Why tax cuts dont create jobs

[Revere]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

Nobody paid those rates. A $400,000 sarly in 1960 is about $3,000,000 today. Almost nobody earned enough money to put them in those brackets.

And even if they did, your attempt at causality falls flat on its face, since there were boom years when rates were lowered.

 

[Bern80]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

Again I just can't figure out where people are trying to go with this argument. You see the implication is that there is some alternative course of action that does do that. I can see the essence of the argument; X doesn't cause Y, therefore we shouldn't do X' or X doesn't cause Y, thuse we can conclude Z does cause Y.

Well that isn't true about the tax cut statement. Do you really think if businesses have less money they can hire more people? And no tax cuts don't automatically spur job growth, but they certianly don't hurt it. The issue is freedom. The more money anyone has, whether it is an individual or business, the more freedom and options they have. The idea behind tax cuts is to give people more money. Doing that alone, government can only hope that business CHOOSES to hire people. In uncertain economic times (like now) they may choose horde extra money. Or they may choose to invest in somthing other than labor. or yes, some greedy CEO may decided to give himself a raise.

OR as much as a business may like to hire more people, they simply can't. Maybe the dont have the demand to warrant hiring more people. The point is tax cuts help job growth as long as a lot of other economic factors are in place that essentially boil down to a business would choose to hire more people if it had the money to do so.

The other undeniable fact is that increasing taxes does NOT create jobs. Again that is also about freedom. Money is the physical represenation of freedom. The less you have the less freedom you have and the less options you have, INCLUDING the option to hire people.

 

[Truthmatters]

Dear Idiot, they are the top marginal tax rates.

That is what we are talking about

 

[Truthmatters]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

Again if your contention is that tax cuts don't create jobs, what is your opposing contention. The higher taxes DO create jobs?

Where is the proof they create jobs?

having the top rates at 70 - 90+ did NOT kill jobs and we had them for decades

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

Go for it!

Why are Dems hurting the economy by keeping rates under 90%?

Why? Write to Pelosi and Reid and ask them to bring us back to the Halcyon Days of 90% rate

 

[Truthmatters]

because the Rs are holding the country hostage by threatening to filibuster everything else congress does.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

because the Rs are holding the country hostage by threatening to filibuster everything else congress does.

Reagan got his tax ideas through a hostile Congress, surely you can sell enough people on the idea that a 90% tax rate will lead to prosperity to get it passed, no?

 

[Truthmatters]

Dear idiot, did that congress EVER threaten to stop all congressional work?

 

[iamwhatiseem]

Soviet style central planning failed for the Soviets, for Hoover, for FDR and now for Obama.

Get a fucking clue.

So now you are against the tax cuts frankie?

I'm all for tax cuts.

I favor a 5 year moratorium on corporate income tax for any new business

I would be 1,000,000,000% against that.
That creates unfair advantage over established businesses.
As well as it would be unbelievably easy to fraudulently get.

 

[boedicca]

You dont even know what you are talking about revere.

And that, Revere, is a Good Posting Seal of Approval.

If TM insults one, one can be sure one is correct.

 

[hortysir]

Why Tax Cuts Don’t—and Won’t—Create Jobs - Working In These Times


The idea that cutting business and wealthy investors' taxes originated in 1961 with then President John F. Kennedy. But at that time business investment tax cuts were tied to proven job creation. Businesses had to prove they added jobs before they could claim the tax cut. That was changed with Reagan. Now businesses could get the tax credits even if they didn't create jobs. Their taxes were cut even if it meant they reduced jobs. By the time of George W. Bush, businesses could claim tax cuts for investments made offshore. GM cut hundreds of thousands of jobs in the U.S. while adding thousands in China. Ford cut jobs while adding them in St. Petersburg, Russia. Corporations could claim the investment tax cuts, even if jobs were created offshore and simultaneously eliminated in the U.S. In effect, U.S. taxpayers were paying US corporations to send their jobs overseas.

What percentage of jobs are for companies that are in a position to send their work overseas?

 

[william the wie]

Between out-sourcing and automation the natural tendency for nominal incomes has been to decline and that has been true for the entire history of this country. Since Savary's invention of the first piston steam engine in the 1690s this has been true and it does not compute. America's trailer trash have better plumbing, beds, healthcare, food choice and functional clothing than Louis XIV ever dreamed of.

The most eyeopening book I ever read was a British book that compared middle-class Britons to Black Americans in the Jim Crow era. Black Americans had a material life style that exceeded that of British professionals in terms of car ownership, TVs, telephones, radios and the other trappings of 50s/60s material wealth. This was back when Lady Bird Johnson had black sharecroppers working one of her plantations. Jobs and wealth are not the problem, therefore use of tax policies to create jobs and wealth is not the problem.

 

[Toro]

Generally, the private sector does a better job than the public sector at creating jobs, at least over the long run. Thus, the more money in the hands of the private sector, the more jobs there will be.

Not if they are not given incentives to spend their tax cuts for job creation.

Businesses have created about 80 million jobs over the past 40 years. They didn't do that because of tax incentives. They did it to expand their businesses to meet the demands of the market.

 

[boedicca]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

The last time we had a marginal tax rate of 90%+ was in the 1950s, on incomes over $400,000 in 1950s dollars.

That would be the equivalent of $3.3M in 2010 dollars, which for those of us who can do math, is much much higher than the $250,000 Obama has identified as being the income level for the Evul Rich.

 

[boedicca]

Generally, the private sector does a better job than the public sector at creating jobs, at least over the long run. Thus, the more money in the hands of the private sector, the more jobs there will be.

Not if they are not given incentives to spend their tax cuts for job creation.

Businesses have created about 80 million jobs over the past 40 years. They didn't do that because of tax incentives. They did it to expand their businesses to meet the demands of the market.

You are leaving out the part where they take the risk to expand their business because they can expect a reasonable return on their investment. High taxes mean a higher risk scenario, and lower the appetite for investment in such expansion.

 

[Toro]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

There were so many loopholes and ways to evade taxes, you could drive a truck through them all. The effective tax rate was nowhere near 90%.

 

[Paulie]

Dear Idiot, they are the top marginal tax rates.

That is what we are talking about

Don't worry, there's 600 million people in the US. Tax revenue will be fine.

 

[loosecannon]

Generally, the private sector does a better job than the public sector at creating jobs, at least over the long run. Thus, the more money in the hands of the private sector, the more jobs there will be.

What America has forgotten is that there are two kinds of jobs: Those in industries that produce or multiply wealth and those in industries that recycle wealth. The service sector and the government are generally the latter.

The private/public paradigm is irrelevant IMO. Wealth generation is the critical aspect.

There is nothing wrong with secondary economies that recycle wealth and distribute it more broadly. Altho there may be some of those that actually destroy wealth, like war and the military.

GDP doesn't care, but our living standards do care.

Think about it Toro.

 

[bag]

Why Tax Cuts Don’t—and Won’t—Create Jobs - Working In These Times


The idea that cutting business and wealthy investors' taxes originated in 1961 with then President John F. Kennedy. But at that time business investment tax cuts were tied to proven job creation. Businesses had to prove they added jobs before they could claim the tax cut. That was changed with Reagan. Now businesses could get the tax credits even if they didn't create jobs. Their taxes were cut even if it meant they reduced jobs. By the time of George W. Bush, businesses could claim tax cuts for investments made offshore. GM cut hundreds of thousands of jobs in the U.S. while adding thousands in China. Ford cut jobs while adding them in St. Petersburg, Russia. Corporations could claim the investment tax cuts, even if jobs were created offshore and simultaneously eliminated in the U.S. In effect, U.S. taxpayers were paying US corporations to send their jobs overseas.

OF COURSE, but what about jingjing

 

[Bern80]

Some of the best years this country has had had 70 to 90 % tax rates on the 2%

Again if your contention is that tax cuts don't create jobs, what is your opposing contention. The higher taxes DO create jobs?

Where is the proof they create jobs?

having the top rates at 70 - 90+ did NOT kill jobs and we had them for decades

My point is that you have started the debate on a false pretense. Raising/lowering taxes does not create/lose jobs. There are all kinds of variables that effect job growth. Tax rates are but one influencing factor and is not the main driver of growth. There is one undeniable truth however, more money makes it POSSIBLE to hire more people. Less money makes it more difficult to hire more people. Other variables may allow for job growth despite less capital or jobs may be lost despite greater profits given other variables.

Hence why I keep saying I don't get it. I dont't know where you're going with this. They only people that may be so bold as to say lower taxes create jobs without elaborating on the many other variables that influence job growth is some politician trying to pander. No logical thinking person who sees the myriad of variables that effect job growth is going to contend that lower taxes in of themselves create jobs.