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Sunday, July 19, 2009
Kevin McCullough :: Townhall.com Columnist
Obama's plan: 58% Tax Rates
by Kevin McCullough
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I was asked this past Thursday morning on Fox News about the impact of President Obama spending the day in New Jersey campaigning for the immensely unpopular sitting governor Jon Corzine. I was asked if it was a good use of the President's time. I was asked if there were bigger things he should be focused on. I was asked if it might not even backfire against Corzine or other candidates in the immediate electoral future. Obama dedicated not just a speech, but the entire day to the Corzine cause.

My response is simple, "It's what he has to do."

President Obama now finds himself facing a political divorce on his policies while most Americans still find him a likable guy.

"But job performance counts, words mean things, and elections have consequences," I proffered.

And when the most read New York daily newspaper plasters its front page with the new startling fact that the marginal tax rates for small businesses will be jumping from 35% to 58%, we can understand one other important truth. President Obama is hurting working class people.

Let me break it down for you with some common sense. If a small business owner has revenue of $250,000 for a year of business and is forced to cough up the current top tax rate of 35%, said business owner is left with $162,000. Doing nothing but letting the Bush tax relief for small businesses expire, the business owner will have only $155,000 left. But bumping the rate to the suggested 58% (according to the Tax Foundation) the small business man is left with only $105,000 of the original $250,000 of revenue. And what did the Obama administration do to help that business owner earn the $250,000 in revenue?

Nada...

So why are they entitled to nearly six dollars out of every ten that a small business owner earns?

A top margin tax rate of 6 cents out of every 10 cents earned sort of ceases to be taxation and begins to look like outright theft. This stunts growth, slows production, eliminates jobs, and brings markets to abrupt halts.

If the administration also does as it has implied, that business owner might also then be forced to offer expensive health insurance programs to workers who may or may not wish to be covered by the company's plan. Of course the employees would also then be taxed for those benefits.

Let's also be clear: this is not a debate between the left and right. Democrats spoke at both of the recent Tea Parties I keynoted. And little hole-in-the-wall eateries in the meatpacking district of Manhattan have to make a payroll just as the Christian book shop owner in Texas does. Continued...
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About The Author
Kevin McCullough is the nationally syndicated host of "'Xtreme' Radio and columnist based in New York. He blogs at www.muscleheadrevolution.com. His second book "The Kind Of MAN Every Man SHOULD Be" is in stores now.

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Reply # 1
Date: Aug 7, 2009 - 4:37 PM EST
Believe!
I used to travel to Canada quite a bit and one time my contact had just been paid when I arrived. I jokingly said that the party was on him tonight and he said he thought he had enough for a beer apiece. He showed me his chech stub and they had decucted 54% of his pay for taxes due to all the socialized programs they have in place. That IS going to happen here! If you want to play you have to pay. I also was subjected to their medical system once. What a nightmare since I wasn't a citizen their first priority was to see how they were going to be paid NOT my medical problems. The afore mentioned individuals father-in-law had heart troubles and was put on a waiting list of 6 months during which he died waiting for a surgery. You folks need to wake up as the "CHANGE" is going to ruin us all.
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Reply # 2
Date: Jul 20, 2009 - 1:10 PM EST
Helping Reduce Our Deficit
Let's stop trying to undermine our President's attempt to reduce our deficit.

RECOVERING FROM THE BUSH TAX CUTS: "It certainly is okay for me to tell my friends on Wall Street, who just got a bonus of $600,000, that they're going to pay more in taxes so that we can lower health care costs in America," Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said.

SURCHARGE WON'T AFFECT SMALL BUSINESSES: A favorite conservative claim is that any tax increase on the top one percent will disproportionately affect small businesses. "Half of those people [who would have to pay the tax] derive their income from small businesses, half of those people are making the decision about whether to hire Americans or not," said Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA). But according to both the Joint Tax Committee on Taxation and the Tax Policy Center, "96 percent of taxpayers with business income would not owe the surcharge." Furthermore, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities pointed out that "the 4 percent of remaining 'small businesses' affected by the surcharge include taxpayers that stretch the definition of the term, including partners in large law and accounting firms and investors who have stakes in Wall Street investment partnerships." Due to the stimulus package that Congress passed in February, small businesses are actually receiving tax breaks, and as Rangel said, in the House's health care legislation, "we exempt small business from a lot of the penalties. We give tax credits so that they're able to hire and get people healthcare in small businesses."
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