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"Democracy in America ." @http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/07/taxes-and-rich. 17 July 2012. Web. 6 Sept. 2012. __ Facts __ > 12.At the federal level, the top 10% percent of the distribution paid over 70% of income taxes in 2009 (again, according to the Tax Foundation). Mr Obama's in-it-together point is mildly offensive in context because it is used to imply that top-earners who resist paying an //even larger// portion of America's tab do so only because they are in the grip of an absurd myth of self-reliance. > 13.Asking the minority who already finances rather more than most government expenditure to "give something back", as if it were currently skating by unfairly on the more open-handed spirit of the less privileged, is plain, old-fashioned demagoguery. That's only to be expected, but it's healthy to see it for what it is. > 14.And his suggestion that opposition to higher top income-tax rates could only be based on by-the-bootstraps social atomism is a silly bit of bad faith. > 15.Obama's notion that the rich get more out of our common institutions than they put in is questionable, to say the least. > > >
 * 1) IN A stump speech at a Roanoke, Virginia fire station, Barack Obama proposed to "ask for the wealthy to pay a little bit more" in taxes—to "give something back"—on the grounds that "if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own" because others have "helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive".
 * 2) There are a lot of wealthy, successful Americans who agree with me—because they want to give something back.
 * 3) Building a successful business in an advanced capitalist economy presupposes the existence of a certain physical and institutional infrastructure that no individual could possibly provide on his or her own. There's no disputing this.
 * 4) However, there are serious questions about whether //all// the underlying public goods that make modern business possible must be provided by government and financed with taxes. Education, roads, bridges, and fire protection are routinely financed privately.
 * 5) If most, or even many, of these goods are //better// provided privately, Mr Obama's "we're in this together" argument for higher top tax rates may be a non-starter.
 * 6) Of course we're in it together! Yet it remains unclear that government-financed 2, much less NASA's moon boondoggle, represent the perfection of productive "in-it-together" public spirit.
 * 7) In this light, it's easy to see why Mr Obama's observation that it takes a village to make a fortune is in one respect irrelevant and in another offensive.
 * 8) It is irrelevant because the class of people Mr Obama wants to "give back" has already paid most of the tab, and continues to pay most of the tab, for the tax-financed public goods upon which they, and the rest of us, so crucially depend.
 * 9) Together with a bit of simple democratic mathematics, the facts about the portion of tax revenue contributed by the rich plausibly suggest that they pay //more// than their fair share for the infrastructure of capitalism.
 * 10) The rich have money, which can buy political influence. But the middle class have votes, which in a democracy //is// influence. So it's not surprising that the public goods upon which the middle class equally depends are financed disproportionately by the wealthy.
 * 11) If most, or even many, of these goods are //better// provided privately, Mr Obama's "we're in this together" argument for higher top tax rates may be a non-starter. Of course we're in it together! Yet it remains unclear that government-financed 2, much less NASA's moon boondoggle, represent the perfection of productive "in-it-together" public spirit.