http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/10-republican-lies-about-bush-tax-cuts Way too long to copy and paste it, but here are the 10 lies the author is writing about. Lie #1: Democrats Plan Across the Board Tax Hikes on January 1st Lie #2: Democrats Want a $3.8 Trillion Tax Increase Lie #3: Tax Cuts Pay for Themselves Lie #4: The Bush Tax Cuts Didn't Add to the Deficit Lie #5: Expiring High Income Tax Cuts Will Hurt Small Business Lie #6: The Estate Tax Devastates Small Businesses and Family Farms Lie #7: The Bush Tax Cuts Helped All Americans Lie #8. Extending Bush Tax Cuts for the Wealthy is the Best Way to Stimulate the Economy Lie #9. Bush Tax Cuts Produced 52 Straight Months of Job Growth Lie #10: The Rich Pay Too Much in Taxes Already For the details, data and charts for each, continue reading after the break.
When the article talks about supply side economics being "snake oil," it is clearly heavily biased. You're right it's not one man's opinion, but it's in truth one side's opinion. The argument that the actual increased govt. revenues after tax cuts is somehow invalid because of inflation is deeply flawed. Wages don't keep up with inflation. However, 1 guy making $100 and paying 20% generates $20 in tax revenue, while 2 guys making $100 each and paying 15% generates $30 in tax revenue. And that is what happened.
Well, in any meaningful sense, the first thing is the one that's worth talking about. Tax rates will increase across the board on January 1. That's the law as currently written, and the Democrats are the folks who control Congress. Thus, they are the only ones who can pass a new law to change it. And their "planning" to date has not included doing so. Most of the original post is nonsense. One would think folks would start to be getting past this sort of nonsense and start thinking in terms of what we need to do to get things right, rather than selling expensive gimmicks. If taxes are too low, we need to raise them. If spending is too high, we need to lower it. In reality, I think we need to do both. The only reasonable argument I see for pushing off end of the tax cuts is that we're in the midst of a recession. The economic thought here is that you don't want to raise taxes in the midst of a recession. On the other hand, part of the recession the result of expectations about massive public debt, and it might just be best to swallow the bitter pill and get over with it. So I could live with not extending the tax cuts. That being said, it will be a significant chunk of money out of my pocket that I don't get to spend on my family. In exchange, I will get and have gotten very little from the government. For that reason, I'd much prefer the government to simply spend much less next year. The vast majority of the stuff they're going to spend on has very little value, and the real pain that must be passed around could be passed around in much smaller doses than I'm going to get.
Isn't that sort of a problem? When did that happen? Certainly not under Bush's watch. Bush has the worst record of job creation of any modern president. barfo
That is a terribly written piece, with most of the "evidence" not even coming close to proving disproving the "lie". How is: "Lie #10: The Rich Pay Too Much in Taxes Already" not an opinion? Then, the "proof" is because the top rate was 39% when Clinton was president? Pretty lame opinion piece.
We don't have a revenue problem; we have a spending problem. And let's allow history to be our guide: increased revenue going to a Congress controlled by either party won't result in a lower debt level, merely increased expenditures.
I believe this to be true, but do you have a plot or something showing this? Can you see that an increase in revenue leads an increase in spending? That would be pretty interesting.
The Reagan and Clinton years are the best indicators. My larger point is that the Congress sees new revenue as not an opportunity to pay off the debt, but "give" us more programs and benefits.
It's a problem for those trying to argue that tax cuts don't increase govt. revenues. http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/01/09/bush-on-jobs-the-worst-track-record-on-record/ In spite of 22 months of recession during W's terms, 3M NET jobs were created. Obama's not done yet, but his term has been marked by negative NET job creation. He's going to be the worst, barring some miraculous turnaround in the economy before he's through. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be in Democrats' interest to turn things around.
