Taxes & The Federal Budget

September 25, 2012

Ensuring the common good should be the introduction to policy making in regards to taxes and the federal budget. There is no question that our national debt needs to be reduced and our spending needs to be reined in. Yet the moral dilemma our nation faces is how we achieve these goals without losing the soul of America. For too long, our military spending has trumped investments in education, health care and balancing our budget. No part of our national budget should be sacred when it comes to spending cuts; rather, the well-being of the most vulnerable in our society should be our sacred duty.

President Barack Obama:

1. Obama and Democrats are fighting to strengthen the nation’s economy and create jobs for American workers by ending tax loopholes for corporations, providing tax cuts to small businesses, investing in a clean-energy economy and putting Americans to work rebuilding our infrastructure.

2. Obama proposed the Buffet Rule asking millionaires and billionaires to do their fair share.

But he said that “if you're one of the 98 percent of American families who make under $250,000 a year, your taxes won’t go up.”

3. The President has asked Congress to take action to reform our tax code and close tax loopholes for millionaires and billionaires, as well as hedge fund managers, private jet owners, and oil companies.

4. http://www.barackobama.com/taxes?source=primary-nav

5. “Asking millionaires to pay their fair share

No household making more than $1 million each year should pay a smaller share of their income in taxes than a middle-class family pays.”

6. “Investing in the middle class

President Obama knows we can’t simply cut our way to prosperity. His budget includes investments in education, manufacturing, and infrastructure, while brining discretionary spending to its lowest level as a share of the economy in more than 50 years .

7. “Reducing the deficit by more than $4 trillion over the next decade

President Obama has put forward a specific, balanced plan of spending cuts and revenue increases that reduce the deficit by more than $4 trillion over the next decade, including $1 trillion in spending cuts he signed into law last summer as part of a deal with congressional Republicans.”

(Sources: http://www.democrats.org/issues/economy_and_job_creation; http://www.barackobama.com/record/taxes?source=primary-nav)

Republican Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney:

1. To repair the nation’s tax code, marginal rates must be brought down to stimulate entrepreneurship, job creation and investment, while still raising the revenue needed to fund a smaller, smarter, simpler government.

2. Romney insists that “the principle of fairness must be preserved in federal tax and spending policy,” in which “lower marginal tax rates secure for all Americans the economic gains from tax reform.”

3. Romney also said the U.S. economy’s 35 percent corporate tax rate is among the highest in the industrial world, reducing the ability of our nation’s businesses to compete in the global economy and to invest and create jobs at home.”

4. Paul Ryan Plan: http://paulryan.house.gov/issues/issue/?IssueID=9974

5. “Path to Prosperity

House Republicans have pledged to lead where the President has failed.  The budget advanced by the House of Representatives on March 29, 2012 helps spur job creation today, stops spending money the government does not have, and lifts the crushing burden of debt.  The Path to Prosperity cuts more than $5 trillion in spending from the President's budget over the next 10 years, putting the budget on the path to balance and the economy on the path to prosperity.  Specifically, the budget:

(Source: http://www.mittromney.com/issues/tax)




Help us continue our work with a quick
one-time or monthly donation.

MAKE A DONATION