Hello Flat Tax!

Bush wants to:

• Eliminate the marriage "penalty".
• End double taxation.
• Abolish the estate tax.
• Eliminate taxes on dividends.
• Cut taxes the most for people who pay the most.

What do all these notions have in common?

Each is another step away from taxing according to ability. Take, for instance, the marriage "penalty." The tax code assumes that if people are married, they share certain expenses and thus are more able to pay taxes than two people living separately. Of course, this is a generalization, but that happens all the time (some children are much more expensive to raise than others, but everyone gets the same credit).

Bush is oblivious to the idea that for those better off, it's less of a burden to pay higher taxes than someone less fortunate. So abolish the estate tax - no matter how big that estate is. Eliminate taxes on dividends - even though most are destined for the wealthy. "Ability to pay" has no meaning to Bush. Which is another way of saying to Americans:

Hello Flat Tax!

It's remarkable how the discussion about taxes has been dominated by these "non-ability" arguments. By positing the notion of equality in the tax code (equal standard deduction for married vs two individuals, equal treatment of corporate debt vs dividends, cut taxes proportional to how much is paid) the debate is immediately moved away from how easy (or hard) it is for people to pay X dollars on Y income. And once you do that, everybody looks the same, and so everybody deserves to be taxed the same. Right?

posted by Quiddity at 1/08/2003 08:21:00 AM