This dishonest characterization has picked up steam recently as these tax cuts are about to expire, and the tax-loving press have campaigned for their departure as if a plague on the society.
For his part, President Obama is advocating the expiration of tax cuts only to couples making over $250,000 a year and individuals making more than $200,000.
With this in mind, the Tax Policy Center, a division of the liberal Brookings Institution, published a report on July 29 that included Treasury Department estimates of tax revenue losses that would accompany an extension of Bush's cuts.
Inside the accompanying PDF was evidence the Left and their media minions have been misrepresenting the beneficiaries of these cuts for a very long time:
As this is likely very difficult to read, there are three crucial components to this report:
This shows that the total ten-year cost of extending the Bush tax cuts is estimated by Treasury to be $3.675 trillion.
Next, Treasury estimated the ten-year revenue gain of not extending these cuts to couples making over $250,000 and individuals making more than $200,000:
This shows that by following Obama's recommendations, Treasury is estimated to receive $679 billion extra in the ten years after 2010.
Finally, Treasury estimated the ten-year cost of extending the Bush tax cuts except to Obama's description of high-wage earners:
So, let's put all the pieces together.
According to Treasury, the total ten-year cost of completely extending the Bush tax cuts is $3.675 trillion. The ten-year cost exclusively associated with extending tax cuts to folks Obama, the Democrats, and the media consider rich is $679 billion.
This means that almost $3 trillion of the cost associated with the Bush tax cuts over the next ten years, or 82 percent, is not for benefits to the so-called rich.
As such, despite what the Left and their media minions have been claiming, 82 percent of the Bush tax cuts benefited the poor, middle-class, and upper-middle class in this country.
And, despite the preceding appearing at a conservative website, this data was originally published by a division of a liberal think tank.
As the media love quoting reports from the Brookings Institution, I'm sure we'll see this information splashed all over a TV set near you in the coming days...but I wouldn't hold my breath!
