The Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, which claims to represent 1.5 million Reform Jews, is asking its people to call or email Congress to "oppose extension of tax cuts for the wealthy." It uses President Obama's definition of wealthy as anyone with income above $200,000 a year (single) or $250,000 (family).
The Religious Action Center justifies this on a passage from Deuteronomy that we shall "open our hands to the poor and needy among us" (Deuteronomy 15:7), and on the basis that "Extending tax cuts for the wealthy undermines the ability of the federal government to fund such programs." I love how on some things (not about homosexuality or eating kosher, but about taxes) Reform Jews are biblical literalists. They don't seem to get the idea that the more the government takes in taxes, the less the "rich" have left to give away to the "poor and needy among us." Nor do they seem to buy the idea that the economic harm of tax increases would hurt the poor and needy among us.
