"It profits me but little that a vigilant authority always protects the tranquillity of my pleasures and constantly averts all dangers from my path, without my care or concern, if this same authority is the absolute master of my liberty and my life."

--Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Fairness

You can make the case that a progressive income tax is a reasonable way of funding the government and a reasonable reflection of our priorities that subsidizing things like raising children (child credits) in a home (mortgage deduction) and giving some money to your church (charitable deductions) are good things that we should do first, before the government starts taking money in taxes.   The following chart from the Heritage Foundation reflects that progressivity in the tax code:




What I don't think you can argue is that the top 1% or top 5% don't already pay their "fair share."   Maybe it would be necessary for them to pay more, or reasonable for them to pay more, or rational for them to pay more, but it isn't fair, and we ought not to fall for that rhetoric.  

And, by the way, the rest of us ought to be grateful, not bitter, toward the 1%.

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