Dear Senator Obama,
I am a stay-at-home mom living in the over $250k tax bracket. I want to ask you why you feel my family is not doing it's part to share the wealth in this country. Our family does well but we also pay taxes at the highest marginal rate. We do not have millions or the kind of lifestyle that would get us access to tax loopholes. We only get deductions for home mortgage interests, state taxes paid and charitable contributions. Last year those three deductions were capped because the government limits the deductions at our income level. In the past we have been stuck in AMT which ensures we do not underpay our fair share of taxes.
Because of our family's income level, our children will not qualify for student loans or other aid. Therefore we must save entirely for their college. We save as much as we can. In recent weeks lost 30% of those savings as well as a decent amount of our retirement savings and the few mutual fund investments we have are under water. The only other asset we have is our family home. We only have one. It would be really tough to sell it in this market, we've lost a large chunk of our equity.
We have never received a stimulus check, yet we do our part to donate to charities we believe in, invest in the market and spend to keep the economy going. And we pay our taxes. There is no question that the opportunities in this great country have allowed us to achieve the American Dream. For that I am grateful.
Your proposals will take an additional 12% out of our annual family budget by increasing the marginal tax rate and increasing payroll taxes. We aren't struggling yet but we will be if your tax proposals pass. We will have to stop or severely limit college savings, with one child only 3.5 years from college and the savings down 30%. Last year we paid enough in Federal Taxes to supply 240 individuals with a Bush stimulus check, similar to the stimulus plan you propose if you are elected (I guess that continuation of the same Bush economic polices is good). I have no doubt that some of what we paid went to wasteful government projects and earmark spending that did not help any struggling families. You say $18 billion in earmarks is not a lot of money to you but 12% of my family budget is a lot to me and my children. I do not begrudge what we already give the government, but I will argue that we are doing our share. I argue we are patriotic and we are neighborly.
We are upper middle class, we are not like your friends, Oprah and Warren Buffet. Our priorities are saving for our retirement, our kids college and paying off our house. We can comfortably do those three things now, though we are worried about the economy like everyone else.
I am a registered Democrat and have always believed in social programs for those who need them. I still believe in them. But I do not understand why when you speak that it sounds as though my family is getting something over on this country. That we aren't doing our part. That we don't pay enough tax. That we don't do enough to lift others up. I say we are doing a lot by not asking anything from the government. I say it is the government that is letting the American people down, not us.
If this economy gets worse my husbands job will be at risk. We could lose our home along with the remainder of our savings. The only good news I see coming from the Democrats is that maybe then we can have the government contribute to our children's college education, we'll get a tax cut and might finally see one of those stimulus checks. Then you'd finally get your chance to lift my family up.
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6 comments:
Obama is so scary. His idea of wealthy is actually the middle class. He'll tax everyone who is not at poverty level so that the lazy people of this country can get a free ride.
Come on, he is going to raise your taxes to the levels under Clinton. Those days weren't so bad were they?
After the Bush tax cuts our tax code had become seriously regressive. As Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said “I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization.”
That's what he'd like you to think, anusar. He will raise them above the taxes we had under Clinton because his payroll tax increases double the impact of his marginal income tax rate.
When you hear Obama speak of raising the marginal tax rate, he fails to mention the increase in payroll taxes and when he talks about how unfair payroll taxes are for the upper middle class, he forgets to mention they already pay the highest marginal rate, their deductions are capped and we have AMT to ensure enough taxes are paid.
It's well above the level of taxes we had under Clinton. Well above.
The tax code might be regressive at the level of Obama's friends Warren Buffet and Oprah - but do you know how much Buffet invests and how many Oprah employs and how much they both give to charity? I'm not rich like them. I'm upper middle, not uber wealthy. I'm just trying to save for my children's college, I expect nothing from the government other than to let me invest in my own priorities.
If the tax rate really was regressive, you'd have a decent argument. It's not regressive at the $250k level, you should do some more research.
Personally, I feel that all American people that work full time work hard enough to earn enough money to live comfortably. What does your husband do for a living that warrants his 250k or more a year that all hardworking Americans don't? My mother has been a teacher for 20 years and makes a little over 50k a year. Does she not work hard enough after earning a masters degree and paying for it all on her lowly teachers income? Maybe Obama's plan is to level the playing field just a bit so that all hardworking people have a chance to live the life that you and your hardworking husband enjoy. I don't feel that the wealth is spread in the right places as things stand today. Why should a football player or a celebrity live their rich lives when the rest of us are busting our buns daily to live paycheck to paycheck and also not be able to send our children to college?
Thank you for your post Karin. I think your post is the class warfare I keep hearing about on the news. My husband having a high paying job is not in any way taking something away from your mom or anyone else. It's an agreement between a company (who employs a lot of people btw) for services rendered by my husband. They decide he's worth that.
Obama will not level the playing field much. He proposes a $500 tax credit and some other credits that your mom may or may not qualify for. That isn't leveling the playing field much.
What is your hope, that people no longer earn more than your mother? Or do you hope that all the federal income tax burden is born by those who do earn over $250k? If they take no federal income tax from those who are in the bottom 1/3 in wage earners (see tax foundation website for this) already, and half the tax burden is paid by the top 5% isn't that already shifting the burden quite a lot?
Irrational reasoning and buying the American vote.
Our government continues to give away the efforts of the middle class in order to buy the votes of those that will not do for themselves and our elected representatives apparently have not learned any lesson from the recent financial crisis or the public outcry that resulted from it.
The initial 700 BILLION DOLLAR give away had risen to almost 850 BILLION DOLLARS when all of the special interest earmarks were added on.
I for one applaud Pennsylvania moms honesty, its about time that the citizenry of the USA starts to take some responsibility for themselves, if we ultimately create a socialist environment and wind up destroying the middle class that has supported this country by taking away the initiative that drives the desire to better oneself, who will pay the bills then?
The ultra rich have more loop holes and specialized accountants to preserve their wealth and many of them have already moved much of their assets off shore, so who will fund the operation of the government then?
My grandparents were immigrants that did not speak the language, but yet they found work and created lives for themselves and their children in pursuit of a dream, if everything were given to them at that time, would they have worked so hard to achieve that dream or would they have settled for the status quo and not worked so hard to better themselves?
Even during the great depression there were no free rides, do a Google search on the Works Project Administration and see just how many public projects were built by men that left their families to earn a government paycheck that they could send back home to better the lives of their families.
I firmly believe that giving a person a hand out instead of a hand up will destroy what made this country great and trying to shame someone for bettering themselves is simply a ploy to buy the votes of those that won't get off of their asses to do for themselves.
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