Wow! Mitt Romney actually believes he should pay NO taxes and he is setting up the underlying structure for that to eventually happen.
In tonights debate he announced with glee that he had a GREAT plan for the middle class to save taxes - he advocates for NO taxes on dividends, interest and capital gains for anyone making under $200,000 a year.
Why is this a crock? Follow below.
Transcript of 2nd Presidential debate
And that is every middle-income taxpayer no longer will pay any tax on interest, dividends or capital gains, no tax on your savings.
That makes life a lot easier. If you’re getting interest from a bank, if you’re getting a statement from a mutual fund or any other kind of investments you have, you don’t have to worry about filing taxes on that, because there will be no taxes for anybody making $200,000 a year and less on your interest, dividends and capital gains.
Number 1 - the vast majority of Americans actually have little or no dividends interest or capital gains in the first place. They are living paycheck to paycheck.
Number 2 - For the Americans who DO have dividends, interest and capital gains, it exists in ALREADY tax deferred accounts like an IRA. In a Roth Ira, your dividends, interst and capital gains are ALREADY accumulating tax free. So Mitt is not offering you something that does not already exist.
But what Mitt IS doing is getting Americans used to the idea that dividends, interest and capital gains SHOULD be tax free. If you agree that poor and middle class people should have this advantage, even though they can't actually utilize it or already do utilize it even if they are unaware of it - it's just a short next step to say, "hey, NO ONE should pay taxes on interest, dividends or capital gains."
Hello America - wake up! This is the wealthy telling you that the money made on HAVING money is or should be FREE MONEY. For many of them, it is their ONLY income. The uber wealthy will be freed from having to pay even a nominal portion of their wealth to support the structure of government. Wars, education, healthcare, infrastructure, safety nets, courts, police systems, etc. etc. etc. will become the burden of the lower and middle classes alone and the wealthy will literally get a free ride on your backs.
9:24 PM PT: Hat's off to sd4david who pointed out in the comments that since Romney himself earns less than 250, he ALREADY would qualify under this proposal to pay no taxes at all on his 20 Millions dollars of UNEARNED income.
THIS PROPOSAL OF ROMNEY'S WOULD FREE HIMSELF OF PAYING ANY TAXES WHATSOEVER - RIGHT THIS MINUTE
Not to mention his backers and the rest of the 1%..
Yeah, he cares about the rest of us.