Here’s an interesting example of how different graphical presentations of the same data can hit the eye differently. First, an explanation of the likely distributional impacts of the McCain and Obama tax plans, from The Washington Post:
Compare this with the depiction at chartjunk, which presents the same data, but this time with a scale that also emphasizes the number of people in each category:
It looks like it tells a different story, doesn’t it?
Here’s a third chart that gives emphasis to the total tax paid by each group rather than the number of people in each group. (Note that the numbers here are only approximate.)
You will surely protest that this scaling exaggerates the importance of the rich, which it does. But if you are concerned about balancing the budget, the rich are very important. The chart above does a useful job of trying to assess whether (and how) each tax plan pays for itself. (This chart would be more useful if it weighted people by their taxable incomes rather than their tax burdens.)
For those who prefer to see the raw numbers, the latest Tax Policy Center analysis was released on Friday, and is available here. (Note that the charts above were based on their previous analysis.) More generally, I highly recommend the Tax Policy Center analysis; it is careful, non-partisan, and broadly accepted by professional economists.
and 
. You can also watch it on 
This tells part of the story, but the comparison is somewhat misleading if it looks like both proposals generate the same total tax revenues, which presumably they don’t. McCain’s proposal looks like it generates much smaller tax revenues, either reducing the funds available to improve healthcare, research alternative energy or fight wars, or – more likely – increasing debt. His chart should reflect the increased tax burden on the “future taxpayer” bracket.
don’t forget that McCain will also cut taxes for corporations, which will further bankrupt the country
To Charles, @ #6.
“Robin Hood” is a misleading analogy. No one is stealing from the rich.
Perhaps it makes more sense to see it as
“the price the rich pay for the privilege of being able to live under societal rules that make it possible to be rich”?
Personal wealth doesn’t just “happen”.
We have a system of laws that not only allows people to become rich, but is also geared quite strongly toward preventing the very wealthy from ever losing that status.
The rich should have to pay for that privilege.
Otherwise, what possible incentive is there for society to allow massive accumulations of wealth?
I think that if you saw the total tax paid as a % not of income but rather of total resources controlled, you might see things differently.
Those few people at the top own or control a staggering fraction of the country’s total wealth, yet that wealth would not exist without the foundation that society provides. A society made up of everyone else on the graphs.
Charles -
Perhaps you don’t realize that the top 1% in the U.S. has approximately 34% of our national wealth?
“You can come up with statistics to prove anything, Marge, fourfteen percent of all people know that”
- Homer Jay
@Mike B (#4)
Yes, but 72% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
I think Robert brings up a great point. How many of these plans, by either side, will just end up being dead in the water due to a hostile congress or a filibuster?
“I never understood the Robin Hood doctrine – and no, I’m not anywhere near the top.”
Here’s a better way to look at it, in terms of the social contract:
“If you, the top 1% or so pay 20% or so of all taxes, we plebians will not rise up and violently overthrow you to take the other 80%”.
This has worked fairly well here in the U.S., and explains why the rich rarely complain more than a little about their tax burden.
Charles, the top 0.1% earn a disproportionate amount of the nation’s income, hence they pay a proportionate amount of taxes. There’s nothing “Robin Hood” about it. The more you earn from our capitalist system, the more you should pump back into it. It’s really quite simple. Kudos to Obama for reinforcing the virtues of a progressive tax system in an economy that inherently produces winners and losers.