Newsweek's Ben Adler in his June 21 blog suggested tea party activists were ignorant because they didn't know that President Obama has cut taxes.
Adler stated, ".... Only 2 percent believed they (taxes) have gone down, even though, in fact, Obama has cut taxes. Might that be worth bringing to bear? Maybe we should even ask Tea Partiers whether they are aware of the reality on taxes if that changes their views?"
But some public policy experts say Adler's claim is outdated.
A CBS/New York Times poll asked about taxes in early February of 2010, about a month or so before The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law March 23. The polls showed that most Americans do not believe the President has raised taxes/
"This was kind of true up until the health care bill," wrote Curtis Dubay, senior policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation, in an e-mail. "The Make Work Pay Credit cut taxes for most Americans. Of course a hike in the cigarette tax preceded that. But now that health care is law, that bill raised taxes by over $500 billion over 10 years. There is no credible way anyone can call Obama a tax cutter now. More tax hikes are on the way, too. There are $50 billion in hikes pending in the Senate now. And the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts will expire soon. "
University of Michigan-Flint Economics Professor Mark Perry said some data on tax cuts has a bit of a lag time. Perry wrote in an e-mail that it takes the IRS about three years to release individual income tax data.
"So we won't know for another three years or show what happened in 2010, as far as tax shares, average tax rates, etc.," Perry wrote.
Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.