Wes Clark's Families First Tax Reform

General Clark has today unveiled the most comprehensive progressive tax plan of any of the serious candidates. The plan aims to relieve (and in many cases eliminate) the tax burden on low and middle income families. Give it a read. It's unclear how the plan addresses married couples and singles without children, but honestly they're not the ones that really need the help. Regardless, I would like to see this point addressed, at least as far as making it clearer that it wouldn't hurt these groups [see update below]. There is some discussion of this issue, and hopefully more, over at the CCN.

Wes Clark's Families First Tax Reform is a major tax simplification proposal that will restore progressivity to the tax code, relieve the working-family squeeze and reduce poverty. Under Wes Clark's Families First Tax Reform, a family of four making up to $50,000 would pay no federal income taxes, and all taxpaying families with children making up to $100,000 would get a tax cut.

Wes Clark's plan will accomplish all this by consolidating and expanding on an existing confusing and uneven set of tax benefits for children, creating a new tax credit of $2,250 for each child available for families making $20,000 or $50,000 or $100,000.

• Wes Clark's Plan is Fair. Under President Bush, typical families have seen their incomes fall by nearly $1,500 - while President Bush provided an average tax cut of $128,000 to taxpayers making over $1 million. Under Wes Clark's Families First Tax Reform:
  • A married couple with two children making $50,000 would get a $1,583 tax break.
  • A married couple with three children both earning the minimum wage, or $21,000 annually, would get a tax break of $2,287.
  • A married couple with two children making $85,000 would get a $975 tax cut.
  • 31 million working families would get tax relief, with the typical family getting a $1,477 tax cut.
• Wes Clark's Plan is Progressive. Wes Clark's proposal not only provides relief for middle-income parents struggling not to fall behind in the Bush economy, but to the working poor struggling to work their families out of poverty and into economic independence.
  • Hundreds of thousands of children will be lifted out of poverty.
• Wes Clark's Plan is Simple. Under Wes Clark's plan, families will only need to fill out a simple, three-line form to find out if they need to pay federal income taxes, providing their income, number of children, and marital status. And the majority of families will no longer be required to file tax forms.
• Wes Clark's Plan is Responsible. The plan will provide $33 billion annually in tax relief for working families. This will be paid for without increasing the deficit by:
  • A 5 percentage point increase in the tax rate only on income over $1 million per year. This surcharge, which could be used only for working family tax relief, would not apply to the first $1 million of income or to any capital gains - so it will not affect 99.9 percent of taxpayers.
  • Closing corporate loopholes, including the ones that Enron took advantage of to unfairly cut its taxes.

[Update]

Incidentally, this passage from the announcement speech makes me warm and fuzzy.

So if Karl Rove is watching today, Karl, I want you to hear this loud and clear - I'm going to provide tax cuts to ease the burden for 34 million American families and lift hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty by raising the taxes on one-tenth of one percent of families in America, those who make more than a million dollars a year. You don't have to read my lips, I'm saying it.* And if that makes me an "old style? "Democrat, then, I accept that label with pride and dare you to come after me for it. Because what I am talking about today is in the best tradition of Wilson and Roosevelt; of JFK, LBJ, and Bill Clinton - and it is in the best interest of the United States of America!

[Another Update]

Apparently, I'm blind.

Expanded benefits for low-income adults without children. Clark's Tax Reform builds on the existing EITC for childless adults, raising the maximum credit from $382 to $500.