Reagan-Lovers: Stop the Bull

[atlcomedy]

Originally Posted by nevergaveitathought

many things have unintended consequences. taxing muni bond income will raise interest rates on state and municipal obligations thus either limiting services, which tend to impact the lower income strata, or causing state and local taxes to rise, impacting again the lower strata from regressive taxes WTF frequently rails against.

".

:mf r_omg:really? you mean if we tax something it will have an impact? It will raise costs somewhere else in the system? I thought all these taxes were just punishment for the rich people (or people that invest in munis)....I didn't think it would have any real world implications

[nevergaveitathought]

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

:mf r_omg:really? you mean if we tax something it will have an impact? It will raise costs somewhere else in the system? I thought all these taxes were just punishment for the rich people (or people that invest in munis)....I didn't think it would have any real world implications

ok, sorry, its exasperating to state the obvious...

[atlcomedy]

Originally Posted by nevergaveitathought

ok, sorry, its exasperating to state the obvious...

on the contrary, I'm sitting in my office applauding you.....

people like to talk about tax this or that but not the consequences....

should munis have a tax-favored treatment? Who knows? That is a policy decision. But one way or another it will have an impact.

[WTF]

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

people like to talk about tax this or that but not the consequences....

.

On the flip side, not taxing something has consequences. You build a road and do not tax enough to pay for it, you have goods that get priced at a lower than actual cost that it takes to get them to market.

Taxes, to me are about fairness. The rich like to talk about Federal Taxes, the poor are to stupid to talk about regressive taxes. So you wind up with a bunch of people in the upper tax bracket doing all the crying.

That seems to be the consequence of our local, state and federal tax system.

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

But one way or another it will have an impact.

agreed

[WTF]

Originally Posted by WTF

The green line in the graph shows what would have happened if Reagan had proposed budgets that let the debt increase in step growing with inflation and the economy—if he had kept it at a constant fraction of GDP.

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

Well, if you would refrain from posting links to stuff written by people who have no understanding of what they're talking about, you would be able to defend the messenger!

It's really pretty simple...the thread was about Reagan myths. This fella pointed out what would have happened had Reagan just kept the debt at a constant fraction of GDP.

You coulda of said that Ronnie had to win the cold war! Or that because he won it we had such and such benifits.

But what you did not say was anything to state that what the author said was false.

For instance if I told you your house was on fire and that I had three heads. Just because I do not have three heads (I have two) does not mean that your house is not on fire. I asked was the authors assumption wrong on the % of debt to GDP had Reagan kept that constant. All you wanna talk about are my three heads.

[nevergaveitathought]

Originally Posted by WTF

On the flip side, not taxing something has consequences. You build a road and do not tax enough to pay for it, you have goods that get priced at a lower than actual cost that it takes to get them to market.

Taxes, to me are about fairness. The rich like to talk about Federal Taxes, the poor are to stupid to talk about regressive taxes. So you wind up with a bunch of people in the upper tax bracket doing all the crying.

That seems to be the consequence of our local, state and federal tax system.

agreed

taxes are about more than fairness...the concept of fairness is like beauty or opinions, it certainly varies. there is no such thing as "fairness" in taxation, save perhaps a use tax or a license of some sort.

one aspect of a proper tax system is sharedness. the single worst aspect of our federal tax system is not taxing everyone (no matter the amount) and when federal tax is increased on any bracket, all brackets should be raised. allowing the escaping from income tax of 50% of the american people is a travesty and can become ultimately the downfall of this shared experience.

[WTF]

Originally Posted by nevergaveitathought

there is no such thing as "fairness" in taxation, save perhaps a use tax or a license of some sort.
.

Would it still be fair if say your Driver License or fishing license was taxed on a % of one's income. That'd be a helluva form of sharedness there
"That'll be 2% of your income sir"
"you sir owe $400 and sir your sharedness fee is 400,000k''
"Both you boys enjoy your fishing, I hear its great this time of year!"

Originally Posted by nevergaveitathought

one aspect of a proper tax system is sharednes.

You got the one aspect part right. Put it all together for fairness.

Come man , you are to bright for me to have to remind you of this!

[nevergaveitathought]

Originally Posted by WTF

Would it still be fair if say your Driver License or fishing license was taxed on a % of one's income.

of course not

Originally Posted by WTF

Come man , you are to bright for me to have to remind you of this!

i forgot of what you are reminding me

[Texas Contrarian]

Originally Posted by atlcomedy

...should munis have a tax-favored treatment? Who knows? That is a policy decision. But one way or another it will have an impact.

The tax-favored status of municipal bonds goes all the way back to the earliest days of the income tax and I doubt that it will change any time soon.
It seems to me that if anyone ever started serious discussions of removing it, you would see a lot of frenzied activity on the part of state and local governments. The first thing they would want to know is whether the administration and congress would agree to increase aid to states and cities commensurate with the additional interest they would have to pay to bondholders who would demand coupons equal to those of taxable instruments with similar risk profiles. And I can hardly imagine policymakers proposing legislation that would suddenly and dramatically devalue large bond portfolios.

Even more to the point, no one should ever forget that a wealthy person who buys tax-frees is not avoiding taxation; he's simply shifting the payment to state or local entities instead of the federal government. (Although generally at a somewhat lower rate than the federal top-bracket rate, depending on the "tax-equivalent" yield at the time.)



WTF, are you even remotely capable of debating anyone other than a Straw Man?

Remember this statement from way back earlier in the thread:

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

Where Reagan failed was in allowing government growth and spending to continue unabated. Like every other modern president (except for Bill Clinton) he failed to halt this inexorable expansion.

We already covered spending. Everyone who hasn't been living in a cave for about 30 years knows that we let spending grow at an unacceptable rate during the 1980s. (Although that sure seems like a frugal era compared with the last couple of years!)

I realize that it's your typical style, but there's really no need for you to just plow boneheadedly along, completely oblivious to what I and others have said.

Originally Posted by WTF

But what you did not say was anything to state that what the author said was false.

You're attempting to intimate that I claimed the graph you keep posting is inaccurate. That's not what I said. Go back and read my post again, particularly this point:

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

The author is wrong about almost everything. Just take a look at that stuff you cut & pasted in post #80. One sentence starts out with, "The economic stimulus of that debt..." The guy apparently thinks that running up massive debt is wonderful "stimulus" for the economy. Try telling that to the Greeks or the Japanese.

And just for fun, take a look at this:

http://zfacts.com/p/1159.html#8593

The author obviously has no understanding of what prolonged recovery from the Great Depression, when and why it ended, or the relationship between debt and economic prosperity. Given that, why should anyone take any of his "analysis" seriously?

That's why I suggested that a more appropriate name for that website would be "zmyths.com."

Take a look again at that link. If someone can pack that much economic ignorance into so few words, do you really think I should give a damn what points he's trying to make with a graph?

You're just playing a "what if" game. Of course, soon enough we'll probably all be asking how much better off we'd be if our current collection of political hacks had refrained from spending money at a record rate on phony "stimulus" packages, political payoffs, and unpaid-for entitlement expansions.

These people make every other collection of politicians in American history seem like veritable tightwads by comparison, yet most of you liberals defend them at every turn.

[pjorourke]

Originally Posted by WTF

But what you did not say was anything to state that what the author said was false.

No, what he is saying is that the sites you keep posting (and this makes 4 bites at this stupid graph) have 0 credibility. Why would we waste our time refuting it.

Next time post something from the Onion. That has zero credibility too, but at least it is funny.

[Rudyard K]

Originally Posted by WTF

This fella pointed out what would have happened had Reagan just kept the debt at a constant fraction of GDP.

I'm curious WTF...since he is projecting the debt...i.e. a different set of circumstances...how did he know what the GDP would be under that different set of circumstances?

That's a bit like a bank projecting it's income if it hadn't made any bad loans. It is a meaningless exercise. It might make a cool graph...but it means nothing.

Nothing happens in a vaccum...change one set of parameters...it changes a whole host of others.

[WTF]

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

You're just playing a "what if" game.

That is what everyone does. That is what Bush did to get us in Iraq. That is what both parties did to get us to bail out the banks.

Originally Posted by Rudyard K

I'm curious WTF...since he is projecting the debt...i.e. a different set of circumstances...how did he know what the GDP would be under that different set of circumstances?

.

Good Point. Historical prespective, I suppose. See fella's, no need to try and shoot the messenger. Hey, I notice that they sure try and project when talking about who to elect or what would happen without the bank bailouts.

[Texas Contrarian]

"If 'ifs' and 'buts' were candy and nuts, what a Merry Christmas we'd have!"

-- Don Meredith

[WTF]

Originally Posted by charlestudor2005

After Reagan's first year in office, the annual deficit was 2.6% of gross domestic product. But it hit a high of 6% in 1983, stayed in the 5% range for the next three years, and fell to 3.1% by 1988. (By comparison, this year it's projected to be 9% but is expected to drop considerably thereafter.)




"What people forget about Ronald Reagan was that he very much converted to base broadening as a means of reducing deficits and as a means of tax reform," said Eugene Steuerle, an Institute Fellow at the Urban Institute who had helped lay the groundwork for tax reform in 1986 and served as a deputy assistant Treasury secretary during Reagan's second term.


.

Originally Posted by CaptainMidnight

"If 'ifs' and 'buts' were candy and nuts, what a Merry Christmas we'd have!"

-- Don Meredith

The thread was about busting Reagan myths. I have said all along that Obama was just borrowing a page from the Reagan economic playbook. Ideologues and people ignorant of actual past history will praise Reagan and curse Obama. Had they a lick of sense in these matters that would see that there is not much difference in the two. Oh yea Reagan spent on Defense and Obama is spending on education and other domestic projects but really that is just a matter of preference. Economically they are very similar. CM, you are one of the few on here that understand this.

[pjorourke]

Originally Posted by WTF

CM, you are one of the few on here that understand this.

Water finds its own level.