This is something I've been kicking around for awhile now. I'm not going to go so far as to say Carter was right, but I can concede that to HW Bush when he regarded it as "Voodoo Economics."
I think the problem was that Reaganomics was, essentially, the product of not recognizing the changes that the post-WWII era brought on. We were number 1 in the fifties and sixties because--pretty much aside for Peal Harbor--we were untouched by the devastation that the war brought to so much of Europe and Asia. The problem was that they got better. In the face of economic competition, we didn't re-tool and train harder to keep up...metaphorically. We juiced up on economic steroids (Reaganomics).
Taxes went down (not that I'm against that) and spending went up. And, we just have to accept that fact that a lot of that spending was in giveaways to industries and far from laissez faire capitalism. The MIC won big. I'm pretty sure there was that ethanol subsidy history that we didn't learn from that some companies scored big on.
Were there increases in welfare and such? Yeah. "Golden Ages" usually have a really ugly underbelly. It has never been the welfare queens, though. I believe that to be the most insipid of elaborate fictions ever dreamt. We gave companies big tax breaks as they moved overseas and took the good paying jobs with them. People took work for less money and got turned on to the dole to keep up. More government debt loaded onto the corporate handout debt. And, save for the oncoming information age in the mid to late nineties, we keep going back to the juice with predictable results.
Welcome to the utopia that "greed is good" thinking gets you. Fuck that movie and fuck Ayn Rand...in the fucking ass.
On the taxes thing, I do believe that tax receipts and economic growth occurred. And, it worked wonders for JFK. But, it is a pretty understandable outcome when you think of what the rates were at when he came into office. At some point, I'm not afraid to entertain the thought that maybe the plan loses efficacy. There may just be a line between "hey, a little extra money to invest" and "hey, look at this boatload of cash I'm swimming in". We may have crossed that line.
This isn't some crazy rant against greed, though. I don't give a fuck that people are rich. Good for them. Eventually, through them buying that over-priced cutting edge tech that I'll buy a few years later at a fraction of the price, good for me. Somebody had to pay those thousands for that crazy flat screen tv that "all us poor folks" marveled (or rolled our eyes) at. Now, we've got 'em too.
There is a point, however, where we have to acknowledge that they aren't the sole source of job creation. We are all the job creating class. We all buy shit. We all create demand by having some extra cash. Through all the constant cutting and the ever added loopholes, the rich have been able to shift the burden onto the middle class (the engine) from the top. It's a fact that I think it is just time for us to accept.
On the other hand, I'm not going to say that the poor have to pay any more or anything at all. They're fucking poor. Fuck it. Let 'em keep what they have. That said, don't give 'em a refund that is more than they paid in. That's shifting the weight to heavily from the bottom. So, fuck the other side of the "pay your fair share" that seems to think we can squeeze blood from a turnip.
The numbers don't lie. We are collecting taxes at about 15% of GDP when we should--historically--be collecting about 18%. We are also spending at 21% when it is usually around--again--18%. Is six percent on either side really that hard of a fucking deal to work out? Honestly. Is trying to raise revenue by 3% really going to throw the economy into another depression? Is cutting spending by 3% really going to make grandma starve? No on both accounts.
Raise rates. Close some loopholes. It can't be that hard to find 3% of GDP there while keeping taxes as low as possible for the middle class. I'd even be willing to pay an extra few percentage points if absolutely necessary. Shared sacrifice, right?
On spending, I'm sure there are a shit load of handouts and subsidies we can get rid of that will close the gap more so than going after entitlements. But, we never start with those because--fuck--how the hell are our great leaders to get re-elected if they dare short us on bacon? Let's really give laissez faire a chance if we really do believe in it? Fuck welfare to corporations and fuck welfare to farmers that are far from the dirt poor farmers we subsidized eighty years ago. Honestly, most of our breadbaskets are supplied by Big Agra anyway. Read that side, it probably says ConAgra or something similar.
We can get to entitlements. We need to get to entitlements. But, let's start with the handouts and work our way there. All we need to start with is three fucking percent. But, watch it with the cliff, ten-to-one says we'll get "unspecified future cuts" from both sides that is code for "make another congress deal with it."
BTW, fuck the cliff. They say we need to address revenues and spending. The cliff does that. What is the fucking problem? Seriously. Fuck all these fuckers.
End rant.
