Obama's Plan Is Risky According To Robert Reich:

[MikeK]

Paul Ryan says his budget plan will cut $4.4 trillion over ten years. The President says his new plan will cut $4 trillion over twelve years.

Let’s get real. Ten or twelve-year budgets are baloney. It’s hard enough to forecast budgets a year or two into the future. Between now and 2022 or 2024 the economy will probably have gone through a recovery (I’ll explain later why I fear it will be anemic at best) and another downturn. America will also have been through a bunch of elections – at least five congressional and three presidential.

The practical question is how to get out of the ongoing gravitational pull of this awful recession without kowtowing to extremists on the right who think the U.S. government is their mortal enemy. For President Obama, it’s also about how to get reelected.


Read the whole article here: President Obama's Real Proposal (and Why It's Risky) | Truthout

 

[Wiseacre]

Independent journalism, my ass.

Risk? God forbid we should have to (gasp!) cut spending! Not a chance in hell if Obama is re-elected and the dems retake the House. They'll rewrite it to raise more taxes on the rich one way or another.

You want out of the current economic quagmire? Here's how: cut gov't spending, cut corporate taxes in half, cut gov't spending some more, cut the capital gains tax in half, cut gov't spending, and then cut everybody's income tax rate. And then cut gov't spending again.

 

[MikeK]

Independent journalism, my ass.

Risk? God forbid we should have to (gasp!) cut spending! Not a chance in hell if Obama is re-elected and the dems retake the House. They'll rewrite it to raise more taxes on the rich one way or another.

You want out of the current economic quagmire? Here's how: cut gov't spending, cut corporate taxes in half, cut gov't spending some more, cut the capital gains tax in half, cut gov't spending, and then cut everybody's income tax rate. And then cut gov't spending again.

Really?

How do we cut EXXON and GE's tax when they (and others) don't pay any? Did Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity offer any suggestions along those lines?

 

[washamericom]

this is his third reich...

 

[auditor0007]

Independent journalism, my ass.

Risk? God forbid we should have to (gasp!) cut spending! Not a chance in hell if Obama is re-elected and the dems retake the House. They'll rewrite it to raise more taxes on the rich one way or another.

You want out of the current economic quagmire? Here's how: cut gov't spending, cut corporate taxes in half, cut gov't spending some more, cut the capital gains tax in half, cut gov't spending, and then cut everybody's income tax rate. And then cut gov't spending again.

Let's see, we want to raise even more taxes on the rich? Or do we want to revert back to some higher rates for the rich? The rich have been receiving monstrous tax cuts for the last few decades. The Bush tax cuts were only meant to be temporary, but now you want to lower them even more, lol. You want to cut the capital gains tax to what, zero? It's only 15% now and you want to cut it even more, lmao. Why don't we just cut all taxes to ten percent and tell the government to live on that? I'm sure that would make you happy as we would all be standing in bread lines to collect our rations. This isn't the wild wild west. There are sensible conservatives and then there are the Loonies. You have some work to do to become a part of the sensible ones.

 

[auditor0007]

Independent journalism, my ass.

Risk? God forbid we should have to (gasp!) cut spending! Not a chance in hell if Obama is re-elected and the dems retake the House. They'll rewrite it to raise more taxes on the rich one way or another.

You want out of the current economic quagmire? Here's how: cut gov't spending, cut corporate taxes in half, cut gov't spending some more, cut the capital gains tax in half, cut gov't spending, and then cut everybody's income tax rate. And then cut gov't spending again.

Really?

How do we cut EXXON and GE's tax when they (and others) don't pay any? Did Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity offer any suggestions along those lines?

They shouldn't have to pay any taxes because of all the new jobs they are creating.

 

[Wiseacre]

I seem to have wandered into dumbass territory. When are you birdbrains going to understand that when you cut taxes, especially corporate and capital gains taxes, you always get more jobs and greater economic growth. ALWAYS. Why do you think every other developed country in the entire freakin' world is cutting taxes right now? Canada in the 90s. Ireland in the 90s. Britain under Thatcher. USA under Reagan. The history is right there.

There has never been a single instance of any country in the entire history of the world that spent their way out of an economic disaster, with the possible exception of WWII. And that took a freakin' war!!!!

 

[auditor0007]

I seem to have wandered into dumbass territory. When are you birdbrains going to understand that when you cut taxes, especially corporate and capital gains taxes, you always get more jobs and greater economic growth. ALWAYS. Why do you think every other developed country in the entire freakin' world is cutting taxes right now? Canada. Ireland. Britain under Thatcher. USA under Reagan.

There has never been a single instance of any country in the entire history of the world that spent their way out of an economic disaster, with the possible exception of WWII. And that took a freakin' war!!!!

Supply side economics do work when taxes are too high. What you don't seem to understand is that there is a point of diminishing returns, where cutting taxes too low does not bring on greater investment, a growing economy, and higher tax revenues. The reason other countries that you mentioned are reducing taxes is that their tax rates are substantially higher than ours to begin with, so for them it makes sense. When Reagan cut taxes, they were too high to begin with.

Think of it this way; if the idea worked so well all the time, why not just cut all taxes to zero. Then the economy would grow like crazy, right? Oh yea, but the government wouldn't collect a dime. I guess that would be a problem, but not according to you.

 

[Wiseacre]

I seem to have wandered into dumbass territory. When are you birdbrains going to understand that when you cut taxes, especially corporate and capital gains taxes, you always get more jobs and greater economic growth. ALWAYS. Why do you think every other developed country in the entire freakin' world is cutting taxes right now? Canada. Ireland. Britain under Thatcher. USA under Reagan.

There has never been a single instance of any country in the entire history of the world that spent their way out of an economic disaster, with the possible exception of WWII. And that took a freakin' war!!!!

Supply side economics do work when taxes are too high. What you don't seem to understand is that there is a point of diminishing returns, where cutting taxes too low does not bring on greater investment, a growing economy, and higher tax revenues. The reason other countries that you mentioned are reducing taxes is that their tax rates are substantially higher than ours to begin with, so for them it makes sense. When Reagan cut taxes, they were too high to begin with.

Think of it this way; if the idea worked so well all the time, why not just cut all taxes to zero. Then the economy would grow like crazy, right? Oh yea, but the government wouldn't collect a dime. I guess that would be a problem, but not according to you.

Cutting to zero is obviously not a good answer, but cutting enough to draw more business here is exactly that. Why do you think US multinational corps like GE park so much money overseas?

My understanding is our corp tax rate is one of the highest in the world, 2nd only to Japan I think. You have to incentivize entrepeneurs and foreign investors to do business here, it's a global economy and they'll go elsewhere if the business climate is better there. Which it is in a lot of places. It's not all about taxes, I realize that. But it's a start.