Quote:
Originally Posted by spence
The deficit did hit 1.5 trillion in 2010 but is shrinking and projected to be about 1/2 as big in a few years. 90 Billion out of $750 B is quite a lot of money, especially when you add up the cumulative impact.
Higher tax rates during a given year will absolutely result in increased tax revenue...every time.
To keep taxes low on the "hope" that the economy improves will quite possibly just saddle Americans with more debt. Don't forget that keeping taxes low during a deficit is actually increased SPENDING.
If the Bush tax cuts proved anything it's that investment in jobs the past decade was more a function of demand than supply.
-spence
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To increase taxes without substantial and realistic cuts in spending will stifle growth as uncertainty in the Economy / Future will prevent people from hiring. My boss is considering hiring someone but won't because of uncertainty in the local market. And he is more liberal than Spence
We have sort of a circle jerk:
- Some people want to Raise Taxes - won't work
- Some people want to drastically cut spending - which means jobs - which means increases in federal assistance with the simultaneous loss of revenue (Taxes of lost jobs).
- Some people (The Beast from New Bedford) want to cut defense spending so the money can be reallocated to others (no sheet - he has said this) all without a realistic look at balancing the force. We will be both weaker AND will sacrifice lots of jobs (see circle jerk #2).
We need to find a way to balance cuts and increase revenue by GROWING JOBS. If we put people to solid, decent paying jobs we will generate revenue from taxes and save money spent in assistance, bailouts, and employment recover acts.
We need to find sources of the economy that generate many levels of income. If you give money to road crews go get a little trickle down foe employes, cop details, engineering, and asphalt manufacturing. If you build ships for the Navy (remembering that we are a maritime nation dependent on trade) you trickle money to shipworkers, tool & die manufactures, steel industry, IT, systems engineering, port facilities, and still trickle down to road crews, asphalt manufacturing, and the like. Not to mention you don't send our Navy to sea in old, under maintained ships because the maintenance funds were robbed for some other Congress Pet Project.
There are other worthy avenues money can be sent to which generate multiple levels of prosperity; Bio / Pharma, realistic green jobs, innovation areas where we still have barely an edge - though that is slipping)> Shipbuilding that was just one that I have a glancing familiarity with. Sending the money to build roads - while greatly needed - doesn't much stimulate economy, it is a fairly dead end, no pun intended, that limits the amount of people it helps. Apologize - working on 2 hrs sleep - going to bed.