John Torinus adds up what is starting to be known as “Taxmageddon,” the upcoming end of the George W. Bush tax cuts after this year:

Without Congressional action and a presidential signature, many tax breaks for individuals and businesses expire at the end of 2012, and the combination of all those expirations could jack combined rates above the 50% mark.

Further, rates would rise for all taxpayers, not just the “one percenters.”

You’d think the negative effects on a struggling economy might scare the bejeesus out of congressmen seeking reelection this fall, but the level of dysfunction in our polarized capitol suggests the expirations could happen. It could be complete gridlock prior to the November elections and then paralysis in the lame duck session prior to new members taking office in January.

Here’s how a high earner could get to the magic 50% bracket:

• A married couple with income of $250,000 (they could own an LLC or an S Corp. where the business income flows through to them) would see their federal rate go from 33% or 35% to 39.6% on Jan. 1. For comparison, President Obama paid 20.5% to the IRS last year and Mitt Romney paid 14%. Some 40% of the population paid zip.

• Add on another 3.8% for a couple with mostly passive income (interest, dividends), a new tax come 2013 to pay for Obamacare.

• Add on the maximum 7.75% rate in state taxes in Wisconsin or 7.95% in Minnesota, meaning a net of about five add-on points after deduction from federal taxation.

• Add on 1.45% for the Medicare tax for each earner.

• Assuming the current two-point tax break goes away Jan. 1, add on 7.65% for the employee share of Social Security for income up to $110,000, or up to $220,000 if both spouses make more than that base amount or more. (You could argue that the employer share of 7.65% is also really a tax on the employee.)

Without the employer share of the Social Security tax, the stack-up in state and federal income-based taxes can accumulate to as much as 55%.

The same couple also pays a 5.6% sales tax in Southeastern Wisconsin. So if they spend half of their income on consumables, that adds another 2.8 points in state taxes.

And, at the local level, let’s assume they pay $5000 in property taxes, another two points before state and federal deductions, or at least one point on a net basis.

Add it all up, and our “rich” couple could be paying nearly 60% in taxes at all three levels. …

Suffice to say that the level of uncertainty about where the nation’s tax policies are going could be at an all-time high. That takes some of the perceived upside out of a lot of investments.

Every economist and business person would agree that such uncertainty curtails investment — just what we don’t need as a nation amidst a painfully slow recovery.

Every financial advisor is sending out red alerts to their clients, urging them to take defensive action on what could happen in 2013. Said one, “We’re all playing a wait and see game until the elections.”

Investors Business Daily channels its inner Ronald Reagan, who famously asked before the 1980 presidential election:

A Bloomberg poll out this week purports to find that “Americans say they’re better off since Obama took office.” Don’t believe it. Fact is that by most measures, Americans have fallen behind under Obama. …

Here are the facts:

More unemployed: As of May, there were almost 700,000 more people out of work than in January 2009, and the unemployment rate is higher — 8.2% vs. 7.8%. There are also 2.7 million more long-term unemployed — those who’ve been out of work for 27 weeks or more, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

More discouraged workers: The number of “discouraged workers” — people who believe no job is available — is still 100,000 bigger than when Obama took office. There are also more people working part-time because they can’t find full-time jobs, and millions more who aren’t in the labor force at all.

Lower weekly earnings: BLS data also show that real median weekly earnings have dropped 3% during Obama’s time in the White House.

Less household income: Aside from a few upward blips along the way, real median household income has declined steadily under Obama, and is almost 10% below where it stood in January 2009, according to the latest report from Sentier Research.

Lower home prices: The price of existing-home sales has dropped 2.5% in real terms, according to the National Association of Realtors.

More misery: This index — which combines inflation and unemployment — is up 26% under Obama.

Greater income inequality: Obama likes to talk endlessly about fairness and complain about the growing income gap. But to the extent that it matters, income inequality has gotten much worse under Obama. …

And this is to say nothing of the massive debt that Obama has piled up which, as we pointed out Wednesday, could hamper growth for years to come.

Now, of course, Obama likes to blame President Bush for these lousy results. But the truth is that the recession ended five short months after Obama was sworn in — and long before most of his “stimulus” had been spent.

Plus, if history is any guide, the deep 2007-09 recession should have been followed by an even more powerful recovery. Had Obama’s recovery been merely average, there would be millions more with jobs today.

The problem is that Obama’s growth-choking policies have produced the worst economic recovery on record. And the sluggish growth over the past three years hasn’t been enough to lift most people’s boats, but has caused them to sink even further.

The Wall Street Journal’s Dan Henninger adds:

If for the next five months the president and Mitt Romney spoke of nothing other than economic growth—on the stump, in their debates, in their sleep—this election would be the best $2 billion “investment” of campaign funds that Citizens United ever enabled. Get the growth choice right, and we’ll be ok. Get it wrong and your kids will be talking Australia emigration.

Right now, with growth stuck below 2%, we’re toast. With strong growth at 3% or better, there will be jobs. With long-term growth, Medicare, debt and the rest of the horribles that keep worrywarts awake at night are solvable. With strong growth, the U.S. will not have to cede world leadership prematurely to whichever Chinese functionary slugs his way to the top of their heap. With strong growth, your college graduate can move out of the house. With normal American growth, Europe may be irrelevant but it won’t die, and a U.S. president won’t look oddly small talking to the Vladimir Putins of the world. …

Put differently, this is a substance election. It’s not about whether one “likes” Barack Obama or can’t warm to Mitt Romney. Voters have to pick two competing growth models, which means paying attention to what the candidates are saying about economic growth. …

It’s true the Obama Cleveland speech had many familiar rhetorical distortions. One of the most revealing, though, is that “Governor Romney and his allies in Congress believe deeply in the theory that . . . the best way to grow the economy is from the top down.”

Whatever that may mean, more interesting is the Obama counter-theory found here, what he calls “our North Star—an economy that’s built not from the top down, but from a growing middle class.”

There is no theory anywhere in non-Marxist economics that says growth’s primary engine is a social class. A middle class is the result of growth, not its cause. Barack Obama not only believes in class-based growth but has built his whole growth strategy around it.

One word appears nowhere in the 53-minute Obama speech on economic growth: “capital.” Human, financial, whatever. Capital dare not speak its name. …

If Mr. Romney hopes to win what Barack Obama is rightly calling a defining growth election, the governor will have to refute in detail the president’s notions of how growth happens and then explain to voters the real-economy alternative.