BDBoop
Platinum Member
- Banned
- #1
Is Obama tax hiker in chief? Not exactly. - CSMonitor.com
So, why the bad rep?
Conservatives like to say that President Obama has been responsible for massive tax increases. It is wonderful rhetoric that plays to the big tax image Democrats have been saddled with for decadessometimes with good reason. But for most households, this claim is the economic equivalent of the birther movement: It is as credible to call Obama Tax Hiker in Chief, as the Heritage Foundation s J.D. Foster does, as to claim he was born in some country other than the United States.
Skip to next paragraph
Howard Gleckman
Howard Gleckman is a resident fellow at The Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, the author of Caring for Our Parents, and former senior correspondent in the Washington bureau of Business Week. (TaxVox)
To tell a more accurate story, my Tax Policy Center colleagues looked at what would happen to both after-tax incomes and effective tax rates in 2013 if Obama could somehow get his tax agenda enacted (which he cant, but thats another story). TPC found that average after-tax incomes would be higher (and effective tax rates lower) in 2013 under an Obama tax code than they would be if Clinton-era rules applied. And average taxes would be about 2 percent higher than if President Bushs 2001 tax cuts were still in effect. But only because the very highest earners would pay lots more.
Average after-tax incomes would, in fact, be almost exactly the same for taxpayers in every income category except for those in the top one percent. If many Democrats got their wish and we returned to the Clinton-era tax law, after-tax incomes in 2013 for a typical household would average $55,647. If Republicans got their wish and we kept all of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, they would rise to $57, 528.
So, why the bad rep?