two long winded cut n pastes. Why is yours better than mine?
For starters, I make every effort to stick with facts rather than just make stuff up!
Again, you haven't addressed what was posted but have pivoted to other articles he has written.
Quote from the article I posted and then dispute those points.
OK! Target-rich environment! (See below)
Originally Posted by WTF
When I post something, I try to make sure it's either a verifiable fact or an opinion I can support with a reasoned argument. Dean Baker? Apparently not so much! Check this excerpt from the article you posted above:
"The story of the tax cut and the economy is simple. We gave a large tax cut, a bit less than $200 billion a year (around 0.9 percent of GDP), with the main beneficiaries being rich people. And, the rich spent a reasonable portion of their tax cut, leading to a boost in consumption and a boost to growth. This proves the old theory that if we give people more money, they will spend more. Of course, that is more true if we give the money to low and middle income people, but even high income people will spend more when they have more money.
The tax cut did lead to a large increase in the budget deficit, which is not necessarily a problem, except that we could have instead done things with this money like provide free child care, extend health care coverage, provide large subsidies to promote clean energy and conservation. In effect, we targeted increasing consumption by the rich instead of these alternative uses of resources." [End of excerpt]
(Note: Here Baker is talking mostly about the
total tax cut -- largely income tax cuts -- rather than just the corporate tax cut.)
Did you not notice something just a bit fishy about that? He claimed that the income tax cuts mostly benefited the "rich." But that's completely false, as the new tax rate was reduced by a far larger percentage for lower and middle income taxpayers than for high income earners. And there was not even a capital gains tax cut. (Even the 3.8% surtax on investment income, which I think should have been the first thing to get deep-sixed, remains.)
Dean Baker, a PhD economist who frequently opines on tax policy and inequality issues, doesn't know this? How embarrassing!
But ... hey, why let little things like facts get in the way when you have a partisan political axe to grind?
