Chris Rock
Actor and comedian Chris Rock is the latest celebrity to come forward and say he wouldn't mind paying higher taxes, sharing his thoughts on the economic crisis with the Associated Press Wednesday.
"I'll pay higher taxes. I look at it this way I can pay higher taxes and people can have jobs or I can pay lower taxes and I have my kid's teacher asking me for a loan because she's going to lose her house, which is true," Rock said. "So I'm going to lose the money no matter what."
In 2009, Forbes estimated Rock's yearly earnings at $42 million. President Barack Obama has said individuals making more than $1 million a year should not pay a lower tax rate than middle class families, a position that has earned him charges of "class warfare" by Republicans.
In December, rapper Jay-Z declared "most people with a conscience" shouldn't have a problem paying higher taxes.
Promoting his film "2 Days in New York" at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, Rock also said Obama is like "the parent of the country" whose role is to reassure everyone.
"That's your job when you run anything is to -- reassure, so that's all I hope for, some reassurance," he said. "The president of the United States is more or less the parent of the country."
Speaking with co-star and director Julie Delpy, the two took the "parent" analogy further, turning it into an opportunity to essentially bash former President George W. Bush.
"When Bush was in power, what kind of parenting was that?" Delpy asked, laughing. "Dysfunctional parents."
"You know, some parents do wacky things," Rock said. "'Let's go to war.' People that didn't do anything. Let's bomb a country that didn't bomb us. I never understood that one."
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