They thought long and hard about it

And two economist professors to the left of Paul Krugman have published a paper (pdf) stating that the “optimal” top tax rate should be…….

Wait for it…….

76%

Wrap your head around that for a moment.

Peter Diamond of MIT and Emmanuel Saez of UC Berkeley believe that their research proves that the “optimal” top tax rate for folks making $1,000,000 or more per year is more than 3/4 of their earnings, and that the skyrocketing of the rates should begin at $400,000, for “the fair distribution of the tax burden”.

Of course, the leftosphere went nuts over the idea.

I noticed that in their “references” section of this paper, they quote their own prior research more than a dozen times. As I stated after the conclusion of my Social Sciences writing course, the favorite pastime of Social Scientists, such as economists, is to quote themselves and their friends while writing a paper that justifies their per-conceived ideas.

Read it if you’ve got the stomach.

On a side note, one of the left-bloggers uses the line “From whom much is given, much is expected.” Now, if my google-fu is up to par, this is a paraphrase of Luke 12:48. The writer is attempting to justify the idea that because someone has earned much wealth, then their tax burden should be far higher so as to “help” those who earn less.

However, if one were to think about the phrase logically, wouldn’t it be those who rely on the money taken from someone at the point of a gun who should be the ones who should live under the higher expectations? We expect more from our constabulary because we give them extraordinary powers over their fellow citizens. Likewise with our politicians.

I guess that the receivers of charity are only following that example.