Taxing The Poor:Walker's "Comeback America" Answer For Deficit Problems

David Walker's book "Comeback America" has some commonsense proposals that he feels will improve Social Security.He wants to focus on people who are most in need.Walker wants to provide a new high-level floor benefit for Americans who have worked at least thirty years to ensure they will not live in poverty(I can support this proposal but it will cost revenue from another place...and what about those who don't work thirty years(women...criminals,drug addicted individuals,etc.)who don't make the cutoff).Second,he doesn't want to cut off SS benefits for higher-income individuals but reduce the relative benefit for the middle-and upper income persons through progressive wage indexing or otherwise(I support this proposal).Third,he wants to trim the cost of living adjustment for certain middle and upper-middle beneficiaries(agree again)Fourth,Walker proscribes to raise the normal and early retirement eligibility ages on a gradual basis..allowance could be made for manual laborers(agree).Fifth,allow individuals to defer their SS benefits to any age they choose and increase their monthly benefit based on life expectancy tables(agree).

For revenues,Walker wants to keep the payroll tax rate at 6.2% but raise the cap on taxable wages from $106,800 to around $150,000.This would be less than the historical dollar level at which 90% of the total wage income would be subject  to the SS payroll tax($171,900 in 2009).This increase is good but why stop at $150,000.Why not continue on all income like the vast majority of Americans pay.If 10% make over $171,900,why not continue on all income earned with no cap.( cap the benefits for anyone over $250,000)The high earners should pay 6.2% plus 15% on their capital gains income.(should raise capital gains to at least 20%).This is a direct way the wealthy could help the poor.The wealthy now avoid the 35% tax rate by placing most of their income in capital gain securities and are taxed less than the average wage earner.

Walker also wants to require citizens to have supplemental savings accounts.A 2 or 3% payroll deduction would go into an individual account for each worker.Individuals would have several professionally managed investment options to choose from.(Walker also wants every citizen to pay at least 10% of their income on federal taxes to help reduce our deficit) I disagree with this proposal because Walker is consistently talking about raising taxes on the poor while letting the wealthy keep their money.He is increasing taxes for the poor by 13% while ignoring the high income earners and their responsibility to the country and the lower class.He feels the upper 20% of the country pays too much in federal taxes(69% according to his numbers) and wants the poor to take some of that burden from them(get real..you have no idea about what the lower class goes through just to survive..shame on you for even suggesting this proposal)