Power Line Blog has some of the numbers on the budget President Obama submitted to Congress. According to their research:
“Even the most basic inspection of the IRS income tax statistics shows that raising taxes on the salaries, dividends and capital gains of those making more than $250,000 can’t possibly raise enough revenue to fund Mr. Obama’s new spending ambitions.
Consider the IRS data for 2006, the most recent year that such tax data are available and a good year for the economy and “the wealthiest 2%.” Roughly 3.8 million filers had adjusted gross incomes above $200,000 in 2006. (That’s about 7% of all returns; the data aren’t broken down at the $250,000 point.) These people paid about $522 billion in income taxes, or roughly 62% of all federal individual income receipts. The richest 1% — about 1.65 million filers making above $388,806 — paid some $408 billion, or 39.9% of all income tax revenues, while earning about 22% of all reported U.S. income.”
This budget is not workable, but I don’t believe it can be stopped. The current income tax system is not fair, and what President Obama plans to do will only make it more unfair. At some point, the people generating wealth are going to resent giving it to people who are not working, and we will have another Boston Tea Party.