Why the GOP are LYING When They Say Increased Taxation Hurting Small Business's Ability to Hire More People

Let's do a little math. What actually happens to the bottom line if you increase a business's taxation rates - once you take into account employee costs.
Sure, you might not have as much money in the bank - as a business owner - at the end of the day, but that money in the bank is AFTER you've paid for your employees, period.
Here's how it works. Let's define a few terms first.
Revenue - Employee Salaries, Operating Costs, Depreciation, Etc = Gross Profit
Income Tax = Gross Profit * Tax-Rate
Net Profit = Gross Profit - Income Tax
Note that the Tax part happens after the Gross Profit calculation is made.
Say I have a $500,000 a year business. I have 5 employees. They each make $40,000 a year. With employer contributions to SocSec & Federal Income Tax, they cost me (not including health insurance, unemployment insurance, etc) $43,000 a year.
Total cost: $215,000.
Now, not including rent on the building, etc. That means that if I bring in $500,000 a year, my
Gross Profit is 500000-215000 = $285000.
Tax on this - let's say it's 18% (not necessarily accurate but there you go)... $51,300.
Net Profit: $233700.
Now, let's hire another employee. This takes my costs from $215,000 to $258,000. Assuming that we have a bad year, and don't make more income, I get:
500,000-258000 = $242000 in profit.
Tax on this at 18% is $43,560. Hey waitaminute! I paid less in taxes for hiring an extra employee... how is that possible?
OK, so what's my gross? $198,440.
How much less than last year is this? $35,260.
Wait a minute... This is insane.
That employee cost me $43,000 this year. But I didn't make any more money, and they only cost me $35,260 from my take home pay?
Yes! Because they are a loss, I get an 18% discount on the cost of them. The government actually subsidizes them as a cost to me. It's a zero sum game.
If I pay 36% income tax, and I'm getting income from my business, I get each employee at a 36% discount.
I don't believe the small business arguments to be honest. If you're small enough that you're making a huge loss, you won't be taxed on it anyway. And in some cases, you can carry that loss year-on-year.
Now, if you feel like arguing whether businesses should be allowed to rollover money into expansion instead of paying taxes as the revenue comes in, I would totally love to see that happen - but only for small business. Large businesses already take advantages of other, larger breaks.
Point being, that the GOP claiming that increasing taxes on people earning > $250,000 will stop them from employing people is a canard. It doesn't stop them from earning a profit. The slope of the line is still positive; it's just not going up as steeply. If the line goes negative, they already lay people off anyway - but changing tax rates is NOT going to help that slope. In businesses in dire straits, it may even help with writeoffs. Remember: we're not talking operating capital here - just profit. Pure profit.
Some proof:
Using a friend's figures (a business with employees who cost $50,000, making a net profit of $50,000 a year), I added a tax rate (total, not marginal) of 18%.

Base Scenario
Gross Revenue $360,976
Employees 6
Employee salary $50,000
Total employee cost $300,000
Gross Margin $60,976
Tax 18% $10,975.68
Net Profit $50,000.32
... and here's what happens if they hire one more person:
Hire One more Person, Everything Else (including Revenue) Static:
Gross Revenue $360,976
Employees 7
Employee salary $50,000
Total employee cost $350,000
Gross Margin $10,976
Tax 18% $1,975.68
Net Profit $9,000.32
... OK, so let's see what happens if we nearly DOUBLE their effective taxation. Note: This scenario never happens in real life; marginal tax brackets don't work that way. Even at 1950's rates, until you're earning in the trillions, your effective total taxation never hits more than about 36% - even if you're well in that 90% bracket.
I chose 34% because that's what my friend had in his scenario; that's what I needed to up the tax rate to for the net profit to drop from $50,000 to $40,000, so that he'd be short by $10,000 and wouldn't be able to hire an extra employee.

Increased Taxation - to 34%
Gross Revenue $360,976
Employees 6
Employee salary $50,000
Total employee cost $300,000
Gross Margin $60,976
Tax 34% $20,731.84
Net Profit $40,244.16
Now, let's see what happens when I up the employee count, and hire one more guy at the same salary.
Hire One More Person We Allegedly Can't Afford
Gross Revenue $360,976
Employees 7
Employee salary $50,000
Total employee cost $350,000
Gross Margin $10,976
Tax 34% $3,731.84
Net Profit +$7,244.16
Hey. Wow. I shoudn't have been able to afford that person. It should have put me in the red. But apparently not. Isn't that odd?
OK, let's say we hire even more people, and run at a loss. Hire 8 people? You're in a worse position in terms of losses in the 18% bracket than the 34% one.
By the way, it's probably no coincidence that it's a lot less palatable to claim "but I'll be personally making less money" than to say "but I won't be able to hire people - look at all those unemployed people you'll be hurting". It sounds like altruism, but it's really not.
In short, the GOP are lying to you.
Boehner: Lying through his teeth on the cost to business of taxation.
It is true, however, that employee salaries are the biggest revenue sink in any company. My recommendation if you can do more with less is to lay off your staff and work the rest to death. The savings will dwarf any changes in taxation to your bottom line - until the remaining people quit. Some might say, in fact, that this is how businesses have run things in this country for years now... Perhaps that's why wages have stagnated? Solely to maximize investor return?

Now, don't get me wrong, businesses need capital. But small businesses typically aren't funded by huge investments from wealthy investors, or venture capital firms. They're funded by the friends and families of the people who start it. They're funded by angel investors - who when they hit it big, hit REALLY big (but that happens a tiny percentage of the time - the rest, the company folds, and the investors take a loss on their tax return).
By the point where the company is turning a profit, we're in the land of great problems to have. Higher taxes? Not a problem. It's a problem I'd love to have.
Simon Cooke has built budgets and developed project staffing and hiring plans as business development manager and technical director for small businesses in the video game industry in a professional capacity, on projects ranging from $300,000 to $14,000,000. Today, he works as a tech ninja for a large business, until the economy recovers enough to start his own entertainment company.
(more...)
#business, #GOP, #taxes, #small business, #hiring, #employment, #unemployment, #uncertainty
This entry was posted under Politics. Bookmark the permalink.

Colorizing images for Windows Phone 7

I know what you're thinking... I have these great icons, and I want to display them in the system color. I need to use a PixelShader. Or some other kind of ShaderEffect.
Well, sure, you could do it that way... but that's overkill. Instead, allow me to introduce you to the OpacityMask.
Here's the idea: you paint a rectangle the size of the icon you want to render. Fill it in the color you want to paint with. And set the OpacityMask of the icon to the image you want to use as the outline.
For example:





And hey presto! One neatly colored image, for very minimal fuss. Doesn't work for tinting, but certainly works for rendering icons in the right color for the UI.
(more...)

Jesus and Schrodinger

This was on Digg today:
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/08/conservapedia_founder_takes_on_the_notorious_liber.php

My response?...

John 4:46:And lo he sat by Schrodinger's bedside.
"Schrodinger... that's a good Jewish name.", he said and laid his hands upon the box by his bedside.

John 4:47:"Why is thine box ticking?", the Lord said.
"That, Messiah, is a Geiger Counter," he said, and wept.

John 4:48:"Why do you weep, for I am the son of God, risen again and here to save you?"
"Well it's just that I put some poison in there too. And Fluffy."
And Jesus wept, for Fluffy was Schrodinger's cat. A calico.

John 4:49: "Well this is quite a quandary", said the Lord. "For this cat is both alive and not alive, dead and not dead. In fact he is far from the light of my Father."

John 4:50:Schrodinger thought about this. "You mean..."
Jesus stalled him. "Yes. Spooky action at a distance. There are unknown variables here."
"But I thought your father was omniscient?", said Schrodinger.
"He is. But the problem is this." He kicked the box, and it shimmered in gold and red, like a desert mirage."... the wavefunctions have not yet been resolved. They need to collapse. The only way we can do that is by opening the box."

Jesus gently pulled his foot out of the sandal, which was now melted half into the box.

John 4:51"Oh Lord, what shall we do? Fluffy must be getting hungry in there, and the Gods..."
Jesus glowered at him.
"I said you were Jewish. Monotheistic. Are you some kind of Egyptian plant? Do you report to Herod?"
Schrodinger looked down, admonished by the Son and the Word. He mumbled back... "... Trinary ...", but the word was lost on the wind.

John 4:52 "We shall open the box on the third day. That way we will know if Fluffy is alive or is dead."
"Or if Fluffy will scratch us to pieces."
"We shall not shake the box; Fluffy will be fine. Besides, quantum entangled systems such as these exhibit a decoherence of mass in the local system which means that gravitational forces and moment are smeared throughout the whole of the probability point cloud for the dynamics of the system."
Schrodinger: "But what if Fluffy is dead."
Jesus scratched his chin.
"No worries. There was once this guy in Bethany, and he was out for four days when I brought him back. Mind you, he was quite annoyed. Nightmares for weeks."
"It is agreed."
"I should hope so. I don't just go around the Middle East resurrecting random pets, you know. This is a special favor."

John 4:53 And so, the Lord waited three days, and with great intrepidation, opened the box.But inside the box there was nothing.
"Deja vu", Jesus said.
"You already looked?". Schrodinger was crestfallen.
"No", said Jesus. "I don't mean it literally."
And the two of them looked in awe.

John 4:54 The Lord left Schrodinger, and walked to the mountain. He sat on the mountain, and became lost in thought.
"I wish I knew where that bloody cat had disappeared to", he said. "Its wavefunction should have been constrained; that's a square well in 3-dimensions; even an undergraduate knows the calculus for that one."
The bush next to him chuckled.
"Dad, knock it off."

(more...)
#religion, #physics, #what's in the box what's in the box?, #se7en
This entry was posted under Humor. Bookmark the permalink.

The blog moves.. pt. 2

Well goddamn it... my GoDaddy setup is all screwed up. (That's what I get for hosting multiple domains on one IIS account, apparently).

More news as I try to fix this damned thing.

(more...)
#accidental scientist
This entry was posted under Meta. Bookmark the permalink.

The Blog Moves…

… but the address remains the same.

Hang onto your hats… I’m going to shift the blog away from using Blogger FTP Publishing to Wordpress. It may get a little bumpy here while things shake out. Links may break. That kind of thing.

Please hold tight :)

(more...)
#accidental scientist
This entry was posted under Meta. Bookmark the permalink.

subscribe via RSS