Source: The Tax FoundationI recently saw this chart (hat tip: Mankiw), and I got to thinking, even though I don't really know what I'm talking about (And who cares? Not that many people really read this blog). At one level this bothers me because I believe that everyone should pay some taxes (preferably more than just FICA), more for the psychological effect of everyone sharing the burden than for any real contribution to the budget. I also believe that assistance should come in the form of payments, maybe even calculated in the same way as tax incentives but to some extent bureaucratically and hopefully psychologically separate.
As far as the chart goes, I'd be interested in seeing how much in the change over the years is a result of greater income inequality. And, often, as a way to make large tax cuts for the wealthy politically plausible, small tax cuts for large amounts of people are added, which takes people who pay small amounts of taxes off the tax rolls (this is basically Obama's strategy too as I understand it, except he's raising taxes on the wealthy).
As far as the chart goes, I'd be interested in seeing how much in the change over the years is a result of greater income inequality. And, often, as a way to make large tax cuts for the wealthy politically plausible, small tax cuts for large amounts of people are added, which takes people who pay small amounts of taxes off the tax rolls (this is basically Obama's strategy too as I understand it, except he's raising taxes on the wealthy).
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