The Tax Policy Center, a respected nonpartisan group, made Mitt Romney's life a little more difficult two weeks ago, publishing a detailed analysis of the Republican's tax plan. The findings were brutal: sticking to Romney's own parameters, the Republican intends to raise taxes on 95% of the country in order to finance tax breaks for the rich.
Note, the policy analysts "bent over backwards to literally give Romney every possible benefit of the doubt" and worked under the dubious assumption that more Republican tax cuts will stimulate the economy. The results were still a disaster.
Romney condemned the nonpartisan analysis this week as "garbage." Yesterday, the Tax Policy Center published its response, explaining that the facts are stubborn, even if Romney doesn't like them.
"A reform proposal that meets the five goals" that Mr. Romney has outlined for overhauling the tax code "would have to raise burdens on middle-class households," the three authors of the analysis wrote in a nine-page response to the criticism.
That is inevitable, they said, mainly as a consequence of two of Mr. Romney's five goals: His insistence that any tax overhaul should be revenue-neutral, neither reducing nor increasing annual budget deficits, and that it should protect or even sweeten existing tax breaks for savings and investment like those for dividends and capital gains income.
If Mr. Romney were willing to either increase deficits or reduce the tax breaks for investors, the authors said, then taxes would not necessarily have to go up for lower- and middle-income Americans.
It's not "garbage"; it's arithmetic. To reiterate what we discussed when the report was first published, there's simply no way around the fact that Romney's figures don't add up. No serious person can run the numbers and reach a different conclusion.
Romney is effectively making a tax argument with two central points: he can (1) offer a 20% across-the-board income tax rate cut, while also eliminating the estate tax on millionaires and billionaires, slashing corporate tax rates, and approving a capital-gains tax cut; and (2) do all of this without raising the deficit or destroying basic American institutions, simply by eliminating various tax deductions and tax expenditures.
The nonpartisan TPC scholars -- one of the authors of the report is a veteran of the Bush administration -- simply took Romney's plan at face value. Since Romney refuses to say which tax deductions and tax expenditures he's scrap, the analysts crunched the numbers in the only way that could make sense.
And they came to an inescapable result: either Romney will grow the deficit dramatically or he'll have to raise taxes on 95% of the population in order to give new tax breaks to the rich. Period. Full Stop.
In terms of the politics, I'm still not sure why this isn't one of the biggest stories of the presidential race. "Republican intends to raise taxes on 95% of the country" strikes me as a big deal.
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I'm not a fan of facts. You see, the facts can change, but my opinion will never change, no matter what the facts are.
Stephen Colbert
That's funny. I was saying something along those lines last night about a reactionary-right friend of mine. It was along the lines of "If the facts don't support my opinion, there must be something wrong with the facts."
Unfortunately it's up to the Obama campaign to bring this up; the journalists are too busy analyzing the horse race. And for the committed wingnuts, it's all "fuzzy math" anyway; since it conflicts with what they want to believe, it's "liberal," and since it's "liberal," they give themselves permission to ignore it.
jheartney, you hit it out of the park.
There's a problem with bring this up... it turns out that all the income tax shelters, loopholes, and deductions, supposedly helping the rich escape taxation... are actually middle class entitlements.
Then there's the half of the country that doesn't pay income taxes. That's always a fun topic to skewer the left with.
In a Walter Mitty sense, yes.
Chalk up another win for epistemological closure.
@Shooter Re: #2.2
Your skewer is ... blunt.
Whenever this topic is raised and we respond with the actual facts about who these people are, the person raising the issue just seems to slink off.
Maphi are you going to claim that half the country is too poor to contribute anything to the Treasury? Not one red cent?
Do you see what that says about Obama?
Shooter, are you claiming that the middle class routinely stuffs $100M into an IRA account, creates a magnitude of offshore shell companies through which to funnel millions in income, and also stashes several more millions into tax haven bank accounts? Because that's called "abuse of the system," aka Romney's tax strategies.
And speaking of middle class tax deductions, economic analysis of Romney's plan has made it clear he wants to rescind even that little which the middle class has in its favor now.
June, the analysis depends on eliminating all the deductions, available on income taxes. All the claims of unfair income tax loopholes for the rich have turned out to be lefty BS. That's the funny part.
As for Romney I have no idea what he has where, and don't really care. I trust Obama's IRS to make sure Romney is paying by the rules. If you don't like the rules that's your problem, not Romney's.
Ain't shooter fun! This "fifty-per cent" meme was a signature part of president's Bush's tax reform/reductions, playing up on that "Compassionate Conservative" oxymoron. Of course, now everything is Obama's fault, at least in the realm of the small minded.
"All the claims of unfair income tax loopholes for the rich have turned out to be lefty BS. That's the funny part." Your statement is the funny part. If you do not believe the tax codes are skewed towards the wealthy, well.... Agreed that Mr. Romney no doubt played by the rules. Refer to the above statement about the tax codes. You are simply a laughable contrarian. We assume you are among the mega-rich, you know, the "I've got mine crowd."
I think the primary issue is one of moral consciousness. How does someone need or spend twenty-five million dollars in yearly income, especially money that requires no labor or produces anything? Why should the blue collar working stiff have to support his family and pay a higher tax rate higher than these ultra rich? I do not oppose wealth or rich folks, but do have trouble with obscene accumulation of wealth while so many live in tenuous circumstances.
Incidentally Mr. Shooter, I've read enough of your comments to fully understand you are a selfish, thoroughly unconcerned individual. I have no interest in your response.
Okay, well, of that "half" you guys keep raving about, about half of them are retirees who don't pay Federal income tax because Social Security benefits aren't taxable if that's your only income, a large percentage of the rest are people whose adjusted gross income on an individualized basis was less than 10K, and, of course, a few percent were people who earned more than 100K but managed to zero out their tax obligations with various tax breaks.
The number of retirees living on Social Security alone represent a demographic bulge caused by the baby boom and, in no small part, because of loss of pension or retirement income due to the recession. Their numbers will decrease over time for obvious reasons. Are those the people you urgently believe whose income must be taxed because it offends your sense of propriety that merely paying state and local sales and property taxes at the end of a life time of contributing to the system and raising the current generation of taxpayers? Is it okay if we exempt the ones who are confined to nursing homes or do they have to be taxed too, lest you have to pay one penny more in income tax?
Most of the the rest are people whose AGI is, on an individual basis, about 10K or less who are paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as well as state and local payroll, property, and sales taxes. They're also paying federal taxes every time they buy gas or use public transportation that runs on gas. Are these the ones whose lack of federal income tax liability you are deeming to be such a grave injustice to people like you? Well you know what would get them into the zone where they have income tax liability again? BETTER F&*!(ING JOBS! But god forbid the government do anything whatsoever to help make that happen.
Shooter, I didn't know Obama created the IRS! Thanks for the tip!
Seriously, though - why do you think what you wrote somehow proves your point about "lefty/unfair income tax loopholes for the rich"?
The analysis eliminates,
"....all deductions that benefit those with more than $1 million in income; then all that benefit those with between $500,000 and $1 million; and so on....The key point is then that even if you do this, the tax cuts Romney gives high-income Americans are bigger than the loopholes he could conceivably close."
So, the analysis itself talks about Romney closing the loopholes that the very wealthy enjoy (though there's not a chance in Hades that Romney/Ryan would actually do that), and on down the line through to the middle class and beyond in order to "broaden the base."
And of course you have no idea what Romney has where - no one does! And that's the point. But here's my view - sure, rich people are free to legally dodge taxes as much as they want. But don't expect me to vote in a guy for President because he's figured out how to be clever in not paying up. -- And then he turns around and promises me that if elected, he'll make sure my taxes go up even further, while his goes down even more! Seriously, that's crazy talk. But that's what Romney/Ryan is asking us to buy.
And of course, it's convenient to not count all the FICA/Medicare deductions that all people who make wage income pay (there are absolutely no deduction or loopholes to eliminate those). These and government fees make up most of the tax burden of lower income people. Since FICA/Medicare go into the general budget rather than segregated budget accounts, they are just as much a tax as the income tax.
13% effective tax rate on millions in income? What a deal.
@jheartney, He has been bringing this up in his tours, and over and over again. He's been telling the middle class that the tax plan (Romney's) is going to be increase on the middle class so the rich can get more breaks. This President and his people know their stuff. They are beating Romney over the head with his own nonsense. His Tax plan, his Medicare Plan, his Business experience at Bain (qualifying him to be president), His role in State Politics (which Romney won't talk about), The fact that he won't disclose more taxes than his father set the Standard for in Presidential races, And last but not least Healthcare. Romney has no foreign policy experience and did a horrible job when he was over seas. He has no legs to stand on.
Romney has nothing to really run on that he will really support or even discuss at least for that matter. People keep telling him that his numbers don't add up, or they will hurt the middle class.
Well this is part and parcel of the larger problem, isn't it? Simple arithmetic leads to a single inevitable conclusion and yet our increasingly ridiculous and innumerate MSM insists on reporting the story as if that's just one more POV.
They do the same thing with delegate math during primaries.
Which taxes have gone up since the Bush miracle unleashed unparalleled economic growth in the past decade?
If lower taxes helps the jobs creators and if we have yet to raise a single tax on them, where are the jobs?
So now we are going to double down on tax reductions in the hopes that this will somehow fix everything?
When have we had the best growth, oh yeah when we raised taxes in the 80s under Reagan and 90s under Bush and Clinton.
So let's double down on what we already know has not worked in the hopes that this time it will. What could possibly go wrong?
"The definition of insanity is doing the same over and over again and expecting different results." Albert Einstein
The point is not to create jobs, that's just the excuse. The real point is that rich people want to be richer, and someone has to fund government.
You could set tax rates at zero and I don't see my company rushing out to hire people. They want to make the biggest profit, with the fewest people possible. Tax rates don't have anything to do with it.
Technology has made it easier to hire cheaper people around the world, and that is going to put pressure on US employment rates for the forseeable future.
To borrow a meme, like one of the shows earlier this week:
Die hard, neo-republicans won't care about the math. Math is, after all, one of those liberal, elite, education thingys taught by unionized teachers. And therefore suspect and not to be trusted. Also, Romney and Ryan are Republicans and they promised Norquist that they wouldn't raise taxes, so therefore any "math" that says they will raise taxes must automatically be wrong. (sarcasm off)
And the numbers involved are HUGE. The vast majority of us simply cannot comprehend a million of something, never mind a billion or a trillion.
I assume Fox will be covering TCP's report in
depthdenial? Rush will discuss at length how someone besides a conservative actually knowsa thing or twonothing?To lessen our nation's debt, to close the budget deficit and to eventually balance the budget will require unpopular decisions. No one candidate wants to provide details as to how they would propose doing so. Perhaps we should be discussing the S-B Commission report and/0r the package offered by President Obama during debt discussions a year ago as possible ways to approach the problem. These could be compared with what can be discerned about Governor Romney's plans. Right now it's "I'll not show you my cards until you show me yours." Oh, NO. That's too complicated for campaign conversations.
Steve, Steve, Steve. For once, I can actually understand why the MSM isn't running with the "Rape-Public-CONs will raise taxes on 95% of the country" story - it's because the Rape-Public-CONs won't. You're writing as if you'd never observed a Rape-Public-CON administration. You hit the nail squarely on the head with the first alternative you listed - "grow the deficit dramatically".
They won't "raise taxes" (though I'm sure we can expect a President Fifi to seek to raise as much as possible through "fees") - as always (see Reagan, Bush I, Bush II for examples) they'll just explode the deficit again (and again and again). You know, the deficit they pretend to care so much about when Democrats hold the White House and conveniently forget/ignore once the Democrats are out.
;-)
Romney's main goal once these reforms are implemented is to eliminate all federally funded social programs, using the reasoning that the numbers suddenly don't add up. In fact he'll probably blame the social programs for why his budgetary plans will fail, i.e. "If it weren't for the welfare programs advocated by the democrats, my massive deficit increasing tax plans would have been a great success. Now we'll, regretfully, have to eliminate those social programs to balance the budget. We'll probably also have to ban abortions and eliminate affirmative action, too."
Obama's job is to run the country. It's the news agencies that are supposed to get this information out, as supposedly non-partisan seekers and dispensers of the truth, who have been failing. Why do you think the Republicans can get away with lying almost constantly? Even in recent days, when there have been glimmers of actual journalistic integrity and honesty, the republicans will just move on to the next lie, confident that their supporters won't notice or care, the Democrats won't capitalize or drive the point home, and the independents won't find out in time. Still, if Obama wants to win, he'll have to dramatize what the Republicans are up to.
The Romney plan for income taxes is this:
The only time you should pay taxes on income is when you contribute work to earn it.
If it 'just happens' because it's money earning interest on bonds or the stock price goes up on an investment in a company actually contributing the the GDP, well that's a wonderful kind of magic unicorn gift. We don't want to frighten off the magic unicorn with that nasty 'tax' word. Shh.