President Bush has a handy example to illustrate his tax-cut/deficit-increase proposal: A family of four with an income of $40,000 would enjoy a $1,133 income tax reduction this year.

The math is presented thusly: Under current law, this family would pay $1,178 in 2003 income taxes. Bush’s plan would reduce that to $45. We’ll deal in a moment with the question of whether this is wise policy.

But there’s a different family to consider, one we don’t see advertised in the political arguments: the household with an income of, say, $13,373,844.

How much federal income tax do these folks pay? How much would they save?

Turns out, this requires some sleuthing and a good measure of guesswork.

For low- and middle-income Americans, such calculations are a dime a dozen. Just peek at the White House Web site. You’d think the president was an old-school ward heeler, battling for the little guy.

But how will the big fish fare? After all, the idea — although not the example — of the “rich” shadows practically every discussion of the administration’s tax policy.

Yet you won’t find these numbers at www.whitehouse. gov.

In fact, case studies about the rich and their taxes are not so easy for the public to come by anywhere, it seems.

For one thing, the IRS does not break out millionaires or multimillionaires in its everyday reports on taxes. Likewise, the important Washington economic think tanks tend to consider tax policy by large groupings — like the wealthiest one-fifth of society, which provides little clue about those at the very top who make up our new gilded class.

Another complication is that there may be no average way to view the rich — finances being more complicated and distinct as they grow in scale.

I turned to divorce records.

Two notable moguls have wound up in court against their estranged spouses lately. No need to name these people. Divorces are painful enough. But these legal battles provide glimpses of life in the economic stratosphere.

In one case, $320,000 was lavished on the couple’s child. In another, a spouse asked for up to $634,487 in support. These are monthly amounts.

I consulted experts.

Purely as a shot in the dark, we assumed that spending on the child accounted for one-third of family income, and that the spouse in the second case was asking for half. The average of the two gives us the $13 million-plus annually. We’ll guess and call that the “reported income” of this hypothetical household.

Three further assumptions: 6 percent of this family’s income came from dividends, which would no longer be taxable under the president’s plan. That’s the percentage Vice President Dick Cheney, himself a millionaire, reported on his 2001 tax return. Also, we’ll allow this hypothetical family 20 percent in deductions for state taxes, mortgages, etc., which is roughly the norm for wage-earning taxpayers. Finally, we’ll overlook the chance that $13 million-plus can buy you a fancy tax dodge or two.

Jeff Rohaly, director of tax modeling at the Tax Policy Center in Washington, D.C., was kind enough to run the numbers: This family would receive an income tax reduction of $683,822 under the president’s plan.

Instead of owing $4,253,332 in taxes, the obligation would decline to $3,569,510.

John J. Barcal, an associate professor of accounting at the University of Southern California, indulged me and did a separate, more generalized calculation. He came to the same conclusion, give or take.

In the way that numbers can tell different stories, you would be correct to note that the president’s $40,000 family would enjoy a whopping 96 percent tax savings, while the millionaire household gets only 19 percent. Equally true and virtually the converse: Of the total savings by these two households, the wealthy family would pocket 99.8 percent.

My own conclusions: A family making $40,000 a year should contribute more than $45 for the support of our national defense, Medicare, parks, highways and other communal interests. Nationhood is worth more each month than the $3.75 price of a hamburger.

Second: A tax cut of $683,822 for people earning $13 million-plus is too much. Even if we grant that these taxpayers toiled their hearts out at considerable risk, their success still owes to the stability and progress of this country, where enterprise can flourish. And right now, the country faces war, record deficits and, as the president’s own budget acknowledges, “deep trouble” in making good on upcoming promises for Social Security and Medicare.

This is no time for any of us to be asking, what can I get out of government? Bush’s plan goes too easy on the rich and on ordinary folks, too.