Middle Class Tax Reform

A simple idea: If we want to cut taxes on middle class wage earners, why don't we simply cut the taxes of middle class wage earners? The payroll tax is currently set at 16% of the first roughly $120,000 of your income. Your income thereafter is not subject to the payroll tax.

Here:

The top line is the combined payroll tax. The green shaded area rising on the left is the maximum amount of money that is subject to the payroll tax.

In all of the recent debate about cutting taxes and the massive cut in corporate income taxes, cutting the payroll tax was never even brought up. Just think about that the next time you hear Mike Pence or some equally obnoxious a$$bag talk about how they delivered "middle class tax relief."

Again, if you want to cut taxes on the middle class, it seems that a good place to start would be by CUTTING TAXES ON THE MIDDLE CLASS.

For the record, when I say that the payroll tax is a "regressive" tax, I mean that it hurts those who make less than the threshold a lot more than those who make more than the threshold. If I earn $100,000/year, my entire income is subjected to this. However, if I make $400,000/year, only the income I make through roughly mid-April is subjected to this.

A data point:

Note that this chart is dated 2010, when we reduced the payroll tax temporarily as part of Obama's "stimulus." I think the chart speaks for itself and leads me to say, one final time for this post:

If you want to reduce taxes on the middle class, a good way to start would be by reducing taxes on the middle class. If you want to reduce taxes on the wealthy, you reduce taxes on the wealthy. If you want to reduce taxes on the wealthy and get re-elected, you reduce taxes on the wealthy and then cite some discredited economic theory (i.e. trickle down economics) to justify it.