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Curiouser and Curiouser

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When curious people do curious things, I get a bit curious myself.

A few months ago I mentioned how Warren Buffett had gone on record as saying he would like to be taxed more. Curious.

Bill Clinton said pretty much the same thing. And my response was to recommend they voluntarily give more. It’s legal to give money to the government; the U.S. Treasury is there to help.

Well, on CNBC recently, a listener emailed Buffett that very question. And the billionaire, not unreasonably, said that his charitable foundation probably does a better job of allocating resources than the government would do.

I can almost see your hand raise up. “Pick me, pick me, Mr. Buffett,” you are saying. “I’ve got a follow-up question!”

Me too. Doesn’t your very answer, Mr. Buffett, beg the question of why we should have higher tax rates in the first place? I mean, why give more money to an entity that will not do a good job of allocating resources?

Maybe good ol’ Warren shouldn’t be taxed more. Maybe we should send our charitable money to Mr. Buffett!

But no. I bet even you and I — yes, humble you and humble me — have just as good ideas of how to spend our money as does Warren Buffett.

And, of course, as does the U.S. government.

So the simple question remains, why higher taxes, Mr. Buffett?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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