Subject:
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Re: Supply-Side Economics? The Evidence Says No!
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 17 Oct 2006 13:35:08 GMT
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Viewed:
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2409 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, John Neal wrote:
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Tim already gave a good answer, but I’d add that a booming economy doesn’t
help those in the lower income bracket, even if they’re there not out of
laziness but out of circumstance. Why is wealth-redistribution acceptable
when it’s redistributed to the wealthy, but not to the poor? The argument
is that the wealthy will put the money back into the economy. Well, what
are the impoverished going to do with it? Burn it?
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The idea is that it gets reinvested into businesses which further spurs
growth, jobs, and wage increases.
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That would be nice if it were true, but despite two administrations espousing
that view, it has yet to work as promised. It fails for a number of reasons.
First, you can’t build a business if there isn’t a demand to support it, and if
the masses are impoverished, then your business won’t be supported. That is, if
a rich guy’s widget factory closed because nobody could afford to buy widgets,
then if you give the rich guy a barrel of money, he’s not going to reopen his
failed business. He’s going to take it elsewhere. And in today’s world much
investment is made overseas, so if you give money to that same rich guy, he’s
going to send it out of the country.
But if you use that money to assist those on the lower rungs, they will put
it back into the US economy, indirectly giving it to that same rich guy after
all, but helping out a greater portion of the population along the way.
The method praised by Bush and Reagan is simply a means of funneling cash to the
rich without having to worry about maybe-just-maybe helping someone along the
way.
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Some boats rise higher on a rising tide, not because of merit but because
they started higher (and because they’re not averse to dropping their
anchors (ie., the tax burden) onto the other boats.
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Life isn’t fair?
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Well, no kidding. Every man for himself, and God against all, right? I submit
that that’s a regressive, feudalist view, and it’s hardly a Christian sentiment
for that matter!
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Waging class war is just destructive;
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Republicans are the aggressors in that war. Any time a Democrat, a Progressive,
or a Liberal says “maybe the poor shouldn’t be punished for being poor,” some
Rightwing mouthpiece starts screaming about class warfare. It’s a red herring.
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But let’s be honest-- the poor don’t pay income tax-- tax cuts
favor the rich because they are the ones who pay the taxes. The top 5% of
wage earners in this country pay over half of our taxes-- the top half of
wage earners pay nearly ALL taxes.
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That’s another red herring. The top 5% of wage earners control more than 80% of
the wealth, so they’re getting quite a bargain if they’re only paying half of
the nation’s taxes.
There’s more clarification to be made in terms of payroll vs. income tax and how
the difference punishes the poor more than the rich, but that’s a bigger issue.
Dave!
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Supply-Side Economics? The Evidence Says No!
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| (...) Well, let's be honest here. If your product is too expensive for the masses in the USA, it probably doesn't stand much of a chance in an even MORE empoverished world market overseas, especially with foreign governments' market-protection (...) (18 years ago, 17-Oct-06, to lugnet.off-topic.debate, FTX)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Supply-Side Economics? The Evidence Says No!
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| (...) "Half-wit" I'd say, but that would be too easy! >:-D (...) Well, my point is that it has been consistently used through the decades and therefore is a sort of standardized snapshot of our economy, if only one part. Though it doesn't reflect (...) (18 years ago, 17-Oct-06, to lugnet.off-topic.debate, FTX)
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