Please, read what I wrote.  For your average American focusing on cutting FICA is far more important than the individual income tax.  Cutting business taxes would help too, since that would increase the amount of money going into retirement investment vehicles like pension funds.  In none of this do I argue against cutting individual income taxes.  Its simply a matter of priorities.  You can cut individual taxes all you want to; until you attack FICA (payroll taxes) you aren’t going to reduce the greatest federal tax burden on your average wage earner.

Anyway, you didn’t answer many of my questions and I am well aware that SSI is a ponzi scheme, as are all unfunded, Bismarkian pension plans.

You’re still only looking at income taxes, and not total taxes. Your typical WalMart employee makes less than $12,000/year and loses 20% of that to taxes.

I’m all for tax cuts, but this tidbit is somewhat misleading.  After all, how are you defining taxes?  Do you include FICA?  Or the various sales taxes?  Or do you simply mean the federal income tax?  If that is the case then you are leaving out over 50% of the taxes that the federal government collects.  A little under 20% of the taxes paid come from the income tax on businesses, which are ultimately paid by you and me either as shareholders (lower share price profits) or as consumers.  Are you including that sort of stuff as well?

Anyway, reducing the federal income tax is never going to really help middle-income and low wage earners much, as most of them pay more in FICA than they ever will in income taxes.  Indeed, its in FICA that we have seen the real growth in taxes in the U.S. (as far as the federal government is concerned) over the past fifty years.  Thus getting that under control is really the area that folks of less lofty incomes should be concerned about.

And while we’re at it, did Krugman win the Nobel before or after his stint as corporate advisor to Enron?  Hmmm?