I agree with this 100%. No politician would ever do it. The tax code is used by Reps/Dems to reward their donors and punish enemies.
Also the fallout would be insane. Every wind farm in the country goes out of business. Gas prices go up 5%.
Prices for crops go crazy because we use subsidies to pay farmers not to farm and pay other farmers to farm at the same time. Maybe HFCS won’t be so cheap after all.
The list would be huge. A no subsidy/loophole world would look very different.
That’s exactly what I said up thread. @pfury argued that tax cuts caused suffering/ hurt the economy. There is no evidence of that.
Do you think the US should pay higher taxes than the other OECD/G20 nations?
I don’t have a problem with tax cuts. Federal level state level local level they can all be useful. But Reagan helped create the boom for the current day joke that is trickle down economics.
Not only that, but we did see negative side effects from passing these cuts BEFORE addressing the spending that needed to be addressed. Cart before the horse. Why Reagan had to bump taxes a couple times after the cuts and they had to go machete on the budget. Not that it wasn’t needed, but doing this shit backwards to score political points is garbage
As long as we have expenses that require it, yes. You can’t run decisions like national level taxes purely on what other countries are doing.
Other countries don’t drop NEARLY as much as we do subsidizing the world.
edit: when I say the world I meant nearly every industry gets it in some way, but thinking about it you could apply it to defense as well
Again agree with you there. Which one of our 800 bases do we close first? Which country do we stop sending aid to?
I’m still not certain if deficits and the national debt matter. Hence that thread. I hate debt for myself and my businesses. There’s been debate over whether it even matters since we owe over half of it to the federal reserve and we can print the world’s reserve fiat currency. I’m not sure where I fall on that yet.
Spending cuts never really happen though. They require laying govt employees (or military) off and reducing benefits to someone somewhere. The only ones I’ve seen that aren’t politically toxic are hiring freezes and early retirement for govt employees. Nobody truly has the spine to cut spending in a real way, hence baseline budgeting.
It depends - I’d say generally no, for competitive reasons, but we may need the revenue a higher corporate tax provides. So, it depends on whether the corporate tax rate is demonstrably hurting us (and I’m in favor of lowering it myself, in the abstract). If it is, lower it, that’s smart policy, but raise the lost revenue from the tax cut from somewhere else. If we’re refusing to raise revenue elsewhere, and the corporate tax rate is tolerable (meaning, we’re prospering ok even with the higher rate and the sky isn’t falling), no, don’t cut the rate to match G20 countries.
I’m a fiscal conservative, I look at both sides of the ledger before deciding if something is good policy or not.
Yes.
If it doesn’t matter the tax rate should be 0%. REEEEEALLY stimulate that economy. Turn that trickle into a flow.
Then they have no business cutting taxes. Just my 2 cents.
Of course they matter. To believe otherwise is to subscribe to a theory that there truly is free lunch available in economics.
Moreover, independent of all the economic consequences of deficits, there are political consequences.
When a nation can give the impression that debt is irrelevant, meaningless, and that no amount of debt can affect its stability, strength and existence, it creates the illusion of an all powerful state to the degree that it can seem to be “too big to fail” and even have a divine nature, which is not a good thing, as history has shown us. But it serves those in power, while it lasts.
Military spending is welfare.
Also, I didn’t read the article but how much of our spending on the healthcare for Americans is due to Americans being unhealthier than Europeans? Then add in the effects of illegal drugs and the war on drugs and what they have done to American cities and their families. What I’m getting at is we spend more because we refuse to fix all of our social ills. We’ve practically created economies that revolve around and are dependent upon these social ills and the money we spend on them.
This needs to be emphasized.
I dunno, from where I sit this:
…is pretty good for the middle class. Let’s also remember many small business owners are middle class.
Not necessarily. Kansas’s major fuck up was that they cut taxes all at once. Businesses thrive on plans in the 3-5 year zone. It would be like a Bernie Bot saying “let’s raise the minimum wage to $18/hr starting in 4 months! It will be great!”
Nobody on this forum except maybe Zep believes that would be a good idea, even if they are in the camp that favors increased minimum wages. Because doing it all at once is dumb as shit.
I am scrambling to get ready for a bunch of family coming into town, so short on time. But this is what I am basing my opinion on:
For the average earner, that amount of savings is a pittance. And considering the right has been howling about the debt all these years, a lot of people take issue with adding $1.5T to it for an additional 1.6% in after tax income.
1.6%!? Dude, that’s an extra Big Mac a week. Where are your priorities?
Notice how the people who actually pay taxes are saving money. Hard to save on taxes if you don’t pay any.
From his graph:
An extra $870/year invested in the SNP500 index at its 90 year average of 9.8% return for 30 years would be worth $137,800 at retirement.
An extra $1,310/year with the same parameters: $207,492 at retirement.
Or, you could let the government have it back if you feel really principled about the debt. Here’s how:
How do you make a contribution to reduce the debt?
There are two ways for you to make a contribution to reduce the debt:
At Pay.gov, you can contribute online by credit card, debit card, PayPal, checking account, or savings account.
You can write a check payable to the Bureau of the Fiscal Service, and, in the memo section, notate that it’s a gift to reduce the debt held by the public. Mail your check to:
Attn Dept G
Bureau of the Fiscal Service
P. O. Box 2188
Parkersburg, WV 26106-2188
https://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/resources/faq/faq_publicdebt.htm#DebtFinance
Yeahhh gonna have to side with BG on this one. Assuming a fiscally responsible citizen, these cuts can equate to decent numbers in the long run for basically anyone. Could stick the extra in an index fund and just wait and it’d turn into huge gains eventually.
The tradeoff is going to be when we see how hard they start slashing public assistance to compensate. That’s when those numbers will be REALLY telling in the “worth it” category.
Somehow I see it going towards Big Macs and iPhones.
Then I’d recommend owning AAPL and MCD in your portfolio.
Nah this is better. Tax cuts for all but the wealthiest people get the biggest amount. Soon comes the massive infrastructure plan (hates that shit when it was called the Obama stimulus bill but this is going to be huge.). Going to make the military bigger and better than ever. Going to build the wall.
Everyones going to pay less taxes everyones going to get more money from the government and more jobs from government spending. Remember when Republicans said the government doesn’t create jobs? Get out of the past man. The government creates jobs and can do it all without taxes now.
Trump figured out the way to a second term. Going to be some great times until the crash.
