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tax cut my ass
Here We Go Again: Bush Exaggerates Tax Cuts
The President can?t keep his figures straight. And most people are getting less than he implies.
February 20, 2004
Modified: February 20, 2004
Summary
President Bush stumbled Feb. 19, saying the average tax cut is $1,089. The White House corrected that figure to $1,586. But the fact is that most Americans won't see anywhere near either of those amounts.
As we've said before when disputing equally misleading lowball figures given by Howard Dean, half of all individuals and families will get less than $470, and half will get more. The ?average? is misleading because it is inflated by very large cuts given to a relative few at the top.
Analysis
Now that the general election campaign is nearing, President Bush has resumed a sales pitch for the tax cuts he's signed. But he persists in making some misleading claims.
At a 24-minute appearance in the White House complex on Feb. 19, the President wrongly stated that "everybody who pays taxes" is getting a cut, which is not true:
Bush: We cut the taxes on everybody who pays taxes. I don't think it makes sense for tax-cutters to say, okay, you win, and you lose. My attitude was, if you pay taxes, you ought to get relief. And we cut all taxes,
In fact, all taxes were not cut and millions who pay only federal payroll taxes got no benefit from Bush's cuts.
It is true that everybody who paid federal income taxes is getting a cut. But according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center , 35.6 million individuals and families got zero benefit from the Bush cuts because their income was so low they were not paying federal income taxes before the cuts. This number includes 15.1 million workers who are paying federal payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare. That's 15 million "taxpayers" who were left out.
The President also bobbled the numbers when describing the average size of the cut. Here's the official White House transcript of what he said, which was wrong, along with the footnotes inserted later by the White House staff to correct the record:
Bush: The tax relief we passed, 11 million* taxpayers this year will save $1,086* off their taxes. . . .
(* 111 million taxpayers will save, on average, $1,586 off their taxes.)
The $1,586 figure is indeed an accurate statement of the average cut received by those who are getting a cut, according to the Treasury Department. However, it is far from typical.
For one thing, the figure does not take into account the 25% of all individuals and families who are receiving zero tax cut this year. It is an average only of those who are getting some cut. When those who get nothing are added in the average cut drops to $1,217, according to the Tax Policy Center.
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