Bloomberg News Service reports on a shift in the Democrats’ arguments about taxes:
“President Barack Obama has shifted his central argument against the Bush-era tax cuts to make the income gap as much a voter concern as the budget gap.
Since Sept. 3, Obama has chided Republicans for wanting to extend tax cuts for ‘millionaires and billionaires’ …. Before then, administration economists cast taxing the wealthy largely as a matter of fiscal prudence -- a way to free up $700 billion from the deficit over the next 10 years.”
But perhaps this quote, from near the end of the Bloomberg article, explains the Administration’s theory more clearly – or at least where things could be heading:
“James K. Galbraith, a University of Texas economist ..., said the Obama strategy should be seen as a first step toward rebalancing the tax system.
‘We don’t need higher taxes, we need better taxes,’ Galbraith, a former executive director of the Joint Economic Committee, said in a phone interview. ‘Putting income in the hands of people who need it, and not in the hands of people who don’t, is the right economic policy.’”
Note the progression. President Obama talks about taxing billionaires and millionaires, but his tax increase starts at $250,000 ($200,000 if you’re single). Professor Galbraith says the President’s plan is a first step to a system that takes money from those who don’t need it (in the government’s opinion and without any indicated level) and gives it to those who do (also, in the government’s opinion). Which fits with what then-Senator Obama told Joe the Plumber back in 2008: Joe needed to pay more taxes because “when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”
Put your hand on your wallets, people; the government is coming, and it may think there are people who need your money more than you do.
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