The Untaxed Middle and Working Casses: A Losing Issue

Ari Fleischer on the current income tax code: Everyone Should Pay Income Taxes http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123958260423012269.html 

This is a talking point that is a loser.  I think that the Obama tax increases are a bad idea.  Lets get that on the table.  I also think that complaining about the cosmic injustice of how much top earners currently pay in income taxes is also a political loser.  Trying to build a politics in which the lower 50% of wage earners actually get a tax increase in the interest of fairness is sick.  For one thing, wage earners at the lower end of the scale already pay a major fraction of their income into federal taxes in the form of payroll taxes (Fleischer mentions payroll taxes but not the bite they take out of the wallet or the role they play in paying for the government).

There is really no better way for conservatives to show how out of touch they are with the concerns of struggling Americans than to tell them that they are not pulling their weight under our current tax regime.  I'm no economist, but the impression I get is that living standards for folks in the lower and middle parts of the income distribution have stagnated in the last ten years or so.  Instead of focusing on market oriented ways of raising those living standards (I would start with healthcare reform myself), some conservatives seem more interested in telling those same people that they need to pay more to the government and that this will in some way rebound to their benefit in the future through higher economic growth.  And even if it doesn't it is only fair.

Find some middle-aged person who is earning less than forty thousand dollars and try to sell them that policy agenda.  Start by telling them that they don't really pay taxes.  Let me know how it goes.