Americans have caught on to many of the myths surrounding tax policy and are starting to reject the tax narrative promoted by progressive liberals as reality belies this narrative.
The progressive liberal narrative promotes the idea that taxes are aimed at the very rich to create a sense of fairness among the haves and have-nots in America. Of course, this flies in the face of reality. America was founded upon the idea that all men are created equal and that through hard work anyone could succeed. Success or failure was not guaranteed, but the ability to pursue one’s idea was. There was no mention of fairness in either the Declaration or the Constitution. These foundational documents dealt with individual liberty and protection of property rights to enable Americans to pursue their happiness.
The income tax was originally sold to Americans on the promise that it would only affect rich people earning more than $500,000 a year. It’s funny how we all became rich over the years. The Alternative Minimum Tax was passed in 1969 because 115 families avoided income tax through investment in municipal bonds, yet this pernicious tax currently affects some four million households with the number expected to increase by 27 million on Jan 1, 2013. Coincidently, this is the 100th anniversary of the income tax established by the 16th Amendment. Every tax increase levied on Americans has been promoted as a tax on the rich to insure that they pay their fair share, but has been quickly expanded to the middle class to raise revenue to feed the insatiable government behemoth.
Americans are catching on to code phrases such as “fair share,” “it’s for the kids,” and “soak the rich.” Taxes are always sold as being on the rich when, in reality, the middle class is where the real money resides in America. It has been pointed out numerous times that even if the top 5% of earners were taxed at 100%, there would not be enough revenue to close the federal deficit. Progressive liberals are practiced at the politics of class envy and employ the subterfuge of forcing the rich to pay their “fair share” to garner support among voters for tax increases. They then expand these tax increases to middle class earners and launch new programs to spend the revenues. They create revenue projections that detail all of the increased revenue to the government using flawed analysis that assumes no change in taxpayer behavior which anyone knows to be unrealistic. If taxes are about fairness as they claim, then why do they need all of the revenue projections? If they are about raising revenue, then why do they engage in all the talk of fairness?
It’s simple. The fairness talk is designed to sell the tax increases while the revenue projections are meant to allay suspicions about where this money is going. These are apples and oranges comparisons designed to prevent voters from realizing that these tax increases are aimed at them to pay for progressive liberal spending plans designed along the failed European socialism model. European socialism always depended upon the existence of American capitalism to balance out the world economy and enable their overspending. This is why the Europeans are screaming at America not to follow their socialist path. They depend upon our consumption to pay for their socialist fringe benefits. Without us, they’re broke. This is why all of the European countries are lining up to fall like dominoes. Their debt is unsustainable, their borrowing capacity is maximized, and their ability to repay their obligations has been exhausted.
Americans have been sold the lie that government exists to provide for their every need and that it is the patriotic duty of every American to pay whatever taxes are required by their government to support those of their fellow Americans who are in need. Meanwhile, behind the scenes the politicians are constantly redefining the concept of need as their promises to extend federal largesse in exchange for votes pushes more Americans into these categories of need. Middle class Americans who used to pride themselves on self-sufficiency have become addicted to government benefits and fear the loss of an illusory safety net created by political magicians. They have allowed their greed to cause them to mortgage future generations in pursuit of their lust for instant gratification. Our children are saddled with crushing debt so they can get a COLA increase every year on their Social Security checks.
These tax myths are sold to Americans so voters will continue to keep the political mythmakers in power. This power insulates them from the ravages they foist upon the country in the form of economic misery and loss of individual liberty. Instead of a country were all men are created equal and stand equal before the law, we have become a country where only the wealthy have a chance in court and pursuit of fame and wealth has replaced pursuit of happiness as our national doctrine.