 
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Sunday, September 17, 2000
By Jack Torry, Post-Gazette National Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader and the Reform Party's Pat Buchanan both have big plans for the projected $4.56 trillion budget surplus during the next 10 years. But they could not be further apart on what to do with it.
Buchanan wants to use it for a large tax cut. Nader wants to spend it.
Buchanan is the only presidential candidate favoring a flat-rate income tax. He would scrap the current five income tax brackets and replace them with a 16 percent bracket for everyone. He would permit Americans to continue deducting home-mortgage interest. Those earning below $35,000 a year would not pay any income tax.
"With the zeal of our patriot forefathers at Boston Harbor, we must dump our tyrannical 7-million word tax code and reclaim our liberty," Buchanan has said. "The exploitative tax system does not need reform; it needs to be ripped out by the roots."
Nader wants to use the surplus for a major federal public works program.
In an article last year, he wrote that "at no time in recent history has a program to construct, rebuild or repair crumbling bridges, schools, sewer lines, docks, parks, mass-transit systems, libraries, clinics, courthouses . . . been so urgent or achievable."