Rich folks can pay more taxes, and...

While it seems obvious that income and happiness are mostly related, beyond a certain income level, there seem to be no measurable increase in an individual's level of happiness. At least this is what seems to suggest a group of Princeton researchers who found that, based on data from Gallup, that threshold of yearly income appear to fall around $75,000 in the United States.

So why am I even bringing up that subject? Simply because past that income level, what extra flows into our hands makes not much difference and more affluent people could easily pay a little more taxes without seeing their life turned upside down. Instead of that however, the American super-rich seems to pay no more than one half of what their middle-class counterparts are saddled with. In my view, something has to give and while I'm not saying we should “soak the rich,” I'm a proponent of scrubbing the Bush-era tax cuts altogether.

The sole caveat in what I'm advocating is that government should also reduce its expenditures while starting paying off the national debt, both in the same magnitude as we're restoring our previous tax rules. Too often, our public discourse focuses on cutting expenses (Republicans) or raising taxes (Democrats). That's all and that's far from being sufficient.

As an independent, I say, let's make it a "three-legged stool" by cutting expenses, raising taxes and paying off the debt in increments that won't kill us but will demand some real, painful sacrifices from all of us. It's not multitasking, it's just being practical and commonsensical!