Dear Editor:
The proposal by Oregon lawmakers to eliminate taxes on low-income persons by hiking taxes on those who earn more than $100,000 is just welfare dressed up as tax relief.
The proposal includes the state sending checks to persons whose tax credit would exceed their taxes paid. This would simply shuffle money from some people to others.
Tax burdens have been increasing on people in the higher tax brackets. As the Tax Foundation in Washington, DC recently noted, “According to the most recent IRS data available, the top 10 percent of households–with incomes roughly $100,000 or greater–pay roughly 70 percent of all federal income taxes. That share is up from just below 50 percent in 1980.”
Rather than cut taxes on some people and raise them on others, Oregon lawmakers should cut everyone’s taxes by controlling spending on existing programs and resisting the urge to create new programs.
Steve Stanek ([email protected]) is managing editor of Budget & Tax News at The Heartland Institute.
