When faced with mounting debt Reagan raised taxes!!

I am constantly amazed at the revisionist that live today. It appears that most were too young when Reagan was President and as a result have bought into the revisionist version of Ronald Reagan. I notice in the original posting that the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 which did the following ;

A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 to encourage economic growth through reductions in individual income tax rates, the expensing of depreciable property, incentives for small businesses, and incentives for savings, and for other purpose." Pub.L. 97-34, 95 Stat. 172, enacted August 13, 1981) It also reduced marginal income tax rates in the United States by 25% over three years (the top rate falling from 70% to 50% while the bottom rate dropped from 14% to 11%) and indexed the rates for inflation, though the indexing was delayed until 1985. Its sponsors, Representative Jack Kemp and Senator William Roth, had hoped for more significant tax cuts, but settled on this bill after a great debate in Congress. It passed Congress on August 4, 1981 and was signed into law on August 13, 1981 by President Ronald Reagan at his California ranch.

The second majot legislation during the Reagan Administration that dealt with taxes was the Tax Reform Act (TRA) of 1986 which did the following ;

The top tax rate was lowered from 50% to 28% while the bottom rate was raised from 11% to 15% - the only time in the history of the U.S. income tax (which dates back to the passage of the Revenue Act of 1862) that the top rate was reduced and the bottom rate increased concomitantly. In addition, capital gains faced the same tax rate as ordinary income. Moreover, interest on consumer loans such as credit card debt were no longer deductible. An existing provision in the tax code, called Income Averaging, which reduced taxes for those only recently making a much higher salary than before, was eliminated (although later partially reinstated, for farmers in 1997 and for fishermen in 2004). The Act, however, increased the personal exemption and standard deduction.

While it is true Reagan did raise taxes on on the bottom level of taxpayers it did increase the deductions allowed thus creating a net tax deduction. So when you look back at history and select something to support your theory it would help that you showed every aspect of it in order to support it. Ronald Reagan outside, of Bill Clinton who I also felt was a good president by the way, both created millions of jobs in this nation. Reagan inherited an economy from Carter that was in a shambles with high unemployment, high interests rates, and high inflation and by the end of his presidency all those issues has been put to rest. If you wish to call into question the Reagan legacy then you should slect something that even Reagan himself called his greatest disappointment and that was the the massive budget deficit rather than a consistant record of cutting taxes.
 

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