Corporations are currently taxed at 35% (highest in the world), less zillions of loopholes, resulting in a nontransparent lower effective tax rate that depends on the individual industry and individual business within that industry. This crony capitalism is what allowed General Electric to pay zero taxes in 2010 despite $billions in profits: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/business/economy/25tax.html?_r=1&ref=business
Note the CEO’s relationship to President Obama. We can find similar examples on the other side of the aisle.

It sure looks like small businesses (responsible for most job creation) that file taxes as individuals already pay more than their “fair share” and do not have a “fair shot” compared to corporations. And yet, taxing corporations more would drive more U.S. jobs overseas – quite the dilemma. Taxing overseas profits would amount to double-taxation as corporations already pay foreign taxes.

Note how the Tax Reform Act of 1986 changed the way many businesses pay taxes: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303816504577305302658158454.html

We will not be going back to the 90% top tax rate under President Kennedy. I do applaud the Tea Party and Republican Presidential candidate Herman Cain who I credit for changing the public discussion from one primarily of spending to taxation. Now, both Obama and Romney propose tax reform. As we move into the heart of the campaign season preceding the November 2012 election, we will hopefully see in detail what tax reform plans are offered by politicians at all levels of govt. The solutions to our problems are achievable if the public is given details in transparent fashion. The current 70,000 page tax code is opaque and filled with countless loopholes created by lobbyists influencing politicians, which makes it impossible to know the effective tax rate for different businesses. A simpler system would be more transparent, and would transform the abstract politically-rhetorical phrase “fair share” into something with practical concrete meaning.

But the best reason to use the number 42 for the percentage that rich people should have to pay for their taxes is it is the number that Douglas Adams chose in his Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy for the answer to everything. So why use any other, because in the end the actual amount is purely arbitrary, as Paul Ryan has so eloquently proven in the novels he publishes under the guise of budgets and at taxpayers’ expense I might add. So I like 42% not because it make sense but because it doesn’t and for those who are fabulously wealthy or just plain stinking rich, they should have to pay the 42 % and the Cube of the Square of 42 on top of that just for being snooty about it and not wanting to pay their fair share. Now we know what their fair share is: 42% of their gross income (non-adjusted and no other fancy stuff, either) if they are the nice rich people. Those who are haughty about it have to pay the squre root of 42 cubed as a penalty for being rude and just darn close to being unAmerican due to an unconstitutional streak of stinginess. That’s what this Democrat declares is the “fair share” percent of what the rich should pay for their taxes.

As for the rest of us, we would take all the ways 42% can be divided, 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and whatever else–as long as it’s a whole number–and each year, by lottery, we would get assigned a number that would be our percentage for the year. Using our gross amount of income, that’s what we would pay that year. The next year we’d, get a new number until we had gone through the whole set, and then start over again. That way you’d only have to pay the bigger amounts once every 6 years, using the digits from my illustration. And we could make the incentive to pay your taxes by threatening to penalize you with having to pay the square root of 42 percent cubes on your income for that year if you insisted in being a stinker over your tax percentage assignment that year.

So, then you ask, where is the line drawn to end up being one of the fortunate to have to pay 42% when everyone else below you is having to pay at most 8%? Well, let’s make it substantial, say $420.000 a year. There’s something to be said for consistency, after all. That comes to a tax of $176,400 for the year, leaving you with $243,600 for your annual income, unless you were being snotty about it and got hit with the penalty, that comes out to, well…let’s see…ummm, if I set up the Excel formula correctly, I came out with 19.44%. Adding that to the 42% comes out at 61.44% which is substantial enough most of the filthy rich will have good sense enough to keep their mouths shut to avoid the extra penalty. There will be those few, however, who just can’t leave well enough alone and moan and wail that they have to pay their fair share. They’d get no sympathy from me.

I would submit that a complete overhaul of the 70,000-page tax code that eliminates loopholes and subsidies would not only make things more “fair,” but also reduce economic inefficiencies and improve the economic structure. We have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world (as of April 1st 2012), but also a lot of loopholes that bring down that rate – we need a flat rate and minimal loopholes (i.e. get rid of lobbyists) so that there is transparency and everyone is on the same “fair” level playing field. It is unfair that General Electric made $billions in profits yet paid zero taxes last year (partially due to “green subsidies” from the Obama Administration). Note that GE’s CEO is an adviser to the President.

In Illinois, the Democrats have done the exact opposite the last few years, and we are paying the price. State income and property taxes have skyrocketed, and we’ve had to grant more financial incentives to businesses to bribe them so that they don’t flee the state. Who pays their “fair share” in IL?

Practically, that means that those who have the most financially should feel a strong sense of responsibility to ensure the Covenant remains strong. Sadly, many (not all, by any means) of the wealthy have retreated to a position of isolationism and regard the attainment and sustaining of their wealth as more important than living up to their obligation to the Nation that made their riches possible to begin with. The position of claiming that every dollar they possess is theirs and theirs alone and the rest be damned, in my way of thinking, is symptomatic of avarice, greed, and an unconscionable miserliness that weakens the country on all levels. At the same time that does not in any way excuse citizens of all socioeconomic levels to shirk their responsibility to the National Covenant under the false assumption that the very rich can save the country so those with much lower incomes don’t have to live up to their part of the deal. They (we, because I fit into this class somewhere) have no right to demand the rich pay more than their share than they do, each according to his or her resources.

As for the question of who gets to decide. The Constitution is clear that the Congress bears the burden for those decisions. We live in an age, however, when the Congress is dysfunctional to the point of paralysis They cannot be relied upon to seriously take up the question of “fair share” because that involves a serious (and non-partisan to the greatest extent possible) examination of post-2008 economic realities and both Houses are thoroughly incapable of having that discussion.

So, because of these various factors, groups of like-minded citizens get together and decide on what “fair share” means for them, and then begin to advocate (and agitate) Congress to buy their solution. That’s when they find out the real problem that has infected Congress, which has now developed into political septic shock. It’s anybody’s guess whether the patient can be saved. The short answer to your question is, don’t expect a rational, well-thought-out definition of “fair share” anytime soon.