Democrats are publicly crawling over each other to see who can cut taxes more than the next one. Has hell frozen over?
Or maybe this is just one more example of Democrats saying one thing while doing another.
The new Democrat governor of Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, ran as a moderate. However, as soon as she was elected, she proposed 50 (yes, 50) new taxes in coordination with her colleagues in the Legislature. Nowhere was there a proposal for cutting expenditures.
The country’s new leader of the communists (sorry, socialists), New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, has a city budget that is larger than the gross national product of 125 countries, but he has also said he won’t be cutting anything. He has effectively put a gun to the head of the state Legislature while telling it to either give him tax increases on the most successful residents or higher property taxes for everyone.
These are the Democrats we know and love.
They were echoing their West Coast comrades, who have created class warfare at the highest levels. The state of Washington has tagged anyone who is making over $1 million a year with a previously unallowed income tax at 9.9%. California likes to do everything in a big way. It didn’t waste its time on puny millionaires, instead going after billionaires. It wants to confiscate 5% of their net worth.
The affordability issue exploded on the political scene, driven by the outsized spending that the Biden administration created in coordination Democrats in Congress. The gargantuan expenditures were funded from the Democrats’ imaginary “money tree” and caused inflation not seen since the 1970s, which in turn caused a severe recession.
Everything from the cost of a bacon and egg breakfast to houses became more costly and unaffordable for many. That brought the Democrats’ most loathed person, Donald Trump, back to the presidency.
Like a lightning bolt from Zeus, Democrats offered us tax proposals we never thought we would see. Sens. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., and Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., have proposed the Working Americans’ Tax Cut Act, eliminating income taxes on anyone earning under $46,000 for an individual or $92,000 for a couple. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., has offered the Keep Your Pay Act, raising the standard deduction to $37,500 for individuals and $75,000 for couples.
None of these people voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed less than a year ago. It eliminated taxes on overtime pay and tip income for many people at these earning levels. We didn’t hear a peep from these senators when that bill was being discussed that those provisions did not go far enough. They just castigated it because it came from Trump.
Katie Porter has jumped into the now-warmed-up pool with her own proposal. The former member of Congress decided she must revive her floundering campaign for California governor. She wants to eliminate California’s outsized state income taxes on anyone making under $100,000. Last year, she did not take the opportunity to campaign for adopting the federal rules of no tax on tips or overtime.
There is a problem with the Democrats’ proposals, as there always is when it comes to your money. If these proposals were adopted, it would be another weapon in their class warfare chest. An estimated 40% of Americans already pay no income tax. In California, that is estimated to be between 45% and 50% of taxpayers already paying no income tax. Those levels will soar if any of these proposals are adopted.
The problem is that the tax base would shrink even more with no commensurate cut in government to offset the loss of revenues. That would cause even greater class warfare against the people with incomes above those levels. It would be simple to convince people to vote for tax increases on “the other” as the money is not coming from their pockets. That is exactly the concept behind the proposed referendum for the billionaire tax.
To that point, both the Van Hollen and Booker proposal quietly offset their tax cuts by raising taxes on “the rich.” Van Hollen raises the top tax rate by 12%, while Booker raises the top tax rate by 6%. This is clear evidence that their tax cuts are just class warfare.
It always ends up hurting you when you tax the “other guy.”
Democrats’ supposed tax cuts are a charade. They always have a hidden motive. No, hell has not frozen over. The Democrats are just doing their newest version of punishing success.
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