"If You're Getting a W-2, You're a Sucker"

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.propublica.org/article/if-youre-getting-a-w-2-youre-a-sucker


Nikki Spretnak loved being an IRS agent. Being able to examine the books of different businesses gave her an intimate view of the economy. But over the years, she became more and more conscious of a chasm between the business owners she was auditing and herself. It wasn't so much that they were rich and she, a revenue agent in the IRS office in Columbus, Ohio, was not. It was that, when it came to taxes, they lived a privileged existence, one that she, a mere W-2 recipient, did not share.

Over the past year, along with a team of my colleagues at ProPublica, I’ve spent countless hours scrutinizing the tax information of thousands of the wealthiest Americans. Like Spretnak, I’ve seen behind the veil and witnessed the same chasm. Doing my own taxes in the past was never a thrill, but only this spring did I fully realize what a colorless and confined tax world I inhabit.

For me, and for most people, filing taxes is little more than data entry. I hold in my hand my W-2 form from my employer and dutifully peck in my wages. Next come the 1099 forms that list my earnings from dividends or interest, and again my finger gets to work. The IRS has a copy of these forms, too, of course, making this drudgery somewhat pointless. By the end of it, there, in black and white, is my income.

The financial reality of the ultrawealthy is not so easily defined. For one, wages make up only a small part of their earnings. And they have broad latitude in how they account for their businesses and investments. Their incomes aren’t defined by a tax form. Instead, they represent the triumph of careful planning by skilled professionals who strive to deliver the most-advantageous-yet-still-plausible answers to their clients. For them, a tax return is an opening bid to the IRS. It’s a kind of theory.

*snip*

[OldBaldy1701E]

1. Well, I am just shocked beyond words!

[MichMan]

2. Who created the tax code she is referring to ?

[Justice matters.]

8. Rich lobbyists.

I win?

[smirkymonkey]

3. K&R

Who knew? What a shocker.

[IronLionZion]

4. I'm a sucker then

there was a time when I didn't have a steady paycheck but that's not the point of the OP. It's time to reform the tax code to tax these billionaires who have tons of wealth but not much "income" offset by losses and deductions. They'll still be plenty wealthy.

[NullTuples]

5. Always amusing when one of them says, "I'll only take $1 / year for my salary..."

...and the media celebrates them being incredibly magnanimous.

[RANDYWILDMAN]

6. Pretty much explains a lot ! WE can't have health care or loan forgiveness if the rich people don't

pay their share of the taxes...shocking and I have no idea why

Most people don't care though and they show it buy voting 70 million voted for the guy who totally cheats on his taxes !!!!!!!

[halfulglas]

7. I was watching with a friend one of those commercials that negotiate with the IRS

to reduce the tax bill middle class people owe to the IRS and I had to explain it to her that these often ex-IRS agents were making a living negotiating their owed amount down and the IRS is trying to get money to fund the government because the rich have even better negotiators. She said huh? The rules are already in their favor.

[C Moon]

9. Thanks for sharing this!

[Laura PourMeADrink]

10. FG supposedly got the biggest tax return of any citizen

per Cohen & no IRS audit? No hmmm? Biggest untold mystery of all WTF IRS. Cohen said he asked FG for proof that they were auditing him and he could never come up with it. Ergo they weren't.

And he declared 60,000 square feet more than he had as a deduction on TT! And I got down on my freaking hands and knees to measure out my work at home space because I was so afraid I would get in trouble. You are allowed to deduct $5 per square foot of at home office!