For a while now, I've been griping about how inequitable the Bush administration's tax policies are. If it were up to them (and nowadays it largely is), the only federal tax would be a wage tax. Dividends and capital gains would be completely exempt.

What an awful system. Working people would pay 30 or 40 percent of what they make (counting their involuntary "contribution" to Social Security), and fat cat investors living off investments would pay nothing. But the White House looks the public straight in the eye and says, "That's right."

The federal estate and gift taxes are a great equalizer. They tax accumulated wealth as it passes from generation to generation. Of course, the Bushies plan to eliminate those taxes entirely, as well as turning the income tax into a wage tax.

Even without the Bush "improvements," the federal income tax had been getting less and less progressive. (By "progressive," I mean based on one's ability to pay.) An article that appeared yesterday in a journal called Tax Notes shows a disturbing trend between 1995 and 2000: The "Fortunate 400," that is, the 400 taxpayers in the country with the most income, doubled their percentage of the nation's income, but their rate of tax fell substantially, over that period.

In 1995 their share of total AGI [adjusted gross income] was 0.49 percent, so between 1995 and 2000 it more than doubled, to 1.09 percent in 2000.... Beginning in 1995, there was also a notable decline in the average tax rate faced by the top 400. This rate fell from 29.93 percent in 1995 to 22.29 percent in 2000.

The author, Professor Joel Slemrod of the University of Michigan, concludes that this was because more and more of the rich folks' income was coming in the form of capital gains, taxed at lower rates.

Imagine what will happen now that the capital gain rates are even lower, and dividends are also taxed at those low, low rates.

Then ask yourself, do we need all the additional tax giveaways that the Republicans in Washington are planning?