this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
805 points (97.9% liked)

Lemmy Shitpost

29882 readers
4414 users here now

Welcome to Lemmy Shitpost. Here you can shitpost to your hearts content.

Anything and everything goes. Memes, Jokes, Vents and Banter. Though we still have to comply with lemmy.world instance rules. So behave!


Rules:

1. Be Respectful


Refrain from using harmful language pertaining to a protected characteristic: e.g. race, gender, sexuality, disability or religion.

Refrain from being argumentative when responding or commenting to posts/replies. Personal attacks are not welcome here.

...


2. No Illegal Content


Content that violates the law. Any post/comment found to be in breach of common law will be removed and given to the authorities if required.

That means:

-No promoting violence/threats against any individuals

-No CSA content or Revenge Porn

-No sharing private/personal information (Doxxing)

...


3. No Spam


Posting the same post, no matter the intent is against the rules.

-If you have posted content, please refrain from re-posting said content within this community.

-Do not spam posts with intent to harass, annoy, bully, advertise, scam or harm this community.

-No posting Scams/Advertisements/Phishing Links/IP Grabbers

-No Bots, Bots will be banned from the community.

...


4. No Porn/ExplicitContent


-Do not post explicit content. Lemmy.World is not the instance for NSFW content.

-Do not post Gore or Shock Content.

...


5. No Enciting Harassment,Brigading, Doxxing or Witch Hunts


-Do not Brigade other Communities

-No calls to action against other communities/users within Lemmy or outside of Lemmy.

-No Witch Hunts against users/communities.

-No content that harasses members within or outside of the community.

...


6. NSFW should be behind NSFW tags.


-Content that is NSFW should be behind NSFW tags.

-Content that might be distressing should be kept behind NSFW tags.

...

If you see content that is a breach of the rules, please flag and report the comment and a moderator will take action where they can.


Also check out:

Partnered Communities:

1.Memes

2.Lemmy Review

3.Mildly Infuriating

4.Lemmy Be Wholesome

5.No Stupid Questions

6.You Should Know

7.Comedy Heaven

8.Credible Defense

9.Ten Forward

10.LinuxMemes (Linux themed memes)


Reach out to

All communities included on the sidebar are to be made in compliance with the instance rules. Striker

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I feel that “outgroup dumb” is shitposting but it’s from a real poll.

https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/5057-understanding-how-marginal-taxes-work-its-all-part

top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] MisterFrog@lemmy.world 2 points 12 hours ago

Hmmm, I better send a suggestion letter to the ATO (Australian Taxation Office) to put the tax bracket breakdown directly into your return with the amounts populated.

Hey, they give us a breakdown graph of where our tax is going, this seems like it's within the realm of possibility.

I think sadly there are also many people here who have no idea how tax brackets work...

[–] bitjunkie@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

These people are allowed to vote, and that is why we are all fucked.

[–] angband@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

this was pushed in the 80's/90's on conservative talk radio (iirc). strangely, it gets an ideological push from the phenomenon of income reduction resulting from lost welfare benefits as income increases. the brain correlates things irrationally.

[–] MordercaSkurwysyn@lemm.ee 27 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Where i live we have a system where if you take sick days, they are paid 80%. 20% reduction applies only to the days you were sick. Once I got sick at the end of a month and took the last 3 days of the month and first 2 days of the next one off and my mother in law freaked out I'm about to loose 20% of 2 month's salaries. She was and is still convinced that 20% deduction applies to a whole month worth of salary even if you take one day off that month. She almost never takes sick days and she works in a hospital... She self medicates and works with patients even when she has a transmittable diseases. Best of luck to those who have serious health problems and then get a fucking flu on top of everything from hospital staff. She is 60+ and reading the law to her doesn't change her mind. A couple years ago she had more serious health problems and took a week off for the first time in decades, even after getting a paycheck reduced only by 5% and not 20% her perception of this issue didn't change. She misunderstood that system once 40 years ago and she is going to take that misunderstanding to ger grave. Real world has no influence on her beliefs.

[–] fishy@lemmy.today 12 points 1 day ago

That's the general conservative mindset. It's why lies work so well on them, get them to believe the lie and they'll never let it go.

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 30 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is absolutely an educational failing. We barely cover taxes in school. At best it's said once in a class, gets covered in a minor question on a test and if we get it wrong, no one notices. "We" probably still got a B on the test without any CLUE how taxes work.

Yet here we are, dismantling any nationwide effort to make education better.

A LOT of people think 99,999 tax is 27,999 and 100,001 is 29,000, even on the democrat side. If those charts are accurate, it's probably damn close to 50% of US citizens.

[–] Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 day ago (3 children)

I seriously don't understand why we don't have a mandatory class that covers taxes, T4 slips, investing, labour laws, budgeting, reading nutritional information on foods, etc.

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

The nutritional stuff is like 6th-grade science, about the time you should be burning peanuts with a Bunsen burner.

I've seen a few schools that have an elective financials class, but I think they're still trying to balance checkbooks.

The problem is it's just one class, and nobody takes classes seriously in high school. Most of them have forgotten the things that they used to know when they were 20, 30, or even 40 years past their education.

It's like we need some kind of driver's ed test but for living

edit: 6th grade, no fire in elementary school

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I have never been invited to burn peanuts with a bunsen burner. Showing the relationship between chemical energy and thermal energy and the sometimes surprising differences between foods?

I think we had too much separation between diet classes and physical science. I think I recall doing something like a puzzle, with physical pieces, where you tried to make a days food using different foods. The point was that it's easier and you get more if you pick the healthier foods. Instead everyone knew what the point was and then fucked around making the dumbest possible meal that fit the defined criteria.
I seem to recall the teacher not being amused with my solution that only has one food group per meal. (What's for breakfast? 9 eggs. Lunch? 3 unseasoned grilled chicken breasts. Dinner? Six baked potatos, plain)

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 hour ago

Yeah, there's a lot of lessons in school that we're not actually ready for. We need some kind of continuing education stuff like they do in the medical profession. When we hit our 30's and 40's and our bodies handle food differently, we need those diet courses again. And when we move out of home, we need those finance and home economics classes that haven't been looked at for a decade.

[–] SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Ah, sorry I slipped in some canadian

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

It was all covered in my Florida education. For the most part it is just a very small amount of information that people tend to forget it. It also isn't all taught in one class. (T4 slips are called W2 forms in the U.S. for those questioning). The investing thing is a broad generalization though. I assume because it may get considered an overlap of teaching kids to gamble. Everyone was required to take either micro or macro economics in high school though for us, both of which touched on stock market invement mostly just tied to the idea of a 401k (retirement accounts).

Nutritional labels were covered in science classes multiple times, but we're touched on in middle school science, and we were all required to take a home ec class for half a year in 7th grade which taught about it as well. Again in physics and chemistry classes.

W2s were covered in our mandatory typing class as a form of data entry, because most people only take the data from boxes off the W2 and enter them into a tax program. Then the tax brackets were taught to us in middle and highschool.

A lot of it to me is that we don't pay attention in school and forget a lot over time. Nutritional and Tax bracket questions were on both the ACT and SAT. Which are national tests required to get into colleges.

[–] Carrot@lemmy.today 54 points 2 days ago

This belief is held by many older folks due to propoganda, and it is passed down to their children when their parents teach them about taxes. Since almost all younger folks use automated tax services, if they aren't doing the math themselves, the fact that this isn't true isn't going to be discovered. I was taught the incorrect way when I was a kid, but noticed that it was wrong the first time I had to do my own taxes. But when I told my parents the way it actually worked, they didn't believe me until I showed them the .gov site that breaks it down. I grew up in a small, blue collar town, and every single person I talked to about taxes parroted the same incorrect system.

[–] w3dd1e@lemm.ee 76 points 2 days ago (30 children)

This is the problem. My partner doesn’t want to work OT because he thinks it will cost him more in taxes. I explain why that’s not exactly true, but I can tell he’s not interested. Financial Literacy in the US is abysmal.

[–] SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

it's just not the US. I live in the Netherland and many people here think OT and bonuses are taxed differently, because they see a higher tax rate applied to it on their slip. They forget that their base salary covers multiple brackets and a tax credit. Thus has a lower average tax rate than their OT and bonuses which falls in their top bracket or even a bracket above.

[–] Mossheart@lemmy.ca 7 points 1 day ago

Tbh, literacy in the US, financial or otherwise is abysmal right now.

[–] GaMEChld@lemmy.world 22 points 2 days ago (14 children)

Your partner is a moron who doesn't understand relatively simple math.

load more comments (14 replies)
[–] sloppychops@lemmy.ca 13 points 2 days ago (3 children)

This is not a US specific issue, tbh. I've heard this weird belief repeated by all sorts of people.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments (26 replies)
[–] Ronno@feddit.nl 8 points 1 day ago

I'm just in awe about those 28% and 33% tax brackets. I'm in the 49,5% bracket here in The Netherlands. That being said, I'm fortunate to be in it.

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 67 points 2 days ago (3 children)

It boggles my mind how many people who have had to pay taxes for decades even, don't understand how tax brackets work.

The only time you'll get screwed on making more is if you were getting some sort of socialized assistance and you make a dollar over the cut off for aid.

[–] kkj@lemmy.dbzer0.com 19 points 2 days ago

Yeah, the Welfare Cliff is the only place where this happens and it's unconscionable.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] BedSharkPal@lemmy.ca 12 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] SkyezOpen@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Don't need one. The amount of times I've had to explain how fucking tax brackets work, I wouldn't be surprised if the numbers were even more skewed towards the wrong answer.

[–] BedSharkPal@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (3 children)

This is how missinformation spreads though. If something lines up with your existing worldview then you just assume it's true.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] joel_feila@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

And this why democracy won't work. How can people votw in their best interests when they don't know how basic taxes work

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] Kuranashi@lemmy.world 170 points 2 days ago (4 children)

If you ever wanted proof that a population that doesn't understand math allows the billionaires to take advantage of them here it is. This is why education systems are under attack, because if you understood how taxes work you'd more likely support higher tax rates for the rich.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works 16 points 2 days ago (1 children)

How dumb do you have to be? By the time you make that much money you should, in theory, know the answer definitively or have a guy.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 150 points 2 days ago (7 children)

To be clear for those unaware, you pay the lower bracket rates for the amounts earned in that bracket and the higher bracket rates for the amounts earned above that bracket.

https://www.irs.gov/filing/federal-income-tax-rates-and-brackets

load more comments (7 replies)
[–] ragebutt@lemmy.dbzer0.com 67 points 2 days ago (20 children)

I used to be a supervisor at a psych hospital and had to regularly explain this to staff who were refusing overtime. They wanted to do it, sometimes desperately so because they needed the money, but they were utterly convinced that once they crossed 40 or 45k or whatever they would be taxed higher and make it all pointless. I felt like some just didn’t want to do ot, which was fine, but some legit keep meticulous records of their earnings to ensure they wouldn’t go over the line. I swore to them it didn’t work this way but they never believed me

load more comments (20 replies)
[–] TheDoozer@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (2 children)

When you are talking large income to larger income, that makes total sense, but are there limits for access to things like child tax credits where if you go over you are no longer eligible, causing significant increase (I just looked, and it's at $200k single of $400k jointly, so unless you have A LOT of children, I suppose there wouldn't be a huge effect)? Similar to people on government assistance who go from getting full assistance to getting nothing at a certain income level?

[–] ricecake@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

The big one there is food and housing subsidies. The way way we have it set-up can create a situation where a raise can cost you benefits that are worth more than the raise. With disability benefits there can actually be limits on the amount of money you're allowed to have in general, which means that disabled people can find themselves in places where not only do they need to avoid trying to find work that they might be able to do, since trying and failing can still make them need to restart the benefits application process or even pay back historical benefits, but they also need to reject gifts above a certain value and can't prepare for any type of emergency, like a car breakdown.

It's annoying because it creates a disincentive to do the things that would help people on assistance actually get off of it, when the people who push for those limits purport to want them for exactly that reason.
Tapering off benefits as income grows, but at a slower rate than the income growth creates a continuous incentive for a person on benefits to increase their earned income. (If you lose $500 in benefits for every $1000 in income, your $1000 raise still puts $500 extra in your pocket, instead of potentially costing you your entire $8000 food subsidy)

Can't do that though, because it doesn't punish people for the audacity of needing help.

[–] Apytele@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is a big factor. A lot of people conflate less benefits with higher taxes because fear-brain just knows they both equal increased hardship in the end. They're technically wrong but their statistically slightly more active amygdalas are responding to a genuine threat, just one that they've been very skillfully misdirected into helping worsen.

[–] interdimensionalmeme@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 day ago (1 children)

So an indoctrinated fear response that create a policy advantage for the very elites who created it.

Wow humans are so nice

[–] Apytele@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

tbh the more I learn and experience that's most of the human experience. I had a Minister when I was young that said there's really only two human emotions, fear and love, and that without significant intervention fear pretty much always wins. I've been working in psychiatry for almost a decade now and there's lots of finer points to be made about human psychology but in the end it pretty much all does just boil down to fear and love.

He was an exceptionally good Minister, to the extent that for while I didn't understand how common it was for people to be deeply betrayed by a church leader. It was not uncommon for people in the community to genuinely compare him to Fred Rogers (who was incidentally also a Presbyterian minister). Very similar background, temperament, points of advocacy, and even appearance and mannerism; if they hadn't both been alive at the same time it almost might make me believe in reincarnation.

[–] burgerpocalyse@lemmy.world 57 points 2 days ago (11 children)

try telling this to people who think government agencies pay taxes

load more comments (11 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›