Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

LETTER TO THE EDITOR:

Taxing the rich not the only answer

Thank you Standard & Poor’s for sounding an alarm about the debt crisis. What took you so long?

Frank Beaty’s Thursday letter to the editor, headlined “U.S. is losing credibility in the world,” says the world’s economists know that only a plan like President Barack Obama’s, which includes spending cuts and increases in revenue, will work to reduce our deficit.

Is that why, if Obama is re-elected, in 2016 (his last full year in office) we will have a $20-trillion-plus deficit? That is what his budget plans will leave us with.

Mr. Beaty is right that we cannot continue down this path. In my view, taxing the rich alone isn’t enough to get us out of this mess.

I will even agree that we can raise the tax rate, back to the rate when Bill Clinton was president. But the federal government will also have to shrink dramatically, which in turn will reduce state and local governments’ size.

Additionally, we are not dependent on each other. The fact that half of this country does not pay any federal income tax means the other half is supporting them. This has to stop. Unless things change now, the United States will have its credit rating downgraded, and the higher interest rates we would have to pay would drive us over the edge.

Let’s stop this nonsense now. We better stop living beyond our means, and we better shrink the size of government, in all categories. Every government program needs to downsize — every one.

Join the Discussion:

Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.

Full comments policy