This is cross-posted at Leaving My Marc.
I’ve long thought that the tea partiers were drinking something a bit stronger than tea. Apparently, I was right!
At a March 16th Tea Party demonstration on Capitol Hill, attendees were asked a wide-ranging number of questions by the Frum Forum – including some on taxes. One of the questions asked was, “Are taxes higher, lower or the same as when Obama was inaugurated?” 67 percent (or two-thirds) of tea partiers believed that taxes are now higher, 29 percent believed that they are the same and only 3 percent believed that they were lower.
According to Bruce Bartlett:
…federal taxes are very considerably lower by every measure since Obama became president. In fact, 40% of Obama’s stimulus package involved tax cuts. These include the Making Work Pay Credit, which reduces federal taxes for all taxpayers with incomes below $75,000 by between $400 and $800.
According to the JCT, last year’s $787 billion stimulus bill, enacted with no Republican support, reduced federal taxes by almost $100 billion in 2009 and another $222 billion this year. The Tax Policy Center, a private research group, estimates that close to 90% of all taxpayers got a tax cut last year and almost 100% of those in the $50,000 income range. For those making between $40,000 and $50,000, the average tax cut was $472; for those making between $50,000 and $75,000, the tax cut averaged $522. No taxpayer anywhere in the country had his or her taxes increased as a consequence of Obama’s policies.
As Einstein once said, “If the facts don’t fit the theory, change the facts.” The Tea Party gets an A+ for that!
