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STR posted:
Mechanical meters tend to run slower as they age, if anything, from buildup of friction on internal parts. When we swapped to solid state digital there were a ton of billing "complaints". I put that in quotations because the majority were just people scapegoating and not understanding the correlation between the ambient outdoor temp and their individual energy usage. Check your hot water heater thermostat setting if possible. Another problem I've run into with apartment complexes is that the meter bases were mislabeled by the electricians who wired the building, so the meters are switched. It usually gets found at some point (account gets shut off for non-pay and the neighbor calls in with no power) but in some cases has gone on for 10+ years. That being said, occupied apartments in the same building tend to have very similar usage so for billing purposes even a found meter switch doesn't end up being a big deal (so far). Anyhow, shut off your main and make sure the meter labeled as yours stops spinning?
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Sep 1, 2018 14:22
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Fermented Tinal posted:I literally live in fear of the reprisals for me standing up for myself wrt my parents because they absolutely have the ability to make life impossibly hard for me since they're my only real support base. Most of this is motivated by my alcoholic mother who thinks I can't take care of myself. I gave up trying to stand up for myself because it only makes things worse for me. Any forward progress I make is just taken away from me. Your parents sound just terrible enough to be friends of mine.
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Sep 1, 2018 15:01
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STR posted:So you guys remember me bitching (sorta) about my weird as gently caress electric plan? Where if I used <1000 kWh, my rate more than doubled? And if I went over 1500, it really went fucknuts? Couple ways to look at this. Is your hot water electric? What are their consumptions? AC and electric hot water are power monsters, even new ones. Certainly better than older stuff but they're not exactly low draw in any universe. Side note, pet peeve of mine when we were house shopping and how many new build spec houses were electric hot water. When I asked the builders why they'd use that instead of gas the reply was "cheaper"  - yeah, for who and how long? Certainly not cheaper for the home owner. Something else you can consider tryng is kill all the power in your apartment for say, an hour or two. Your fridge will be fine as long as you aren't opening it. See if your power meter moves at all. If so, you've got a problem with consumption on your meter that isn't yours.
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Sep 1, 2018 15:01
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- thanks to the loving water heater sitting on in an uninsulated closet on my patio). Built in 1983. FWIW, I was using >2500 kWh/mo before they replaced the HVAC, but they'd also eventually jammed a 50 amp breaker in for an AC rated for a 20 amp breaker (which tripped the main breaker)... loving amazing that building hasn't burned down yet. 2 other buildings at that property have burned down in the past few years, though.
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I just want to make sure I fully understand - you have a job and your own place, right? When you say “support” what you mean is “folks I can talk to about problems and who will come feed my cats if I need them to,” right? Assuming this is the case, 1. Definitely keep going to therapy. 2. Set boundaries. Your parents are being jerks and it’s ruining your life and you are letting them. It’s incredibly difficult for folks to stop letting their parents do this, but you can do it. Talk to your therapist about next steps and what appropriate interactions with parents look like. Here’s an example of what will probably happen. You say “oh man, I got a speeding ticket” and your mom starts yelling at you. Then you say “mom, I’m an adult. It’s not ok for you to yell at me anymore.” Then she keeps yelling at you because she’s a jerk who’s used to getting her way. You then get up and walk out. She yells while you walk out. Dad yells while you walk out. You still walk out. Don’t let people treat you like poo poo. Those people being your parents only makes it worse, not better. Eventually, you will both have to decide whether being in each other’s lives is worth the cost - my guess, based on your brother, is that they’ll come around a little but not all the way and you will have a more distant relationship with your parents if you stick up for yourself. A distant relationship is much better than them loving your life over six ways to Sunday. Making friends as an adult is difficult. Try this: find a hobby, like rock climbing (indoor climbing gym) or motorcycling. Folks in those hobbies are very friendly and like to do their hobby with other people. I recommend riding because it’s awesome and not dangerous and I’m sure your parents will be fine with it (j/k, it’s none of their business as you’re an adult who gets to make their own decisions about their life). Come post in CA to learn about it and join some local riding groups and you’ll soon have a regular group of folks to ride and hang out with. tetrapyloctomy posted:Starting the month with holiday shifts ... DAY shifts. 7a-5p today anynd the next two days. Sitting at a Dunkin' Donuts. Why? Their donuts haven't arrived yet. The manager is actually driving to a nearby store to get them for me, having offered to drop them off at the ED if I have to get to work first. I don't think any DD in the country has ever offered this level of service. Spoiler: it’s just a front for a methamphetamine empire.
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Sep 1, 2018 15:01
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slidebite posted:Couple ways to look at this. Is your hot water electric? What are their consumptions? AC and electric hot water are power monsters, even new ones. Certainly better than older stuff but they're not exactly low draw in any universe. Side note, pet peeve of mine when we were house shopping and how many new build spec houses were electric hot water. When I asked the builders why they'd use that instead of gas the reply was "cheaper" Check your fridge temp. Mine got set too low after the maintenance guy messed with it, and it almost doubled my power usage for a couple months while I figured out what the gently caress was causing it.
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Sep 1, 2018 16:14
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Rhyno posted:We realized tonight that we're going up a tax bracket. I suddenly have opinions on adult things. uhh...that's not how tax brackets work...only the earnings you make over that threshold to the next bracket are taxed at that higher rate
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Sep 1, 2018 16:19
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BraveUlysses posted:uhh...that's not how tax brackets work...only the earnings you make over that threshold to the next bracket are taxed at that higher rate Progressive taxation is one of those things that everyone needs to be taught and noone is.
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Sep 1, 2018 16:28
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InitialDave posted:Should I buy a Panasonic TZ200 (I think it's called the ZS200 in the US) as a do-everything/holiday camera? builds character posted:Don’t let people treat you like poo poo. But it sounds like this may not be a fantastic approach. What you should probably do, though, is hit up your brother for a chat, maybe go see him and have a beer or something. Sounds liek he got himself out from under their nonsense, and I'd hope he'll support you doing the same.
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Sep 1, 2018 16:30
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Rhyno posted:Your parents sound just terrible enough to be friends of mine. Except they have no real friends or social lives because while they can get along with people for a short period of time, they read too heavily into everything and something like a small misunderstanding will turn into a major slight against them. Larrymer posted:This got heavy. Therapy sounds like the right call and putting some distance from them might not hurt either. Sounds quite toxic of a relationship. I really need to move closer to my job and resume therapy, those are basically my two current life goals. My last one helped me a lot and I wish I could've afforded both the time and money to keep going. As for distance, they're moving away, but taking a long time doing it. builds character posted:I just want to make sure I fully understand - you have a job and your own place, right? When you say "support" what you mean is "folks I can talk to about problems and who will come feed my cats if I need them to," right? I have my own job and my own place but they basically act like they own my place. I am sooooo looking forward to them starting the snowbird thing so that for 6 months of the year I don't have them going through my house and then complaining about how disorganized my office is. As for support, right now they're coming by once a day to walk my dogs around midday while I'm at work because I have two border collies and don't want them spending the entire 12 hours I'm away 5 days a week in their kennel. Also dad is helping me with the cruiser, and by helping me I mean 10 years from now when I'll be bitching in here about random things about the cruiser that annoy me it'll be whatever corner cutting he's decided is the way to go. Now time for me to get ready to spend an entire weekend with them and my brother. 
Fermented Tinal fucked around with this message at 16:53 on Sep 1, 2018 |
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Sep 1, 2018 16:41
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I've gone from making GBS threads up wagoneers and fieros, to being a professional tractor fucker and i've never ignored any of you.
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Sep 1, 2018 16:42
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BraveUlysses posted:uhh...that's not how tax brackets work...only the earnings you make over that threshold to the next bracket are taxed at that higher rate But that's why you have people like accountants to help optimise tax avoidance etc.
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Sep 1, 2018 16:52
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Fermented Tinal posted:I have my own job and my own place but they basically act like they own my place. I am sooooo looking forward to them starting the snowbird thing so that for 6 months of the year I don't have them going through my house and then complaining about how disorganized my office is. As for support, right now they're coming by once a day to walk my dogs around midday while I'm at work because I have two border collies and don't want them spending the entire 12 hours I'm away 5 days a week in their kennel. Also dad is helping me with the cruiser, and by helping me I mean 10 years from now when I'll be bitching in here about random things about the cruiser that annoy me it'll be whatever corner cutting he's decided is the way to go. Can you not fence the back yard where your 20' poles live and just let them run free in it during the day? That's how everyone out here does dogs.
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Sep 1, 2018 17:17
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InitialDave posted:It depends, you can end up with a compound effect that isn't directly from the additional tax bracket itself, but you lose benefits etc that you are no longer entitled to and end up not seeing as much benefit as you'd expect. ok sure but this is rhyno we're talking about
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Sep 1, 2018 17:36
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Darchangel posted:I hate *having* to work on a car, especially with a deadline. I like working on projects that I *want* to do. This is pretty much what I answer when people ask me why I didn't become a mechanic. It would make me hate cars. See: the cobbler's shoes, the mechanic's car, my home computer setup (I'm a PC toucher,) etc. Somewhat Heroic posted:I also occasionally wonder if I should have plunked down all the money I spent on the M3 in a more responsible way like paying down the mortgage more or investing it all. Fermented Tinal posted:Not an automotive confession, but I turn 32 a week from tomorrow and it will have been over 12 years since I was last in a serious relationship. Took the Locost to Cars & Coffee this morning. There was no traffic on the way there so I may have did a couple extra loops on the round-about. Tons of questions, lots of pictures and I'm fairly sure every kid in attendance got their picture taken in it.
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Sep 1, 2018 17:36
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STR posted:So you guys remember me bitching (sorta) about my weird as gently caress electric plan? Where if I used <1000 kWh, my rate more than doubled? And if I went over 1500, it really went fucknuts? I haven't used more than 820kWh this year, it is hot as gently caress here (and was especially hot as gently caress this summer with almost a month straight of 100+ days), my AC is old as gently caress (but it is central), and my building is from the 1930s and hasn't even heard of insulation. Also, top floor, ~1000sq ft, my downstairs neighbor refuses to use AC (but also probably doesn't need to because I probably cool her entire unit), and I face the west (and am half the 2nd floor, so both north and south). And I love the cold. So I'd say you got something else.
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Sep 1, 2018 17:53
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BraveUlysses posted:uhh...that's not how tax brackets work...only the earnings you make over that threshold to the next bracket are taxed at that higher rate That's not how it was explained to me. Our household income has literally doubled over 18 months.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:32
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Only the amount earned above the bracket is taxed higher. It's not retroactive. You ALWAYS earn more money.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:38
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Rhyno posted:That's not how it was explained to me. Our household income has literally doubled over 18 months. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/taxbracket.asp
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Sep 1, 2018 18:38
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Metal Geir Skogul posted:Only the amount earned above the bracket is taxed higher. It's not retroactive. You ALWAYS earn more money. I know it's not retroactive, just that our household income has now grown to a point that our taxes are going to be higher. Also considering that the IRS continues to fight to keep increasing my settlement I wouldn't be surprised if they do try to gently caress me over come tax time.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:40
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Rhyno posted:That's not how it was explained to me. Our household income has literally doubled over 18 months. Doesn't matter how it was explained to you, that's how it works irl. If out of 100,000 there are two tax brackets, one from 0-50k and the other from 50-100k and you make 75k, you are taxed at the 0-50 level for the first 50k and at the 50-100 level for the next 25k. Earning more is always better full-stop.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:41
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Rhyno posted:I know it's not retroactive, just that our household income has now grown to a point that our taxes are going to be higher. hey if you doubled your income just pay it all off at once and be done with it and yes of course if you earn more you pay more that's literally the backbone of how it works, until you're in the 1% territory when you can afford to do tax avoidance
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Sep 1, 2018 18:47
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I have paid it off. They keep coming back for more despite a court settlement. Going on 4 years now.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:50
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Rhyno posted:That's not how it was explained to me. Our household income has literally doubled over 18 months. A large amount of the reason the GOP wants any tax amount on the lower class is so people feel they have skin in the game, even if it's just a few bucks. You could tax the bottom 90% at 10% and not meet what Gates or Bezos or etc pay by themselves. You're never going to get meaningful income tax payments from people who don't make poo poo in the first place. ilkhan fucked around with this message at 18:54 on Sep 1, 2018 |
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Sep 1, 2018 18:50
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So the tax bracket is not the tax rate we pay? Because this link is what I was sent https://www.bankrate.com/finance/taxes/tax-brackets.aspx And I was just going by what that grid lays out. The percentage on the left corresponding to the income on the right.
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Sep 1, 2018 18:55
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Rhyno posted:So the tax bracket is not the tax rate we pay? Because this link is what I was sent you only pay that percentage on that block of income. So to simplify it - if you are now earning $40,000, you pay 10% on the first $9,325, 15% on the next $28,624 ($9,326 to $37,950 section) 25% on the next $2,049 ($37,951 to $40,000) so don't worry about your pay rise too much
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Sep 1, 2018 19:03
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Tomarse posted:you only pay that percentage on that block of income. Okay now THAT makes sense, thank you. I honestly didn't realize it was incremental like that and I have my taxes prepared so I just look at the form, see if I owe and sign off these days.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:08
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Rhyno posted:So the tax bracket is not the tax rate we pay? Because this link is what I was sent So you pay your tax rate on the money in each pool. If you make $100k, you pay: 10% on the first 9ishk. This means like $900 15% on the next 20 odd thousand. So $3k 25% on the next 50 off thousand So $12.5k 28% on the next like 10k. So $2.8k This is $19.2k in taxes. You pay an effective rate of 19.2%, not 28%. You will never be in a situation where you end up taking less money home because you hit a new tax bracket. edit: goddammit.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:08
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nm posted:
I wasn't under this assumption, I just assumed my overall taxes were going to go up since we're both making twice what we used to.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:09
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Well your taxes will go up if you get a raise, but only by the amount of tax on your raise. Counterpoint: If you are just over into a new tax bracket, consider lowering your taxable income by donations to a cause you care about or (and this is a guess because I am not  ) putting extra into your retirement plan if that can do the same thing.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:15
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Also, always make sure you are putting enough money in your 401k to maximize the match from your employer
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Sep 1, 2018 19:19
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Yes, you will pay more tax, that's not the issue. The reason it's an arse is that you see increasingly less net income from your pay rises, so you can see a 50% increase in gross income but only a 40% (or whatever) increase in net, which pisses you off a bit. But that's how it works. This is where accountants and financial advisors are useful to help you with things like optimal pension funding etc to minimise tax liability.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:21
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Rhyno posted:Okay now THAT makes sense, thank you. I honestly didn't realize it was incremental like that and I have my taxes prepared so I just look at the form, see if I owe and sign off these days. It got me confused too the first time I went up a bracket and I had to have it explained in just the same way!
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Sep 1, 2018 19:21
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BraveUlysses posted:Also, always make sure you are putting enough money in your 401k to maximize the match from your employer I am at maximum match contribution. They have monthly 401K one on one days and the day I qualified fell on that week so I sat down and just had our advocate set it all up for me. If I could just get the IRS to gently caress off about this settlement life would be a dream. This goes back to my Amazon selling and all the cars I had in 2012. When they audited me they wanted $12K and we mediated and agreed on less and payments. I paid $4K off and then they reopened the loving case and said they wanted $18K and were not applying to what I had paid already to that total. My lawyer went back and got it down again and I paid that off and it was supposed to be settled but they want another $8K currently and I've dug in my heels. My lawyer is a busy dude so he keeps deferring the mediation so there's been no progress this year at all. Even if I just gave them $8K they'll just come back for more, I have no doubt.
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Sep 1, 2018 19:29
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Can't help but chuckle at rhyno posts. To think I had you on ignore once.  I'm glad you are doing better money wise and are starting to learn adult things at 40. Suburban Dad fucked around with this message at 20:08 on Sep 1, 2018 |
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Sep 1, 2018 20:04
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Makin your way in the world today takes everything you've got
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Sep 1, 2018 20:07
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Stop being stupid about taxes, jfc. The $20k more you made this year isn't going to change your tax situation one loving iota.
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Sep 1, 2018 20:14
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NitroSpazzz posted:This was basically me ~3.5 years ago except no relationships ever. Took a lot of work and putting myself in uncomfortable situations but I made myself start dating and now I'm married. I started with, as ilkhan said, getting out the house and meeting people. This is 100% true and 100% me. Except for the part about actually getting out, I still can't put myself out there and despite a year of therapy I don't know why. Maybe I can get some brain drugs to help. I basically hosed myself by spending my entire 20s on the computer. I haven't particularly enjoyed video games for a long time either!  My automotive confession is that I love cars but hate driving. It would be so much more pleasant without these erratic/suicidal NPCs all over the place. My eyes are also slightly hosed so driving is never relaxing, and track time is a big ol nope. I also need a new fridge, I think mine is as old as I am and I'd bet it uses a ton of juice, now to figure out how to weasel a new one out of the building management...
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Sep 1, 2018 20:15
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Mower resolution: I stumbled upon Lowes clearancing this out for $425: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Troy-Bilt-TB-WC28-223-cc-28-in-Self-propelled-Gas-Lawn-Mower-with-Briggs-Stratton-Engine/1000066759 I don't see how I can go wrong with that. I can use it and sell it in a year or two for the same price, if not more. 
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Sep 1, 2018 20:26
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EVERYWHERE 
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Ether Frenzy posted:Stop being stupid about taxes, jfc. The $20k more you made this year isn't going to change your tax situation one loving iota. It's closer to $44K combined. That won't make a difference at all?
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Sep 1, 2018 20:54
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Rhyno posted:It's closer to $44K combined. That won't make a difference at all? The more money you make, the more you take home after taxes. Period. JFC. You can think of it (oversimply) as "diminishing returns," but a diminishing return is still a return. Unless you're getting some specific benefit from having a low income, like Medicaid, there is no way you could take home less* by making more. *you will always "make" more. Imagine, if you will, the tax rate is 25% $1-40,000, and then 99% $40,001+ The first $40k will pay 10k in taxes, and the next $4k will gain you $40. Yes, you're technically now in the "99% tax bracket," but only on the amount above the earlier bracket. That doesn't retroactively apply the 99% tax to the first 40k. Queen_Combat fucked around with this message at 21:16 on Sep 1, 2018 |
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Sep 1, 2018 21:13
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