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| quote: | Originally posted by DevilDogUSMC
Boy do you know how to generalize decades of government
spending with "Republicans spent more than democrats". |
Umm, is that somehow run counter to my point over the past 26 years with the last 4 presidents?
| quote: | Anyway, at least Republicans are all about tax cuts, letting
us keep our money to do as we wish more than dems who love
taking our hard earned money... |
Hmm, please don't tell Reagan that, who happened to impose a tax hike after his tax cut by the advice of my former Senator Bob Dole. A little trip down memory lane for you:
| quote: | The following year, Reagan signed another big tax increase in the Deficit Reduction Act of 1984. 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 two 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
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/col.../28/168618.html |
That article goes on to mention that Reagan, in fact, raised taxes 7 times. Also please don't inform Bush Sr. for imposing the tax hike that he implemented proceeding his "no new taxes" debacle.
And please don't remember how incredible our economy was with Clinton's economic policies in place either with a tax hike primarily on the upper echelon.
And let's keep something in mind as well - Democrats today propose keeping the tax cut for the middle class in the same manner as Clinton did. What they disagree with is keeping the tax cuts for the upper class, the top 10% which receives 90% of the tax cut, as well as tax breaks to corporations and oil companies which I've posted my criticisms on in another thread. I realize as much as any old bloke that you may believe they are entitled to their money as much as those in the middle class, but in terms of helping boost the economy this is NOT the ideal philosophy to hold.
Our recovery from the 2001 little recession has been one of the most anemic on record as a result of these asinine tax cuts to the wealthy. The only reason why it didn't get worse was because the GOP-led Congress helped maintain and even increase federal spending by using BORROWED money instead of tax revenues. It wasn't the tax cuts that helped us with our recovery - it was the fucking borrowing like a teenager with daddy's credit card.
And guess what? Guess who has to pay back that bill from your Administration and GOP Congress' borrowing and spend-thrift habits in efforts to support their tax cut?
And let's also keep something in mind in regards to Clinton vs. Dubya: Clinton's discretionary spending increased from $539 to $614 billion during his time in office - a 13% increase. Wanna know how much discretionary spending has increased for Dubya? From $649 to $967 as of February '06, a 48% increase.
I'm sorry, you were saying something about the history of librul spending?
Finally, a run-down on numbers of inflation-adjusted increase in tax revenues during Reagan's presidency: 22.13%
Clinton's presidency: 81%
Dubya so far: 17%
All of which can be found here: http://www.bea.gov/
The bottom line is these tax cuts are not paying for themselves, period. I love idealism as much as the next guy about keeping my $ from taxes and all that jazz, but I've accepted the notion that as an American citizen I am required to pay my taxes to the government and hope that my government can sustain itself without borrowing the shit out of itself and have it come back to bite us all in the collective asses down the road.
I'll leave you with a word from none other than the Wall Street Journal back in July of this year:
| quote: | Do Tax Cuts Pay for Themselves? Not if you read the fine print in the new White House midsession review of budget trends. "While difficult to estimate precisely," Treasury long-run analyses of the effects of President Bush's tax cuts "may ultimately" raise total national output of goods and services by 0.7%.
.....So is that enough to pay for the tax cuts, even after allowing them to work their economic magic over the next 10 years? The Center for Budget Policies and Priorities, a Washington think tank and advocacy group that is distinctly unfriendly to Bush fiscal policies, says it isn't. "A 0.7 percent increase in the economic output that the Congressional Budget Office has projected for 2016 would represent an additional $146 billion [in gross domestic product]," it says. "If new revenues equaled as much as 20% of the additional output, the increase in revenues resulting from making the tax cuts permanent (assuming Treasury's best-case assumptions) would be $29 billion."
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2006/...for-themselves/ |
Actually, let me give you a few more pieces. This following analysis demonstrates that since WWII, Democratic presidents have consistently produced greater GDP growth, lower unemployment, and lower inequality versus Republican presidents:
http://www.princeton.edu/~bartels/income.pdf
An interesting piece on the stock market, although it's a bit dated:
http://www.slate.com/?id=2071929
And if you're really interested, here's an analysis back in '04 of comparison:
http://www.eriposte.com/economy/other/demovsrep.htm
___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...
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