Buffett Rule demagoguery
By Boston Herald Editorial Staff
Sunday, April 15, 2012 -
Sunday, April 15, 2012 -
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Campaigning in 2008, candidate Barack Obama told ABC he didn’t care that raising the capital gains tax rate might reduce revenues; a higher rate would increase “fairness.” He’s now playing a different instrument in his vote-seeking sonata of envy and resentment, the so-called Buffett Rule.
The president wants all those with incomes above $1 million to pay at least 30 percent of it in federal taxes regardless of what their obligation would otherwise be. The provision is named after financier Warren Buffett, who noted that his federal tax rate, about 17 percent, was less than his secretary’s, 36 percent. (Details have never been published, but Buffett has hinted that Social Security payroll taxes might be included.)
Obama now admits — he didn’t used to — the rule would be a “gimmick” in terms of deficit reduction. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates the rule would raise $47 billion over 10 years, 0.1 percent of expenditures projected in Obama’s proposed budget and 0.5 percent of the projected increase in the national debt.
But even then Washington’s phalanx of lobbyists would be all over any new provision like a cheap suit. There’s a good chance this alleged loophole closer would sprout loopholes of its own.
The Buffett Rule may poll well, but we see no spontaneous demand for it. Mitt Romney was absolutely correct in commenting, “Dividing America is not going to work out.”
Anybody who hasn’t detected spontaneous anger over the complexity of the tax code (requiring 73,608 pages in the CCH Standard Federal Tax Reporter) hasn’t paid attention. Billionaire Warren Buffett did nothing that Congress did not encourage him to do. A proposal from Obama for a real tax simplification would be an advance; the Buffett Rule is old-fashioned demagoguery.
The president wants all those with incomes above $1 million to pay at least 30 percent of it in federal taxes regardless of what their obligation would otherwise be. The provision is named after financier Warren Buffett, who noted that his federal tax rate, about 17 percent, was less than his secretary’s, 36 percent. (Details have never been published, but Buffett has hinted that Social Security payroll taxes might be included.)
Obama now admits — he didn’t used to — the rule would be a “gimmick” in terms of deficit reduction. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates the rule would raise $47 billion over 10 years, 0.1 percent of expenditures projected in Obama’s proposed budget and 0.5 percent of the projected increase in the national debt.
The Buffett Rule may poll well, but we see no spontaneous demand for it. Mitt Romney was absolutely correct in commenting, “Dividing America is not going to work out.”
Anybody who hasn’t detected spontaneous anger over the complexity of the tax code (requiring 73,608 pages in the CCH Standard Federal Tax Reporter) hasn’t paid attention. Billionaire Warren Buffett did nothing that Congress did not encourage him to do. A proposal from Obama for a real tax simplification would be an advance; the Buffett Rule is old-fashioned demagoguery.
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