GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Is $100,000 middle income? MITT ROMNEY: No, middle income is $200,000 to $250,000 and less. So number one, don’t reduce– or excuse me, don’t raise taxes on middle-income people, lower them. Number two, don’t reduce the share of taxes paid by the wealthiest. The top 5% will still pay the same share of taxes they pay today. That’s principle one, principle two. Principle three is create incentives for growth, make it easier for businesses to start and to add jobs. And finally, simplify the code, make it easier for people to pay their taxes than the way they have to now. http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/09/full-transcript-george-stephanopoulos-and-mitt-romney/ Maybe is NoCal or NY 250k Might be middle class, but if you want to define middle class as one standard deviation from the mean is definitely not middle class. 200-250k would be closer to two standard deviation from the mean
Talk about being out of touch. Wow!!!!! I would like to see the whole exchange to understand context but he just walked into a land mine with that one. Worse than the "corporations are people" comment.
Who knows when analyzing semantics, but it sounds like he is just saying the upper bound is somewhere between 200 and 250,000 because he then says "and less."
His word choice was terrible, but that is clearly not what the discussion is about. The part of the discussion was about: 1.) will his plan increase taxes on the middle class and 2.) what income levels will have their income tax burden low.
I read most of the transcript and I know what he meant though I do not agree with him. However, I think he just lost the election with that statement.
I think he lost the election a couple of days ago with the Libya thing, but really -- he's like a gift that just keeps on giving.
I want to believe, but Stephanopoulous asked him point blank, "Is $100,000 middle income?" and he responded flatly, "No." He went on to say it's $200k-$250k and less. Even when you look at it in context, it looks pretty bad.
Romney Stares Uncomprehendingly At $1 Bill POCATELLO, ID—A $1 bill somehow made its way into the hands of Mitt Romney during a campaign stop Thursday, reportedly causing the Republican presidential candidate a moment of uncomprehending fascination. "What am I looking at here? What is this?" said Romney, squinting at the bill as he turned it over and over in his hands. "It almost looks like money, but it's missing the zeroes. Huh. Do people try to buy things with this?" Romney finally crumpled up the bill and threw it away, chuckling as he told reporters that "whoever thought that one up must be a real wiseacre."
However that would not represent the middle class as it is close to two standard deviation from the mean. Otherwise just say everyone because it is 96% of the population and not the middle 66%.
I thought taxes would be reduced by 250k on those making 7 figures? And atleast 50k on those making around 500k? It's funny. Intelligent men like good looking women. All the good looking women in America are upper middle or upper class, with the exception of Hispanics. That tells me all I need to know about the benefits of catering to the wealthy and what a joke it is to consider America a homogenous society. It is AS segregated as ever. So if Romnie wants to leave the shot callers out to dry and start worrying about the poor, who have no aptitude whatsoever... he can go **** himself.
This is true, but at the same, it's the same standard the Obama admin uses. When they talk about raising taxes on the wealthy as opposed to the middle class, they are referring to $250,000+. He really meant to just say that $100,000 is not the limit, and it goes higher. It was a clumsy political answer, but in practice, the two parties and the two candidates are on the same page here. It's a gaffe, but we're way too obsessed with gaffes - I think things like the Libya response are much more telling because they expose actual beliefs and views, as opposed to things like this which is just bad wording.
Obama says he doesn't want to raise middle class taxes and caps the number off at 250k. How's that any different? You really think "middle class" is a statistical calculation?
It's just bizarre. First, he says no to $100k. Then, he goes from a smaller number to a larger number ($200k-$250k) and then says "and less." That in itself is a very odd twist for both economics and rhetoric. Of course, that begs the question: What did he mean by less? Has to be somewhere between $100k and $250k (but not $200k?). If that's the case, why not use whatever number he's thinking about as his original lower number ($150k-$250k)?
It's obvious by his response he thought the question was referring to the upper bound for middle class. Come on guys, this is no better than the Obama "gaffe" posts that pollute the board.
I'll join the counter-dogpile: he's just saying he wants a tax-break for people making under $250k while holding taxes steady above that number. Other than the fact you can't bring in enough revenues to balance the budget that way, what's the big deal? He's supposed to be 'out of touch' because he thinks a family making $200k/year is middle class? He was clearly thinking about tax brackets, not the existential question of what it means to be middle class.
He wasn't saying middle income is $200000-$2500000. He said middle income is $200,000 to $250,000 and less. Nonetheless, I'm sure the Democrats will try to do with that statement what the republicans did with "You didn't build that".