besides adding massively to the national debt, what else did bush's tax cuts do?

[thereisnospoon]

Ask Obama and the Dem Senate what was so good about the Bush tax cuts, they passed it again...

ummm because the GOP threatened to not extend unemployment for working Americans which would have been disaster for our economy.

WRONG.....The extensions have been a disaster. No economic benefit long term has been realized by giving people and incentive to not seek work.
Now the other shoe has dropped. Many states are running out of have exhausted the funding for unemployment compensation. This was predicted and is the reason why the extensions were opposed in the first place.
There is no more money for this. People will just have to suck it up and take work wherever they can find it.
I find the current system to be outrageous. Up until recently, unemployment compensation had many restrictions which kept in check the ability of lazy people from quitting work to collect. In the past unemployment checks were to be picked up at the local unemployment office. With each pay day, the recipient had to show they were actively seeking work. For example in New Jersey, out of work people had to show at least 6 contacts per 2 week period in order to get their check. If they could not furnish required contacts, pay was denied. Also, no person would be eligible for compensation if they lost their job for cause. There was no quitting to collect. Also , recipients could not have any documented income. If income was discovered, benefits were denied. If later on, the Unemployment Office discovered unreported income, all monies received by the recipient were to be returned with interest and penalties.
It should still be this way because the working taxpayers should be protected from fraud and lazy people who can, but will not work.

 

[Uncle Kenny]

It made the world a better place for billionaires, didn't it?

EVery policy ccreates winners and losers.

The rich won, and the nation as a whole lost.

What? Middle class families made out very well in the tax cuts. They got increased EIC and kept more money. That assisted a lot of not wealthy people. As for taxing the highest earners, how much of that is passed down in inflation? Almost all of it is the answer. Review the Carter Administration policy and effect. Disproportionate taxation is our policy already, but the more burdens we place on those who can divert the expense the higher we inflate pricing and in net effect bury the lowest earners.

The naivety of liberals is amazing. They seem to think you can simply take the money from the wealthy and give it to the “poor” and it has no other effect on economics, like Robin Hood. Something has to be produced to create wealth. Money given and not earned creates nothing but debt. Taking money from people who have earned it, especially when they are the highest producers reduces capital for production and raises costs. Taxes are overhead and they can create inflation as an offset. Higher costs means fewer sales and a need for higher profit per sale or reduction of labor (that’s the middle class jobs FYI), or usually both.

Strong economy is based on expansion, production and innovation, none of which does taxation facilitate. Liberals actually seem to want a 2 class system based on providers and dependants. I can only assume they really believe they would be the providers despite producing nothing. Keep taking away incentive to produce and expand and industry will follow suit. Explain where jobs and money come from in that scenario..

 

[thereisnospoon]

Maybe if your representatives made people pay for every nickel of government spending they passed, when they passed it,

people would stop asking their representatives for more government spending.

The ability to borrow is the root cause of the deficit/debt problem.

Actually it is not the root cause. That sits squarely on the shoulders of the inability to borrow and spend responsibly. Borrowing in and of itself gives the federal government a safety net in case of emergencies or unforeseen contingencies. It is the abuse of the borrowing process for non essential spending and pork projects which is the root of debt/deficits.

 

[Uncle Kenny]

Ask Obama and the Dem Senate what was so good about the Bush tax cuts, they passed it again...

ummm because the GOP threatened to not extend unemployment for working Americans which would have been disaster for our economy.

WRONG.....The extensions have been a disaster. No economic benefit long term has been realized by giving people and incentive to not seek work.
Now the other shoe has dropped. Many states are running out of have exhausted the funding for unemployment compensation. This was predicted and is the reason why the extensions were opposed in the first place.
There is no more money for this. People will just have to suck it up and take work wherever they can find it.
I find the current system to be outrageous. Up until recently, unemployment compensation had many restrictions which kept in check the ability of lazy people from quitting work to collect. In the past unemployment checks were to be picked up at the local unemployment office. With each pay day, the recipient had to show they were actively seeking work. For example in New Jersey, out of work people had to show at least 6 contacts per 2 week period in order to get their check. If they could not furnish required contacts, pay was denied. Also, no person would be eligible for compensation if they lost their job for cause. There was no quitting to collect. Also , recipients could not have any documented income. If income was discovered, benefits were denied. If later on, the Unemployment Office discovered unreported income, all monies received by the recipient were to be returned with interest and penalties.
It should still be this way because the working taxpayers should be protected from fraud and lazy people who can, but will not work.

In fairness, it is difficult to convince someone to work above board when the 40 hour income they would recieve afer taxes is only $120-$160 dollars a week more than unemployment. Let's face it they are in effect working for $3-$4 dollars an hour, right?

 

[NYcarbineer]

"The original" means prior to 1913, nitwit.

Is the income tax constitutional or not?

 

[thereisnospoon]

ummm because the GOP threatened to not extend unemployment for working Americans which would have been disaster for our economy.

WRONG.....The extensions have been a disaster. No economic benefit long term has been realized by giving people and incentive to not seek work.
Now the other shoe has dropped. Many states are running out of have exhausted the funding for unemployment compensation. This was predicted and is the reason why the extensions were opposed in the first place.
There is no more money for this. People will just have to suck it up and take work wherever they can find it.
I find the current system to be outrageous. Up until recently, unemployment compensation had many restrictions which kept in check the ability of lazy people from quitting work to collect. In the past unemployment checks were to be picked up at the local unemployment office. With each pay day, the recipient had to show they were actively seeking work. For example in New Jersey, out of work people had to show at least 6 contacts per 2 week period in order to get their check. If they could not furnish required contacts, pay was denied. Also, no person would be eligible for compensation if they lost their job for cause. There was no quitting to collect. Also , recipients could not have any documented income. If income was discovered, benefits were denied. If later on, the Unemployment Office discovered unreported income, all monies received by the recipient were to be returned with interest and penalties.
It should still be this way because the working taxpayers should be protected from fraud and lazy people who can, but will not work.

In fairness, it is difficult to convince someone to work above board when the 40 hour income they would receive after taxes is only $120-$160 dollars a week more than unemployment. Let's face it they are in effect working for $3-$4 dollars an hour, right?

I'm not quite sure I follow your logic. However, is that really OUR problem? Really, is there justification to allow someone who is capable of working, to not hold a job, collect a paycheck for production, pay taxes and the like?
To hell with fair. I'm not interested in fair. My primary interest is the protection of MY income that I earn through the fruits of MY labor.
Since the word "fair" crept into the discussion though, let's look more closely.
Do you believe it is fair for a work capable person to sit home on a taxpayer funded vacation because all he or she can earn is a couple hundred more per week if they had a job,while the rest of us did the right thing by seeking and maintaining gainful employment or operating a business?
Where the hell did we go astray as a society when we find acceptable the ability to do nothing (productive) and live off the taxpayer tit?

 

[thereisnospoon]

"The original" means prior to 1913, nitwit.

Is the income tax constitutional or not?

It's not in the US Constitution in specificity. However the US Constitution does state that government has the ability to lay and levy taxes. The Document does not visit "income".
According to the wisdom of the Framers, government may not do anything not specifically stated in the Constitution. Based on that narrow point, the answer is no, a tax on income is not Constitutional. That is not my opinion. Just stating the facts as they are.
Now, here's an example of what I referred to on the issue of "income"...The following forces us to define "income" as the following appears to exclude wages as "income"...
The Sixteenth Amendment (Amendment XVI) to the United States Constitution allows the Congress to levy an income tax without apportioning it among the states or basing it on Census results. This amendment exempted income taxes from the constitutional requirements regarding direct taxes, after income taxes on rents, dividends, and interest were ruled to be direct taxes in Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. (1895). It was ratified on February 3, 1913.
Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Uncle Kenny]

WRONG.....The extensions have been a disaster. No economic benefit long term has been realized by giving people and incentive to not seek work.
Now the other shoe has dropped. Many states are running out of have exhausted the funding for unemployment compensation. This was predicted and is the reason why the extensions were opposed in the first place.
There is no more money for this. People will just have to suck it up and take work wherever they can find it.
I find the current system to be outrageous. Up until recently, unemployment compensation had many restrictions which kept in check the ability of lazy people from quitting work to collect. In the past unemployment checks were to be picked up at the local unemployment office. With each pay day, the recipient had to show they were actively seeking work. For example in New Jersey, out of work people had to show at least 6 contacts per 2 week period in order to get their check. If they could not furnish required contacts, pay was denied. Also, no person would be eligible for compensation if they lost their job for cause. There was no quitting to collect. Also , recipients could not have any documented income. If income was discovered, benefits were denied. If later on, the Unemployment Office discovered unreported income, all monies received by the recipient were to be returned with interest and penalties.
It should still be this way because the working taxpayers should be protected from fraud and lazy people who can, but will not work.

In fairness, it is difficult to convince someone to work above board when the 40 hour income they would receive after taxes is only $120-$160 dollars a week more than unemployment. Let's face it they are in effect working for $3-$4 dollars an hour, right?

I'm not quite sure I follow your logic. However, is that really OUR problem? Really, is there justification to allow someone who is capable of working, to not hold a job, collect a paycheck for production, pay taxes and the like?
To hell with fair. I'm not interested in fair. My primary interest is the protection of MY income that I earn through the fruits of MY labor.
Since the word "fair" crept into the discussion though, let's look more closely.
Do you believe it is fair for a work capable person to sit home on a taxpayer funded vacation because all he or she can earn is a couple hundred more per week if they had a job,while the rest of us did the right thing by seeking and maintaining gainful employment or operating a business?
Where the hell did we go astray as a society when we find acceptable the ability to do nothing (productive) and live off the taxpayer tit?

I used "in fairness" to mean fair in our expectations, not what is ultimately fair or unfair in some braoder sense.

To clarify my intent, I am explaining why we shouldn't expect extending unemployment to have a positive net effect or to have any incentive to get people to find work if it is extended. Your rant is supposed to be assumed since it is common sense.

I didn’t call it fair or unfair; I gave comment on an overlooked and important aspect to consider. Of course not many people will go back to work for almost no income differential. It is why we can’t simply extend unemployment without some type of periodic reduction to create an incentive. Let’s face it, a lot of people who go on unemployment for that length of time have under the table income subsidizing them any way.

If you want to create a hand out this works, if you want to genuinely help people this is a pitiful attempt at it. Hand outs create dependants, which has a political advantage, while independent people tend to be less predictable. Hum, seems almost like an agenda in play doesn’t it?

 

[thereisnospoon]

In fairness, it is difficult to convince someone to work above board when the 40 hour income they would receive after taxes is only $120-$160 dollars a week more than unemployment. Let's face it they are in effect working for $3-$4 dollars an hour, right?

I'm not quite sure I follow your logic. However, is that really OUR problem? Really, is there justification to allow someone who is capable of working, to not hold a job, collect a paycheck for production, pay taxes and the like?
To hell with fair. I'm not interested in fair. My primary interest is the protection of MY income that I earn through the fruits of MY labor.
Since the word "fair" crept into the discussion though, let's look more closely.
Do you believe it is fair for a work capable person to sit home on a taxpayer funded vacation because all he or she can earn is a couple hundred more per week if they had a job,while the rest of us did the right thing by seeking and maintaining gainful employment or operating a business?
Where the hell did we go astray as a society when we find acceptable the ability to do nothing (productive) and live off the taxpayer tit?

I used "in fairness" to mean fair in our expectations, not what is ultimately fair or unfair in some braoder sense.

To clarify my intent, I am explaining why we shouldn't expect extending unemployment to have a positive net effect or to have any incentive to get people to find work if it is extended. Your rant is supposed to be assumed since it is common sense.

I didn’t call it fair or unfair; I gave comment on an overlooked and important aspect to consider. Of course not many people will go back to work for almost no income differential. It is why we can’t simply extend unemployment without some type of periodic reduction to create an incentive. Let’s face it, a lot of people who go on unemployment for that length of time have under the table income subsidizing them any way.

If you want to create a hand out this works, if you want to genuinely help people this is a pitiful attempt at it. Hand outs create dependents, which has a political advantage, while independent people tend to be less predictable. Hum, seems almost like an agenda in play doesn’t it?

Agenda? Oh yes sir!! Extending unemployment benefits indeed does create at least some dependency. Dependent people tend to support those who protect the source of dependency. This is primarily the reason ridding ourselves of well established entitlements is nearly impossible. As to political considerations.

 

[Liability]

Maybe if your representatives made people pay for every nickel of government spending they passed, when they passed it,

people would stop asking their representatives for more government spending.

The ability to borrow is the root cause of the deficit/debt problem.

I do not often agree with Carbs. But when he is clearly spot on, it is appropriate to make note of that fact. And in what he said, he was close to spot on.

The ability to borrow is a big problem. The willingness to spend endlessly OUR money is a bigger part of the problem. Although, again, without the ability to "deficit" spend, it would work out okay.

To Carbs:

 

[MaggieMae]

I have a great idea! How about you name this thread "Bush was the only, only President of the United States, and he's responsible for every single itsy-bitsy financial ill that we ever have been or will be faced with!!! And, and and I really really hate Bush!"

Pretty accurate?

Since I don't read your history lessons anymore, I'll only say that there is no denying that Obama didn't create an economic mess all by himself, ergo the reason the policies of the Bush Administration are so frequently made a part of the discussion. Obama inherited much of it from Bush, then had to deal with his own set of economic nightmares. Let's just stick with those two, shall we?

This is a joke, right?

You actually used to be sensible, perhaps you should go back to my 'history lessons...'

You certainly need something to ground you in reality.


"Obama has repeatedly claimed that his budget would cut the deficit by half by the end of his term. But as Heritage analyst Brian Riedl has pointed out, given that Obama has already helped quadruple the deficit with his stimulus package, pledging to halve it by 2013 is hardly ambitious. The Washington Post has a great graphic which helps put President Obama’s budget deficits in context of President Bush’s."
Bush Deficit vs. Obama Deficit in Pictures | The Foundry: Conservative Policy News.

OK...not history lesson....how about an English lesson:

quadruple: Four times as much in size, strength, number, or amount.
A fourfold amount or number.
To multiply or be multiplied by four: quadrupled the order; quadrupled in size.
quadruple - definition of quadruple by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia.

And why did he have to do that? If the roof is falling in on your house, do you spend the money to fix the roof or let the house collapse and then be forced to invest in another one at much greater cost?

 

[MaggieMae]

DA BOOOOSH aint da Prez no mo. Your Hopey Changey One passed the same cuts. So you should take your whining up with him. See if he cares what you little people think. Better catch him fast though because he's heading out for yet another Vacation. Good luck and have a nice day.

Good grief, I keep forgetting how dumb you are. The Republicans were no way, no how going to let the top earners pay a higher tax, so the only way to avoid LOWER INCOME EARNERS facing an I.N.C.R.E.A.S.E in their tax obligation which would have happened if the tax cuts had expired, Obama and the Republicans cut a deal. Oddly, it is BECAUSE he cares about the "little people" that he even went along with it. I know you won't get the contents of this link explaining what the "little people" will get, but others reading this thread will, so I post it for their benefit, not yours.

Your Paycheck: What the Obama Tax Cut Extension Means for You - ABC News

 

[MaggieMae]

People keeping more of what's yours to begin with isn't positive?

BTW, only spending money you don't have adds debt.

That's what Bush did twice when he cut taxes without cutting spending. He reduced the amount of revenue available for the spending he was also signing into law and directly brought back massive deficits.

Something PC always seems to forget during her history classes.

 

[Oddball]

Bottom line...Spending , which is what causes deficits, was never cut.

The end.

 

[MaggieMae]

You were all about the cuts, so you can also stfu. Search function works great.

If President Obama came out tomorrow and personally cured cancer himself, Libo would complain about him not curing cancer fast enough. The next time he gives President Obama a honest compliment will be the first.

The problem is you hack, Obama has not even done what he claimed he would do... He has expanded most of the Bush policies with ZERO repeal. Grow up and quit selling out, you look like a fool.

I love the way you people toss out the word "hack" like it's something you're not.

 

[MaggieMae]

If President Obama came out tomorrow and personally cured cancer himself, Libo would complain about him not curing cancer fast enough. The next time he gives President Obama a honest compliment will be the first.

The problem is you hack, Obama has not even done what he claimed he would do... He has expanded most of the Bush policies with ZERO repeal. Grow up and quit selling out, you look like a fool.

This is true.

No, it isn't true. Having to work with a just-say-no bunch of Republicans who have said from the outset they would block everything he tried to do because their concentration was going to be on making sure Obama was a one-term president has had a lot to do with not being able to follow through with many promises. Oddly enough, I just came from another thread where the cons were all up in arms because they continue to whine that Obama has stifled oil production in the U.S. So I guess that means he's been quietly REVERSING some of Bush's energy policies and, as promised, pushing for development of alternatives.

 

[MaggieMae]

So, now people have to prove that keeping what's theirs in the first place benefits you.

Is there no end to the entitlement mentality?

It's not all theirs.

Whose is it then?

When the Constitution opens with WE THE PEOPLE, it didn't add that it expected growth of a new country to be dependent on a new crop of money trees. I'd like to know when this I-GOT-MINE-SO-FUCK-YOU attitude became the norm.

 

[MaggieMae]

besides adding massively to the national debt, what else did bush's tax cuts do?

added massively to Obama's deficits.

They sure as shit didn't raise employment, revenues or strengthen the Middle Class.

Oh really? We never saw 4.5% unemployment?

It's easy to get numbers down to that level when a company lays off one full-timer and hires two part-timers to do the job.

 

[bripat9643]

Me keeping what's mine "gives" me nothing.

It's fun watching the logical contortions liberals go through to justify taking what they haven't earned from the people who have earned it.

 

[LibocalypseNow]

So why did the Hopey Changey One & Democrats pass the same cuts? If they were so "Evil & Wrong",why did they pass them? They controlled the White House & Congress and they all voted to pass them. So your problem isn't with DA BOOOOOOOSH. It's actually with your Hopey Changey One & Democrats. So why don't you give them a call and give em a piece of your mind? See if they give a shit what you think. Give it a try and then get back to us. We're all anxious to hear what they had to say to you. Good luck.