Victor Davis Hanson: Why Not Soak the Rich?
[NRO contributor Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, the editor of Makers of Ancient Strategy: From the Persian Wars to the Fall of Rome, and the author of The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern.]
...Who exactly are the “rich”? Zillionaires such as Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and George Soros surely are. But these wealthiest individuals have so much money at their disposal that they don’t care much about income-tax rates. Their tax lawyers have found ingenious ways to divert millions of what would be owed to Uncle Sam by funding tax-free pet causes, private foundations, and favored charities — in a way not available to those who make far less than a million dollars a year.
Is annual income a good gauge of wealth? Who is richer — the architect in Monterey, Calif., who makes $250,000 a year and who paid $700,000 for a modest house while picking up the full tab of $50,000 a year for his daughter at a private liberal-arts college, or the engineer in Salt Lake City, Utah, making $100,000 a year who has a house twice as large at half the cost, and whose son is on a need-based scholarship at the university? Should annual income alone trump all other considerations when the costs of living vary widely by region, and eligibility for billions of dollars in federal and state subsidies is predicated on income levels?...
Income levels are not static. Belonging to the upper brackets is not always a matter of privilege or inheritance. Some Americans go in and out of the top tax brackets depending on the economy. Others are “rich” for only a few years in their 50s and 60s — making far less before and after....
Read entire article at VDH's Private Papers
...Who exactly are the “rich”? Zillionaires such as Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and George Soros surely are. But these wealthiest individuals have so much money at their disposal that they don’t care much about income-tax rates. Their tax lawyers have found ingenious ways to divert millions of what would be owed to Uncle Sam by funding tax-free pet causes, private foundations, and favored charities — in a way not available to those who make far less than a million dollars a year.
Is annual income a good gauge of wealth? Who is richer — the architect in Monterey, Calif., who makes $250,000 a year and who paid $700,000 for a modest house while picking up the full tab of $50,000 a year for his daughter at a private liberal-arts college, or the engineer in Salt Lake City, Utah, making $100,000 a year who has a house twice as large at half the cost, and whose son is on a need-based scholarship at the university? Should annual income alone trump all other considerations when the costs of living vary widely by region, and eligibility for billions of dollars in federal and state subsidies is predicated on income levels?...
Income levels are not static. Belonging to the upper brackets is not always a matter of privilege or inheritance. Some Americans go in and out of the top tax brackets depending on the economy. Others are “rich” for only a few years in their 50s and 60s — making far less before and after....