better work incentives are for everyone ....not !

http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/901508-Marginal-Tax-Rates-Work-and-the-Nations-Real-Tax-System.pdf

forget about incentives to "invest"
contemporary advanced societies have  more then too much spontaneous
aggregate accumulation already hence the need for so much usury


but how about incentives to be more productive ?
can taxes reduce the supply of time and effort ?

read the link

couple money points:

"The nation’s real tax system includes not just the direct statutory rates explicit in such taxes as the income tax and the Social Security tax, but the implicit taxes that derive from phasing out of various benefits in both expenditure and tax programs "
"for the same amount of cost, a program that requires work will indeed lead to more work  than one that does not. "

"EITC and welfare reform have done better on the work front than did AFDC. "


need for reforms

" Combined effective marginal tax rates from dozens or hundreds of phase-outs can be very high and certainly lead to hidden and confusing government."

" The rates are especially high for low-to-moderate income households with children and include hundreds of billions of dollars of marriage penalties as well. "

"These high tax rates also extend into many middle-income programs as well. "

suggestions :

" (a) seeking broad-based social welfare reform rather than adopting programs one-by-one with multiple phase-outs,


(b) starting to emphasize opportunity and education over adequacy and consumption;

 (c) putting tax rates directly in the tax code to replace implicit tax rates,


 (d) making work an even stronger requirement for receipt of various benefits


 (e) adopting a maximum marginal tax rate for programs combined,


(f) letting child benefits go with the child and wage subsidies go with low-income workers rather than combining the two. "


a look at the total  tax and transfer  system's income profile
included:


--get an f ing mag-glass ---

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some utterly off the cuff remarks unrelated to the paper:



why might a diabolic system
have two plans

example
 tax cuts at the margin like your high flyers get in reaganomics
but
for the  lower orders of wagelings higher taxes

yup
the jaw bone of an ass
              right across the back side

think of two forces inside one jobbler/producers head

 one force wants more market stuff
the other force wants more leisure


job hours offered are the outcome of this tussle of forces

now imagine the survival level is about your earning max potential

cut your take home wage and you either don't have enough
 or you work more hours...right ?
simple
nothing will stop  you from trying to get enough hours to survive

ya its like being under water
no matter how much harder it may get to keep  going higher and higher
   you'll do it till you surface

these critters can really be wacked to hell...and have been

however imagine you are easily surviving
and suddenly you get a raise per hour

you might reduce your life time job hour plans eh ?
take a bit more leisure
that second force has cut in here

so again taxing your ass off will induce more offered hours

so when do we get to the point where lowering hourly rates might
reduce hours offered ?

  when you got so much task related income
 every increase gets off set at least in part
  by offering less hours

my guess this never happens to our "high market achievers"
but according to reaganomics it does
reagan himslef claimed he'd of taken more roles
in his hay days past
if back then his marginal tax rate hadn't been  so  damn high

how his eagerness to work more
could produce more roles to play in aggreaget instead of simply seeing the availible roles more hogger by the lucky/gifted few
  is left undiscovered i might add

but that's another thread
 but hey we hit another poser
what if we change not the average tax but the tax on additional job or task income


now rethink all this two force tussle bull shit
using marginal changes

its this that gets reaganized:

 additional hours  or higher rates per hour
                  are compensated at reduced  income  ?

again look at your underwaters first
they'll still take more hours  at least till their  heads are above water
in fact they 'll take as many hours as they can get
even at a reduced marginal pay rate

which btw is exactly what happens to lots of souls
    now  in the income related  social transfer payment system

now look at middlers the bulk of the production force

all are likely still looking for more income not more leisure

reaganites at the top ?

well you decide

joe stglitiz contends we oughta have progressive  average income taxes
and flatly regressive  marginal taxes on job/ task income
more or less pro rated by hours worked

make sense to you ?

i prefer a human capital tax
 a tax on wealth in market evaluated
 out put potential