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ARE THE RICHEST LEAVING THE RICH BEHIND?

June 10, 2005

Do the tax laws fail to adequately tax the "hyper-rich"? This has been a theme of the New York Times tax correspondent, David Cay Johnston. Last Sunday he wrote a piece on this subject as part of a Times series on class, "Richest Are Leaving Even the Rich Far Behind."

We hope to spend a bit more time on it - like actually read the whole article - before commenting. Mickey Kaus already has read it, so you can get his take here. He opines:

What he doesn't answer is the important question on the relationship between (a) and (b), namely how much richer would they have gotten if they hadn't gotten the tax cuts? ... When I looked at this question in the early 90s, the answer was pretty clear: the rich were growing richer due to changes in the underlying economy (e.g. greater rewards for skills) that affected their pretax income, not changes in the tax code that affected how much of that income they got to keep.

So now the article is pre-spun for you.

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