The Washington Post has an interesting graphic which gives a good visual for both McCain and Obama’s tax priorities. It’s easy to see the difference between the two: for McCain, the more money you already have, the more you’ll get back from the government. The less you have, the less you’ll get. For Obama, those who have the least receive the most tax support proportionally:
These figures are based on the Tax Policy Center’s analysis of the candidate’s proposals. (The full report is available on pdf here.)
What’s particularly striking to me is what this says about each candidate’s priorities. John McCain evidently believes that those who have the most should be given the most back – both in terms of actual dollars and percentages of tax decreases. Barack Obama has the exact opposite philosophy here: those who have the least actually get the highest percentages back.
As a Christian first, but also as an American who believes in fairness and equal opportunity, I frankly can’t understand where John McCain is coming from. The idea of giving the most to those who already have the most, and giving the least to those who have the least is completely backward. It belies the interests of economic greed to which McCain is beholden. It is out of touch not only with the needs of real people, but with the biblical idea of whom in society should we really be helping. If this is an example of how John McCain’s values translate to policy, he should be opposed not only on political but moral grounds.
UPDATE: Commenter cheyenne alerts us to another chart of the same data, created by chartjunk. This one offers a visual that corresponds to the size of the U.S. population.
Reflections of Ryberg 