Shlaes: New Fiscal Buzzwords Obscure Old Problems

"As it happens, more young Americans know what Google Inc's Android operating system is than know some basic facts about our politics," writes Shlaes. Now, though, the "budget-ese we're not learning is allowing our legislators to get away with some deeply misleading claims, and it's threatening to make our fiscal problems much worse."

Second example: "making the rich pay their fair share." So what is a fair share? In the rest of the English language, “fair” means proportionality. “Share” implies equality by percentage. A bigger man lifts a bigger load, in proportion to his size. But our tax system isn’t proportional. It’s progressive, with a graduated scale, so that the wealthier man pays more than his share. The bottom half of all earners pay less than 5 percent of the income tax. 

That so many Americans don't know the difference between progressivity and proportionality is certainly convenient to revenue-hungry Washington.