create any if they were lowered, I'm just not planning on creating any......

I am happy with my current situation and I don't see the point of taking on more responsabilities and working more ( because creating more jobs will always entail a time commitment ).

You have to understand that in some ways most people that create jobs do not do so because they want their fellow citizens to have work. They do so in the end to make more money.......Seeing how I am happy with what I make and I don't plan on becoming a workalcoholic if my taxes were raised I would cut back on some spending and that would be it.

Why do people want more money ? To buy more stuff. Well stuff is overated at some point, I rather have time to enjoy outside of work than work like crazy, make a lot more money and in the end have very little free time and be unhappy ( I was an executive in a small software company belonging to a big software corporation 5 years ago. I was making 170k/year without including stocks and I decided I would rather be a software developer, work less and have more free time, I took a pay cut and I am actually a lot more happy now..., those stocks I am exercizing these days are actually a left over of that period..)

If you look at who creates business it's not the rich in most cases, it is people that actually have an idea and wants to make some money out of it.

Lary Page, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs or Marc Zuckerberg did not make 250k a year when they created their companies. And guess what they created the 4 most successfull companies of the last 35 years............. And if you were to raise their tax rate now, they wouldn't even notice it...

like i said my dad hasnt made 250k for a while now, i think the last year was 2006. but of course theres small businesses bigger than his who do make 250k.

also you answered your own question. what do you think happens when people spend less. thats right less jobs

I fail to see how your view is consistent. You say you disagree with the rich paying more for the same government services but then you support a flat tax that would mean that the rich pay more overall?

"I know you're joking, but I suspect the massive resistance to a flat tax scheme is that it makes it much more difficult to bribe people or buy votes ...

If you notice a large portion of social programs are pushed by people who effectively say (by calling for higher taxes for people who earn a higher income) that these programs are not worth implementing if they had to pay for these programs themselves. With the other reforms I would implement it would be very difficult to sell social programs that the majority of people would not be paying for.

Essentially, if it meant that the tax rate would be increased from 25% to 30%, I doubt many progressive politicians would get much traction selling a universal day care program; but, as long as they can promise to tax the rich or pass on the debt to your great grandchildren, in the current system progressive politicans can be remarkably successful because they can promise anything without thinking of the costs."

Actually a lot of the people supporting progressive taxation and the welfare programs they can pay for are amongst the people who will be hit hardest by the progressive taxation.

If that's true, then there shouldn't be a need for progressive taxation, since if those people truley believe that they could support said programs volentairly, and since they're in large numbers.

You wouldn't need government mandates welfare, beause most people would donate too such programs anyway.

Well unless there attitude is "I should be taxed more, but until I do i'm going to blow all this money on myself!"  Which somewhat comes off more a just a positon held as a selfjustifcation so they feel better about their selfishness.