Paul Ryan Responds To Obama Tax Cut With Lies And Calls For Tax Hikes On The Middle Class

Rep. Paul Ryan responded to President Obama’s plan to cut taxes for the middle class by lying about the president’s plan and calling for a tax increase on the middle class.

Obama’s tax plan closes loopholes that the super-rich and corporations use to avoid paying their share of taxes while giving millions of middle-class families a tax cut. In a statement, Rep. Paul Ryan’s office responded by calling for tax cuts on the rich and tax increases for the middle class. Ryan spokesperson Brendan Buck said, “This is not a serious proposal. We lift families up and grow the economy with a simpler, flatter tax code, not big tax increases to pay for more Washington spending.”

What Ryan means by a flatter tax code can be found in each of his four budget. Paul Ryan’s flatter tax means cutting taxes for those at the top while eliminating deductions and tax breaks for everyone else. The Center For Budget and Policy Priorities broke down Ryan’s 2013 budget and found that in order to cut taxes on the wealthy, Ryan’s plan would raise taxes on the middle class, “As explained below, even with the same dramatic scaling back of tax expenditures for filers with incomes above $200,000 that TPC examined in its Romney analysis — including entirely wiping out their deductions for mortgage interest and charitable giving — families with children that have incomes below $200,000 would have to face tax increases averaging more than $3,000 a year, if policymakers were to avoid increasing the deficit while reaching Chairman Ryan’s 25-percent top-tax-rate goal.”

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Rep. Ryan’s (R-WI) entire philosophy is centered around redistributing wealth to the rich. Ryan is the biggest proponent of the trickle down fairy tale. Each of Rep. Ryan’s budgets has been built around the fantasy that the economy will grow if the super rich don’t pay any taxes. The philosophy that Republicans are trying to defend does not work.

A 2012 study by economist Owen M. Zidar found that tax cuts for the top 10% don’t work:

“Almost all of the stimulative effect of tax cuts,” Zidar found, “results from tax cuts for the bottom 90%. A one percent of GDP tax cut for the bottom 90% results in 2.7 percentage points of GDP growth over a two-year period. The corresponding estimate for the top 10% is 0.13 percentage points and is insignificant statistically.”

Paul Ryan responded to the president’s proposal to do something that has been proven to work by proposing a course of action that has never worked.

Republicans are married to a failed ideology that keeps the checks coming in from their rich backers, but will never create economic prosperity.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association