Tax Hikes Are Not Government Savings

Curtis Dubay / May 26, 2011

Most people think of savings as that portion of a family’s income that they put away for emergencies, a big purchase, or their kids’ college education. It seems that some in the media want to change that definition.

The Hill ran an article equating tax increases with “savings” in terms of the budget deficit:

Senate Democrats claim they are close to agreement on a spending plan that would reduce borrowing by more than $4 trillion over the next decade, with about half the savings coming from higher taxes.

To review: Savings come from spending less, not taxing more. Higher taxes cannot be savings for the government, because the income wasn’t the government’s to begin with. The extra revenue that would come from those tax hikes belongs to the American families and businesses that earned it. The government cannot “save” it by taxing it away from those who earned it. (more…)