Robert Wuerth, for the Evansville Courier Press and using analysis from the non-partisan Tax Policy Center of the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution lays out the impact of the Obama & McCain tax plans in terms of tax cuts to various income groups.
Do you make:
Less than $19,000? (20th percentile) McCain cuts $21 from your tax bill; Obama cuts $567.
$19,000 – $37,600: (40th percentile) McCain $118, Obama $892.
$37,600 – $66,400: (60th percentile) McCain $325, Obama $1,118.
$66,400 – $111,600: (80th percentile) McCain $994, Obama $1,264.
$111,600 – $161,000: (90th percentile) McCain $2,584, Obama $2,135.
$161,000 – $227,000: (95th percentile) McCain $4,437, Obama $2,796.
Above $227,000 – No numbers, but McCain is your guy.
So, if you make less than $111,600 and going strictly by proposed tax cuts, Obama’s the guy to go with. If you make between $111,600 and $161,000, it’s pretty much a wash and you should go looking for other policies to break the tie. But, the more you make over $161,000 per year, the more it’s in your financial self-interest to vote for McCain.
I don’t want a tax cut. I want the feds to start paying down the national debt. In the long run, my family will be much better off if we reduce the national debt. All the money I’m socking away for retirement and my kids’ college education will be reduced to nothing by inflation and poor economic performance if we don’t get the federal debt under control.
BUT…BUT…BUT OBAMA WILL TAX BUSINESSES WHO WILL FIRE ALL THERE WORKERS AND SO EVERY ONE WILL MAKE $0!!!! WE WON’T EVEN HAVE ANY MONEY TO BUY BULLET’S TO SHOOT A MOOSE FOR MOOSEBURGERS!!!! WHAT WILL WE EAT ABORTED BABIES????
I just thought the other side should be presented.
POW BABY POW!
The all caps and extra ! made it all the more accurate.
So, they’re both going to cut my taxes? Call me skeptical, but this just seems like a steaming pile. Both are promising a hell of a lot more government, and that doesn’t come without cost. More borrow & spend?
These numbers are very contradictory to anything else I have seen, btw. Certainly, I have not seen or heard from Obama that ‘the rich’ were going to see a tax cut, but these numbers show everyone getting one, apart from the above $227k bracket.
Doesn’t pass the smell test.
I think Obama is planning on raising taxes on those making over $200,000. (I’m not sure how far above $200,000 per year before they’d kick in.) Basically, from what I’ve heard, these folks would go back to what they were paying under the Clinton tax structure.
Whether or not this passes the smell test depends on just how much folks in this income bracket are raking in currently.
The numbers make absolutely no sense. First of all, the bottom 32% of taxpayers pay no federal income tax. That large number of taxpayers was expanded by Bush’s doubling of the child tax credit, which Obama and the Democrats never mention when describing Bush’s tax cuts for the rich. What Obama is doing is transferring money from those who pay taxes to people who are currently paying no federal income taxes. The bulk of the federal income tax is paid by the wealthiest of Americans. You’re just stoking the old class warfare politics that the Democratic Party is all about.
I’m not going to begrudge them their $11 per week. They pay other kinds of taxes (gas tax, payroll tax, sales tax, etc.) and they’ll spend it on stuff that makes the economy stronger. Hell, they may even keep their homes, and stay off the street.
(At least you said “Democratic” Party — Seriously, that made me read your post about 100 times more attentively than if I’d seen “Democrat Party.”)
Considering Gary Welsh comes from a family of wealthy farmers in Western Illinois, I’m amused at his concerns about “class welfare” from the Democrats. The Welsh’s receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in corporate welfare (farm subsidy payments) from taxpayers — Gary sounds like he’s worried about that lucrative racket being upset!
Oh! Snap!
I’m not comfortable with folks delving into the personal lives of commenters here. So, respectfully, knock it off. Thanks.
So Marie Antoinette’s remark about the eating habits of peasants is now off the table?
“BUT…BUT…BUT OBAMA WILL TAX BUSINESSES WHO WILL FIRE ALL THERE WORKERS AND SO EVERY ONE WILL MAKE $0!!!! WE WON’T EVEN HAVE ANY MONEY TO BUY BULLET’S TO SHOOT A MOOSE FOR MOOSEBURGERS!!!! WHAT WILL WE EAT ABORTED BABIES????”
The incorrect use of there (instead of their) and misplaced apostrophe on “bullets” and teh missing comma is what makes this truly authentic – and I love the bit about mooseburgers.
I saw Lewis Black live the other night. He observed that lots of folks describe Sarah Palin as “normal” and then asked how normal it was to eat moose.
Wilson,
Feel free to argue that the “class warfare” argument or any other argument is crap. I think that can be done without delving into the personal situations of those who comment here. The personal situations of those politicians or other public figures who advocate these arguments are fair game, in my opinion.
I’m not saying it’s completely irrelevant or that all right-thinking people would avoid approaching an argument from the angle of the personal situations of an argument’s advocate, it’s just a line I’d personally prefer that folks here not cross. So, you know, as a favor to me. (Not that you particularly owe me one.)
I first remember the class warfare fight with the Reagan era when the question was how do we pay for tax cuts and also fund Social Security,as if we have to choose one over the other.This question has never been answered,since the answer supposes one side has to lose.
As many commentators have pointed out, Palin puts us back into the ‘culture wars’,and that’s a war Republicans always win at the ballot box.
Culture wars are best decided fairly in the courts with a copy of our Constitution at hand. Culture war discussions invariably end up with personal attacks and characterizations,and winners and losers.
Obama’s tax plan is just too boring to read and understand compared to protecting the culture from the undeserving.That’s a slam-dunk.
Oh, please. As if Obama’s attack mantra about ‘tax cuts for the rich’ isn’t a culture war feature. Seriously, you partisans are hilarious in your ability to see it going only one way. Culture wars and class wars are two-way streets. After all, this isn’t a fight over a government that will leave us alone. This is a fight over which gang will control, and which preferred constituents will be winners, and which politically correct non-constituents will be losers. That’s inherently a culture war, and it gets thicker when you look at the specifics- if you can bring yourself to do it.
My point was that a new culture war will serve Republicans and may lead them to victory in November,and that it was resurrected by VP candidate Palin,probably by design.
Sure, ‘tax cuts for the rich’ is part of the rhetoric,but the rich,whoever they are exactly, will be the beneficiaries of being singled out.Palin will be ‘supermom’ and welfare moms will be the ‘anti-moms’.
Lou,
You are correct about the culture war statement from everything I’ve been hearing from rural voters many are former Clinton primary voters.This is a battle Obama can not win!
As former senator Fred Thompson stated: they’re not taking it from your side of the bucket, they’re gonna take it from the other side….what a crock, if a Dem gets elected the first thing that is going to happen is the tax cuts that were previously passed will go away which is a tax increase no matter what you want it to be called. OBAMA looks like a worried man, and he should be, what looked like a cake-walk suddenly got real serious with the inclusion of GOP vice president nominee.
Obama’s tax plan will destroy the Social Security system.
Obama says his income tax plan will lower taxes for 95% of Americans. There is just one problem with this, 40% of Americans already pay no income tax. Obama’s response to this is that these people pay Social Security tax. Well, that’s not income tax, but a contribution to their retirement plan. So if he wins and implements his tax plan, for the first time in the history of Social Security, 40% of the people who will get retirement benefits will have paid nothing for them. Social Security will then loose all pretext of being a retirement plan, and will become a national welfare program.
This will cause Social Security to lose public support in a massive way. Leave Social Security contributions out of income tax plans. If you take some peoples income taxes to pay others Social Security taxes, Social Security will be destroyed forever.
http://strategicthought-charles77.blogspot.com/2008/10/obamas-tax-plan-will-destroy-social.html