2/21/2009

I believe the part about increasing taxes by Obama. I will be interested to see how Obama keeps his other promises

The Washington Post has a discussion of Obama's plans to cut government spending and raise taxes here. Of course, Obama promised to increase defense expenditures so it will be interesting to see what he actually does to cut spending.

To get there, Obama proposes to cut spending and raise taxes. The savings would come primarily from "winding down the war" in Iraq, a senior administration official said. The budget assumes that the nation will continue to spend money on "overseas military contingency operations" throughout Obama's presidency, the official said, but that number is significantly lower than the nearly $190 billion the nation budgeted for Iraq and Afghanistan last year.

Obama also seeks to increase tax collections, primarily by making good on his promise to eliminate the temporary tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 for wealthy taxpayers, whom Obama defined during the campaign as those earning more than $250,000 a year. Those tax breaks would be permitted to expire on schedule for the 2011 tax year, when the top tax rate would rise from 35 percent to more than 39 percent.

Obama also proposes to maintain the tax on estates worth more than $3.5 million, instead of letting it expire next year. And he proposes "a fairly aggressive effort on tax enforcement" that would target tax havens and corporate loopholes, among other provisions, the official said.

Overall, tax collections under the plan would rise from about 16 percent of the economy this year to 19 percent in 2013, while federal spending would drop from about 26 percent of the economy, another post-war high, to 22 percent.

Republicans, who are already painting Obama as a profligate spender, are laying plans to attack him on taxes as well. Even some non-partisan observers question the wisdom of announcing a plan to raise taxes in the midst of a recession. But senior White House adviser David Axelrod said in an interview that the tax proposals reflect the ideas that won the election last fall. . . .

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2 Comments:

Blogger Harry Schell said...

Axlerod is right, if you recall the little interview where Bama was asked about marginal tax rates and failed completely to register that decreasing rates has the proven tendency to increase economic vitality and increase tax revenue more. This is why most of the world has decreased marginal rates, particularly corporate and inheritance tax rates.

This is not in accord with Bama's marxist training or "spread the wealth" doctrine, which he in unable to overcome despite the facts.

Indeed, this debate is not about facts but about building a social model marxists would approve of. Definitely not what made the US what it is and definitely the "stimulus" was the first step.

If you are not happy about "outsourcing" then you will be less happy, as Bama's plan to increase taxation will promote it, absent punitive law to prevent it.

Every taxpayer will lose, directly through higher tithes, or indirectly with everyone else through inflation and more expensive goods, and reduced economic opportunities even if you want to work.

Expanded welfare and healthcare will make unemployment more attractive for the marginally unemployable, so we can expect a permanent increase in welfare rolls to remain with us after this recession passes. One of the few bright lights of the Bill Clinton years has been extinguished.

California has just paved the way Bame intends to go. He has spent too much time with the heiress Pelosi, perhaps. The dark irony of this intentional breach of fiduciary duty to the citizens is that people like Pelosi and in general the political class will not suffer at all for what they are doing to the rest of the country.

2/22/2009 11:34 AM  
Blogger David said...

Let's see; if the government is taking most of what you produce and gives back according to what they feel you need, why would anyone be as productive as possible if they get no more than those who are non-productive?

What will Obama do when the nation as a whole loses productivity?

After all, we are taxed based on productivity via income tax. When our productivity drops Obama will have to raise income taxes to offset the loss of tax income to the government.

It is a dead drop to the bottom-as the government gives more they have to take more. Do people not realize we are paying in every penny the government spends?

2/23/2009 10:13 AM  

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