EDIT: Seems like the article is suggesting that giving more disposable income to the rich, results in them using that extra income to buy capital rent seeking assets. So it is a double fuck you to the poor. Because not only do the rich end up paying proportionally less in taxes, but they also use the extra money to compete with you for your home, buy the home and rent it back to you, putting you in an even worse financial situation.
The policies of supply-side economics, however, are much more defensible, but it seems people would much rather pick on the strawman.
Unlike many of our worst ideas, I'm actually surprised this one didn't become more popular around the world.
In any case, I suspect that were I to learn about the industrial revolution I would find that the Robber Barons didn't invent their talking points either and that they simply took British Industrialist talking points and, err, gave them 3 minutes on the stove.
I mean I'm perfectly fine with people who work hard making a lot of money. But that changes once that money is used against me. From that moment on I want to be compensated for damages, and the best way to do it is through taxes.
I don't want to be personally compensated. I just want to live in a society where people's basic needs are easily met: clothes, food, medicine, housing. The current landscape is, by the day, increasingly dystopian.
PS And you wonder why Mississippi is richer than the UK.
PPS The Laffer curve is real, has a mountain of evidence and disproves this paper.
Also just because someone benefits, that doesn't mean that other people have to suffer.
If basic needs aren’t being sufficiently eased, there’s no money left to invest.
I think it’s been decades by now.
When half the country has believed something for close to a half a century, across multiple generations, you bet your ass it needs to be debunked. The fallacy of the "precious job creators" is as American as "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps"
The fact that you and I were not dumb enough to fall for it doesn't really help anyone in the grand scheme of things. There's still an insane amount of work left in educating the public, and we may even be regressing at this point.
I found at least found one analysis (by a left leaning think tank, so take it for what you will) https://www.americanprogress.org/article/the-failure-of-supp... that seems to show that supply-side economics hasn't panned out.
It seems obvious that there is an optimal tax rate, too much or too little is bad. But I'd definitely say right now we are far far on the too little side of things.
"the term 'trickle-down economics' was popularized by Democrats in the US to derogate Reaganomics"
If you similarly look up supply-side economics, at the top of the Wikipedia page it says "not to be confused with trickle-down economics".
I'll happily take you on your word that you're not trying be argumentative. It's certainly not your fault that this strawman has been so widely spread that people think it's a real policy idea now. It is confusing to me too.
As for whether supply-side economics actually works, to say it "hasn't panned out" I think, is really oversimplifying. Has capitalism (efficient markets but also environmental decay) worked? Has socialism (universal healthcare but also the military) worked? It depends on who your asking and in what regard. In some ways yes and in other ways no. The category is too broad.
Also, just as important as how much we tax is where we tax. Carbon tax (very good) vs stamp duty tax (very bad). Competent policy sometimes allows you to have your cake (supporting government services) and eat it too (not sacrificing growth).
Much of Reagan’s trickle down stuff was based on the idea that we were on the wrong side of the peak.
Most of the nation (and world) never took any economics. This stuff is all magic or religion or whatever to them. Ronnie Raygun is as good as a saint to much of the US.
teach•28m ago