According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, “CBO data for 2007 (the most recent year available) suggest that 80 percent of U.S. households pay federal tax at a lower rate than the Tax Foundation’s estimated “average” federal tax obligation.”
Here is the first sentence from the mission statement of the Tax Foundation:
The mission of the Tax Foundation is to educate taxpayers about sound tax policy and the size of the tax burden borne by Americans at all levels of government.
Elsewhere on the Tax Foundation’s web site About Us web page, they claim to be “nonpartisan.”
Give me a break! Just look at the key words in their mission statement above. They have a bias against taxes – taxes are a “burden.” Trying to claim Americans, especially the mega and ultra rich, are overtaxed is misleading and partisan.
Taxes are needed and they have been cut too many times and cut excessively for the really rich since WWII. It’s wrong that 10 percent of Americans own 83 percent of the nation’s wealth. Cutting taxes over recent decades has depleted the coffers that built the middle class.
Taxes are about funding those things that protect citizens against abuse of power and empower all citizens to make sure we each have an equal chance to become prosperous. Taxes are about preventing a plutocracy like the one we rebelled against in the late 18th century. Taxes are about controlling the transfer of 83 percent of America’s wealth to the top 10 percent of America’s citizens and stopping the destruction of the middle class. Taxes are about preventing the mega and ultra rich, like the Koch brothers, from buying and owning our democracy through lobbyists and minority groups, like the Tea Party and Republican Senators in our Congress. Taxes are necessary for our democracy. Taxes are the dues we all owe for what we have gained from our way of life where others shared part of their wealth to give each of us a chance to prosper. The more we gain and prosper from the common wealth, the more we owe back to the common wealth.
This is the second time I have pointed out the bias of the Tax Foundation. They don’t believe that taxes can be used for the good of all. They believe tax breaks should favor the rich. Unfortunately, the mega and ultra rich can become too powerful and abuse the middle class.