When faced with mounting debt Reagan raised taxes!!

[bk1983]

In fact, no peacetime president has raised taxes so much on so many people. This is not a criticism: the tale of those increases tells you a lot about what was right with President Reagan's leadership, and what's wrong with the leadership of George W. Bush.

The first Reagan tax increase came in 1982. By then it was clear that the budget projections used to justify the 1981 tax cut were wildly optimistic. In response, Mr. Reagan agreed to a sharp rollback of corporate tax cuts, and a smaller rollback of individual income tax cuts. Over all, the 1982 tax increase undid about a third of the 1981 cut; as a share of G.D.P., the increase was substantially larger than Mr. Clinton's 1993 tax increase.

The contrast with President Bush is obvious. President Reagan, confronted with evidence that his tax cuts were fiscally irresponsible, changed course. President Bush, confronted with similar evidence, has pushed for even more tax cuts.

The Unofficial Paul Krugman Web Page

When defecits started to balloon and the recession deppened Reagan raised taxes to counteract the revenue loss. He also bailed out social security to the tune of $165 billion, payed for by raising payroll taxes. What about the tax reform act of 1986? The act which imposed the largest corporate tax increase in history. So the question is, if tax cuts are the answer to everything then why did Reagan raise taxes when faced with his expanding defecit?

 

[bk1983]

 

[bk1983]

furthermore, Arnold the republican governor of california who criticized Obama on his bailout stance as the typical liberal government giveaway. Is now not surpisinlgy eating his own words and requesting from congress a 7 billion dollar bailout for his state california. why doesn't he just cut taxes isn't that the answer to everything?

 

[editec]

It cracks me up how misinformed most young self-proclaiming conservtives really are about Reagan.

He raised taxes on most people because why?

Because it was the fiscally prudent thing to do, that's why. Had he not done so social security would be insolvent today.

Bush I, much to his credit, did likewise.

There can be no hard and fast single tax policy set in stone for all time.

Just as families must change their spending and savings plans when conditions change, so too much government have that same freedom to respond to changes.

 

[DavidS]

It cracks me up how misinformed most young self-proclaiming conservtives really are about Reagan.

He raised taxes on most people because why?

Because it was the fiscally prudent thing to do, that's why. Had he not done so social security would be insolvent today.

Bush I, much to his credit, did likewise.

There can be no hard and fast single tax policy set in stone for all time.

Just as families must change their spending and savings plans when conditions change, so too much government have that same freedom to respond to changes.

Reagan raised taxes to fund social security.... a government run monthly benefit program for seniors. Let's see here, raising taxes on the rich to pay the poor... sounds like Reagan was a re-distributor!

 

[rayboyusmc]

Reagan also begin the fairy tail of the Trickle Down Theory. This is something that should have died when monarchies were overturned. It has never worked and never will.

Like the Obama campaign has been saying, a strong economy depends on a strong middle class where the profits for all bubble up. Seeing as I would guess that most of those on these threads are in the middle class economically, I am amazed at how many still think the success of the rich drive the succes of this country.

Reagan is definately the most overated conservative figure in our time. A second rate Hollywood actor who did a lot better as an "acting" president.

 

[rayboyusmc]

Update: For the econowonks out there: business cycles are an issue here — revenue growth from trough to peak will look better than the reverse. Unfortunately, business cycles don’t correspond to administrations. But looking at revenue changes peak to peak is still revealing. So here’s the annual rate of growth of real revenue per capita over some cycles:
1973-1979: 2.7%
1979-1990: 1.8%
1990-2000: 3.2%
2000-2007 (probable peak): approximately zero
Do you see the revenue booms from the Reagan and Bush tax cuts? Me neither.

Reagan and revenue - Paul Krugman - Op-Ed Columnist - New York Times Blog

When Reagan dropped the top income tax rate from over 70% down to under 30%, all hell broke loose. With the legal and social restraint to unlimited selfishness removed, “the good of the nation” was replaced by “greed is good” as the primary paradigm.

In the years since then, mind-boggling wealth has risen among fewer than 20,000 people in America (the top 0.01 percent of wage-earners), but their influence has been tremendous. They finance “conservative” think tanks (think Joseph Coors and the Heritage Foundation), change public opinion (Walton heirs funding a covert effort to change the “estate tax” to the “death tax”), lobby congress and the president (who calls the “haves and the have-more’s” his “base”), and work to strip down public institutions.

The middle class is being replaced by the working poor. American infrastructure built with tax revenues during the 1934-1981 is now crumbling and disintegrating. Hospitals and highways and power and water systems have been corporatized. People are dying.

And Bush, following closely in Reagan’s footsteps, is making things worse. As Senator Bernie Sanders pointed out at recent hearings for the confirmation of Bush’s new nominee for the Office of Management and Budget:

Since Bush has been president:

over 5 million people have slipped into poverty;
nearly 7 million Americans have lost their health insurance;
median household income has gone down by nearly $1,300;
three million manufacturing jobs have been lost;
three million American workers have lost their pensions;
home foreclosures are now the highest on record;
the personal savings rate is below zero - which hasn’t happened since the great depression;
the real earnings of college graduates have gone down by about 5% in the last few years;
entry level wages for male and female high school graduates have fallen by over 3%;
wages and salaries are now at the lowest share of GDP since 1929.
The debate about whether or not to roll Bush’s tax cuts back to Clinton’s modest mid-30% rates is absurd. It’s time to roll back the horribly failed experiment of the Reagan tax cuts. And use that money to pay down Reagan’s debt and rebuild this nation.

ThomHartmann.com - Roll Back the Reagan Tax Cuts

 

[Red Dawn]

National Review Online

"A Taxing Experience"
by Bruce Bartlett-
Domestic Policy Advisor to Ronald Reagan
Treasury Undersecretary to George H.W. Bush


Reagan may have resisted calls for tax increases, but he ultimately supported them. In 1982 alone, he signed into law not one but two major tax increases. The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act (TEFRA) raised taxes by $37.5 billion per year and the Highway Revenue Act raised the gasoline tax by another $3.3 billion.

According to a recent Treasury Department study, TEFRA alone raised taxes by almost 1 percent of the gross domestic product, making it the largest peacetime tax increase in American history. An increase of similar magnitude today would raise more than $100 billion per year.

In 1983, Reagan signed legislation raising the Social Security tax rate. This is a tax increase that lives with us still, since it initiated automatic increases in the taxable wage base. As a consequence, those with moderately high earnings see their payroll taxes rise every single year.

In 1984, Reagan signed another big tax increase in the Deficit Reduction Act. This raised taxes by $18 billion per year or 0.4 percent of GDP. A similar-sized tax increase today would be about $44 billion.

The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 raised taxes yet again. Even the Tax Reform Act of 1986, which was designed to be revenue-neutral, contained a net tax increase in its first 2 years. And the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 raised taxes still more.

The year 1988 appears to be the only year of the Reagan presidency, other than the first, in which taxes were not raised legislatively. Of course, previous tax increases remained in effect. According to a table in the 1990 budget, the net effect of all these tax increases was to raise taxes by $164 billion in 1992, or 2.6 percent of GDP. This is equivalent to almost $300 billion in today's economy


http://www.nationalreview.com/nrof_bartlett/bartlett200310290853.asp

 

[bk1983]

Reagan and revenue - Paul Krugman - Op-Ed Columnist - New York Times Blog



ThomHartmann.com - Roll Back the Reagan Tax Cuts

lol.. republicans like to avoid history when discussing their one legged approach to economics.

 

[SwingVoter]

the CBO Surplus/Deficit numbers are bullshit because they use cash accounting, if any business presented numbers like this, the Dems would be in up in arms about a corporate scandal

if you use proper, accrual accounting, Reagan reduced the deficit dramatically by lifting the retirement age for full social security benefits from 65 to 67

instread of the politically unworkable private accounts, GOP should put lifting the age from 67 to 70 in its 2010 congressional campaign plans, would also fit with its "40 under 40" strategy of appealing to younger voters

 

[SwingVoter]

lol.. republicans like to avoid history when discussing their one legged approach to economics.

don't see many Democrats now taking pride in the Carter years

 

[Chris]

Reagan and the Bushes raised taxes more than anyone.

Deficit spending is an invisible tax.

 

[xsited1]

...Nice Charts...

Those are nice charts, but the people who post them do not understand that it is Congress that controls spending. Here are the real facts:

"History shows if you want your stock portfolio to increase at a rate of 20 percent per year, make sure Republicans control Congress; but if you want your portfolio only to increase 6 percent per year, go with the Democrats."

Taking Stock of the Parties

 

[Chris]

Those are nice charts, but the people who post them do not understand that it is Congress that controls spending. Here are the real facts:

"History shows if you want your stock portfolio to increase at a rate of 20 percent per year, make sure Republicans control Congress; but if you want your portfolio only to increase 6 percent per year, go with the Democrats."

Taking Stock of the Parties

The President controls the budget.

Congress is just a rubber stamp.

Reading the Rev. Moon's newspaper I see...

 

[DiveCon]

lol
so predictable

 

[DiveCon]

The President controls the budget.

Congress is just a rubber stamp.

Reading the Rev. Moon's newspaper I see...

uh, no bozo, congress controls the budget

 

[PeterS]

don't see many Democrats now taking pride in the Carter years

I have no problem with the Carter years. What is there to be ashamed of?

 

[editec]

I have no problem with the Carter years. What is there to be ashamed of?

He was a man whose energy policies would have worked to save us from the mess we're in now.

How shamefully prescient that man was.

 

[Gunny]

Reagan raised taxes to fund social security.... a government run monthly benefit program for seniors. Let's see here, raising taxes on the rich to pay the poor... sounds like Reagan was a re-distributor!

Retard "logic" if ever there was any.

 

[The Paperboy]

I have no problem with the Carter years. What is there to be ashamed of?

20% interest rates.

7.8% unemployment.

Iran Hostage Crises.

Mondale.