A look at upcoming taxes--Obama and Romney

I read an interesting article on National Review's online site. It dealt with projected taxes under either a Romney or an Obama Presidency.

Mitt Romney has proposed to cut tax rates for the middle class — and everybody else who pays the federal income tax — by reducing all brackets by 20 percent. He makes up this lost money by eliminating certain exemptions and deductions. How many and which of those deductions would need to be reduced or eliminated would be determined by the economic facts on the ground come January: If the economy is growing more quickly than expected, then fewer offsets will be required to keep tax revenue level. Romney has repeatedly offered this scenario-- lower rates and fewer deductions, producing a system that is fairer and flatter. His goal is not to lower federal revenue but to increase economic growth by simplifying tax law, lowering compliance costs, and reducing economic distortions.  Sounds good to me.

What would we get with Obama's fiscal policies? If he continues this string of elevated levels of federal spending that have produced an unbroken chain of deficits exceeding $1 trillion, he will be forced to create a very large tax increase on, guess who, the middle class and all other taxpayers. Gigantic deficits like we have seen over the past three years can be sustained for only so long.

The National Review article brought out specific numbers to illustrate this. Interest rates are at present very low, but if they should return to their historic average, the increasing costs of financing our national debt will be catastrophic. Here's what the numbers suggest. The president’s most recent budget proposal would add some $7.6 trillion in new federal debt. The additional debt-service costs would add up to an average of about $1,300 per family per year under the current tax system. Families of relatively modest means would see hundreds of dollars a year in new taxes, and better-off families would see thousands or tens of thousands of dollars a year in new taxes. This is no small matter.

So it comes down to this. Obama proposes ever-higher spending, which means, unavoidably, ever-higher taxes. Romney proposes to restrain spending and to reform the tax code in the hopes of turning around our sluggish economy. I know which candidate has the best chance of keeping our taxes under control.