Ben Carson Has New Tax Plan Based On The Bible, Says Taxing Poor People Less Is ‘Condescending’
Ben Carson is hard at work laying out the lines of his proposed policies, and some of them are more than a little startling. On Sunday, Carson laid out a plan that he says is Bible-based, and that he thinks will make taxation fair for all: a flat tax.
According to Politico, Ben Carson rationalized the plan by saying that poor people would actually appreciate having the same tax rate as the wealthiest Americans, because those living below the poverty line have a lot of pride. It may sound like yet another means to make the poor poorer and the rich richer, but fear not — the plan is apparently divinely inspired. The Republican presidential hopeful explains that it comes directly from the Bible.
Specifically, Carson cites tithing. Of course, tithing works on the belief that one is giving back to God a fraction of what God Himself has given first, so for it to work as a government plan, people would first have to believe the government was responsible for giving them their livelihoods. The blowback from “You didn’t build that” might be sufficient to show how well that is liable to go over.
There’s also the fact that Carson seems to be suggesting the elimination of deductions and loopholes — which isn’t likely to be a popular policy at any income level.
It’s not the first time Carson has proposed a flat tax — on April 15, he tweeted it, along with a request for donations and a suggestion to completely eliminate the IRS.
Tax Day reminds us that our tax code is a disaster! We need a simple, proportional tax code that eliminates the IRS. http://t.co/GV4LbtNANP
— Dr. Ben Carson (@RealBenCarson) April 15, 2015
It isn’t the only proposal Carson is making that is unlikely to sit well with voters at any point in the political spectrum. According to the Washington Post, he also has some ideas about ending the Supreme Court’s review of laws and allowing a president to ignore the Supreme Court’s rulings.
Of course, he and conservative followers are probably thinking of the upcoming ruling regarding marriage equality. However, surely no member of his audience can fail to consider that this (if it was even a remote possibility) would have to apply equally to, for instance, giving President Barack Obama the right to overrule the Supreme Court’s decisions on certain parts of the Affordable Care Act.
Ben Carson’s Sunday statements don’t seem to quite align with our two prominent political ideologies, nor are they a meeting-in-the-middle compromise. Instead, they seem to be outlier notions that aren’t likely to actually have enough support for any success.
[Photo by: Bill Pugliano/Getty Images]
