A study by the NY Times demonstrates that tax rates have fallen for the wealthy in the past thirty years by a far greater amount than for middle income taxpayers, while their incomes have soared.
At the same time, the incomes of most workers have grown only slightly, and their taxes have only gone down a bit.
The rich have become much richer, a with a greater share of income concentrated at the top, and they are taxed less than they once were on every dollar.
But the study shows that if taxes are not raised on the wealthy, the only alternative is to raise taxes on everyone else a lot more than would occur otherwise,or there will have to be deep cuts in Medicare, Social Security, military spending, and other large spending programs.
It is clear that affluent families have the ability and means to hide much of their income, and are therefore putting the burden of taxation on the middle class. There is no sense of responsibility or patriotism that their being more fortunate requires that they willingly pay more taxes as they used to, without complaint, since it is the American system that allowed them the opportunity to achieve more success, and they owe support to the country that gave them that chance.
No one “enjoys” paying taxes, but it is a responsibility of citizenship. It has become a mark of greed and selfishness that those on the top do everything they can to avoid taxes and put the burden on those less fortunate and less able to pay higher taxes.
Future increases in taxation, in any case, is inevitable, whether one likes it or not!
This is a sobering thought on Income Tax Day, April 15!