The Lead: Taxing The Rich
credit: youtube
President Biden is on tour to promote his American Families Plan and his infrastructure plan. He kicked off his tour on Monday in Virginia where he reiterated his idea of increasing taxes on corporations and wealthy Americans to pay for it all.
“I think it’s about time we started giving tax breaks and tax benefits to working-class families and middle-class families, instead of just the very wealthy,” the President said.
He continues to use the phrase “fair share” and assure Americans that this will mostly affect corporate America. This ignores two fundamental truths: 1. Fair is not an objective word. 2. Most middle-class Americans have their savings and retirement accounts invested in the stock market so they will be affected by higher corporate taxes indirectly.
The economy is an interrelated system. We must not pretend that doing something to one group does not affect others.
But something must be done to increase revenue due to all this government borrowing. The U.S. plans to borrow nearly $1.3 trillion over the next two quarters. Borrowing for the current quarter is nearly five times what was expected before the President’s $1.9 trillion relief bill. That puts federal debt on track to reach 108% of gross domestic product, which is the highest level of government debt since World War II.
So maybe we should ditch the word “fair” altogether? Is it "fair" to put this debt on the next generation? Is it "fair" to borrow your way out of a slump? Is it "fair" to leave crumbling infrastructure to the next generation? These are tricky questions that require tricky solutions but it has nothing to do with fairness.
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