Aren't the Rich Already Being Taxed to Help the Poor?

On Jan. 6, The Dispatch-Argus ran an article headlined, "Tax the rich to help the poor." But since the Great Depression, hasn't the federal government been doing just that?

In 2016, IRS published data concerning 2014 federal income tax collections showed 139,562,034 taxpayers filed 2014 individual (as opposed to corporate) federal returns, and paid $1,374,379,000,000 in federal income taxes. They included:

-- 139,562,034 taxpayers, the top 1 percent paid $542,640,000,000 - 39.48 percent;

-- 6,978,102 taxpayers, the top 5 percent paid $824,153,000,000 - 59.98 percent;

-- 13,956,203 taxpayers, the top 10 percent paid $974,124,000,000 - 70.88 percent;

-- 34,890,509 taxpayers, the top 25 percent paid $1,192,679,000,000 - 86.78 percent;

-- 69,781,107 taxpayers, the top 50 percent paid $1,336,637,000,000 - 97.25 percent; and

-- 69,781,017, the bottom 50 percent paid $37,740,000,000 or 2.75 percent of all individual federal income taxes paid.

Imagine the plight of the bottom 50 percent, if the top 50 percent didn't exist, or if the top half paid no taxes. There would have been $1.336 trillion less revenue in individual federal income taxes. That would have increased the 2014 deficit from $483 billion to $1,819 billion.

In 2014, U.S. military spending was $800 billion, pensions, $914 billion; health care, $921 billion; welfare, $370 billion; transportation, $92 billion; interest, $229 billion, etc. The $37.7 billion paid by the bottom 50 percent, would not have covered 50 percent of a single one of those expenses!

Without the top 50 percent, there would have been no money for defense, health care, transportation, interest, and only $37 billion on welfare costs of $370 billion. That $370 billion for welfare is 10 times more than the bottom 50 percent paid in federal income taxes.

In 2014, the Census Bureau reported the numbers of Americans who received welfare, i.e., participated in means tested programs in 2012, included:

-- 82,679,000, Medicaid.

-- 51,471,000, food stamps

-- 22,526,000, Women, Infants and Children programs,

-- 20,355,000, SSI

-- 13,267,000 lived in public housing or received housing subsidies.

-- 5,442,000 Temporary Assistance to Needy Families


-- 4,517,000 others received some other form of federal cash assistance.

And the poor also benefit from roads, bridges, courthouses, and a strong military.

Somebody paid, and it wasn't the 50 percent taxpayers who paid 2.75 percent of all individual federal income taxes.

So, when the top 10 percent of all taxpayers -- incomes over $133,445 -- pay 70.88 percent of all federal income taxes, how much more must they pay to be deemed righteous? Fair? Doesn't a wage-earner with a wife and two children have a right to spend the greatest part of his $150,000 earnings on his own family?

And when 25 percent of all taxpayers -- over $77,714 -- pay 86.78 percent of federal income taxes, how much more must they pay to be deemed fair? Doesn't that wage-earner with a wife and two children have the same right to spend the bulk of his $80,000 earnings on his own family? Or is it just those with incomes over $542,640 paying 39.48 percent of all federal income taxes who aren't being fair?

Do the math. If 100 million Americans are receiving some share of the $37 billion in welfare benefits, is it fair to cry "tax the rich to help the poor?" Aren't the top 50 percent already carrying 97.25 percent of the burden?

If the top 1 percent -- incomes over $542,640 -- had been required to pay at a 50 percent rate, they would have paid $687,189,500,000, rather than the $542,640,000,000 they paid at 39.48 percent in 2014. That would have generated an additional $144.5 billion in revenues, more than enough to relieve the entire bottom 50 percent from paying the $37.5 billion they paid.

Clearly, the poor who are disabled or otherwise in genuine need can't be expected to pay taxes. But they are only a part of the bottom 50 percent.

So, would it be fair for the other part of the bottom 50 percent to claim all the benefits of citizenship while paying no income taxes? To demand his neighbor pay more? Should fairness not require that they at least pay the "widow's mite?" Is that 2.75 percent?

Fairness to some degree is in the eye of the beholder.

Posted: QCOline.com January 25, 2018
Copyright 2018, John Donald O'Shea

Taxing Rich to Help Poor - Some Background

On Jan. 6, The Dispatch-Argus ran a piece, "Tax the rich to help the poor."

Some years ago, Father Bob Lee gave a short sermon. It ran only five minutes. I've listened to thousands of others. But Fr. Lee's is the only one that has stuck with me. The topic of his homily was, "What must we do to be saved." Matthew 25: 31-46.

“When the Son of Man comes ... he will separate the people ... He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“He will say to those on his right, ‘Take your inheritance .... For I was hungry and you gave me to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me to drink ...

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me ... for I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink ... Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

Christ enjoined these duties on us as individuals. He wasn't speaking to governments. We were individually charged with being charitable to those in need. Christ said he came to save men; not to set up either a capitalist or socialist utopia. Had he wanted to be king, he could have continued multiplying loaves and fishes. The people would have made him king. John 6:25

Did Christ ever tell the Roman government that it had a duty to support the poor through taxes? Nevertheless, based on Christ's teachings, the church's catechism has extrapolated that message. But even so, does one get to heaven by paying his taxes? Would Christ buy the argument, "OK, I was never charitable, but I paid my taxes, and thereby helped the poor. Therefore, I belong in heaven?

In his great social encyclical, "Rerum Novarum" (1891), Pope Leo XIII penned what is generally regarded as the church's foundational document on social justice. Pope Leo, in the main, discussed the co-relative rights/duties of capital and working men, affirmed the right of private property, and condemned Socialism and the excesses of capitalism.

Speaking critically of socialism, Leo wrote:

"The socialists ... are striving to do away with private property, and contend that individual possessions should become the common property of all, to be administered by the State .... The remedy they propose is manifestly against justice. For, every man has by nature the right to possess property as his own ... [Without private property] no one would have any interest in exerting his talents or his industry... [Socialism would result in] the leveling down of all to a like condition of misery and degradation. The main tenet of socialism, community of goods, must be utterly rejected."

Perhaps because the focus of the encyclical is on the rights/duties of capital/laborer, it speaks only briefly of the duties of the state to the poor, but appears to define the poor.

"The contention, then, that the civil government should at its option intrude into and exercise intimate control over the family ... is a great ... error.

"True, if a family finds itself in exceeding distress, utterly deprived of the counsel of friends, and without any prospect of extricating itself, it is right that extreme necessity be met by public aid."

Prior to our Great Depression, aid to the American poor was largely provided by charitable individuals, the churches, some civic organizations, and units of local government. When during the Depression, those sources were overwhelmed, the federal government necessarily became involved and remains involved to this day.

Today it is generally agreed that some part of the nation's resources should be used to help those in genuine permanent, and even temporary, need. But who is in need and how much is debated.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church - dealing with the Seventh Commandment - sets out at considerable length the church's current teachings on social justice, private property, common stewardship, and our duties toward the poor, inter alia. (Word limits preclude further discussion here. Read it!) That article provides guiding principles. It does not, however, set out specific numbers as to what is fair, just, and enough in a particular case.

My next op-ed will marshal some specific numbers to help you start to judge for yourselves: What is fair? Just? How much more, if any, the rich must be taxed to help the poor? The needy?

Posted: QCOline.com January 16, 2018
Copyright 2018, John Donald O'Shea

What if Jurors only Listened to Accusors?

Don Wooten and I don't often agree politically. But for once, we do - at least in part ("Women force out a potent champion," Viewpoints, Dec. 17).

Former state Sen. Wooten wrote in reference to the allegations of sexual misconduct leveled against Sen. Al Franken, "Congressional women [have forced] the resignation of one of their champions. ... What I found unconscionable was the rush to pass judgment before there was evidence to do so. ... No one should be drummed out of office this way, without some kind of objective judgment."

Sen. Wooten deplores the rush to judgment" He states his case in terms of evidence and objective judgment, I agree with him on that, although, I would prefer to make the argument in terms of due process: procedural due process, fundamental fairness.


Due process in America addresses the question, what process is or procedures are, required in a given case, consistent with fundamental fairness.

In our country, due process in a state criminal trial has come to mean essentially the procedures specified in our Bill of Rights. But even within the narrow context of U.S. criminal law, what amounts to due process varies depending on the stage of the proceeding.

For an arrest or search warrant to issue, the state must establish "probable cause." At trial, the state must prove its case "beyond a reasonable doubt." In a probation revocation hearing, the state must prove by the greater weight of the evidence that the defendant violated his probation.

Due process also applies to civil cases. For example, at a hearing to suspend or revoke a liquor license, the moving party must prove the violation by the greater weight of the evidence.

In a state court felony (criminal) prosecution, due process requires that the defendant has the right to hire an attorney; if he can't afford an attorney, he gets a free one. Due process does not require that in most civil cases. If you run somebody over with your car and get sued, you may have the right to hire an attorney, but you generally don't get a free one.

At a minimum, however, procedural due process in America means you get a written specification of the charge against you, and an opportunity to dispute that charge before an impartial tribunal - but not necessarily before a jury.


So when a man is charged with sexual misconduct by a woman in the newspapers, or on radio or TV, what does due process require? The argument has been made that a woman would never lie about being sexually abused. That is as mindless as saying that a man would never lie when he denies engaging in sexual abuse.

Attorney Lisa Bloom has now been accused of offering a woman $750,000 to make allegations of sexual misconduct against President Trump. That woman apparently refused. However, another did "speak out" - after her $30,000 mortgage was paid off, and after she received "fees for licensing photos."

My experience in the affairs of life tells me that some women lie. Others, like my mother and my Aunt Nell wouldn't have lied at gunpoint. Some men lie; others don't.


The point is simply this: When a woman publicly asserts that she has been the victim of sexual misconduct, abuse, or exploitation, she deserves a fair hearing. If the male accused then makes a denial, he deserves a fair hearing.

In politics, most of these charges and denials appear in the papers, and on TV, etc. They never get to court. Nevertheless, as rational voting citizens, we become the jury, and have a duty to use our best judgment to decide the truth or falsity of the charges.

In doing so, we employ the tools that any juror would employ, i.e., is there corroboration? Why has the victim waited 50 years to make her charge? If $55 million is being spent to win a House seat, is part of that money being used to induce victims to come out of the woodwork to accuse one or both candidates of acts of sexual misconduct? Do the accuser and the accused have reputations for always being truthful? For occasionally being truthful, etc.?

I agree with Don Wooten. A has a right to accuse. B has a right to defend. Truth is best served when the voters behave like an impartial jury.


Posted: QCOline.com January 4, 2018
Copyright 2018, John Donald O'Shea