Warren Buffett is very rich. Even after giving away most of his fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, he’s still worth billions of dollars. Don’t say that he just gave that money away for the tax write-off. Buffett’s never been about that kind of thing.

He doesn’t hire some hot-shot tax advisor to do his taxes, even though they probably could have saved him billions of dollars through the years. He just receives the paperwork from the IRS in the mail, fills it out, and sends the government the millions of dollars he owes them. Does he complain about his taxes? Hardly. The only thing he complains about is the taxes the secretaries and clerks that work for him have to pay.

Buffett recently looked at the taxes paid by people who work in his office. As a percentage of their income, the secretaries and clerks pay more in taxes than Warren Buffett, a man who could never spend all the money he has in a dozen lifetimes. That’s not fair, says Buffett.

In class warfare, the wealthy class will always find a way to win economically. That’s why the rich pay less of their income in taxes than the poor. Increasing the tax on income above $5 million by 5%, for instance, would likely erase the federal deficit. Would anyone really feel that kind of tax? Probably not. For a person who made $100 million last year (and yes, there were plenty who did), it would mean an increase of less than $5 million. When you’re pulling in $100 million a year, $5 million isn’t going to break the bank. Add in the rest of their tax bill, and they’ll still have a good $50 to $60 million to throw around on their yacht or Italian roadster.

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