Obama's Middle-Class Tax Cut Bigger than McCain's

[RunInRed 16,492]

In his effort to run the best campaign of 1980, John McCain has hauled out the dusty tax-and-spend label from the GOP basement and tried to wrap it around Barack Obama. He's even opened the crate where they keep the "biggest tax increase in history" banner (well-worn, since Republicans use it every election cycle) to attach it to Obama's proposed tax plan. In a way, it's nice to see that Republicans don't bother to change one word of their approach, even when they've just finished executing the fiscal equivalent of a plane crash. On a nursing home. With nuclear weapons.

And of course, McCain's statements aren't talkin' anywhere near straight, as as fact-checker Larry Rohter points out:

In a study of the candidates' plans made public Wednesday, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center concluded that in contrast to Mr. McCain, "Senator Obama offers much larger tax breaks to low- and middle-income taxpayers and would increase taxes on high-income taxpayers.

The study said, “The largest tax cuts, as a share of income, would go to those at the bottom of the income distribution,” whereas “Senator McCain’s tax cuts would primarily benefit those with very high incomes.”

Other groups that focus on tax and economic policy are preparing similar analyses, but say they regard the Tax Policy Center’s assessment as highly reliable, based on its work in the past.

Mr. McCain is correct when he says that Mr. Obama intends to increase the maximum tax rate on capital gains, the bulk of which fall on the wealthiest segment of the population, and that he would be less generous in offering breaks on the estate tax. But he tends to play down or ignore Mr. Obama’s proposals to eliminate taxes for retirees earning less than $50,000 a year and to give tax breaks to workers earning less than $75,000 annually.

“McCain is picking the areas where rates go up and ignoring the areas where Obama is trying to rebalance the tax code so that taxpayers would save,” said John Irons, research and policy director at the Economic Policy Institute, which is generally viewed as sympathetic to working families. Mr. Irons said that “the important thing is to look at overall impact on people” and that on this score, “the vast majority of the population, almost the entirety of the middle class, would see more from Obama than McCain.”

Economists have also criticized the methodology behind Mr. McCain’s assertion that Americans from all kinds of backgrounds could end up paying thousands of dollars more in taxes if Mr. Obama got his way. Several criticized him as apparently basing his claim on an average figure in which, as Mr. Irons said, “Bill Gates is mixed with you and me, and everything gets skewed.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25133125/

[Tigermike 3,055]

What does Obama & the dim congress have in mind for the Bush tax cuts?

[autigeremt 6,716]

EXACTLY!

They say "Oh, it's not a tax increase, it's a rollback".....

GOD LAWD HAVE MERCY

[Auburn85 432]

wow, so McBush's cuts the last 7ish years won't equate Obama's proposed tax cuts. my gracious. that does it... i'm voting for Obama.