Taxed to the Nines

Said Cain: "With this tax plan of mine,
Your taxation is fair, flat and fine!"
(But it opens the door
For a VAT on the poor);
Said the Right and the Left: "Nein, nein, nein!"

With Herman Cain's rise in polls of Republican Presidential primary voters, his "9-9-9" tax plan is getting a closer look. The early findings have both progressive and conservative analysts sounding like hordes of angry Germans. Anti-tax groups such as Freedom Works point out that Cain's 9% national sales tax (and elements of his 9% corporate tax) could act as a Trojan Horse for a larger and much less transparent value-added tax. Meanwhile, the Think Progress blog concludes that Cain's 9% flat income tax, combined with the sales tax and the elimination of taxes on capital gains and inheritances, would dramatically shift the tax burden downward to the poor and the middle class.