I know I've got to pay some tax, but I hate the fact that they collect millions of pounds a day from the congestion charge and I don't see anything or anyone benefitting from it. Where are the new hospitals?
Millions and millions of people don't pay an income tax, because they don't earn enough to pay on one, but you pay a land tax whether it ever did or ever will earn you a penny. You should pay on things that you buy outside of bare necessities. I think this sales tax is the best tax we have had in years.
Raising the congestion charge won't necessarily make a difference. Rather than increasing the amount you pay in congestion charge, we should be thinking about an ultra low emission zone. We should penalise those cars who are the biggest polluters and reward cars that don't, like electric cars.
When you see Paul Wall, I'm always going to be the same person. I might have on a new grill, I might have on some new jewelry. I might've put on some pounds, I might've lost some pounds. You never know.
And what's interesting, and I don't think a lot of Americans understand this fact, is that, one, most new jobs are created by small businesses; two, most small businesses pay tax at the individual income tax, or many small businesses pay tax there.
I pay tax, and I pay federal tax, too. But I have a write-off, a lot of it's depreciation, which is a wonderful charge. I love depreciation.
It would actually be quite nice if the American ambassador in Britain could pay the [congestion] charge that everybody else is paying and not actually try and skive out of it like some chiselling little crook.
I know hedge-fund guys that are making hundreds of millions of dollars a year and pay no tax. And I want to lower [tax] for the middle income. The middle class in this country has been decimated.
If you're in people's living-rooms, via the television, it's what happens. You're more noticeable. But I'm not aware that anyone has said I pay a lower rate of tax. I don't. I pay my full share of tax, believe you me.
You got to remember, S corporations pay one layer of tax, corporations pay two layers of tax. So we basically see equivalent, but here`s the point. The rest of the world, they tax their businesses at an average rate in the industrialized world of 23 percent. Our corporate is 35. Our top S corporate, small business rate is 44.6 effectively. This is killing us.
I get an abundance of e-mail every day, some say 'dear Richard, can you call my husband, he weighs 400 pounds...' or 'my 14-year-old is 200 pounds...' or 'I just got divorced, no one wants me, I am 500 pounds.' So I pick up the phone and I call people.
I think we should have basically the same tax policy that Germany, Japan, the U.K., everybody else has, which is a tax rate in the mid-20s and no loopholes. Zero. The U.S. has the most antiquated tax system. And that means some people are going to pay more taxes, and some people are going to pay less.
In New York, you are competing with Times Square lights and all of that, so you've got to be 300 pounds and crazy to get anyone's attention. Then, you can refine yourself. I always knew under those 300 pounds and tracksuits was a refined, slim, dignified man.
Anyone who lip-synchs in public on stage when you pay 75 pounds to see them should be shot.
I'm finding that everything sells. I've been toying with the fact that I have this big giant glass jar with the metal screw lid on it that's full of ribbons and memorabilia from conventions and stuff. I've got buttons and I have all of my Walt Disney Mickey Mouse credit cards. I'm wondering in my old age if anyone would pay for a credit card with Mickey Mouse on it issued to me. I wonder if anyone would pay anything for that?
It used to be that we taxed property - zapped farmers basically. And there were very rich people who didn't pay that much tax. So in 1913, they put in the income tax. It was incredibly popular. The tax we love to hate today.
The problem for new businesses isn't corporate taxes. Anyone who has actually started a new business knows you don't make enough money for years to pay any meaningful tax on it.