Josh Barro, Columnist

Paul Ryan vs. the Middle Class

At a time when Republicans must appeal to the middle class, Paul Ryan is pushing ideas that would hurt them.

March 14, 2013 at 8:22 PM UTC

Josh Barro is the lead writer for the Ticker, Bloomberg View's blog on economics, finance and politics. His primary areas of interest include tax and fiscal policy, state and local government, and planning and land use. Previously, Barro was a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and a commercial real estate banker at Wells Fargo. He holds a bachelor's degree in psychology from Harvard and lives in Queens, New York.

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

This article is for subscribers only.

I'm a little depressed having to write about Representative Paul Ryan's budget proposal because there is so little merit to it. Matt Yglesias provides the best summary, but the gist of the budget is to cut taxes on the rich and offset that by raising taxes on the middle class and deeply cutting programs that the poor and middle class depend on, such as Medicaid, Pell grants and (eventually) Medicare. It is a document that would make life more difficult for non-rich Americans and widen income inequality in America.

(I can already hear the wounded Republicans shouting that I'm lying because Ryan's plan is too vague to be called a middle-class tax increase. Call me out on it. I dare you.)