OH MY GOD!
How do you survive with taxes like that?! I would be homeless and then dead for sure if we had taxes like that.
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Taxes like that pays for housing assistance for low income people and healthcare, so that keeps you housed and alive.
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To add to what Fraggles wrote: those taxes also often pay for medical care, something that in the US is covered through insurance, which is sometimes covered by one’s employer, but more typically is out-of-pocket either through getting your own insurance, or getting medical services uninsured.
I’d much rather have a 40% income tax rate than deal with the bills I’m dealing with, because they’re hella more than 40% of my income xP
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It certainly has never helped me in my many years of life. I can’t imagine earning $600 and then losing 40% of it. 
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You don’t really need imagination, just math and knowledge of the more intricate all encompassing impacts of different economic systems.
But lets just throw a few things out here. As already mentioned, healthcare. Your employer either pays for insurance, which is of course a cost that comes off the top of your paycheck whether that’s specified or not. Or you have to pay that insurance yourself which is, I’m sure, a noticeable bit of money each month. And even then you’re still going to get dicked around with co-pays and be limited to the medications your insurance company prefers on top of having to deal with all the admin and paperwork involved with insurance business. I pay $18 for a doctors visit and that’s it no fuzz and BS.
Most cities in Sweden has great cycling infrastructure and public transport, which is payed for with tax money. This means I do not need to own a car at all. Thus I don’t need to pay car insurance, maintenance or worry about gas prices. Now you told me you don’t have one either, but most Americans do and those costs are for sure another noticeable bite out of your paycheck.
The schools around here are properly funded and most kids learn at least enough to be functional adults eventually. This means I don’t have to deal with a whole lot of certifiably stupid people as I navigate society and that’s something I’m not even able to estimate a monetary value of.
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Well this is almost spooky.
Maybe it’ll be of some use to you, not sure why it was recommended to me though.
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At the job I used to work at. I made $38.51/hr. Paid biweekly so $3080.80 per payment. After taxes, health insurance, retirement, 5% (elected) to an investment account, my take-home pay was $1801.25. That’s an effective 41.5% “tax”. I was on the cheaper health insurance as well. Removing the 5% for investment and that’s pretty close to my guesstimate of 67% of what you make is take home pay.
So we already pay it. We just get a middle finger to the face for the benefits.
That’s 33%.
Yeah, finicky things. Probably takes a good amount of patience and maybe some snips. If you can set it to second and just use the rear instead you might be able to get by. Of course I would recommend doing it properly or getting a shop to do it… I just know a repair shop requires money.
Ftfy. Google’s been spying on you.
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Yup, i guess @Fraggles laid it pretty well on how things are here in Europe. Especially for countries like mine there we dont really have any natural resources to sell so everything is literally paid by tax money.
You sit on a bench in a park, congrats, 1/1000000 of that bench is literally yours. From what i’ve heard even though they keep rising prices for public transport around here it is still not self sustainable and part of the cost is tax money.
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Yea, I think my last job was robbing me. I should not have been taxed that much. I lost so much money. They did a lot of other scummy things, I realized much later.
Where do you live, if you don’t mind me asking? It’s so crazy seeing such high taxes. Like anything higher than 15% would 100% no joke drive me to homelessness, but I’m beginning to think that might be a bigger problem in the U.S than I realized.
Good news though, at least my bike is now fixed. 
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Kansas City.
Not all of that is taxes. A good chunk is health insurance and retirement.
Even when I was working retail it seemed I would only get 67% to 75% of my full wage. Maybe I can find an old pay stub somewhere.
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This off topic thread has found a topic it seems, taxes.
Headline with qualifications of course, TLDR: Depends on what kind of payout structure is picked, how future federal tax rates will fluctuate and what other state taxes might apply.
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That’s so funny. Gov’s gotta have a piece of the pie to spend on more war and war machines, and their campaigns to keep getting elected.
And also…
COVID sucks guys. I hurt so bad. It hit me so suddenly today it’s crazy! I hope I don’t get fired for calling in when the official results come in. That’d be just my luck. 
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From a certain point of view that mean that the IRS/gov have in a way won every usa lottery in history. 
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The house always wins.
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I believe that title goes to the lottery itself. By taking the lump sum you lose half the value. Where tf did that go? I get why people take the cash out. But realistically the over time is better. You get 68million a year for 30 years. Might as well retire early.
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I would certainly not take the lump sum. lol
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It’s really easy to say I’ll take ‘x’ option. But the reality may be when presented with cash now or payments over time, the choice will be cash now since you feel you need it for something or would like to have it.
I have personally made that mistake but for a much much smaller sum. My circumstance was I could choose between $8000 ‘now’ or $6000/yr for 3 years (I think paid direct to student loans). I had about $2000 to my name at that point and just moved to a new city. I really wanted to have the money for a safety net. So, even though I knew the yearly was the correct choice, I went with the lump sum. Turns out I didn’t get it for several months anyway so I had built the safety net already.
Now in the case for the lottery, I feel like some of the decision making is related to thinking that taxes will go up in the future and they’ll have to pay so much more money, yadda yadda.
I’m not saying you’re lying. Obviously, some people will make the annual choice. I just think it can depend on the circumstances.
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3 hrs later …
Still at the clinic at the QEH. Hald hour ago the nurse said my notes are still missing, though a doctor said they would be looked for 2 weeks ago.
Tired. Hungry. Read last hald of a ghost story. Not gonna get anything else done today. Also, another clinic starts in this space in 2 hrs. Maybe I should go home right now.
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