Taxpayer Association: Oregon stimulus pork. 1M bike boxes.
The Taxpayer Association was honored to make the lead story on KGW-8 regarding Oregon being listed among the 100 wasteful projects in the federal stimulus package. Noted was a million dollars for bike lockers. Embarrassingly, a biker interviewed at a Tri-Met station said the current bike stations work just fine and a million dollars is quite excessive. Another million went for a better horn for the newly minted (way over-budgeted and under-used) Westside train. Several million also was targeted for Eugene bike paths. How many prisoners could we keep behind bars for that $3 million bike path?Jason Williams of the Taxpayer Association was quoted as saying, "The politicians are selling this as a stimulus plan, but you can't stimulate the economy by replacing train horns and building bike boxes, you stimulate the economy by giving us taxpayers are tax dollars back."
Oh, yea, another referral for freeing education from the public-union education monopoly which in this last session succeeded in restricting the success of charter schools. The legislature, governor and teachers union didn't do it for the children. They did it to the children. The Union label: "Do it to the Children, not for the children."
Plus, there is nothing like the sound of a good old horn.
Ignore the phonetic mispelling for a moment. First, the federal stimulus package included I think $300 billion in tax cuts, so we did get some of our tax dollars back. According to studies, for the most part we have chosen to pay off our debts and save that money (true in my case). Good idea, but zero stimulus. On the other hand, the government actually buying stuff, whether bike boxes or train horns, puts people to work and circulates money, which is a stimulus.
Also, I hope Jason is acknowledging that whether government spends money or gives tax cuts, the net result is higher deficits, so don't whine about that.
Jason needs to read up on his Econ 101.
That is about the most ridiculous thing in the world.
Spending doesn't cause deficits.
Tax cuts don't cause deficits.
Only one thing causes deficits, spending more than the revenue will support.
Since tax cuts have no historical correlation at all to lower revenue, your argument that tax cuts lead to deficits is about as uninformed a statement as anyone could make. You need to understand the difference between tax rates and tax revenue. Since you made the basic error of confusing the two in your argument that tax cuts lead to deficits I would suggest you brush up on that.
At any rate - I figured out why you constantly make this fundemental error of economics.
Since you never can admit you are wrong, then you can never learn from your mistakes. That's really sad, but at least it provides an explanation as to why you make this same basic fundamental error regarding taxes and revenue every time.
In fact, we've never really tried reducing the size, scope and power of government to fit within what the Constitution authorizes. Instead, we continually move in the direction of the Eastern Bloc. Today's NYT editors wrote that since the Bush and Obama stimuli have failed, we need even more stimuli ... that's the kind of fresh Obama thinking that makes sure we will never, ever try the 'tired, old ideas' of limiting gov't to live within our means.
With folks who flunked economics in charge, the U.S. Job Freeze is going to get a LOT WORSE before things get better. Fortunately, leaders in places like China and India do not have such hatred for the economic success they inherited, so there will be places on Earth that prosper, where folks can expect and get a reasonable return on their investment.
But the resentment that our leaders harbor toward freedom and liberty will keep the U.S. down, until Obama quits his anti-business agenda. Don't hold your breath.
Moron.
Get real Dean, everyone here knows you would be all over McCain if he had done the exact same policies and gotten the lousy results BO has. Good lord, the stimlous didnt even live up to BO's projections and cost us trillions. Pretty sad stuff.
Read it and weep. Bush's own Council of economic Advosers said that claiming tax cuts would generate revenue higher than the cuts is akin to sellong snake oi. How much snake oil have you purchased lately?
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=507
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=967
The best sustained rate of economic growth since the 60s occured after Clinton raised taxes in 93. It averaged 4% per year, or double what it did under Bush, who cut taxes substantially. And the best thing about the Clinton period was that every income bracket gained significantly. Read this one and weep some more.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/02/clinton-economic-record-and-rising.html
Believe what you want Rupert. But the data does not lie.
The problem with McCain is that he would not have passed a stimulus. And yes, I would have complained about that.
"Only one thing causes deficits, spending more than the revenue will support."
Its a miracle. We agree on something.
"Since you never can admit you are wrong, then you can never learn from your mistakes."
OK Rupert. Show me where I am wrong. Don't just assert something. Show me your data that tax cuts raise more revenue than they give up. And explain to my why we had a 4% average growth rate after Clinton raised taxes, AND that we ran balanced budgets.
US Treasury web site. It shows really clearly that tax revenues were almost double what they were comparing the beginning and the end of Reagan's term. I'm surprised you don't know that and thus make the mistake time and time again of saying his tax cuts lead to deficits.
OH, and by the way, don't try and do this weasely tax cuts increasing revenues more than they give up.
The revenue increase is a known commodity historically. The revenue lost is simply a guess. We all know how poor economic forecasting can be, just look to the BO stimulus as compared to BO's projections for that one.
Anyone trying to pull this kind of BS is absolutely out of their realm as they are trying to equate a known historical amount with an economic guess. Nice try, but doesn't cut a lot of ice with me.
So, now we can add yet another thing to add to the Dean can't admit he was wrong list - The Reagan tax cuts did not cause deficits as they lead to higher revenue.
Id go back to lying about my income if I were you Dean. It took me close to a year to show you up on that one. This one took just a matter of hours.
You just can't give it up can you Rupert? Like a poor old dog with a new bone. Call names, discredit, insult, do anything you can to avoid a debate. Truly beyond pathetic.
Reagan's first 2 years (81-82) were pretty bad econonmically. In 81 he had a 1.8% growth rate, and in 82 that declined to -2%. You can blame that on Carter, which is fine, but then you have to go along with Obama blaming Bush for his first year or 2.
So since Reagan's first 2 years sucked, yes, when you compare his later year tax revenue, it was much higher. In 1982 unemployment rose to 9.7%, thus tax revenues were very low. His tax cuts, which took effect in late 82, probably were stimulative. But so were steadily declining interest rates.
1984 was Reagan's best year, with 6% growth (morning in America). But by the end of his 2nd term the economy was tanking again, growing only 2% in 89 and then hitting recession territory under Bush 1. Unemployment under Reagan never got below 5.5%, and then shot right back up under Bush1. Job growth under Reagan was pretty lousy, worse than under any other president other than the 2 Bushes (since Kennedy).
OK...tax revenues did increase over Reagan's term, but not by much when you factor in inflation. BAsically they went from 1 trillion to 1.2 trillion using 2000 dollars. After Clintonr aised taxes, revenues increased much faster than they had under Reagan.
So we are back to square one. Reagan cut taxes, the economy recovered from a recession, revenues increased somewhat, and deficits skyrocketed. Clinton raised taxes, the economy recovered from a recession, revenues increased a lot more, and the federal budget was balanced. Bush 2 repeated the Reagan tax cuts, and at the end of his term we had bupkis plus a very large accumulated debt.
What is it I'm supposed to admit I was wrong about again?
Cue Rupert to call me more names. That is your best bet here because you simply cannot seem to win a factual argument.
Why would a businessman take any risk on buying new equipment if his taxes will be raised, his borrowing costs increased or his business killed by regulation? No new equipment means no new jobs which means no consumer confidence. If our President would merely step up to the microphone and say "For the remainder of my term I will freeze all taxes and regulations, curtail spending and borrowing, and audit the federal government for waste, fraud and abuse" the economy would jump start itself immediately. We're all afraid and rightly so.
Presently we are wasting billions and couple of million at a time. It inspires no confidence in our government when they waste it on things like the bike boxes and train horns. Multiply that by a factor unknown around the country. It amazes me the pitchforks are still in the barn.