>Schatsky said that the incentive to get under $250,000 may be more so if the tax plan outlines that an individual who goes over a prescribed limit would face a reduced value of their itemized deductions.
>"If the value of all your itemized deductions goes from a 33 percent level to a 28 percent level than there would be a reason for people to do dramatic things to reduce their incomes," said Schatsky.
This is coming from "Gary Schatsky, a financial adviser and the president of N.Y.-based Objectiveadvice.com". As such, he presumably has a clue about taxation matters, so I hesitate to call him out on this, but... surely no government would ever enact such a scheme; they would bracket the deductions in a similar way to the income, rather than having a magic barrier of $250k, in order to avoid a situation where people have an incentive to earn less. To me this seems common sense, but at the same time, I'm not a financial adviser -- does anyone have any input on this?
Agreed; much of the appeal of TV seems to be that it removes all need to make any decisions. I have two younger sisters in their mid teens, and although they both have facebook and MSN etc, I'd say that for every hour they spend on the internet, they'll spend 3 hours watching TV.
For the most part, though, it won't be anything specific -- they'll just sit there and watch literally whatever's on, including even the really awful daytime game shows and the like. They're not very bright, but neither are they especially stupid -- they're both at grammar schools (~top 20%). Neither are they poor, friendless or isolated -- they just enjoy the utter mindlessness of watching whatever is put in front of them. To have to choose what to watch would ruin the experience.
>Schatsky said that the incentive to get under $250,000 may be more so if the tax plan outlines that an individual who goes over a prescribed limit would face a reduced value of their itemized deductions.
>"If the value of all your itemized deductions goes from a 33 percent level to a 28 percent level than there would be a reason for people to do dramatic things to reduce their incomes," said Schatsky.
This is coming from "Gary Schatsky, a financial adviser and the president of N.Y.-based Objectiveadvice.com". As such, he presumably has a clue about taxation matters, so I hesitate to call him out on this, but... surely no government would ever enact such a scheme; they would bracket the deductions in a similar way to the income, rather than having a magic barrier of $250k, in order to avoid a situation where people have an incentive to earn less. To me this seems common sense, but at the same time, I'm not a financial adviser -- does anyone have any input on this?