What if taxes went up to over 90%?

[midcan5]

Crash Course in Economics by Larry Beinhart

"The core, the very heart of Bushonomics, is cutting taxes. Especially for the wealthy.

I find it impossible to figure out what George Bush's motivations for anything are. He may have that impulse because he himself, his family, and his friends are all very rich and they'll save themselves millions of dollars over the years. Maybe it's political. As he once said, the super rich are his "base." It may be a class thing - the belief that rich people are rich because they're better and will do better things with the money. It may be theological, the mystical belief that "the market" makes everything better.

Whatever the truth is, the tax cuts were sold as economic stimulus and jobs packages with the promise that they would not create deficits. This last was based on a romantic Ayn Rand vision of millionaires racing into the backwoods to build, build, build new businesses which would create jobs, "good jobs," and new taxes would be paid by the businesses and the workers, making up for the initial deficits.

Alas, none of that ever happened.

Deficits were created."

Crash Course in Economics | CommonDreams.org

"On moral grounds, then, we could argue for a flat income tax of 90 percent to return that wealth to its real owners. In the United States, even a flat tax of 70 percent would support all governmental programs (about half the total tax) and allow payment, with the remainder, of a patrimony of about $8,000 per annum per inhabitant, or $25,000 for a family of three. This would generously leave with the original recipients of the income about three times what, according to my rough guess, they had earned."

UBI and the Flat Tax

"There is no historical evidence that tax cuts spur economic growth. The highest period of growth in U.S. history (1933-1973) also saw its highest tax rates on the rich: 70 to 91 percent. During this period, the general tax rate climbed as well, but it reached a plateau in 1969, and growth slowed down five years later. Almost all rich nations have higher general taxes than the U.S., and they are growing faster as well."

Tax cuts spur economic growth


A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote to continue the same economic policies that are destroying the middle class in America.

 

[WillowTree]

May 25, 2006




FEDERAL HOUSING ENTERPRISE REGULATORY REFORM ACT OF 2005




Mr. President, this week Fannie Mae's regulator reported that the company's quarterly reports of profit growth over the past few years were "illusions deliberately and systematically created" by the company's senior management, which resulted in a $10.6 billion accounting scandal.

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight's report goes on to say that Fannie Mae employees deliberately and intentionally manipulated financial reports to hit earnings targets in order to trigger bonuses for senior executives. In the case of Franklin Raines, Fannie Mae's former chief executive officer, OFHEO's report shows that over half of Mr. Raines' compensation for the 6 years through 2003 was directly tied to meeting earnings targets. The report of financial misconduct at Fannie Mae echoes the deeply troubling $5 billion profit restatement at Freddie Mac.

The OFHEO report also states that Fannie Mae used its political power to lobby Congress in an effort to interfere with the regulator's examination of the company's accounting problems. This report comes some weeks after Freddie Mac paid a record $3.8 million fine in a settlement with the Federal Election Commission and restated lobbying disclosure reports from 2004 to 2005. These are entities that have demonstrated over and over again that they are deeply in need of reform.
GovTrack: Senate Record: FEDERAL HOUSING ENTERPRISE REGULATORY REFORM... (109-s20060525-16)




Now take a look at the top two receivers of money from FM AND FM




Dodd, Christopher J S CT D $165,400 $48,500 $116,900
Obama, Barack S IL D $126,349 $6,000 $120,349







OpenSecrets | Update: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Invest in Lawmakers - Capital Eye

 

[midcan5]

Willow, that's politics today, they all do it. Support campaign reform - something republicans shot down.



A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote against the fundamental principle of America, the right of the individual to lead their life privately without the government interfering.

 

[Skull Pilot]

I'll take a page from the libbies and say I will move out of the country.

 

[midcan5]

I notice that no one ever counters the fact that when our taxes were highest on the wealthy and corporations our nation worked the best. This seems a truism, but then republicans have made taxes a four letter word and no one uses it for fear they will be banned from the discussion. Should executives make millions of dollars while workers in the same company get minimum wage is a question that is never asked? Our conservative MSM does not know how to handle the issue either.


"This is the Bush-McCain economy. Senator McCain may have forgotten, but President Bush already tried his economic policies and the results are not good. We have just been through a business cycle in which the wage of the typical worker and the typical working family fell. This is the first time that has ever happened."

The Whiner's Recession | CommonDreams.org

 

[glockmail]

I notice that no one ever counters the fact that when our taxes were highest on the wealthy and corporations our nation worked the best. ....

That's bullshit right there. Our nation worked the best when Reagan was President, and Greenspan was still sane instead of a tool for his MSM wife.

 

[midcan5]

That's bullshit right there. Our nation worked the best when Reagan was President, and Greenspan was still sane instead of a tool for his MSM wife.

You know no history if you think that. Reagan began the decline of the working people and of the middle class. While he reduced taxes he realized the mistake and had the highest peace time tax increase ever. He made us a debtor nation for the first time in our history. Bush sr lost because Ronnie created a mess that created a recession.

CEPR - America Since 1980: A Right Turn Leading to a Dead End

"U.S. politics took a sharp turn to the right in 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan as president. Domestically, Reagan touted an agenda that would lead to a sharp upward redistribution of income...

The welfare state in the United States was always weaker than in West Europe, but in 1980 it was reasonable to believe that West Europe presented a model that the United States would follow...

Reagan's election changed the political reality. His agenda was rolling back the welfare state, and his budgets included a wide range of cuts for social programs. He was also very strategic about the process. One of his first targets was Legal Aid. This program, which provides legal services for low-income people, was staffed largely by progressive lawyers, many of whom used it as a base to win precedent-setting legal disputes against the government."


A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote to continue the same economic policies that are destroying the middle class in America.

 

[editec]

Should executives make millions of dollars while workers in the same company get minimum wage is a question that is never asked?

Spot on.

Somebody remind me again about how free our market is.

I need a good laugh.

 

[glockmail]

You know no history if you think that. Reagan began the decline of the working people and of the middle class. While he reduced taxes he realized the mistake and had the highest peace time tax increase ever. He made us a debtor nation for the first time in our history. Bush sr lost because Ronnie created a mess that created a recession.

CEPR - America Since 1980: A Right Turn Leading to a Dead End

"U.S. politics took a sharp turn to the right in 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan as president. Domestically, Reagan touted an agenda that would lead to a sharp upward redistribution of income...

The welfare state in the United States was always weaker than in West Europe, but in 1980 it was reasonable to believe that West Europe presented a model that the United States would follow...

Reagan's election changed the political reality. His agenda was rolling back the welfare state, and his budgets included a wide range of cuts for social programs. He was also very strategic about the process. One of his first targets was Legal Aid. This program, which provides legal services for low-income people, was staffed largely by progressive lawyers, many of whom used it as a base to win precedent-setting legal disputes against the government."


A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote to continue the same economic policies that are destroying the middle class in America.

A Liberal think tank. Who would have thunk that you of all people would believe this garbage?

 

[midcan5]

A Liberal think tank. Who would have thunk that you of all people would believe this garbage?

Not an answer, not even a thought. Dean Baker is an economist.

 

[glockmail]

Not an answer, not even a thought. Dean Baker is an economist.

Economics is a series of theories. Most economists are liberal. Do you deny that interpret the theories are interpreted differently in this field?

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

I notice that no one ever counters the fact that when our taxes were highest on the wealthy and corporations our nation worked the best.

It's very easy to counter--there were gigantic tax loopholes.

Would you prefer to go back to 1969 (minus the Vietnam war of course)? I would. That's because federal/state/local governments consumed a smaller slice of the pie.

Government spending as a percentage of GDP. That's the number to look at. Not some meaningless high tax rate, which can have 500 pages of loopholes applied to it; or some misleadingly low supply-sider tax rate, which can be bolstered by the stealth tax of borrowing and inflation.

 

[midcan5]

Economics is a series of theories. Most economists are liberal. Do you deny that interpret the theories are interpreted differently in this field?

But there are outcomes and you can open your eyes for the current one - a mess. So the question isn't difference, it is what works and FDR's New Deal worked for a heck of a lot longer than the recent voodoo economics has.

 

[midcan5]

It's very easy to counter--there were gigantic tax loopholes.

Would you prefer to go back to 1969 (minus the Vietnam war of course)? I would. That's because federal/state/local governments consumed a smaller slice of the pie.

Government spending as a percentage of GDP. That's the number to look at. Not some meaningless high tax rate, which can have 500 pages of loopholes applied to it; or some misleadingly low supply-sider tax rate, which can be bolstered by the stealth tax of borrowing and inflation.

I would agree in part, those times had strong regulatory polices and the tools to enforce them. I see this in the corporate world today, the old ideas that business operated for the common good of the customers, employees and owners has been supplanted with the idea that businesses operate for profit and damn those other socialistic ideas.

 

[PeterS]

That's bullshit right there. Our nation worked the best when Reagan was President, and Greenspan was still sane instead of a tool for his MSM wife.

And that is bull shit right there. You do understand that when you counter bull shit with bull shit you still have bull shit don't you? The era of borrow and spend started under Reagan. That is hardly our best.

 

[PeterS]

I'll take a page from the libbies and say I will move out of the country.

Bye!

 

[PeterS]

Not an answer, not even a thought. Dean Baker is an economist.

But he is a liberal and he thinks. I don't know if he has a tank though but I'll try to find out.

 

[PeterS]

Crash Course in Economics by Larry Beinhart

"The core, the very heart of Bushonomics, is cutting taxes. Especially for the wealthy.

I find it impossible to figure out what George Bush's motivations for anything are. He may have that impulse because he himself, his family, and his friends are all very rich and they'll save themselves millions of dollars over the years. Maybe it's political. As he once said, the super rich are his "base." It may be a class thing - the belief that rich people are rich because they're better and will do better things with the money. It may be theological, the mystical belief that "the market" makes everything better.

Whatever the truth is, the tax cuts were sold as economic stimulus and jobs packages with the promise that they would not create deficits. This last was based on a romantic Ayn Rand vision of millionaires racing into the backwoods to build, build, build new businesses which would create jobs, "good jobs," and new taxes would be paid by the businesses and the workers, making up for the initial deficits.

Alas, none of that ever happened.

Deficits were created."

Crash Course in Economics | CommonDreams.org

"On moral grounds, then, we could argue for a flat income tax of 90 percent to return that wealth to its real owners. In the United States, even a flat tax of 70 percent would support all governmental programs (about half the total tax) and allow payment, with the remainder, of a patrimony of about $8,000 per annum per inhabitant, or $25,000 for a family of three. This would generously leave with the original recipients of the income about three times what, according to my rough guess, they had earned."

UBI and the Flat Tax

"There is no historical evidence that tax cuts spur economic growth. The highest period of growth in U.S. history (1933-1973) also saw its highest tax rates on the rich: 70 to 91 percent. During this period, the general tax rate climbed as well, but it reached a plateau in 1969, and growth slowed down five years later. Almost all rich nations have higher general taxes than the U.S., and they are growing faster as well."

Tax cuts spur economic growth


A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote to continue the same economic policies that are destroying the middle class in America.

When taxes were cut in late 81 the economy was in severe demand-pull. The economic remedy for demand-pull is to induce supply-push and you do this is done by stimulating capitalization. The last 'spot-on' tax cut was the Reagan tax cut. The fallacy is that it won't create massive amounts of debt--it did. I have no problem with the 81 tax cut and would never want to return to a 90% tax rate. I would like to see a single revenue neutral flat tax for both earned and unearned income with a reasonable CoL cutout. This would satisfy the right who thinks the wealthy elite are taxed unreasonably and satisfy the left because taxes would still be progressive with the middle and lower incomes paying nothing while the wealthy elite remain paying the lions share.

 

[glockmail]

And that is bull shit right there. You do understand that when you counter bull shit with bull shit you still have bull shit don't you? The era of borrow and spend started under Reagan. That is hardly our best.

You mean borrow to spend to build up our military that Carter decimated? The military that caused the USSR to buckle without firing a shot- that spending?

 

[glockmail]

But there are outcomes and you can open your eyes for the current one - a mess. So the question isn't difference, it is what works and FDR's New Deal worked for a heck of a lot longer than the recent voodoo economics has.

Its a mess perpetrated by liberal economic policies, such as creating mortgage lenders staffed by political hacks.