Nearly 70 percent of Americans believe the wealthy pay too little in taxes, according to a new poll seemingly showing support for parts of President Obama’s populist approach to funding middle-class initiatives.
The Associated Press-GfK poll released Sunday found that 68 percent of those surveyed said wealthy households pay too little in federal taxes, while 60 percent of respondents argued that middle-class households pay too much in such levies.
Less than 20 percent of Americans said low-income families pay too little in federal taxes.
Obama is calling on lawmakers to close certain loopholes for wealthy individuals and corporations, among other measures, to fund his blueprint for “middle-class economics.”
The president would also like to increase the capital gains tax rate on couples earning more than $500,000 annually, charge capital gains on assets passed on to heirs and place a new tax on big banks.
However, his ideas have no chance of passage in a Republican-controlled Congress.
The poll found that 56 percent of Americans favor raising capital gains taxes on households making more than a half million dollars a year.
But other provisions of Obama’s tax plan were far less popular.
Just 27 percent of respondents supported the president’s call to have estates pay capital gains taxes on inherited assets, compared to 36 percent who opposed it.
And a lowly 19 percent of Americans backed Obama’s abandoned plan to tax popular 529 college savings plans.
The AP-GfK Poll of 1,045 adults was conducted online Jan. 29-Feb. 2, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
