On Tax Day, thank Democrats for your lower tax bills

by folkbum

It may not seem like it, given the relative availability of pennies in your pocket to rub together in these recessed economic times, but unless you're one of the very, very wealthy few (and if you are, why the hell are you reading my blog?), your income tax rates are lower this year than in the past.

At the federal level, 98% of working Americans (99% in Wisconsin, pdf) are paying less in income taxes, with none of the other federal taxes increased either. The bulk of that reduction in taxes came from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009, a bill no Republicans voted for.

At the state level, state tax rates and spending are lower than they have been in nearly 40 years. This, too, is the result of work by Democrats without support from Republicans.

The challenge, of course, is that this reality is not well publicized and, consequently, not well believed. For example, the new NYT/CBS poll (via) of the "tea party' people gathering, perhaps even as you read this, across the nation to protest their taxation with representation, finds that among the tea-party crowd, 64% think Democrats have raised their taxes. This corresponds well to what conservative apostate David Frum found that tea-drinkers overestimated, by a factor of eight, how high taxes really are.

What to do to overcome this reality is beyond my ken; the best I can offer is this post reminding people of the truth: Republicans talk tough on tax rhetoric, but Democrats deliver. Do not be deceived.