So yeah, um I was looking at this graph here that shows the tax rates in the US for 100 years and I may be wrong but it seems that the periods of the greatest prosperity were during periods of higher taxation, and that pretty much every time taxes were lowered there was some kind of recession or depression-- see especially 1929-- huge tax breaks for the rich, and a short time later-- the depression, after which the taxes go up again and the recovery begins. Then look at 1973, early 80s recession, early 90s recession, 2001 and, of course, 07/08. Could it be because tax cuts for the rich only ever lead to bubble economies that crash markets completely, while also excluding the less well-off from participating in the booms? Could it be that trying to convince people they're rich enough to participate in these free-market low tax bubbles with predatory lending schemes actually causes more harm than good? How exactly would you explain this?
You may be right. I think it's a lot more complicated than that though, but it's beyond my expertise.
I agree it's a lot more complicated... I'm not an economist either, but it seems to make sense to me. I also think it's interesting to note that in the 80s, taxes went up on the middle/lower classes and DOWN for the higher income earners. This was probably an attempt to keep wall street going through its debt problems and building up corporations with middle-class money... which was Ronald Reagan's whole schtick. It seems like the ideal is to keep the tax rates at around 20% for lower/middle classes and closer to 70% for the top earners... but the right seems to have a history of being elected by promising tax cuts, then a bubble, then a crash. Right now the tax rate is officially 35% for the rich, but of course they just ship their money overseas (banks will help them find tax shelters) or declare their income as capital gains and end up paying 15%.
I think too much focus is placed on the amount of taxes instead of the manner in which they're spent. If you're running a business that is falling apart, you can't just throw more money at it blindly and expect it to fix itself. Its like pouring gas on a fire when theres no more wood to burn. Yeah it will get some bright flames but there's no sustenance to keep it going. The huge beaurocracy that is the US Government, is infamous for throwing away money like nobodies business. I say we audit the fed, and analyze the way money is spent all throughout government. Shrink the tax code into something any halfway intelligent human being could understand. Get rid of all loopholes, exemtions, etc. If we got back to the basics I'm sure that we could go a lot further with a lot less. If not, fine. THEN let's raise the taxes.
It's curious that you immediately switch to talking about the government as opposed to Wall Street, banks, corporations, etc. I would definitely agree that some government spending can be wasteful and that it should be more efficient, but I really don't think that you could simply reroute existing funds from the military into education and all of your problems would be solved, or that we should all try to 'do more with less'. And a lot of people have already lost their jobs in the name of 'efficiency'... it's another reason why companies that used to have decent opportunities gradually turn into exclusive members only clubs. This isn't changing the quality of the goods being produced, and isn't causing a drop in prices... all that it's doing is preventing advancement, shutting out people who could have contributed, and concentrating wealth. And a lot of quality products have taken a hit in the name of 'efficiency'-- look at Sony. It used to be the industry standard for quality electronics until cheap competitors from China edged it out of the market. I owned my original sony tape player for well over 10 years without any noticeable drops in sound quality or functionality, but my Sony MP3 player made in 2011 broke down within 2 years. Plus, government isn't as inefficient as it is perceived to be: http://www.science20.com/machines_o...tems/why_government_appears_inefficient-95422 There are a lot of great points made in that article and it's hard to choose just one of them as the best, but I did think it was important to note that private interests tend to own the types of businesses that lend themselves to greater efficiency, and also that people demand more transparency from the government than from private business.
oh its just a made up democrat graph when prices fall you are richer crony commies dont like that esp bank buds they wana plow house prices to moon while blockign unregulated housing from making houses a service equipment peice not a monument any more questions? basically cut gov 99% and disallow gov regulations allow poor to compete with crony commies and everyone richer with lower price plentiful goods also allow unrestricted manufacturing union free private trains and replace lawyers n docs with software law fee are waste of everyone money
czar, That made absolutely zero sense. The Tax Foundation is NOT even remotely leftist/democrat, and even if they were, it's pretty hard to change objective facts of history. If you can prove that the tax rates weren't what the graph above suggests, then I think you should produce that because historians everywhere would really like to know.
It kills me when conservatives complain about how high taxes are now. They are just full of shit and facts don't matter to them.
Conservatives will try to get me to believe the reason the reason I am poor is because of taxes and an oppressive government. Ha. The reason I am poor is I've been making $8 an hour at jobs that have no incentive to pay me anything more! If it weren't for the government's power to set wages, they would pay me even less than they do, I am sure.
