For those of us who lived through the Nixon/Ford, Carter, and Reagan years in the workforce, the myths and misconceptions are so deep it is nearly impossible without a scorecard of history to know even a bit of the real situation. The Bible states, money is the root of all evil, written so long ago they missed the modern function of money. It needs to amended to add: money is also the root of all tax spin and total BS when elections and politicians are controlled by corporate welfare.
"Despite Peggy Noonans wild delusion that Reagan "said he would cut the budget, and he did," he expanded it significantly. Neither did he reduce the size of government the number of federal workers rose 61,000 under Reagan, as opposed to Clinton who cut 373,000 jobs. The deficit tripled from the time he took office until the time he left.
I understand that Republicans are responsible for the complete and utter failure of supply side economics and the damage that the unfettered implementation of their crackpot theories has wrought, and theyre struggling to rationalize why anyone should listen to them. But their continuing need to transmogrify Ronald Reagan in order to gin up an excuse only underscores how morally impoverished, intellectually bankrupt and justifiably discredited the conservative movement is right now."
.....
"Its conservative lore that Reagan the icon cut taxes, while George H.W. Bush the renegade raised them. As Stockman recalls, "No one was authorized to talk about tax increases on Ronald Reagans watch, no matter what kind of tax, no matter how justified it was." Yet raising taxes is exactly what Reagan did. He did not always instigate those hikes or agree to them willinglybut he signed off on them. One year after his massive tax cut, Reagan agreed to a tax increase to reduce the deficit that restored fully one-third of the previous years reduction. (In a bizarre bit of self-deception, Reagan, who never came to terms with this episode of ideological apostasy, persuaded himself that the three-year, $100 billion tax hikethe largest since World War IIwas actually "tax reform" that closed loopholes in his earlier cut and therefore didnt count as raising taxes.)
Faced with looming deficits, Reagan raised taxes again in 1983 with a gasoline tax and once more in 1984, this time by $50 billion over three years, mainly through closing tax loopholes for business. Despite the fact that such increases were anathema to conservativesand probably cost Reagans successor, George H.W. Bush, reelectionReagan raised taxes a grand total of four times just between 1982-84.
This record flummoxes the best efforts of todays Reagan hagiographers to explain away. Peter Wallison, for instance, after proclaiming that Reagan "stayed the course against changes in his economic plan," later dismisses the presidents tax increases as "a modest rollback" that "seems to have been the result" of his accepting a Democratic promise to cut spending by twice that amount. (Whatever happened to "Trust, but verify"?)
Reagan continued these "modest rollbacks" in his second term. The historic Tax Reform Act of 1986, though it achieved the supply side goal of lowering individual income tax rates, was a startlingly progressive reform. The plan imposed the largest corporate tax increase in historyan act utterly unimaginable for any conservative to support today. Just two years after declaring, "there is no justification" for taxing corporate income, Reagan raised corporate taxes by $120 billion over five years and closed corporate tax loopholes worth about $300 billion over that same period. In addition to broadening the tax base, the plan increased standard deductions and personal exemptions to the point that no family with an income below the poverty line would have to pay federal income tax. Even at the time, conservatives within Reagans administration were aghast. According to Wall Street Journal reporters Jeffrey Birnbaum and Alan Murray, whose book Showdown at Gucci Gulch chronicles the 1986 measure, "the conservative presidents support for an effort once considered the bastion of liberals carried tremendous symbolic significance." When Reagans conservative acting chief economic adviser, William Niskanen, was apprised of the plan he replied, "Walter Mondale would have been proud.""
Newsflash: Ronald Reagan Raised Taxes (You Idiots) | Firedoglake
The Idolatry of Ideology-Why Tax Cuts Hurt the Economy by Russ Beaton
Spending Cuts Vs. Tax Increases at the State Level, 10/30/01
"Despite Peggy Noonans wild delusion that Reagan "said he would cut the budget, and he did," he expanded it significantly. Neither did he reduce the size of government the number of federal workers rose 61,000 under Reagan, as opposed to Clinton who cut 373,000 jobs. The deficit tripled from the time he took office until the time he left.
I understand that Republicans are responsible for the complete and utter failure of supply side economics and the damage that the unfettered implementation of their crackpot theories has wrought, and theyre struggling to rationalize why anyone should listen to them. But their continuing need to transmogrify Ronald Reagan in order to gin up an excuse only underscores how morally impoverished, intellectually bankrupt and justifiably discredited the conservative movement is right now."
.....
"Its conservative lore that Reagan the icon cut taxes, while George H.W. Bush the renegade raised them. As Stockman recalls, "No one was authorized to talk about tax increases on Ronald Reagans watch, no matter what kind of tax, no matter how justified it was." Yet raising taxes is exactly what Reagan did. He did not always instigate those hikes or agree to them willinglybut he signed off on them. One year after his massive tax cut, Reagan agreed to a tax increase to reduce the deficit that restored fully one-third of the previous years reduction. (In a bizarre bit of self-deception, Reagan, who never came to terms with this episode of ideological apostasy, persuaded himself that the three-year, $100 billion tax hikethe largest since World War IIwas actually "tax reform" that closed loopholes in his earlier cut and therefore didnt count as raising taxes.)
Faced with looming deficits, Reagan raised taxes again in 1983 with a gasoline tax and once more in 1984, this time by $50 billion over three years, mainly through closing tax loopholes for business. Despite the fact that such increases were anathema to conservativesand probably cost Reagans successor, George H.W. Bush, reelectionReagan raised taxes a grand total of four times just between 1982-84.
This record flummoxes the best efforts of todays Reagan hagiographers to explain away. Peter Wallison, for instance, after proclaiming that Reagan "stayed the course against changes in his economic plan," later dismisses the presidents tax increases as "a modest rollback" that "seems to have been the result" of his accepting a Democratic promise to cut spending by twice that amount. (Whatever happened to "Trust, but verify"?)
Reagan continued these "modest rollbacks" in his second term. The historic Tax Reform Act of 1986, though it achieved the supply side goal of lowering individual income tax rates, was a startlingly progressive reform. The plan imposed the largest corporate tax increase in historyan act utterly unimaginable for any conservative to support today. Just two years after declaring, "there is no justification" for taxing corporate income, Reagan raised corporate taxes by $120 billion over five years and closed corporate tax loopholes worth about $300 billion over that same period. In addition to broadening the tax base, the plan increased standard deductions and personal exemptions to the point that no family with an income below the poverty line would have to pay federal income tax. Even at the time, conservatives within Reagans administration were aghast. According to Wall Street Journal reporters Jeffrey Birnbaum and Alan Murray, whose book Showdown at Gucci Gulch chronicles the 1986 measure, "the conservative presidents support for an effort once considered the bastion of liberals carried tremendous symbolic significance." When Reagans conservative acting chief economic adviser, William Niskanen, was apprised of the plan he replied, "Walter Mondale would have been proud.""
Newsflash: Ronald Reagan Raised Taxes (You Idiots) | Firedoglake
The Idolatry of Ideology-Why Tax Cuts Hurt the Economy by Russ Beaton
Spending Cuts Vs. Tax Increases at the State Level, 10/30/01
