Warren Buffett presently pays billions in federal taxes, but business writer James Stewart finds all of this unfair. To be clear, Stewart thinks the tax code is slanted toward Buffett (and others like him) despite the billions Buffett hands over each year to the federal government. In fairness to the New York Times columnist, his analysis is based on Buffett's faux - and long ago discredited – lament that he pays a lower rate of tax on his income than does his secretary.
Income is italicized up above simply because Buffett was engaging in a bit of rhetorical trickery that most quickly picked up on. While his annual income is relatively low, Buffett is the 2nd richest American precisely because he's a major shareholder in Berkshire Hathaway, a rather successful collection of blue-chip companies cobbled together by Buffett. As a major owner of Berkshire, Buffett pays billions annually in taxes; the latter seemingly an inconvenient truth glossed over by the class warriors in our midst. In Stewart's case, maybe he just didn't know.
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