Kick 'Em When They're Down: Texas Tax System Burdens Poor Residents

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/19/rick-perry-texas-tax-system_n_931623.html

During his presidential campaign announcement speech last week, Texas Gov. Rick Perry lamented the "injustice" that nearly half of all Americans -- the poorest half -- "don't even pay any income tax." But in Texas, the tax burden is disproportionately shouldered by those families living below the poverty line, newly-released data from the Census Bureau show.

The distribution of wealth in America at the end of 2009 was the most unequal it's ever been, with the wealthiest 1 percent of U.S. households having 225 times the net worth of the median household.

**Opinion**

Often times, those that don't pay taxes, don't do so out of choice. It's more of an inability to pay due to the structure laid out by, many times, the same people who worked to implement or continue such oppression. So, really, it's just being flipped and they (the fortunate) are reporting on their success.

It's way more of an injustice to work to suppress people, especially when you are fortunate, and then to turn around and place blame on those that were institutionalized through systems you and yours implemented.