WEEKS 101

jakke:

So here are the two federal tax rate proposals that the US will almost certainly be facing in the 2012 election. It’s impressive how the only difference in their plans is at the very top of the distribution, where’s there’s a really sharp divergence in tax rates. (Seriously unimpressed by the misleading graph, incidentally. The top 20% are all spread out here, which makes the increase look way more gradual at the top. Not cool.) I’d like to imagine this is kind of a legacy of the whole “99 Percent” slogan-related campaign - everyone has noticed that the wealth distribution in the United States is vastly unequal (to be fair, you’d basically have to be in a coma not to notice this) and now the question is whether the government should shake down those inordinately wealthy few or let them continue to bleed the economy dry and stash their capital away in overseas factories and unproductive derivatives markets.

Also it’s worth noting that Romney’s proposal leaves a huge hole in government spending, of 5-6% of GDP in a good year. He’s promised to balance the federal budget without cutting defence spending, but realistically that’s totally infeasible. And any expense shocks (e.g., a war or financial crash) would leave an even bigger gap.