Edward Teach
Blackbeard
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Registered: Feb 2003
Local time: 06:06 AM
Location: The Seven Seas or the Outer Banks.
Posts: 6052
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I found this 2001 article concerning the Bush Tax Cuts. Can't list the whole article but if you may go to the source to read the entire article. Sounds pretty familiar and shows how the critics were wrong then are are wrong now.
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By Mark J. Perry
One of the most disingenuous tactics used by politicians attacking President George W. Bush's proposed (at latest count) $1.35 trillion tax cut is to characterize it as "a tax cut for the rich." They know that when most Americans hear that the biggest dollar amount of relief from the Bush tax cut will go to the top 5 to 10 percent of taxpayers, Americans don't really know who these people are. They're not "fat cats."
Consider a married couple in Michigan with one spouse working at the average state manufacturing wage of $42,000 per year and the other spouse teaching in a public school at the average state teaching salary of $45,000. Next consider a husband and wife teaching at any of the public universities in Michigan at the average annual salary of about $75,000 for full professors.
Would most people consider either of these couples "rich" and undeserving of a tax cut? Probably not. Yet, the first couple is in the top 10 percent of America's richest households, with a combined income above $83,000. And the married professors are easily in the top 5 percent, with a combined income above $115,000. In fact, economic statistics show that because of combined salaries most households will have incomes in the top 10 percent sometime during their lives.
Another source of confusion about tax cuts stems from a misunderstanding of who actually pays the lion's share of income taxes under our federal system. If those in the top income brackets also pay the most in taxes, it makes sense that any tax cut is going to benefit them disproportionately. It just so happens that the top 1 percent of taxpayers pay 35 percent of all income taxes paid. The top 20 percent of all taxpayers pay 83 percent of all taxes. And the top 50 percent pay almost 96 percent of all federal income taxes.
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Entire Article
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10-11-2004 02:18 AM
