In Paul Ryan's world. Whatever the case might be, Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI) is offering us a plan for balancing the federal government budget. It consists of taking government expenditure to the level it last was in 1951 and of providing lots of lovely, happy tax cuts.
For some, that is. According to two different (though not right-wing) think tanks, the Ryan plan would give those luscious tax cuts to the top ten percent of income-earners but raise taxes on everybody else. Here is one of the relevant tax tables. Click on it to make it larger:
The regressive impact appears to come mostly from the Value Added Tax he proposes. One can certainly understand George Bush's joke about his base being the haves rather than the have-nots.
What I don't get is why anyone else would vote for Republicans. They wish to privatize Social Security (in this climate where we all can see the downside of risk), kill Medicare, get rid of publicly funded education and in general turn this country into a Banana Republic where the rich live in guarded enclaves while everyone else struggles to survive.