Sunday, January 06, 2008

During Dem debate, ABC's Gibson suggested middle-class families would be hurt by proposed rollback of Bush tax cuts

During the January 5 ABC News-Facebook Democratic debate at St. Anselm College, in Manchester, New Hampshire, moderator and ABC's World News anchor Charlie Gibson suggested that the Democratic presidential candidates' proposals to roll back or let some of President Bush's tax cuts expire would affect middle-class families. After Gibson noted that the Democratic candidates are "all talking about letting some of the Bush tax cuts lapse," Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) replied that they would roll back "tax cuts on the wealthiest of Americans, not the middle class."

Gibson continued: "If you take a family of two professors here at St. Anselm, they're going to be in the $200,000 category that you're talking about lifting the taxes on." In fact, contrary to Gibson's suggestion that $200,000 is a typical, middle class household income in the United States, the U.S. Census Bureau's data for 2006 -- the most recent year available -- place the median household income at $48,451, and the mean household income at $65,527. According to the Census data, only 3.4 percent of U.S. households have an income of $200,000 or more.

Gibson did not cite a source for his assertion that a family of two St. Anselm professors would make more than $200,000 in taxable income, an assertion that was met with laughter from the audience and the remark from former Sen. John Edwards (D-NC) that: "I don't think they agree with you." According to the American Association of University Professors, a full professor at St. Anselm in 2006-2007 had an average salary of $77,400 (not including other taxable benefits given to St. Anselm faculty)....

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