This is a point I have argued many many times but it all goes back to my days at Ole Miss when my Econ 101 professor pulled his wheel chair up to the black board and wrote the following letters across the board in a herky jerky motion caused by his disability, TINSTAAFL. He said this is really the most important lesson he could teach us and very few if any of us will ever get it. It stand for there is no such thing as a free lunch. Somebody has to pay for it, he explains..always. This is the same BS, with the top 2 percent and their army of monkeys aka social conservatives who think Jesus was a free market economist, ( Don't ask, it is not as if they ever read the Bible or any other book. Yes I have cover to cover if you need to know, although I think you really only need the new testament if you are a Christian.), not only destroying the middle class and working class but pretty much the whole damn country. Does it matter whether you income tax is 38 % income tax level at Feds, 6 % at state level, with another 10k in fees and taxes, Fica is 10% or vice versa. What matters is who much money you have to spend in real dollars each month. Moving one tax to replace it with fees etc doesn't really help anyone unless you make so much money it doesn't matter. This jackasses seem to want to Replace the British Royalty we rebelled against to start this experiment with a new American version only richer and meaner. Well as PT Barnum saying "You can fool some of the people all the time and all of the people all the time but you can fool all the people all the time."
Here is to the next civil war, may it be bloody and great. Maybe, one day soon, someone will do like may great, great, great, grandfather Alexander Moulins did in a Paris cafe 100 years ago and announce "Viva Liberty" and the mobs will began to burn something like Goldman Sachs to the ground. Or maybe not.
The GOP Position on Taxes Gets Worse
By
Please focus on the boundless cynicism here.
Through the artificial debt-ceiling "crisis," through the Moonie-like spectacle in Iowa of candidates (including Mr. Sanity, Jon Huntsman) raising hands to promise never to accept any tax increase, the Republican field has been absolutist and inflexible about not letting any revenue increase, in any form, be part of dealing with debts and deficits.
Except, it now turns out, when the taxes are those that (a) weigh most heavily on the people who are already struggling, and (b) would have the most obvious "job-killing" effect if they went up.
When it comes to those taxes -- hell, we're easy! According to the AP and Business Insider, Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas (at right), the Republican co-chair of the all-powerful budget Super Committee, is dead set against letting the Bush-era tax cuts expire for anyone, including millionaires. But he sees no problem in letting the current cut in payroll-tax rates -- you know, the main tax burden for most Americans -- run out. As the AP story puts it:
I had thought that Republican absolutism about taxes, while harmful to the country and out of sync with even the party's own Reaganesque past, at least had the zealot's virtue of consistency. Now we see that it can be set aside when it applies to poorer people, and when setting it aside would put maximum drag on the economy as a whole. So this means that its real guiding principle is... ??? You tell me.____
The fine print. Yes, I know that there is a critique of these tax cuts from the left: That by reducing the self-funding nature of Social Security, they could in the long run undermine its legitimacy and support. I am confident that this is not the reason for Rep. Hensarling's position.
And, yes, there is a further level to the critique from the right. The problem with this tax cut, according to Republican majority leader Eric Cantor, is precisely that it's temporary, so businesses can't base plans on it. Eg, according the AP quote from Cantor's spokesman, he "has never believed that this type of temporary tax relief is the best way to grow the economy."
But as an anti-recession measure, the temporary nature of the cut is its advantage. It gets money into people's hands when they need it, without building in another permanent revenue hole -- like the tax cuts Cantor fights so hard to preserve.This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/08/the-gop-position-on-taxes-gets-worse/243930/
Through the artificial debt-ceiling "crisis," through the Moonie-like spectacle in Iowa of candidates (including Mr. Sanity, Jon Huntsman) raising hands to promise never to accept any tax increase, the Republican field has been absolutist and inflexible about not letting any revenue increase, in any form, be part of dealing with debts and deficits.
Except, it now turns out, when the taxes are those that (a) weigh most heavily on the people who are already struggling, and (b) would have the most obvious "job-killing" effect if they went up. When it comes to those taxes -- hell, we're easy! According to the AP and Business Insider, Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas (at right), the Republican co-chair of the all-powerful budget Super Committee, is dead set against letting the Bush-era tax cuts expire for anyone, including millionaires. But he sees no problem in letting the current cut in payroll-tax rates -- you know, the main tax burden for most Americans -- run out. As the AP story puts it:
>>Many of the same Republicans who fought hammer-and-tong to keep the George W. Bush-era income tax cuts from expiring on schedule are now saying a different "temporary" tax cut should end as planned. By their own definition, that amounts to a tax increase."Not created equal" is exactly right. In fact, payroll-tax cuts are the sort of tax break most likely to "get the economy moving again" during a recession. (Because they put money in the hands of people most likely to spend it and therefore boost other businesses. And on balance they lower the cost of adding new workers.) Income-tax breaks at the top end are least likely to create new demand or jobs. (Because they go to people who have a lower "marginal propensity to spend" and are more likely to park the money in the bank.)
The tax break extension they oppose is sought by President Barack Obama. Unlike proposed changes in the income tax, this policy helps the 46 percent of all Americans who owe no federal income taxes but who pay a "payroll tax" on practically every dime they earn...
"It's always a net positive to let taxpayers keep more of what they earn," says Rep. Jeb Hensarling, "but not all tax relief is created equal for the purposes of helping to get the economy moving again."<<
I had thought that Republican absolutism about taxes, while harmful to the country and out of sync with even the party's own Reaganesque past, at least had the zealot's virtue of consistency. Now we see that it can be set aside when it applies to poorer people, and when setting it aside would put maximum drag on the economy as a whole. So this means that its real guiding principle is... ??? You tell me.____
The fine print. Yes, I know that there is a critique of these tax cuts from the left: That by reducing the self-funding nature of Social Security, they could in the long run undermine its legitimacy and support. I am confident that this is not the reason for Rep. Hensarling's position.
And, yes, there is a further level to the critique from the right. The problem with this tax cut, according to Republican majority leader Eric Cantor, is precisely that it's temporary, so businesses can't base plans on it. Eg, according the AP quote from Cantor's spokesman, he "has never believed that this type of temporary tax relief is the best way to grow the economy."
But as an anti-recession measure, the temporary nature of the cut is its advantage. It gets money into people's hands when they need it, without building in another permanent revenue hole -- like the tax cuts Cantor fights so hard to preserve.This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/08/the-gop-position-on-taxes-gets-worse/243930/
Copyright © 2011 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All Rights Reserved.
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