I was distinguishing between very rich people who make all their income in capital gains (who pay 15%) and middle class wage earners who make their income in wages, which are taxed at around 45% at the margins.
Well, comparing investing (risk of losing 100%) with wage earning (ZERO risk) is kinda like comparing apples to coconuts, isn't it?
No, I think all kinds of income should be subject to the same tax structure.
But in any case, the original poster in this thread was complaining that Teresa paid a lower tax rate than most wage earners. I was simply pointing out that wages were taxed at a much higher rate than capital gains (thanks to Republicans), and thus there is nothing underhanded about very rich people paying a lower rate than middle class people. The system may be morally wrong, but there is nothing wrong with an individual paying their taxes according to the appropriate rates.
It was actually President Clinton who signed a large reduction of the capital gains tax, to 20%, in 1997. So it isn't just a Republican policy.
Kerry's wife doesn't work, and therefore her income is passive, or unearned. Kerry seeks to more heavily tax high income wage-earners, so I don't see how his plan addresses the huge tax gap between wage earners and those wealthy enough not to work.
While I am not a fan of Kerry or his wife, I think these low effective tax rates for people who live off investment income are a necessary evil, so to speak. To raise those rates to ordinary income rates would discourage investment, depress the economy, and hurt wage earners as a whole through economic contraction.
But politically, these low rates of taxation for his loud-mouthed wife do create political problems for Kerry, given his (falsely) populist rhetoric.
