Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Scumbria who wrote (112390)	5/24/2000 2:11:00 PM
From: pgerassi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1570935

Dear Scumbria: OT My memory has it different. I think we both remember the negatives but place different spins by our biases at the time. I remember that Reagan wanted two things, a 600 ship navy and those tax cuts to stimulate the economy. Remember Carter left with inflation in the high teens (the exact number escapes me) and the economy was going into recession. Reagan, correctly as it turned out, said that the tax cuts would produce more revenue. Revenue has increased greatly since that time. The problem was that Congress spent it faster than it was coming in for social programs, pork barrel spending (the Republicans must take blame for this as well), and always spent more overall than Reagan wanted. Although to be fair, even the Republicans spent more every year in the last 6 years. What they did differently, was to spend less than the increase in revenue from the previous year following the spending targets from the Graham, Rudman, and Hollings Act (I may be attributing it incorrectly here). These spending targets were an important leftover from the Bush deficit reducing tax bill that he was not reelected for. The net result of this is the budget surpluses we now enjoy (well most of us do). But Reagan should not be taken to task for the increased deficits of later years because Congress spent far more than any increase (the House sets the budget process going although it always claims that the presidents budget of the other party is DOA). With prudent restraint on the expenditure side, the tax cuts would have produced surpluses by 1986 or so. And by now, we would have paid all debt, the public and private parts of the deficit. I believe that government spends far too much of our money. Most of the money it spends are wasted in bureaucracy and unwise programs. There is also a large and growing compliance tax on the economy as well (bureaucracy needs to justify itself). Do you agree? Pete