Anyway, back to 'income inequality'.
Every collectivist progressive loves to tout how 'due to the Bush Tax Cuts, the top 1 percent got filthier rich and the poor just got poorer.' They often cite studies from this or that progressive organization such as the Brookings Institute or the Pew Charitable Trust. As Dr Reynold's article is rather short, there is no need to recreate it here, but suffices to say that it is a simple as choosing what year the comparison begins or ends with. Another simple method is to use before tax numbers to justify increasing taxes. Finally, what components of a group's income are included as income for the various brackets compared is used. The differences can be dramatic.
What Reynolds demonstrates is that the only real way to compare is via actual tax rates, per group over the same time-frame using the same data-set--in other words, comparing apples to apples. Here is a concise breakdown using a single Congressional Budget Office set of data (Dr Reynolds does not actually put this in a table, so I did) This table actually included one of the two years (1979 and 2002) that are routinely used to demonstrate income equality:
Year/Bracket | Top 1% | Middle 20% | Bottom 20% |
1979 | 21.8 | 7.5 | -- |
1989 | 19.9 | -- | (-1.6) |
2000 | -- | 5.0 | (-4.6) |
2005 | 19.4 | 3.0 | (-6.5) |
That is right, folks. Those minus signs are payments to the bottom 20% through things like the Earned Income Tax Credit and other giveaways. Of other people's money. If you were constrained by money in choosing your child's college, for example, now you know where that money went. And yes, everyone has received a tax break. But by far those in the bottom quintile have 'benefited' much more (1.4, vs 4.5 vs at least 4.9).
Although I probably shouldn't stray too far from the point, one perspective that I can't get away from is: In light of the above, just how is Obama planning to give a 'tax cut' to 95% of working Americans?
No comments:
Post a Comment