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

To: Srexley who wrote (554870)	3/22/2004 2:07:11 PM
From: Kenneth E. Phillipps	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 769667

When did the deficit shrink? Not since Clinton was in office.

To: Srexley who wrote (554870)	3/22/2004 5:18:58 PM
From: Steve Dietrich	Respond to of 769667

<<Last time you were belly aching about deficits the economy grew and they shrank.>> Actually it took a lot of tax increases to get the deficits under control, starting with Reagan in '82. Then Bush raised taxes, and then Clinton raised them again. Only then did we get a substantial recovery with shrinking deficits. From the National Review on Reagan's tax increases: nationalreview.com The only problem with this analysis is that it is historically inaccurate. Reagan may have resisted calls for tax increases, but he ultimately supported them. In 1982 alone, he signed into law not one but two major tax increases. The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act (TEFRA) raised taxes by $37.5 billion per year and the Highway Revenue Act raised the gasoline tax by another $3.3 billion. According to a recent Treasury Department study, TEFRA alone raised taxes by almost 1 percent of the gross domestic product, making it the largest peacetime tax increase in American history. An increase of similar magnitude today would raise more than $100 billion per year. In 1983, Reagan signed legislation raising the Social Security tax rate. This is a tax increase that lives with us still, since it initiated automatic increases in the taxable wage base. As a consequence, those with moderately high earnings see their payroll taxes rise every single year. In 1984, Reagan signed another big tax increase in the Deficit Reduction Act. This raised taxes by $18 billion per year or 0.4 percent of GDP. A similar-sized tax increase today would be about $44 billion. The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 raised taxes yet again. Even the Tax Reform Act of 1986, which was designed to be revenue-neutral, contained a net tax increase in its first 2 years. And the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 raised taxes still more. The year 1988 appears to be the only year of the Reagan presidency, other than the first, in which taxes were not raised legislatively. Of course, previous tax increases remained in effect. According to a table in the 1990 budget, the net effect of all these tax increases was to raise taxes by $164 billion in 1992, or 2.6 percent of GDP. This is equivalent to almost $300 billion in today's economy. Steve Dietrich

To: Srexley who wrote (554870)	3/22/2004 5:29:12 PM
From: Steve Dietrich	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 769667

<<Bush believes America is a prosperous and industrious nation>> If you want to take a serious non-partisan look at our economy you should look at how closely spikes in crude oil coincide with recessions. We all know about the embargoes in the 70's that turned our economy upside down but we had shocks in the early 80's followed by a huge drop to near $10 a barrel in '85. We had another spike to near $35 a barrel in the early 90's followed by sub-$20 a barrel oil for most of the mid and late 90's. Another spike in '00 and now it's spiking again. Compare oil prices to our expansions and recessions and you'll get a much closer picture of what drives our economic cycles than by looking at taxes or party affiliation... Steve Dietrich