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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: U Up U Down who wrote (100066)	12/4/2000 11:04:44 AM
From: Enam Luf	Respond to of 769670

Ahem... excuse me, but that article is unadulterated bullshit. It is not sound analysis to look at one particular period of time and take one variable for a statistical analysis. While I agree that spending is just as big of a cash sucker, it is simply absurd to say that tax cuts do not play a role. I would rather see taxes stay where they are (and trust me, I will feel the brunt of that top bracket) and have the gov't cut spending and use the surplus (if there is any) to pay down the debt and shore up social security. Using taxes as fiscal stimulus is unwise, imo, because they are not so readily changed as interest rates. Lowering rates now just means that someone gets stuck raising them again later. Stealing from the present at the expense of your future is akin to cutting off your nose to spite your face. No one is willing to take their medicine like a man. The truth is spending will not decline under either party's rule. Aside from this, I am going to check out the numbers in that article, I do not think they are accurate. Check that, they may be, but someone has manipulated the statistics to make them more appealing. In my next post, I will get deeper into the numbers to show how this is done. I hate when journalists play with numbers.

To: U Up U Down who wrote (100066)	12/4/2000 11:38:47 AM
From: Enam Luf	Respond to of 769670

Ok, let's look at the numbers from the article. "Receipts from individual income taxes rose to $446 billion in '89 from $286 billion in '81, a 56% increase" 56%.... wow that looks like a lot! Wait, that's compounded over 9 (count'em) years, which is only 5.06% annually, hmmm, the article doesn't use that number. next... "Tax receipts grew faster than that period's 4% inflation" Great! Wait a minute... the inflation rate actually averaged 4.7% during that period (works out to 4.65% CAGR) and that only leaves about 0.4% real growth per annum, much less than real GDP growth. "From 1981 to 1983, personal income tax receipts rose 1 percent -- while spending surged 19 percent. This was during a bad recession. After the recession, the Reagan tax cuts worked and revenues soared." To attribute the economy's success to the tax cuts because they coincided is not valid logic. Just because events coincide does not indicate a causal link. I think the Fed had a lot to do with the success during this time period. The Kennedy example is shoddy as well. While this article clearly shows that is dubious to say that tax cuts cause deficits in some economic environments, it does not prove or disprove anything... It all depends on how high tax rates are at the time, the relative interest rates, inflation, jobless rates... and lots of international factors as well. Spending is a more egregious culprit but lowering taxes doesn't help. I'd rather see these matters left to the Fed who can manipulate interest rates as they see fit. Tax rates are too cumbersome and partisan to change often and as such are not a good tool for manipulating economic policy in today's rapidly changing environment. -enam (statistics are for suckers)

To: U Up U Down who wrote (100066)	12/4/2000 1:55:55 PM
From: Enam Luf	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

Moreover, lowering taxes now enables the aging baby boomers to stick the majority of the tax burden on the younger generation. As they get older, it will become necessary to substantially raise taxes to pay for them (medical, social sec, etc). If we don't start saving in advance, we will be screwed later on. This also requires cutting spending. That site you posted is a sham, btw. It claims to be independent but is cleary very pro-Republican as all the articles on it have serious GOP/Bush slant.