Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

Donate

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Google+
  • Email
  • RSS
  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2023 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Uncategorized

Dems Reluctant to Allow Taxes on Rich to Rise

Juan Cole 09/02/2010

Tweet
Share
Reddit
Email
0 Shares

AP says more Democrats are reluctant to allow taxes to rise on the rich.

It is a matter of despair to me that the constituents of these Democrats don’t put their feet down on this issue. Allowing tax rates on the rich to go back to Reagan-era levels will not derail the economic recovery. What, are they going to cut back on their yacht-buying? Some heiresses seem to be sending the extra money they save on paying taxes down to Colombia for coke, which doesn’t exactly help the US economy.

And, you can’t be for fiscal discipline or for a balanced budget and also be in favor of lower taxes on the super-wealthy. This analysis made the rounds in the blogosphere, but it is worth reprinting the conclusion of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

The fact is that the Bush tax cuts for the super-wealthy are the main reason for the large size of our current budget deficits, and if the cuts weren’t abolished, they would go on bankrupting government into the distant future.

A tax cut on the rich is a way of stealing from the middle class. See Paul Buchheit, “Top 10 Reasons for Higher Taxes on the Top 1%”: “Funding for our country’s children is being cut, but we allow a hedge fund manager to make enough money to pay the salaries of every public school teacher in New York City. Most of his earnings are taxed at a rate less than that of his secretary.”

Their chart is eloquent. Is it that the public doesn’t know how to read it?

The tax cuts dwarf the wars and make TARP and the stimulus packages look minuscule as a source of the federal budget deficit.

So, voters, put some steel in the spines of the Democrats.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

Primary Sidebar

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter and have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.

Twitter

Follow Juan Cole @jricole or Informed Comment @infcomment on Twitter

Facebook



Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2023 All Rights Reserved

Posting....