# Why are Republicans pushing to extend the Bush tax cuts?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-republicans-pushing-to-extend-the-bush-tax-cuts/547945>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [July 25, 2010, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-republicans-pushing-to-extend-the-bush-tax-cuts/547945 "2010-07-25T14:55:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 379

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**Author:** ![yorick73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/b5a626/32.png) [@yorick73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yorick73)\
**Post date:** [August 3, 2010, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-republicans-pushing-to-extend-the-bush-tax-cuts/547945/379 "2010-08-03T21:08:03Z")

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> [@Jas09](#):
>
> > [@Huerta88](#):
> >
> > The rhetorical value of the hateful references to “the wealthy” and “the rich” must be very high indeed because tax raisers can’t help themselves from using it even when they know that the $200k annual salary that triggers the “millionaire tax” corellates with a comfortable but not much more than middle class family existence in many or most cities on the East and West coast, and that the GWB tax cuts lowered the proportion of the taxes paid by the lower bands of what we’d all agree is the middle class.
> 
> This type of talk is exactly why many folks don’t think the Republican Party gets it. $200k salary is not middle class. The median household income in 2007 was around $50k. Four times the median is no longer in “the middle”. 96.5% of the households in American made less than 200k in 2006.
> 
> [http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032007/hhinc/new06\_000.htm](http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032007/hhinc/new06_000.htm)

I can guarantee you that a family making $250K before taxes is decidedly middle class in the DC area.

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