Tom McGee's Blog

Remember Lucky Ducky?

That was the much-reviled concept floated by the WSJ Op-Ed page (aka, the Funny Papers) editors in November, 2002. Their idea was, people in the low tax brackets are “Lucky Duckies” because they don’t have as big a tax burden as, say, Steve Forbes. Leaving out that whole part about poor diets, insufficient health care, and struggling to pay the bills every month under the threat of foreclosure or eviction, they are Lucky simply because they don’t also pay a ton in taxes.

Who are these lucky duckies? They are the beneficiaries of tax policies that have expanded the personal exemption and standard deduction and targeted certain voter groups by introducing a welter of tax credits for things like child care and education. When these escape hatches are figured against income, the result is either a zero liability or a liability that represents a tiny percentage of income … Say a person earns $12,000. After subtracting the personal exemption, the standard deduction and assuming no tax credits, then applying the 10% rate of the lowest bracket, the person ends up paying a little less than 4% of income in taxes. It ain’t peanuts, but not enough to get his or her blood boiling with tax rage.

The much-parodied strategy: Jack up the rates on the lower tax brackets so that they too would feel the populist rage they feel, and rise up to smite the IRS. Or something. I know, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense but then it was probably worked up between courses at La Bernardin after a $125 bottle of white burgundy.

The “Notable & Quotable” feature today offers up this little tidbit from a Forbes.com piece:

If ObamaCare hasn’t been repealed by Congress or nullified in court by then, its opponents would be justified in urging Americans to refuse to buy coverage or pay fines and dare authorities to come after them.

By some estimates, Uncle Sam will need to hire an additional 17,000 IRS agents or so just to enforce the coverage mandate. But even if a few million Americans simultaneously refuse to abide by it, they could easily overwhelm the system.

Wow, it’s just like Martin Luther King isn’t it? At least, it would be if King sat in a luxurious office on the 49th floor with a gold-plated health insurance plan and a private helicopter to take him to the hospital if he needed it, or Ghandi lived in a 20,000 sq. ft. mansion in the countryside urging his protesters on over his cellphone.

But of course they didn’t; they were on the front lines and took their beatings. Do you think Forbes and the Journal offer good health plans? The WSJ web site says so:

We offer a comprehensive and competitive benefits package that affords wide-ranging health care options to meet the different needs of a diverse workforce and their families. We also sponsor many different fitness and health screening programs focused on overall well being.

Now here we have the wealthy and comfortable urging struggling families to the barricades, while they sit comfortably miles behind the lines. It’s really shocking to see it put forward so blatantly — asking some poor guy with children to support to take all the risks, just for the sake of their little political obsession.

But they’re just another version of the chickenhawk phenomena, I guess.