Tax cuts for the wealthy are sacrosanct; tax cuts for everyone else don’t really matter.

[kpete]

.............

America’s presumably anti-tax party wants to raise your taxes. Come January, the Republicans plan to raise the taxes of anyone who earns $50,000 a year by $1,000, and anyone who makes $100,000 by $2,000.

Their tax hike doesn’t apply to income from investments. It doesn’t apply to any wage income in excess of $106,800 a year. It’s the payroll tax that they want to raise — to 6.2 percent from 4.2 percent of your paycheck, a level established for one year in December’s budget deal at Democrats’ insistence. Unlike the capital gains tax, or the low tax rates for the rich included in the Bush tax cuts, or the carried interest tax for hedge fund operators (which is just 15 percent), the payroll tax chiefly hits the middle class and the working poor…

Republicans like to complain that Democrats practice “class warfare” and “the politics of division,” as House GOP leader Eric Cantor argued on this page Monday. What the Republicans’ position on the payroll tax makes high-definitionally clear is their own class warfare on working- and middle-class Americans. Their double standard couldn’t be more obvious: Tax cuts for the wealthy are sacrosanct; tax cuts for everyone else don’t really matter. Norquist, Cantor, Ryan, Camp, the Journal editorialists and the whole Republican crew give hypocrisy a bad name.

MORE:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-gop-will-raise-taxes--on-the-middle-class-and-working-poor/2011/08/23/gIQAEDJuZJ_story.html?hpid=z3

[PSPS]

1. In this case, this "tax holiday" undermines social security.

This "tax holiday" should expire. It was a ridiculous idea to begin with because its long-term implications seriously undermine the social security system. The reason this affects only those making under $106K/year is due to the design of FICA and that should be addressed (raising the cap, for instance.) But keeping this "tax holiday" permanent is a very bad idea and I question the motives of anyone who suggests otherwise.

[Little Star]

3. [phone]

[raccoon]

2. K&R K&R K&R . nt

[gristy]

4. The payroll tax cut was never a good idea

That particular tax cut should not be extended. And of course, while we're at it, we need to not extend the bush tax cut.