Calling Bullshit by Jevin D. West & Carl T. Bergstrom

Author:Jevin D. West & Carl T. Bergstrom [West, Jevin D. & Bergstrom, Carl T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780241327258
Google: w2jMDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Penguin UK
Published: 2020-08-03T23:00:00+00:00

In general, we need to be on the lookout for uneven or varying scales on the x axis. Something similar can happen with bar charts, when data are “binned” together to form bars. Consider the following bar chart from an article in The Wall Street Journal about President Obama’s tax plan.

The graph purports to show the location of the bulk of the US tax base. Each bar represents taxpayers in a certain income range; this is what we mean by binning the data. These income ranges are displayed along the horizontal axis; along the vertical axis is the total income of all filers in a given range. Most of the taxable income, according to this figure, comes from the “middle class,” the region from $50,000 to $200,000 where the bars extend the highest. (There is also a large block of taxable income in the range from $200,000 to $500,000, but even by Wall Street Journal standards this is hard to envision as middle class.)

The author makes the argument that the bulk of the burden from Obama’s tax plans will inevitably fall on the middle class, not the rich.

The rich aren’t nearly rich enough to finance Mr. Obama’s entitlement state ambitions—even before his health-care plan kicks in. So who else is there to tax? Well, in 2008, there was about $5.65 trillion in total taxable income from all individual taxpayers, and most of that came from middle income earners. The nearby chart shows the distribution, and the big hump in the center is where Democrats are inevitably headed for the same reason that Willie Sutton robbed banks.*7

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