Senator Mike Lee's Tax Plan: Same Ole B.S.

This author at the New York Times seems to think Mike Lee (R-Utah) has a fair tax plan, and links to the National Review, who then links to Mike Lee's speech about his spiffy new tax plan called The Family Fairness and Opportunity Tax Reform Act. (Have you ever noticed how they always have these patriotic-sounding, but very misleading names for their deceitful bills.)

Right out of the gate Mike Lee criticizes Social Security and Medicare, saying the system has an unintended consequence: the parent tax penalty.

Now the GOP is using "parents" to thin the herd in an attempt to divide and conquer us in another new way— to drive a wedge between single, sinful and childless adults—and hard-working all-American middle-class married couples with family values who raise adorable children.

Just like the GOP uses other means to divide us: black vs. white, gay vs. straight, middle-class vs. poor, young vs. old (generational warfare), Christian vs. other, employed vs. unemployed, civilian vs. Veteran, conservative vs. liberal, etc. (Dividing people is the only way these greedy @holes can ever win a policy issue, by selling us all out to the wealthiest individuals and their large corporations.)

In his speech before his conservative brethren Mike Lee says, "Parents are required to contribute to this system [Social Security and Medicare] not once, but twice. First, when they pay their taxes, just like everyone else. And then again, by bearing the enormous economic costs of raising their children, who in time, of course, grow up to become the next generation of taxpayers...This hidden, double tax on parents in and of itself violates conservatism’s core principle of equal opportunity...Another way to think about it is that current policy imposes an enormous 'capital gains' tax on the economic, human, and social capital that all parents invest in their children, and in our country."

Mike Lee's bogus tax plan (The Family Fairness and Opportunity Tax Reform Act) would establish two individual income tax rates: 15% on all income up to $87,850 (per person, married or not) and 35% on all income above that.

The plan has an additional $2,500-per child tax credit and would also apply to the employer's side of payroll taxes. Single people with no children get none of the deductions because the premise is, they don't "invest" in children to grow up and pay their fair share of Social Security and Medicare taxes in the future. Oh, and of course, the employers get a deal too—even though they're not raising anyone's children.

Mike Lee says the plan "repeals the Obamacare tax hikes, lowers rates, and finally begins to address the parent tax penalty." In other words, his tax plan repeals the 3.8% surtax on capital gains to fund the expansion of Medicaid.

He says "The parent tax penalty could be dealt with through entitlement reform rather than tax reform" and he says "The expansion of the 15% bracket essentially creates a low, flat tax for about 90% of all individuals and families" and he says "Right now, the tax code penalizes parents" and he says his tax plan would "restore opportunities to working parents and their children to pursue happiness that right now federal policy unfairly denies them."

In other words, there's too damn much crap in his bogus tax plan to comment on here. Just read Mike Lee's speech, then you decide if it's all the same ole same ole BS.