Political Quotes

“Mr. President, 78 percent of the benefits in the President's proposal are to people in the top 20 percent of income. If you divide all the wage earners in America into five groups based on how much they make, the top 20 percent get 78 percent of the President's benefits, more than $68,000 a year. Then, when you get down to the lower 40 percent of wage earners, they are getting less than $21,000. It really tells the story. If you are going to give tax benefits to a majority of Americans, and a majority of benefits to those Americans, you really have to take a look at the distributional charts here. First, it strikes me it is not good economics. Good economics suggest if you want to increase demand for goods and services, you give spending power to people who will spend rather than save. That is basic as principles of economics. So it is not good economics to stimulate an economy by rewarding the wealthiest people, who are more likely to save the money than spend it. Second, it is fundamentally not fair.”