Stephen Moore in the WSJ,
..for the first time in decades, and perhaps ever, the richest 1% of tax filers will have paid more than 40% of the income tax burden. The top 50% will account for 97% of all federal income taxes, while the bottom 50% will have paid just 3%.
And this, despite the “Bush tax cuts for the rich!” Shouldn’t progressives, like Barack Obama, be hailing President Bush for soaking the rich? After all, Barack and the Dems see the government as the answer to all of our problems, and tax cuts bring in more revenue. Barron’s editor Thomas G. Donlan says the facts are clear,
Oddly, if you really want to raise taxes on the rich, you should cut their tax rates the way Congress and President Bush did in 2001, 2002, and 2003. It sounds like a joke but it’s the most sensible way to read the results of the Bush years in U.S. tax policy. After the Bush Administration and Congress reduced the top marginal `rates, the people with the highest incomes shouldered a larger share of the tax burden because they made so much more money….Of more importance, the expanding economy generated more revenue from income taxes, sales taxes, corporate income taxes, and social insurance taxes….By fiscal 2007, higher economic growth and lower tax avoidance covered the loss of revenue from lower rates.
Bloomberg confirms,
Individual and corporate income tax revenues are growing for a fourth straight year in spite of five rounds of Bush tax cuts totaling about $2 trillion from 2001 to 2006.
Conclusion:
1.) By any reasonable measure, the “rich” are shouldering a significant tax burden.
2.) Lower taxes = higher government revenue.
3.) Democrats demagauge the issue, prefer class warfare to real solutions.
Remember this next time you hear Barack Obama talking about the rich “paying their fair share”.