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The Lasting Legacy of the Last Decade: A Shrinking Middle Class

bobknightfan said:
Still waiting.......
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Sorry about the delay - I was celebrating various and sundry labor causes this weekend and only briefly checked in on the boards. Um.. in response, you're kidding, right? I interpreted your initial comment as "find a Republican supporter of higher taxes" (which I did), then it seems you narrowed it somewhat to a Republican supporter of increased marginal rates. You're sophisticated enough to know tax policy is more complex than the rates themselves, so I'm not clear where you're going with your commentary. Rational members of both parties support a reduction (elimination, even) of the deficit and a sane debt/GDP ratio - some (including Ryan / Tea Party types) believe increased revenues are part of the solution.
 
Ryan has the insane belief that cutting taxes will create more revenues. Even the person who came up with this idea, David Stockman, says it was a scam form Day One to brainwash the masses in order to enrich the upper class.
 
RJKarl said:
Ryan has the insane belief that cutting taxes will create more revenues. Even the person who came up with this idea, David Stockman, says it was a scam form Day One to brainwash the masses in order to enrich the upper class.
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Yet we have objective evidence of inverse relationships between revenue and rates (e.g., capital gains rates, et al).
 
No what you have, re:capital gains, is a one or two year bump followed by less revenues as then rates become accepted.
 
More about the impact of cutting capital gains taxes:


"In September, an analysis by the Washington Post concluded that "capital gains tax rates benefiting wealthy feed [the] growing gap between rich and poor." As the Post explained, for the very richest Americans the successive capital gains tax cuts from Presidents Clinton (from 28 to 20 percent) and Bush (from 20 to 15 percent) have been "better than any Christmas gift":

While it's true that many middle-class Americans own stocks or bonds, they tend to stash them in tax-sheltered retirement accounts, where the capital gains rate does not apply. By contrast, the richest Americans reap huge benefits. Over the past 20 years, more than 80 percent of the capital gains income realized in the United States has gone to 5 percent of the people; about half of all the capital gains have gone to the wealthiest 0.1 percent.

As the New York Times uncovered in 2006, the 2003 Bush dividend and capital gains tax cuts offered almost nothing to taxpayers earning below $100,000 a year. Instead, those windfalls reduced taxes "on incomes of more than $10 million by an average of about $500,000." As the Times explained, "The top 2 percent of taxpayers, those making more than $200,000, received more than 70% of the increased tax savings from those cuts in investment income." It's no wonder that between 2001 and 2007- a period during which poverty was rising and average household income had fallen - the 400 richest taxpayers saw their incomes double to an average of $345 million even as their effective tax rate was virtually halved. As the Washington Post noted, "The 400 richest taxpayers in 2008 counted 60 percent of their income in the form of capital gains and 8 percent from salary and wages. The rest of the country reported 5 percent in capital gains and 72 percent in salary."

It's purely a giveaway to the Top 3%.
 
I believe Laffer as much you believe Krugman.

If you start out with a premise that X is bad as core belief, you can usually find data to justify it.

I also noticed that when it is proven that cutting capital taxes is simply a giveaway to top income earners you change the subject.
 
bobknightfan said:
So please don't continue to evade my question. Either give me the name of one or more elected Republicans in congress who have publically stated that they would support raising marginal tax rates under ANY circumstances, or admit that you know of none. No more bullshit diversionary responses.
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Combative much? Apologies if you interpreted my Boehner link as a diversionary tactic - it wasn't. It was a good faith attempt to provide the info you requested. For the record, I know of no (current) Republicans calling for higher marginal federal tax rates.
 
RJKarl said:
More about the impact of cutting capital gains taxes:


"In September, an analysis by the Washington Post concluded that "capital gains tax rates benefiting wealthy feed [the] growing gap between rich and poor." As the Post explained, for the very richest Americans the successive capital gains tax cuts from Presidents Clinton (from 28 to 20 percent) and Bush (from 20 to 15 percent) have been "better than any Christmas gift":

While it's true that many middle-class Americans own stocks or bonds, they tend to stash them in tax-sheltered retirement accounts, where the capital gains rate does not apply. By contrast, the richest Americans reap huge benefits. Over the past 20 years, more than 80 percent of the capital gains income realized in the United States has gone to 5 percent of the people; about half of all the capital gains have gone to the wealthiest 0.1 percent.

As the New York Times uncovered in 2006, the 2003 Bush dividend and capital gains tax cuts offered almost nothing to taxpayers earning below $100,000 a year. Instead, those windfalls reduced taxes "on incomes of more than $10 million by an average of about $500,000." As the Times explained, "The top 2 percent of taxpayers, those making more than $200,000, received more than 70% of the increased tax savings from those cuts in investment income." It's no wonder that between 2001 and 2007- a period during which poverty was rising and average household income had fallen - the 400 richest taxpayers saw their incomes double to an average of $345 million even as their effective tax rate was virtually halved. As the Washington Post noted, "The 400 richest taxpayers in 2008 counted 60 percent of their income in the form of capital gains and 8 percent from salary and wages. The rest of the country reported 5 percent in capital gains and 72 percent in salary."

It's purely a giveaway to the Top 3%.
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Okay. It's a giveaway to the top 3%. Now what? Increase the rates and watch the money flow in?
 
You increase the tax rates and make cuts. You can't close the deficit without doing both. Anyone who says you can is delusional and thinks the person he/she is telling that to is a fool.
 
As an aside, I wonder what the over/under was on me breaking 100 posts while in a discussion with you and/or BKF?
 
RJKarl said:
You increase the tax rates and make cuts. You can't close the deficit without doing both. Anyone who says you can is delusional and thinks the person he/she is telling that to is a fool.
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I disagree. We went through a major policy change (including rate reductions) in the mid-80's. Tax receipts (in '05 adjusted dollars) from 1982 to 1988 were: $1.2, $1.1, $1.2, $1.3, $1.3, $1.4, and $1.4. I interpret those numbers as saying a rate reduction doesn't necessarily mean a fall-off in revenues. What I do agree with is we'd have a difficult time closing the deficit without increasing taxes and cutting spending. The gap seems too large to tackle from one side alone.
 
It had nothing to do with cutting taxes. It was about employment going up and being during the time of the first computer revolution.
 
RJKarl said:
It had nothing to do with cutting taxes. It was about employment going up and being during the time of the first computer revolution.
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You know the GOP response to this. The computer revolution was made possible by the tax cuts.
 
Geeks in mom's basement or garage don't know from tax cuts.
 
No it shows another GOP myth is debunked. It shows the "death tax" doesn't apply to smart people.
 
RJKarl said:
It had nothing to do with cutting taxes. It was about employment going up and being during the time of the first computer revolution.
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Okay. We'll time machine it to the early 60's drop from 91% to 70%. Receipts from 1963 - 1967 were: $.7, $.7, $.7, $.8, $.9. I'm still interpreting 'the numbers' as saying rate reductions don't necessarily equal a fall-off in revenues.
 
RJKarl said:
No it shows another GOP myth is debunked. It shows the "death tax" doesn't apply to smart people.
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One might also interpret it as evidence that rates don't matter. Overall tax policy matters. Jobs didn't cheat, rather he took advantage of trust-based loopholes.
 
There were other ways in those days to shelter money. You are talking apples and oranges.

No one is talking about 90% tax rates. It is ludicrous to think that cutting current tax rates will create more revenues.

Revenues are destined to go up during the next five years as the economy will continue growing. cutting rates will not create more revenue. Growing the economy will.

I'll put it bluntly. There is nothing you can say that would ever convince me that in the same level of an economy that cutting taxes will ever create more revenue nor that cutting taxes at this point would ever create any jobs.

It's as silly as saying raising the top rate by 4% for income over $250,000 will cost jobs. This concept is insulting to anyone who has ever run a business.

If my business had pretax profits of $350,000 or even $1,000,000, that hire or that piece of equipment would never impacted by the rate increase. If it makes sense with the 4% it makes sense without it.
 
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