Obama says he is going to raise taxes only on the top 5% of wage earners, and says 95% of tax payers will see a decrease in their taxes.
The top 5% pay 57% of the total federal income taxes.
http://www.american.com/archive/2007/november-december-magazine-contents/guess-who-really-pays-the-taxes
The total income taxes collected by the federal government last year was $1.25 trillion.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/hist.html
If the top 5% paid 57% of that, that means that the top 5% of taxpayers paid $712.5 billion.
As it is now, people in that tax bracket pay 35% of their money in taxes. So that means that the top 5% of people made $2.034 trillion.
So, assuming that they made that same amount of money under Obama’s tax plan (39.6%), the federal government would collect $805.5 billion.
That means Obama will collect $93 billion more from the richest 5%.
Obama has promised $270 billion in tax cuts for the poor and middle class.
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/publications/url.cfm?ID=411693
Obama has promised $293 billion in new spending, annually.
http://www.ntu.org/main/page.php?PageID=97
So, Obama will collect $93 billion more from the richest 5% but he has promised $563 billion in extra spending and tax cuts to the poor and middle class per year.
Here is what I can conclude, either:
1. He is lying about who he will raise taxes on (he’ll have to raise taxes on many more people).
2. He is lying about giving tax cuts to the poor and middle class and also lying about the spending that he is promising to special interest groups (since there is no way he’ll be able to afford all those promises).
3. He is going to increase the federal deficit by approximately $470 billion per year.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Friday, September 19, 2008
Charity: Obama vs. McCain
In Obama’s convention address, he stated:
“That's the promise of America, the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise or fall as one nation; the fundamental belief that I am my brother's keeper; I am my sister's keeper.”
It’s no surprise coming from the democrat presidential nominee that he would advocate helping out our fellow Americans, and a big part of his campaign has been focused on what he’ll do to help out the poor and middle class. But does Obama live by his own credo?
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2008/03/obama-releases.html
I thought it was very interesting that someone who is so actively involved in promoting social change and progressive values seems to be so stingy with his own pocket book. Some years, he gave less than 1% of his income to charity. What I find even more interesting is that he couldn't even donate the extra money that he was able to keep because of Bush's tax cuts.
By the way, Obama’s actual half brother lives in Africa, surviving off pennies per month, so I guess Obama doesn’t really think he should have to be his brother’s keeper. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2008/08/20/2008-08-20_barack_obamas_povertystricken_halfbrothe.html
Anyway, I got curious and looked up McCain’s tax records:
“In 2007, the Arizona senator reported $405,409 in total income and contributed $105,467, or 26 percent of his total income, to charity. In 2006, Mr. McCain said he had $358,414 in total income and donated $64,695, or 18 percent of his total income, to charity.” http://philanthropy.com/news/updates/4437/john-mccain-discloses-data-o%20n-his-charity-giving
So which is more noble? Trying to use power to force everyone else to help the poor through taxes, or actually putting your money where your mouth is to give sizable portions of your income to those who are less fortunate?
“That's the promise of America, the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise or fall as one nation; the fundamental belief that I am my brother's keeper; I am my sister's keeper.”
It’s no surprise coming from the democrat presidential nominee that he would advocate helping out our fellow Americans, and a big part of his campaign has been focused on what he’ll do to help out the poor and middle class. But does Obama live by his own credo?
http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2008/03/obama-releases.html
I thought it was very interesting that someone who is so actively involved in promoting social change and progressive values seems to be so stingy with his own pocket book. Some years, he gave less than 1% of his income to charity. What I find even more interesting is that he couldn't even donate the extra money that he was able to keep because of Bush's tax cuts.
By the way, Obama’s actual half brother lives in Africa, surviving off pennies per month, so I guess Obama doesn’t really think he should have to be his brother’s keeper. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2008/08/20/2008-08-20_barack_obamas_povertystricken_halfbrothe.html
Anyway, I got curious and looked up McCain’s tax records:
“In 2007, the Arizona senator reported $405,409 in total income and contributed $105,467, or 26 percent of his total income, to charity. In 2006, Mr. McCain said he had $358,414 in total income and donated $64,695, or 18 percent of his total income, to charity.” http://philanthropy.com/news/updates/4437/john-mccain-discloses-data-o%20n-his-charity-giving
So which is more noble? Trying to use power to force everyone else to help the poor through taxes, or actually putting your money where your mouth is to give sizable portions of your income to those who are less fortunate?
Monday, September 15, 2008
If you like Michigan's economy, you'll love Obama's
I started trying to put this into my own words, but the original article was just too good so a lot is copied directly from the original article:
One of the main issues in the upcoming election is the state of the economy. While we can only speculate what the candidates’ plans will do to our economy, we can get a pretty good idea by looking at the plans on a smaller scale.
Individual states are able to exercise substantial freedom in pursing their own economic fortune – or misfortune. As a result, the states provide a laboratory for testing various policies. In other words, if we want to see what Obama’s and McCain’s plans will do, we can see them in action on a smaller scale (the states).
Ranking states by domestic migration, per-capita income growth and employment growth, American Legislative Exchange Council found that from 1996 through 2006, Texas, Florida and Arizona were the three most successful states. Illinois, Ohio and Michigan were the three least successful. Their analysis showed that “generally speaking, states that tax less, particularly on productive activities such as working or investing, experience higher growth rates than states that tax and spend more.”
From 1996 to 2006, Texas Florida and Arizona were the three most successful states. Illinois, Ohio and Michigan were the three least successful.
Texas gained 1.7 million net new jobs, Florida gained 1.4 million and Arizona gained 600,000. While the U.S. average job growth percentage was 9.9%, Texas, Florida and Arizona had job growth of 18.5%, 21.4% and 28.9% respectively. A third of all the jobs in the US in the last 10 years were created in these 3 states. The population of the three highest performing states grew twice as fast as the national average, per-capita real income still grew by $6,563 or 21.4% in Texas, Florida and Arizona. That’s a $26,252 increase for a typical family of four.
By comparison, Illinois gained only 122,000 jobs, Ohio lost 62,900 and Michigan lost 318,000. Population growth in Michigan, Ohio and Illinois was only 4.2%, a third the national average, and real income per capita rose by only $3,466, just 58% of the national average. Workers in the three least successful states had to contend with a quarter-million fewer jobs rather than taking their pick of the 3.7 million new jobs that were available in the three fastest-growing states.
What explains this relative performance over the last 10 years? The simple answer is that governance, taxes and regulatory policy matter. The playing field among the states was not flat. Business conditions were better in the successful states than in the lagging ones. Capital and labor gravitated to where the burdens were smaller and the opportunities greater.
Incredibly, the business climate in Michigan is now so unfavorable that it has overwhelmed the considerable comparative advantage in auto production that Michigan spent a century building up. No one should let Michigan politicians blame their problems solely on the decline of the U.S. auto industry. Yes, Michigan lost 83,000 auto manufacturing jobs during the past decade and a half, but more than 91,000 new auto manufacturing jobs sprung up in Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and Texas.
So what do the state laboratories tell us about the potential success of the economic programs presented by Barack Obama and John McCain?
Mr. McCain will lower taxes. Mr. Obama will raise them, especially on small businesses. To understand why, you need to know something about the "infamous" top 1% of income tax filers: In order to avoid high corporate tax rates and the double taxation of dividends, small business owners have increasingly filed as individuals rather than corporations. When Democrats talk about soaking the rich, it isn't the Rockefellers they're talking about; it's the companies where most Americans work. Three out of four individual income tax filers in the top 1% are, in fact, small businesses.
In the name of taxing the rich, Mr. Obama would raise the marginal tax rates to over 50% on millions of small businesses that provide 75% of all new jobs in America. Investors and corporations will also pay higher taxes under the Obama program, but, as the Michigan-Ohio-Illinois experience painfully demonstrates, workers ultimately pay for higher taxes in lower wages and fewer jobs.
Mr. Obama would spend all the savings from walking out of Iraq to expand the government. Mr. McCain would reserve all the savings from our success in Iraq to shrink the deficit, as part of a credible and internally consistent program to balance the budget by the end of his first term. Mr. Obama's program offers no hope, or even a promise, of ever achieving a balanced budget.
Mr. Obama would stimulate the economy by increasing federal spending. Mr. McCain would stimulate the economy by cutting the corporate tax rate. Mr. Obama would expand unionism by denying workers the right to a secret ballot on the decision to form a union, and would dramatically increase the minimum wage. Mr. Obama would also expand the role of government in the economy, and stop reforms in areas like tort abuse.
The states have already tested the McCain and Obama programs, and the results are clear. We now face a national choice to determine if everything that has failed the families of Michigan, Ohio and Illinois will be imposed on a grander scale across the nation. In an appropriate twist of fate, Michigan and Ohio, the two states that have suffered the most from the policies that Mr. Obama proposes, have it within their power not only to reverse their own misfortunes but to spare the nation from a similar fate.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122126282034130461.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
One of the main issues in the upcoming election is the state of the economy. While we can only speculate what the candidates’ plans will do to our economy, we can get a pretty good idea by looking at the plans on a smaller scale.
Individual states are able to exercise substantial freedom in pursing their own economic fortune – or misfortune. As a result, the states provide a laboratory for testing various policies. In other words, if we want to see what Obama’s and McCain’s plans will do, we can see them in action on a smaller scale (the states).
Ranking states by domestic migration, per-capita income growth and employment growth, American Legislative Exchange Council found that from 1996 through 2006, Texas, Florida and Arizona were the three most successful states. Illinois, Ohio and Michigan were the three least successful. Their analysis showed that “generally speaking, states that tax less, particularly on productive activities such as working or investing, experience higher growth rates than states that tax and spend more.”
From 1996 to 2006, Texas Florida and Arizona were the three most successful states. Illinois, Ohio and Michigan were the three least successful.
Texas gained 1.7 million net new jobs, Florida gained 1.4 million and Arizona gained 600,000. While the U.S. average job growth percentage was 9.9%, Texas, Florida and Arizona had job growth of 18.5%, 21.4% and 28.9% respectively. A third of all the jobs in the US in the last 10 years were created in these 3 states. The population of the three highest performing states grew twice as fast as the national average, per-capita real income still grew by $6,563 or 21.4% in Texas, Florida and Arizona. That’s a $26,252 increase for a typical family of four.
By comparison, Illinois gained only 122,000 jobs, Ohio lost 62,900 and Michigan lost 318,000. Population growth in Michigan, Ohio and Illinois was only 4.2%, a third the national average, and real income per capita rose by only $3,466, just 58% of the national average. Workers in the three least successful states had to contend with a quarter-million fewer jobs rather than taking their pick of the 3.7 million new jobs that were available in the three fastest-growing states.
What explains this relative performance over the last 10 years? The simple answer is that governance, taxes and regulatory policy matter. The playing field among the states was not flat. Business conditions were better in the successful states than in the lagging ones. Capital and labor gravitated to where the burdens were smaller and the opportunities greater.
Incredibly, the business climate in Michigan is now so unfavorable that it has overwhelmed the considerable comparative advantage in auto production that Michigan spent a century building up. No one should let Michigan politicians blame their problems solely on the decline of the U.S. auto industry. Yes, Michigan lost 83,000 auto manufacturing jobs during the past decade and a half, but more than 91,000 new auto manufacturing jobs sprung up in Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and Texas.
So what do the state laboratories tell us about the potential success of the economic programs presented by Barack Obama and John McCain?
Mr. McCain will lower taxes. Mr. Obama will raise them, especially on small businesses. To understand why, you need to know something about the "infamous" top 1% of income tax filers: In order to avoid high corporate tax rates and the double taxation of dividends, small business owners have increasingly filed as individuals rather than corporations. When Democrats talk about soaking the rich, it isn't the Rockefellers they're talking about; it's the companies where most Americans work. Three out of four individual income tax filers in the top 1% are, in fact, small businesses.
In the name of taxing the rich, Mr. Obama would raise the marginal tax rates to over 50% on millions of small businesses that provide 75% of all new jobs in America. Investors and corporations will also pay higher taxes under the Obama program, but, as the Michigan-Ohio-Illinois experience painfully demonstrates, workers ultimately pay for higher taxes in lower wages and fewer jobs.
Mr. Obama would spend all the savings from walking out of Iraq to expand the government. Mr. McCain would reserve all the savings from our success in Iraq to shrink the deficit, as part of a credible and internally consistent program to balance the budget by the end of his first term. Mr. Obama's program offers no hope, or even a promise, of ever achieving a balanced budget.
Mr. Obama would stimulate the economy by increasing federal spending. Mr. McCain would stimulate the economy by cutting the corporate tax rate. Mr. Obama would expand unionism by denying workers the right to a secret ballot on the decision to form a union, and would dramatically increase the minimum wage. Mr. Obama would also expand the role of government in the economy, and stop reforms in areas like tort abuse.
The states have already tested the McCain and Obama programs, and the results are clear. We now face a national choice to determine if everything that has failed the families of Michigan, Ohio and Illinois will be imposed on a grander scale across the nation. In an appropriate twist of fate, Michigan and Ohio, the two states that have suffered the most from the policies that Mr. Obama proposes, have it within their power not only to reverse their own misfortunes but to spare the nation from a similar fate.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122126282034130461.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
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