• expr@programming.dev
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    25 days ago

    Living on $50k/year is not easy. The federal poverty line for a family of 4 is $31,200, and many consider those numbers to be much too low.

    There’s absolutely no need to target normal American households with more taxes. Billionaires already don’t pay their (too low) taxes and have far, far more than they need that they’ve taken from the labor of others. Actually taxing them appropriately would cover everything we could possibly need and then some.

    We should be raising substantially the minimum income needed before you have to pay taxes. It’s fucking stupid to be levying a bunch of tax on people who are struggling to make ends meet.

    • Nikls94@lemmy.world
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      25 days ago

      What? $50k is even in the richest European countries about as much as 2 people earn per year. €25k/year is the median, give or take 2k. Subtracted are about 5k in taxes.

      Crazy how expensive the US is…

      • expr@programming.dev
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        25 days ago

        Yeah, European salaries across the board are generally lower than the US by quite a bit, but we also typically pay for a lot more services than Europeans do as generally a lot more is privatized (healthcare, etc.). $100k is typically what most middle class Americans are striving for in order to have a relatively “comfortable” life, buy a house, etc. (though honestly, the housing market today is so fucking insane that even that isn’t really enough to buy a house in many places now). The median household income in 2023 was $80,610, for reference.

      • GHiLA@sh.itjust.works
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        25 days ago

        Everything is relative, who made the product, how long did it take to get where it is, who had to be paid to get it there, how far did it travel, how many tariffs or taxes were paid between here or there, etc, shit Americans forget entirely while voting.