Romney agrees: Tax code too easy on those in his bracket
If actions speak louder than words, then Mitt Romney agrees with Barack Obama that the federal tax code requires too little of rich people like himself.
I don’t know how else to interpret the fact that Romney artificially increased his own taxes in 2011 by taking fewer charitable deductions than he could have. By doing so, Romney’s effective tax rate in 2011 jumped to 14.1 percent, still lower than the rate paid by millions of his fellow Americans.
Absent that step, ABC News reports, “his effective tax rate could have been as low as 10.4 percent.”
And would Romney have taken that step if he wasn’t running for president? Highly unlikely. As the candidate himself told us back in July:
“I don’t pay more than are legally due and frankly if I had paid more than are legally due I don’t think I’d be qualified to become president. I’d think people would want me to follow the law and pay only what the tax code requires.”
So to review:
Romney paid 14.1 percent of his income in taxes, a figure that could have and would have been as low as 10.4 percent if he wasn’t running for office. In contrast, the average effective tax rate paid by his wealthy father back in the ’60s was 37 percent.
Yet Romney continues to insist that wealthier Americans today can’t be asked to shoulder more of the financial burden, even as changes in the global economy continue to concentrate more and more wealth in their hands.
– Jay Bookman
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726 comments Add your comment
curious
September 24th, 2012
3:28 pm
Romney won’t release his tax returns; he’d go to jail.
Stevie Ray..Clowns to the Left of me Jokers to the Right, here I am...
September 24th, 2012
3:29 pm
BRO,
So biometrics are less of a burden than getting a valid id?
They are likely more credible to say the least but I can only imagine that having to make any effort whatsoever will remain a beef of the Left..
Stevie Ray..Clowns to the Left of me Jokers to the Right, here I am...
September 24th, 2012
3:30 pm
KAMCHAK,
I see you got your propeller cap on today…why do you take all this stuff so personal?
curious
September 24th, 2012
3:31 pm
Romney doesn’t want the wealthier Americans to be asked to share more of the financial burden and certainly not the military service burden.
He’s a phoney.
Stevie Ray..Clowns to the Left of me Jokers to the Right, here I am...
September 24th, 2012
3:32 pm
Curious,
I guess you know more than the rest of us….don’t you think this “fat-cat” has the best tax lawyers money can buy? They have liability if a crime is committed that they were aware of…you know this don’t you?
TaxPayer
September 24th, 2012
3:36 pm
If you continue to move the goal posts, don’t expect me to follow…the point was SL was profitable so how exactly did he stick it to them?
I didn’t see you provide a link showing that the Olympics repaid the money it got from the fed, Erwin. Remember that I commented on the taxpayer’s money used to fund the Olympics and all you have given is a statement that the Olympics turned a profit. Try to keep up, Erwin.
curious
September 24th, 2012
3:36 pm
Stevie Ray
There sure seems to be a whole host of “fat-cats” before Romney that had the best tax lawyers and still wound up in jail.
Don’t know how many of the lawyers did though.
John 12202012 Birch
September 24th, 2012
3:36 pm
Kam, jewcow et al – As opposed to your logic which apparently goes like this. Bain made money in part by offsghoring American jobs. Romney was part of Bain. Therefore, Presient Romney will offshore American jobs. My conclusion is therefore, if you’re liberal enough, logic and reason need not apply.
Stevie Ray..Clowns to the Left of me Jokers to the Right, here I am...
September 24th, 2012
3:38 pm
CURIOUS,
I don’t know either but they can certainly be dis-barred for aiding or abetting the commiting of a crime…not incentive to do so..
curious
September 24th, 2012
3:43 pm
Stevie Ray
History is littered by smart people doing dumb things for money.
Kamchak ~ Thug from the Steppes
September 24th, 2012
3:45 pm
Kam, jewcow et al – As opposed to your logic which apparently goes like this.
Your efforts to read my mind are pitifully off target, sport.
Brosephus™
September 24th, 2012
3:47 pm
So biometrics are less of a burden than getting a valid id?
Yep. An ID will eventually have to be replaced because of the person’s looks changing or it expiring. Fingerprints or retina scans don’t expire or change for the most part. You’re talking one registration over an entire lifetime vs continuously having to obtain an ID. Which do you think is less a burden?
John 12202012 Birch
September 24th, 2012
3:50 pm
kam – good point. A brillant observation like “there’s your sign” could actually mean just about anything!
Holy Moly!
September 24th, 2012
3:58 pm
Isn’t this part of the reason for the ACA:
Mitt Romney, On 60 Minutes, Cites Emergency Room As Health Care Option For Uninsured
Does he not understand that was part of the problem to begin with?
That Black Guy,
September 24th, 2012
4:02 pm
Stevie Ray, “sheets” means that Jay has started a new thread topic.
Erwin's cat
September 24th, 2012
4:02 pm
TaxPayer – you do know what “profit” is don’t you…
Did they pay back all govt money…I’m sure they paid back what they were supposed to, since the debt was paid in 2002…and that $101M profit was reinvested in the area..
Can you tell me how much the taxpayers got “stuck” for?
TaxPayer
September 24th, 2012
4:08 pm
Erwin,
You do know Mitt’s well known for his sophistry, do you not:
His operating budget finished with a $100 million surplus. But not included in that budget were hundreds of millions of dollars spent for security and transportation infrastructure — money not paid back with Olympic revenues.
…Romney had no control over that spending, and his aides openly said some of the infrastructure projects were not needed for the Olympics. So, Romney deserves credit for the budget surplus, but it’s also a stretch to say the Salt Lake Olympics were “profitable.”
In other words, the taxpayers got stuck paying that tab, unless someone can produce documents showing that the Salt Lake Olympics paid back all the money it got from the fed. Now try to keep up, Erwin.
Erwin's cat
September 24th, 2012
4:16 pm
so how much where the tax payers stuck for TP?…You made the assertion, so you must know how much it was
Erwin's cat
September 24th, 2012
4:17 pm
obviously not 100% was intended to be paid back
Krystal'sBalls
September 24th, 2012
4:33 pm
@Brosephus
They were using Biometrics to get you into Seaworld to see Shamu back in 2009! We all know the truth. It’s easy, painless and fool proof. It’s only an issue when they show up to the polls to vote. It’s not like there would need to be a massive roundup of people every four years to get them registered for Biometrics! That’s how they wanna make it seem on the other side of the argument. Matter of fact, since we can assume that most of these same people are the “moocher 47%”, we can make it even easier. You apply or receive government benefits, Unemployment office/Food Stamp office, etc. takes biometric fingerprint scan at application. There! But we know that’s not what the voting suppressors really want. They want to simply make it difficult to vote.
Tom Middleton
September 24th, 2012
4:39 pm
That’s just Romney stepping on his message, Jay – something he’s been doing more and more of these days. I mean, while you were on vacation back in July he said: “We ought to give whichever president is going to be elected, at least 6 months to a year to get (his) policies in place.”
Fair enough, I believe, but if this is the rule for every newly elected president – and it should be – then President Obama cannot be held accountable for all the jobs lost during the first part of his term before his policies were in place.
And once they were, of course, we’ve seen 30 straight months of economic growth and 4.6 million private-sector jobs added in a record better than George W. Bush’s for all eight years.
So thanks again, Mitt. I know you didn’t mean to, but like grass poking through the concrete, you sometimes tell the truth. Now please tell the rest of your staff to stop lying about our president’s record!
Krystal'sBalls
September 24th, 2012
4:57 pm
@Tom
Obama gets NO time…and no MONEY! You know those are the rules!!!
LOL
Romney agrees: Tax code too easy on those in his bracket | Jay … | Income Tax Guide
September 24th, 2012
6:13 pm
[...] the average effective tax rate paid by his wealthy father back in … … Visit link: Romney agrees: Tax code too easy on those in his bracket | Jay … ← COLUMN: Pay Attention Mitt | Aiken [...]
Tom Middleton
September 24th, 2012
6:54 pm
Krystal’sBalls
LOLOLOL!
ODD OWL
September 24th, 2012
11:23 pm
If Mittens somehow became President, the first thing he would do is perpetrate an act of RomneyHood on america… Romney refuse to tell America about his tax reform plans because there would be a revolt and an uprising by we the people, when we discover that Romney will eliminate home mortgage deductions, federal deductions for local and state taxes, child tax credits will be eliminated etc, etc, etc… In other words, a Romney-Hood Presidency would would mean a massive transfer of wealth from the pockets of the working class and the middle class, into the pockets of the rich, elite, greedy, selfish, vain, conceited, narcissistic Koch Bros., sheldon Aldelson, Romney/Ryan types… RomneyHood ==> Bush/Cheney/Reagan supply-side, trickle down economics on steroids…
ODD OWL
September 25th, 2012
2:43 am
CNN has gone rogue… They will do anything to attract viewers… CNN stole Amb. Stevens personal diary, read it and then televised a news story about its contents… CNN perpetrated this shameful act of unprofessional news reporting before they informed Amb. Stevens family about the fact that they had possession of the diary… CNN==> pseudo Cable Narrative News network…