Behind The Mic With Joe Mathieu: Rich Getting Richer

BOSTON (CBS) - A new study into tax breaks and loopholes confirms what a lot of people already thought.

The system is stacked against the little guy.

We heard a lot about the 99-percent during the last election (not to be confused with the 47-percent). Activists from Occupy Boston and other groups told us the system was built to benefit the 1-percent. The rich getting richer.

(Insert line about Warren Buffet's secretary here)

This report might make you feel the same way.

It's from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office which crunches numbers for lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

It found that more than half the benefits of 10 major tax breaks go to the one-fifth of households at the top of the income scale.

Those same households enjoy four-fifths of the benefits of deducting state and local taxes.

Some will tell you this is because the tax code was written by rich people. Wealthy white men. And whether that's true, the reason why there is such disparity is because our tax code gives preferential treatment to people with investment income.

And most low income households tend to have fewer, if any, investments.

Democrats will likely use this information to build the case for eliminating some tax breaks for wealthy Americans.

Indeed the study was requested by Congressman Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) who is the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee.

You can follow Joe on Twitter @JoeMathieuWBZ.