Senator Elizabeth Warren gave another speech on taxes a few days ago proving, yet again, that she is Coming for YOUR money!
But I am here to skim even more from you!
It’s always thinly veiled behind the refrain of making “the rich” (as defined in her sole discretion) pay their “fair share” (also defined in her sole discretion).
Frankly she’s been shrieking this refrain since before she even became a Senator. Yet for more than a decade she’s never once made her position clear. If anything, she keeps moving the goalposts.
Warren famously started by slamming billionaires, i.e. the top 0.1%. She then cast a wider net to the wealthiest 1%.
Later she derided the top 5%, claiming those evildoers should not be eligible for student loan forgiveness… or even Medicare!
And when she howls about “accountable capitalism” on her website, Comrade Warren trolls the the top 10% for having too much wealth.
This trajectory throughout her career shows an ever-expanding reach – from the top 0.1% to the top 10%. And it would be foolish to assume she’s stopping there.
Naturally Comrade Warren has no idea what she’s talking about.
For example, she ignorantly blames eye-popping federal deficits on tax cuts that go as far back as 2012 – when then President Barack Obama made a compromise with Congress to extend the Bush-era tax cuts.
Warren claims, to this day, that “once Obama made that tax cut deal with [the other party], the federal deficit ballooned.”
I know Socialists aren’t great at math, but this is blatantly false. All you need to do is look at the Treasury Department’s own data.
The federal deficit actually FELL in 2013, i.e. the year after the Obama tax deal. Then it continued to decline in 2014… and in 2015.
In fact, if the federal government had simply frozen spending at 2012 levels, then the entire federal deficit would have nearly disappeared by 2016.
Instead, however, Elizabeth Warren and her merry band of Bolsheviks continued to find creative new ways to spend money. This is why federal spending has more than DOUBLED since 2012.
This is quite curious… because, despite a 2x increase in federal spending, America does not seem twice as secure against overseas threats. Infrastructure is not twice as robust. Public schools have not doubled their performance.
And if you look across all government performance – military readiness, customer service quality at the Internal Revenue Service, FAFSA student loan enrollment, Obamacare enrollment, Medicare efficiency – it’s ALL down.
One would be hard-pressed to come up with something that the government does BETTER today than it did in the past… except for racking up massive deficits.
I guess Elizabeth Warren doesn’t have anything to do with that, though.
She completely fails to see her own role in increased spending. She even fails to see how tax revenue has actually INCREASED since the tax cuts – because lower taxes promote a healthier economy.
Despite such overwhelming evidence, however, she STILL wants taxes to increase. She just doesn’t get it.
If high taxes were the key to a prosperous society, then Ivory Coast, with its record 60% tax rate – should be absolutely booming. And yet it is one of the world’s most impoverished nations.
But simple truths never stop the dangerous Bolshevik logic train.
Warren is now fighting against members of her own party who are negotiating an extension of the 2017 tax cuts.
And if you’re thinking, “Big deal, Lizzie is just one Senator, she can’t do anything on her own,” then think again. Warren is not alone. And more importantly, she has the power to hold everyone and everything hostage.
That’s because Congress and the next president don’t have to raise a finger for taxes to increase for most Americans in January of 2026.
Many of the individual tax cuts introduced by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) are set to automatically expire at the end of 2025. So, in order to extend them, both chambers of Congress plus the President, whoever that might be, will have to take deliberate action to make it happen.
And Lizzie can easily hold up the process.
Poke Your Hontas – Land of Flakes
Thanks to Comrade Warren stonewalling her own colleagues, this is becoming more and more likely by the day. What are the implications?
For starters, the standard deduction will be reduced by nearly 50%, from $14,600 (for single filers) to approximately $8,000. So much for only soaking the rich.
There are a host of other provisions that will hit the middle class harder than anyone else. Yet Lizzie remains firm in both her resolve and her ignorance.
And again, she’s not actually alone.
Joe Biden has also proposed major tax increases: a 5% payroll tax hike, taxes on unrealized capital gains, a top rate to 44.6%, and various changes that substantially increase estate taxes.
Obviously, everything is on the table given the upcoming election in a few months. But we do know, no matter what happens, that there is a growing number of Socialist politicians who want to increase taxes… because no matter how much they collect, it is never enough for them.
This is why we encourage our readers to avail themselves of the many, completely legal ways of reducing their taxes.
For example, Americans who move to the US territory of Puerto Rico can qualify for special tax incentives that offer rates as low as 0% for eligible capital gains, and 4% total tax rate on eligible business profits.
By moving overseas, US citizens can take advantage of the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion (FEIE), which allows taxpayers living abroad to exclude up to $126,500 per year from US taxation (adjusted annually for inflation). Plus, you could exclude thousands more in housing costs.
Even if you stay where you are, contributing to tax-advantaged retirement accounts is a great way to legally optimize your current (and future) tax bill.
The larger point is that the tax code is full of ways to reduce what you owe and get ahead of any automatic tax hikes.
Unless you truly believe that you are getting your money’s worth from the ever-expanding US government budget, it makes a lot of sense to do everything you can to reduce your taxes.
To your freedom,
James Hickman
June 25, 2024
