Taxing the Rich is very Popular

And the rich have a lot of income to tax.  I’m outsourcing this post to Matt Yglesias:

There’s no form of tax increase or spending reduction that has a really enormous amount of public support behind it, but as both public opinion polling and even Pete Peterson’s “America Speaks” event demonstrate, far and away the most popular method available for reducing the long-term fiscal deficit is higher taxes on rich people. I’m much friendlier to the idea of broader-based tax increases than is the average American, but it’s really striking the extent to which members of the political elite insist on ignoring the strong public consensus behind higher taxes on the rich in their discussion of politically feasible policy options.