The rich -- as liberals like to call them -- are the people in this society who earn enough to invest and create jobs so that all the rest of us can live decently. A couple earning $50,000 a year with two kids doesn't have money left over after paying the bills to invest in the stock market or even hire one part-time worker at minimum wage.
Small and medium-size businesses create most of the jobs in our economy, and the people who start and run those businesses are the very taxpayers Obama is targeting. He says he's going to cut the deductions these people take on their tax returns by about 20 percent -- which means they'll have less to pay their employees and less incentive to hire new ones.
And the worst part of Obama's plan is that it will actually increase the deficit, not halve it as he promises. When individuals have disincentives to earn more money because Uncle Sam will take more of every extra penny they earn, they do the natural thing: They cut back on work. And when they earn less, they pay less in taxes. Obama's plan will mean a rush to the bottom -- where government incentives give the biggest rewards to those who produce the least. Pretty soon there won't be anyone to foot the bill.
Maybe if President Obama had spent time in the real economy, not simply as the recipient of government or nonprofit paychecks his whole life, he'd be a little less confident in his utopian plans.