Dude, that was 32 years ago. You think forgetting something that was 32 years ago is memory dysfunction? You have really high standards, especially for normal people like me.

I guess if my salary was $500,000 per year I would remember something like that.

Now I’m no tax expert, but I was getting significant bonuses and had some decent dividends in the 1990’s, and I have no memory of that income being treated any differently than any other. (Capital gains were different then, as now.) I read as much as I could and found nothing about a different treatment for dividends or bonuses. So when you blame Clinton for that I have to say “wha???”

Yes, he did raise the top brackets, to 36% if you earned more than $250,000, and to 39.6% if you were somewhere above $300,000, the inflation adjusted equivalent buying power of $530,000 and $630,000 today. Yeah, I would remember that. I remember extremely well paying six figures of taxes for 1999 when I cashed out all my gains in AOL and Cisco (and a few others.) Those things linger in the memory.

Meanwhile for the first time in, well, forever, the budget was balanced. It wasn’t only the doing of those hikes, it was also a recalcitrant Congress that refused new spending, and the gusher of tax receipts brought on by the internet (bubble) which produced a lot of corporate revenue and stock market gains.

But mostly you’re complaining about the same things that have happened (at least in nearly every bracket you and I were part of) during every Presidency. I agree with Bush did reduce taxes. The top brackets got thousands. You probably got about $60. Good show.