Is Hillary rethinking her definition of the middle class?
At last week's debate in Las Vegas (right), Barack Obama suggested increasing the $97,500 cap on wages subject to payroll taxes to get bigger earners to pay more to improve the financial outlook of the Social Security system.
Clinton (who favors a Social Security study commission) accused Obama of wanting to impose a $1 trillion tax "on the backs of middle class families and seniors." Obama said people making more than $97,500 are the top 6 percentile of wage earners in the US, hardly the middle class.
Today, in Iowa, Hillary continued her critique, but left out one thing: "We don't need more Republican scare tactics about a Social Security crisis. And we don't need a trillion-dollar tax increase that will hit families already facing higher energy, health care and college costs."
Notice, though -- no more "middle-class families."
At the debate, she tried to say firefighters and "school supervisors" made more than than $97,500. But -- maybe Mark Penn decided that was a little bit too NY standard of living, and made Hillary sound a little out of touch in Iowa, NH and Nevada. In any event -- no claim today that raising the cap would affect the 'middle class.'