Why Will Franklin Is An Economic Genious

Will (of Willisms) has unearthed things such as his constantly updating Social Security Reform Thursday (55 issues and growing), and especially his 375th Trivia Tidbit, which covers the Bush Tax Cuts which Democrats have long beat the drum of only benefiting the rich. However, as Will points out, the greatest beneficiary was in fact the lower 50% of income makers.
Will uses Jon Kyl's analysis of the Democrat plan to repeal the tax cuts, and with that, they will raise taxes on everyone, except the rich. Will points out that the wealthiest 10% of people have actually paid more taxes with the tax cuts than if the cuts were repealed.
Right now, the top 1% of Americans pay 32.4% of the taxes in the United States (Compared to 32.3% before), the top 5% pay 53.3% (compared to 51.6% before the "cuts") and the top 10% pay 65.7% (compared with 63.6% before). But if the Democrats have their way, then the tax burden of the lowest 50% will increase from 3.4% of the total tax revenue to 4% of the government's tax revenue. If repealed, the lowest 50% of tax payers will have an increase of 17% in their taxes. Here are some other numbers:

According to the Treasury Department, all American taxpayers will experience a tax increase if the 2001 and 2003 tax provisions are not made permanent. On average:

* 115 million taxpayers will see a $1,716 increase.
* 84 million women will see a $1,970 increase.
* 48 million married couples will see a $2,726 increase.
* 42 million families with children will see a $2,084 increase.
* 12 million single women with children will see a $1,062 increase.
* 17 million seniors will see a $2,034 increase.
* 26 million small business owners will see a $3,637 increase.
* More than 5 million low-income individuals and couples will no longer be exempt from individual income tax.

And who is going to head the Ways and Means Committee, and will write our new tax laws? Charles "I love taxes" Rangel.