#40Dollars Could Have Got You A Lot More in 1912

12-23-2011 • Silver Underground

In a partisan face off over how long to extend a payroll tax cut that expires soon and amounts to an extra $40 per biweekly pay period for the average American worker, the White House stirred up some discussion on Twitter by tweeting out: What does #40Dollars mean to you? But the latest fiscal policy battle over a forty dollar tax cut every two weeks and whether to extend it for two months or two years (and whether to attach this or that condition to the tax cut, and whether people with Ds next to their name are more awesome than people with Rs) is just another distraction from the biggest, baddest, most insidious tax that American workers have to pay every year-- the inflation tax. Congress would much rather use up your attention span on fighting over $80 a month so that you don't notice just how much inflation tax you pay every time you buy gas, pay your electric bill, or pick up groceries. Because if you did notice and started speaking up, then Congress might have to decide which

1 Comments in Response to #40Dollars Could Have Got You A Lot More in 1912

Comment by Bill Barker

Entered on: 12/24/2011 9:27:39 AM

Where does this average worker live? The average wage in AZ is not $25.00/hour, which is what $20.00 a week calculates out to based on a 2% reduction in "payroll" tax. Are they reducing the influx of money in to the Social Security system, so that they will have an excuse to reduce benefits, because of a lack of funds?

As a Libertarian I would like to see the system done away with, but, in fairness to those of us that have been forced to pay into it (in my case over 40 years) it needs to be phased out. The quickest way would be to refund all money paid by an individual and the employer plus compound interest, at the average savings rate in effect at the time the money was withheld, not at today's interest rate.

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