<strong>I see the economic theory behind the flat tax - if you redistribute the tax burden so it's greater on the lower-income, and lower on the upper-income, you're putting more money in the hands of those who create jobs, and taking it away from those who just consume.
But moral reasons? The top incomes have gotten much richer over the past several decades, and the bottom half has remained stagnant. So is it really moral to put a greater tax burden on the bottom/middle, and lessen the burden on the top?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Don't look at me. You're the one who's leaning more in the direction of a sales tax. That would be at least as regressive as any flat tax. And under a flat tax it would be a trivial matter to exempt the first $20k of income. Most flat tax proposals have an even higher exemption. I prefer a lower threshold because I think it's better to have more people sharing the tax burden. I'd even support the creation of a special low income bracket to make this idea more palatable to people like you.
(BTW, the theory behind the flat tax is that it is the most efficient and most transparent way of raising revenue to fund the government.)
You still haven't made the moral argument. You've just pointed to some people who aren't getting ahead and using them as your "reason" to be against a flat tax. And your complaint about income inequality leaves out the fact that this happened under a progessive code.
[quote]<strong>And even the economic theory is in doubt. The economy should have been better under Reagan, and we should have gone into deep depression under Clinton, if things were as simple as "trickle down."</strong><hr></blockquote>
Wrong again. Reagan's first tax (like Bush's) cut didn't flatten the code at all. It just provided an across the board cut. It wasn't until the '86 tax reform that we saw a flattening of the brackets. Reagan's term was almost over by then.
Moreover Reaganomics pulled the economy out of a deep ditch. Remember how Clinton went around in 1992 talking about the worst economy since the Great Depression? Well, he lied. (Surprise.) But in 1981 the econmy was really that bad. Reagan's policies reversed direction and set us on course for the economic expansion that continued (with a few bumps in the road) to this day.
In 1992 the ecomy was already in recovery. Clinton's economic policy flattened the growth curve for a couple of years but didn't do any damage beyond that. This was partly because he was boxed in by the bond market and a Congress that didn't sign off on any of his other "big ticket" initiatives (Hillary's health care plan, a carbon tax).
[quote] The personal computer industry, ie, any computer placed on top of a desk as opposed to the mainframe industry dominated by IBM, grew by an order of magnitude or more. It grew the typical 15 to 20% in hardware and however much the accompanying software growth is computed, much the same as it was in the 90s. Saying one is better than the other is stretching it I think.
I think you're fitting you're Republican worldview to spin the events to your favor. I'm more apt to believe it was just part of the typical business cycle which would involve a variety of factors dynamically influencing each other working on a timescale of decades or more than 5 years. <hr></blockquote>
1. No, I disagree. The economy was still based on other things in the 80's. Now, we have a more technologically based economy. This changeover, in part, caused a period of uncertainty and recession (along with a war ending).
2. Wow, you must have just learned the term worldview. I continue to assert that Reaganomics saved the country from a second Great Depression. This was no normal recession/business cycle....not at all. Umemployment at like 10% or higher, interest rates in the teens, the top tax bracket at 75%.....yeah, normal business cycle. OK.
Comments
<strong>I see the economic theory behind the flat tax - if you redistribute the tax burden so it's greater on the lower-income, and lower on the upper-income, you're putting more money in the hands of those who create jobs, and taking it away from those who just consume.
But moral reasons? The top incomes have gotten much richer over the past several decades, and the bottom half has remained stagnant. So is it really moral to put a greater tax burden on the bottom/middle, and lessen the burden on the top?</strong><hr></blockquote>
Don't look at me. You're the one who's leaning more in the direction of a sales tax. That would be at least as regressive as any flat tax. And under a flat tax it would be a trivial matter to exempt the first $20k of income. Most flat tax proposals have an even higher exemption. I prefer a lower threshold because I think it's better to have more people sharing the tax burden. I'd even support the creation of a special low income bracket to make this idea more palatable to people like you.
(BTW, the theory behind the flat tax is that it is the most efficient and most transparent way of raising revenue to fund the government.)
You still haven't made the moral argument. You've just pointed to some people who aren't getting ahead and using them as your "reason" to be against a flat tax. And your complaint about income inequality leaves out the fact that this happened under a progessive code.
[quote]<strong>And even the economic theory is in doubt. The economy should have been better under Reagan, and we should have gone into deep depression under Clinton, if things were as simple as "trickle down."</strong><hr></blockquote>
Wrong again. Reagan's first tax (like Bush's) cut didn't flatten the code at all. It just provided an across the board cut. It wasn't until the '86 tax reform that we saw a flattening of the brackets. Reagan's term was almost over by then.
Moreover Reaganomics pulled the economy out of a deep ditch. Remember how Clinton went around in 1992 talking about the worst economy since the Great Depression? Well, he lied. (Surprise.) But in 1981 the econmy was really that bad. Reagan's policies reversed direction and set us on course for the economic expansion that continued (with a few bumps in the road) to this day.
In 1992 the ecomy was already in recovery. Clinton's economic policy flattened the growth curve for a couple of years but didn't do any damage beyond that. This was partly because he was boxed in by the bond market and a Congress that didn't sign off on any of his other "big ticket" initiatives (Hillary's health care plan, a carbon tax).
[ 04-19-2002: Message edited by: roger_ramjet ]</p>
I think you're fitting you're Republican worldview to spin the events to your favor. I'm more apt to believe it was just part of the typical business cycle which would involve a variety of factors dynamically influencing each other working on a timescale of decades or more than 5 years. <hr></blockquote>
1. No, I disagree. The economy was still based on other things in the 80's. Now, we have a more technologically based economy. This changeover, in part, caused a period of uncertainty and recession (along with a war ending).
2. Wow, you must have just learned the term worldview. I continue to assert that Reaganomics saved the country from a second Great Depression. This was no normal recession/business cycle....not at all. Umemployment at like 10% or higher, interest rates in the teens, the top tax bracket at 75%.....yeah, normal business cycle. OK.
[ 04-19-2002: Message edited by: SDW2001 ]</p>