Clash Cadillac wrote:LittleCupcakes wrote:Where has the compromise been? What exactly has Obama ceded any aspect of his assbackwards economic gambit ("plan" is far too exalted a word for that mess) to conservatism/libertarianism? I guess one could point to the small tax breaks he allowed in the lardass "stimulus", but those were purely political (so he could claim "bipartisanship"), but otherwise, where is the compromise?
So please tell me exactly what you believe the economic plan should be? If you are going to tell me you believe in supply side economics then please tell me why or point me to some examples of where this has worked. I am actually enjoying this crash course in economics (the little bit of internet browsing I did last night) more than I thought I would.
For a start:
Military:
Pull all troops currently stationed on foreign soil. It's not our business to have permanent troops in Germany or Korea or Iraq or wherever.
Abolish:
Federal Departments of: Education, Commerce, IRS, Labor, Transportation
The Education department is a wasteful, regulatory agency. It is not authorized by the Constitution, and does not educate one person. It sucks up taxpayer money and peels a good chunk off the top for it's massive bureaucracy, and then returns what it sees fit to the several states. Education is the states' prerogative.
The IRS does much the same. A simpler tax system (as previously discussed elsewhere) would eliminate the need for the bloated mass of uselessness called IRS.
The Department of Labor is basically a tax-sucking statistics generator (and the Feds have no business sticking their nose into private labor contracts anyway) and their few legit purposes are again better handled by the several states.
Better to take the money wasted on those departments and let the states keep it, or the people.
Revenues:
Higher tax rates encourage gaming the system (ESPECIALLY for the so-called rich). Lower tax rates are easier to swallow, and so people do not feel the need to resort to all sorts of shenanigans to avoid them, and (as with Reagan and JFK) tax revenues INCREASE over the longer term when rates are lowered; greater economic activity is stimulated AND rich folks PAY taxes instead of AVOIDING them. Is it not obvious that higher taxes PUNISH growth and success? And that growth and success are the driving factors in the economy? Why would one want to punish that which ought be encouraged?
Ditto for the capital gains tax. If the goal is more investment, then why punish people who do so? Of course, if the goal is punishment (how dare people make money at a greater rate than me?) then sure, go ahead. If we want to see investment plummet, by all means raise the capital gains tax (for our non-USA people, that's basically the tax on the sale of stocks). If you want to force the middle-class out of the market, then absolutely raise those rates. If you want to prevent people from becoming wealthy then please raise those taxes.
Encourage wealth formation. Encourage growth. Don't punish success. More people with more money equals more tax revenues.
A thought problem: If the tax rate for individuals were cut to ZERO % today and held there for one year, do you believe economic activity would increase or decrease? And if it were, say, 90%?
I can point to Ireland, Lithuania, Sweden (which is enjoying excellent results from corporate tax cuts), and Great Britain (which enjoyed a retail boost when the VAT was cut) for starters when it comes to stimulating examples.
Let's turn it around, Clash. Where have higher taxes helped an economy recover? And what would be your plan for stimulation, and where has that worked before? And where has a Euro-style economy provided income mobility, low unemployment, and incentives for work? Just see France for a dispositive case.
DzM wrote:Well yeah, but that's one of our fundamental differences Lil' C. I'm a dork that grew up on Star Trek and Spock's clichéd mantra that "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." I happen to agree with the "soft socialist ideology of the left." I believe that it is the responsibility of the government to provide for the common good of its citizenry. This means more than just having a strong military. This means having a health care system that affordable and life-prolonging for all citizens (this does not mean there should not be
better health care for those that can afford it, but rather that all citizens should be able to expect that broken bones will be set, infections treated, wounds salved, etc), food and shelter should be a basic right (again they need not be luxurious, but nobody should HAVE to live under bridges because no housing exists that they can afford), a quality education should be within the means of anyone willing to apply themselves, and so-on.
I had a much longer rant about this written but have decided to remove it.
Lil' C, and Benno too - Please tell me what you'd cut. If Gubment Spending is the boogeyman, and taxes are in support of that boogeyman, then what services would you cut? Here's a
handy view of the 2009 Federal budget. Military spending accounts for 68% of that budget. All the rest - EVERYTHING - accounts for 32%. So what would you cut? Would you cut back on military spending? If so, how? Would you have an immediate and unilateral pull-out from Iraq and Afghanistan? We're dumping a crap-load of money into both those places, but pulling out immediately and unilaterally would make us even bigger jerks than we already are. The only thing I can think of worse than bombing some country into the stone-age is to bomb them into the stone age and then pull out leaving a note saying "sorry for the mess."
So where else would you cut? Social Security? Health & Human Services ("Medicare")? Non-military national security? Department of Education? Department of Transportation? Where would you cut?
Right now personal income tax accounts for ~33% of the income needed for the budget. ~15% is borrowed (meaning "gets added to the nation's debt"). Eliminate the IRS without making cuts and you end up with a 50% deficit (note that this is, of course, before all the bailouts and stimuli, etc). What do you propose cutting, specifically, to make up for the lost income? What "pork" will you trim?
I'm all for identifying what has worked and what has been mismanaged. I'm
positive there's a crapload of wasteful spending going on in every single large institution, government or not. But shaving 5% from this budget and 10% from that budget won't reclaim our missing dollars. What programs en masse would you cut, and how would you propose that
whatever service that program provides be recreated either in the public or private sectors?
DzM, rather than quote and refute (my apologies for having taken a liberty with your thoughtful, challenging post){edit: full quote added}, I have some bullet points to add to the above, which I believe respond to some of your queries:
I see that you tacitly accept that no compromise has been made by Obama? And that he is a devoted fanatic? Or did I misread you?
People DO have their limbs mended NOW. Nobody in the USA who needs immediate medical care is denied it. As you may have read from me before, however, the health care thing is such a difficult and large problem that crappy government health may in fact be the only practicable solution, and I remain on the fence.
Social Security was dumb then, and it's dumb now.
We feed millions of kids EVERY DAY with school lunch programs, WIC, and food stamps. Those are only slightly less objectionable in that kids are not adults, and so cannot control their own destiny.
It is not my responsibility to cover the shitty choices made by other people, though I am more than willing to help (by force of law) those who are TRULY unable to work, and to temporarily help those who become unemployed through no fault of their own. Do I "owe" anyone a place to live? NO!
Quality education IS available to anyone who wants it. Student loans (I have no problem with LOANS) and community colleges place higher education in the reach of anyone who really wants it (note to lefties: this actually means hard work, not a handout). Besides, not all people SHOULD go to college, nor are all people qualified. That's why we should have a system of trade schools, apprenticeships, and suchlike. McDonald's, Yale, or the military should not be the only choices.
Thanks in advance for the rebuttals, echo-chamberians. Sorry for my delay in replying, Clash and the rest who give a damn. I'm trying to stay away a bit, as I don't want to over-focus on this thread. I sometimes have thought about it at work, or while resting, or at other inappropriate times, and so I have found that less-frequent reading and posting has been better for me overall.
Allow not nature more than nature needs, man's life is cheap as beast's.
) But in a large number of cases it was small banks handing out student loans with full knowledge that the person wasn't going to use the money for school. The DOE would usually catch these within a month, but a lot of loans can acculumate during this time. 
I didn't think of it that way. 
