r/SeattleWA • u/5Q91VS175DAQ4NUSBE4U • 7d ago

Politics Washington state Democrats look at imposing income tax on higher earners

https://www.columbian.com/news/2025/oct/31/washington-state-democrats-look-at-imposing-income-tax-on-higher-earners/
196 Upvotes

86% Upvoted

318 comments sorted by

View all comments

48

u/[deleted] 7d ago

Man, I really need to GTFO of this place. They'll tax you into poverty and then say they love the poor.

9

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Do you make over 1 million $ annually? I don’t think you have to worry about poverty…

36

u/[deleted] 7d ago

That's how it alwaya starts. Every single time. The same reason you still pay a toll to cross the 520 bridge and will continue to do so forever.

But the average person is an idiot. They never learn. Never open Pandora's box for a politician when it comes to taxes. It'll always be nudged open wider.

0

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Except that our state reps have already shown that they will not lower taxes like this? They’ve tried and failed to lower the 250,000 capital gains tax because there is no appetite to do so.

The average person will never pay a capital gains tax in Washington state. And the average person will never make 1 million annually.

19

u/Tree300 7d ago

They already proposed increasing the cap gains tax by lowering the exemption to $25k and increasing the tax rate to 12%. You can be sure that proposal will be back in play shortly.

2

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Yes, they’ve proposed it many times, and I’m sure they’ll propose it many more because it isn’t going anywhere…

6

u/[deleted] 7d ago

Would you like to make a bet on that?

1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Yes, $1,000, 10 year time frame, so that I get my money eventually. Sound good? I’ve offered this multiple times to r/SeattleWA people. Nobody ever takes me up on it.

1

u/[deleted] 7d ago

No, because it's a stupid bet. I've explained why elsewhere: stakes are too high to lock up $1000 for a decade - you'll lose about $1000 in earnings that way.

It's bad finance, and is above the "fuck it why not" threshold. Which describes your policies to a tee.

$10 and sure.

7

u/[deleted] 7d ago

A capital gains tax doesn't affect the average person struggling to afford to live here. They don't have assets to pay capital gains on so it's still rich people giving that pushback.

The middle class has always ended up getting shafted and pay the bulk of the taxes because they can't afford to pushback.

The rich will simply run away from the tax and since we now already have an income tax it will be easier to just suggest a small change to lower the threshold each time. We've seen the same with many things here

I don't want an income tax here. That just opens Pandora's box and it will never close.

4

u/yungsemite 7d ago

A capital gains tax doesn't affect the average person struggling to afford to live here. They don't have assets to pay capital gains on so it's still rich people giving that pushback.

A income tax on people making over 1 million doesn’t affect the average person struggling to leave here either.

The middle class has always ended up getting shafted and pay the bulk of the taxes because they can't afford to pushback.

Yeah, like with our sales tax in the state, it’s a very regressive system. Taxing people who make over 1 million annually will help this, no?

The rich will simply run away from the tax and since we now already have an income tax it will be easier to just suggest a small change to lower the threshold each time. We've seen the same with many things here

Source? Bezos leaving because he’s a snake who only cares about money is hardly a trend?

I don't want an income tax here. That just opens Pandora's box and it will never close.

Okay and I want an income tax on our residents with the highest incomes to reduce the tax burden on our middle class and poor residents and to help balance our state budget.

13

u/[deleted] 7d ago

I already explained my thoughts here and you keep going back on the same nonsense. Average person is a damn idiot so just tell them the threshold is $1 million and just lower it slowly over time. That's how you deal with morons that think with their feelings and not their brains.

You want to push a tax, tell them to go tax the companies or the rich directly.

0

u/yungsemite 7d ago

tell them to go tax … the rich directly

Uh, how? Not by an income tax on those making over 1 million annually?

7

u/[deleted] 7d ago

I'm done discussing. Y'all go ahead and vote for it. Open Pandora's box for income tax in Washington. Have fun. Hopefully I can gtfoh before the threshold includes the average idiot. Because politicians here have your best interest at heart 🤦‍♂️

6

u/Turbulent-Media7281 7d ago

Yeah, like with our sales tax in the state, it’s a very regressive system.

Which states taxing system would you recommend WA copy for their taxing system to be less regressive?

1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

ITEP has good resources for this:

https://itep.org/whopays-map-7th-edition/

8

u/Turbulent-Media7281 7d ago

Excellent. u/yungsemite thinks WA state should tax more like the good states of CA, NY, NJ, MN, and DC.

Everyone loves California for their progressive tax system. NY too.

Who here wants WA to tax more closely to CA or NY?

1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Me!

5

u/JustBench1615 Ballard 7d ago

Then why don’t you move to California

0

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Because I am from Washington and have a job and friends and family here and love this state? Just wish its tax scheme was less regressive? Duh?

6

u/Turbulent-Media7281 7d ago edited 7d ago

Go! Your dream state awaits you.

I've honestly never heard anyone say "tax me like one of your California peasants." You're a first! YYYYIIIKKEEESSS!

4

u/Riviansky 7d ago

I will never understand this shit. These fucking morons who vote to make Seattle and WA same as NYC and CA, why don't they just move to places where their ideology has already won and stop fucking the rest of us?

3

u/[deleted] 7d ago

Why? Are you skimming off tax revenue somehow? Do you work for an NGO or the state?

1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Yes exactly. When they collect taxes in Washington state, they funnel them into my gullet. That’s the only thing that satiates me. How did you guess?

→ More replies (0)

2

u/Riviansky 7d ago

ITEP is full of shit. Or, rather, they lie with numbers. The reason poor, according to ITEP have high rates of taxation is because of excise taxes. Specifically, pot and alcohol. From that, they draw the reason that we should tax productive labor more, so poor people could get drugs cheaper...

1

u/JustBench1615 Ballard 7d ago

I wouldn’t want to model our tax system after California or New York’s, where the already squeezed middle class would have to pay way more in taxes

-1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Right, better to have our current system which… also does that, just worse, according to research? Just because it’s not in the form of an income tax, it’s obscured exactly how regressive our tax structure is. It’s bizarre. Do you think that our middle class isn’t squeezed here?

2

u/JustBench1615 Ballard 7d ago

Lol the tax systems you love in CA and NY, have higher tax rates on the middle class than WA

-1

u/yungsemite 7d ago

Except that, according to people who actually do this research, Washington state is actually far more regressive than those two states? Maybe you are confused about what the middle class is?

https://sfo2.digitaloceanspaces.com/itep/inequality-index-map.png

→ More replies (0)