Thursday, October 16, 2008

The Peril of Anecdotes

OK, let us see: Joe the plumber and independent voter wants to buy the plumbing company he works for, which earns $250,000+ a year, and he is concerned about the tax burden for which he will be responsible.


Shall we deconstruct the sentence?


"Joe" - His name is Sam (But ok, given what follows I'll assume that he might be known as Joe, as that seems to be his middle name).


"the independent" - He is a registered Republican.


"plumber" - He is unlicensed.


"wants to buy the plumbing company he works for" -- But which is not apparently for sale, which Joe is not actually trying to buy, and which Joe could not afford to buy on his $40,000 income. Oh, and that damned licensing issue again.


"which earns $250,000+ a year" - Actually it's about $100,000, which is important given the supposed magic number of $250,000 based on Obama's tax plan.


"and he is concerned about the tax burden for which he will be responsible." - Obviously (well, maybe not so - people usually are unclear on the arcane tax code) any rate hike for those incomes above $250,000 would only count against the money earned above $250,000. But beyond that, my favorite part of all of this is that Joe has a tax lien against him. So he is not paying his taxes now.


So here is what is accurate in the sentence:


"Voter plumbing company he works for, and he is concerned." Actually, I think Sarah Palin uttered that exact sentence in her debate in response to a question about foreign policy.

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