“It starts very simply: Taxes, lower taxes.”
That was the first line of Newt Gingrich’s explanation of how he would create jobs, given at the December 10 Republican debate in Iowa. Gingrich talked about his desire to end the capital gains tax and cut the corporate income tax to 12.5%. In addition, Gingrich has proposed a 15% flat tax as an option for all Americans, going further than the 20% flat tax advocated by Rick Perry.
On one level, Gingrich’s intense focus on lower taxes fits current dogma in the Republican party, which puts tax cuts above almost everything else. He is playing to the conservative base, as a way of counteracting some of his other personal liabilities.
If enacted in their entirety, Gingrich’s proposed changes would turn the U.S. tax system from progressive to regressive. Someone earning $40,000 in wages could pay a higher tax rate than another person who made $400,000 a year in capital gains.
This shift from progressive to regressive is not acceptable, of course. The tax system should be a tool for reducing the stresses of inequality in the economy, not increasing it. That’s especially true now, coming out of such a devastating recession where so many American are unemployed or underemployed.
