Tax Facts Torpedo Class Clash

President Obama is trying to incite anger by saying the rich don't pay their fair share and charging that wealthy Americans pay lower tax rates than the middle class and poor. Such rhetoric has an effect, even in a conservative region such as Northwest Florida. When the Northwest Florida Daily News asked online readers in late September whether taxes should be raised on incomes above $250,000 to reduce the deficit, 53 percent said yes.

Time for a fact check.

When The Associated Press analyzed government and private data, it found that America's wealthiest citizens pay "a lot more taxes than the middle class or the poor ... They pay at a higher rate, and as a group, they contribute a much larger share of the overall taxes collected by the federal government."

AP reported that 10 percent of households with the highest incomes pay more than 70 percent of federal income taxes. Fewer than 1 percent of millionaires pay tax rates lower than middle-income workers.

Relying on data from the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, AP explained how the tax code's $1 trillion in annual deductions, exemptions and credits "benefit people at every income level," not just the rich.

In other words, The Associated Press — often accused of pro-Obama bias — exposed the president's pitch for higher taxes as a sham.

Obama talks about billionaire Warren Buffett paying a lower tax rate than his secretary, a tale Buffett himself promotes. Why does Buffett want a soak-the-rich tax increase? Because it will make him richer.

"His company that made him rich, Berkshire Hathaway, itself is a sophisticated tax shelter," wrote Peter Ferrara, author of "America's Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb" and general counsel of the American Civil Rights Union. "If tax rates are raised, that will only lead more of the wealthy to flee to investing in his company to avoid the abusive multiple taxation."

We are thoroughly soaking the rich, which explains why they buy into Mr. Buffett's tax shelters with capital they might otherwise invest in production and jobs.

Almost no one believes that sticking it to overtaxed Americans will create jobs. Mr. Obama's jobs bill can only increase the size and cost of government, a move that may serve a final blow to our beleaguered economy.

 

REPRINTED FROM THE NORTHWEST FLORIDA DAILY NEWS

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM