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BUSH TAX CUTS — Illogical and Unjustifiable from the Start Bush's tax cuts have always been part of a blind idiot-ology that had no economic justification from the start. Even previous proponents of Reagan's supply-side tax cuts did not support Bush's reverse Robin Hood tax cuts.
Paul Craig Roberts, assistant Secretary of the Treasury under Reagan, and an earlier advocate of tax cuts for top earners under Reagan (supply-side tax cuts), has opposed Bush's pseudo-supply side tax cuts.
Roberts maintains that Bush's tax cuts were never supply-side justifiable.
1 He states economic conditions when Bush 1st took office did
not justify high-end tax cuts—even from a supply-sider's standpoint. None of the criteria to justify supply-side tax cuts existed. Roberts states that Bush's tax cuts were nothing but a reward to his rich cronies, with no economic benefit whatsoever. In later writings, Roberts implies that Bush's tax cuts hurt the economy.
Again, these assertions are not coming from a "liberal," a leftist, or a socialist. They're coming from a former Reagan appointee— an economist who even authored a book titled
The Supply-Side Revolution.
Bush's tax cuts were really "plutocrat-side" tax cuts, and "corporate-side" tax cuts. A better term might be "feudalistic." They were anti-growth, anti-worker, and anti-American. Given that they advanced the cause of Benedict Arnold Corporations, Bush's tax cuts were unpatriotic.
By increasing money available for the richer investment class—but without increasing the purchasing power of consumers (and hence, not increasing domestic investment
opportunities)— tax cuts increased
foreign investment, since lower-wage workers were available in foreign countries. Increased foreign investment enhanced foreign production and its importation to US markets. This further reduced US producers' share of the US market—further reducing US investment opportunities. As such, Bush's tax cuts
reduced domestic investment.
By increasing the money available to the most wealthy Americans, Bush's tax cuts increased funds available to further the cause of the American portion of the world's richest elite. This increased the power of global Corporatists—bringing us closer to a One-World Government—controlled by the world's richest Corporations & individuals.
Tax cuts "freed-up" more private money to advance the cause of groups like the World Trade Organization (WTO), which enacts international laws that supercede US law. WTO laws are written exclusively for the benefit of unpatriotic American multinational Corporations. WTO laws are written exclusively to override US law that's profit-un-friendly. It allows the laws passed by the representatives of the American people to be trumped by international law, which is concocted by the world's richest global elite—most of whom are Americans. WTO rules allow the interests of a few to override the interests of the many. As such, Bush's tax cuts enhanced the ability of
un-American multinationals to circumvent US law, and even circumvent the US Constitution.
Without Bush's tax cuts, money available to finance the Global Corporatist agenda would have been less. Even free-traders, such as Robert Reich, have also made this point. Reich contends that Clinton's free trade policies wouldn't not have caused today's outsourcing tidal wave, had it not been for Bush's tax cuts.
Without the excessive (and "un-investable") capital from Bush's tax cuts, and the increased lobbyist financing it provided,
more investment would have occurred in the US. More American jobs would have been created. More employment AND higher wages would have resulted—increasing aggregage American income and spending power—increasing aggregate consumer demand for American production—causing still further increases in demand for American labor.
But the above did not happen. Bush's reverse Robin Hood tax cuts had no economic justification whatsoever. Worse still, they were counterproductive. They resulted in more foreign investment—not American investment. Tax cuts funded lobbying to open up American markets to the products of the increased foreign investment resulting from Bush tax cuts (think WTO, NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR with China, etc.) Tax cuts funded media propaganda to garner public support for legislation benefiting only the Corporate plutocracy—legislation that was diametrically opposed to the interests of the American people.
Though job losses from outsourcing began before Bush's anti-American tax cuts, his tax cuts worsened job lossess exponentially. Though Clinton's free trade agenda unlocked the outsourcing gate, his higher marginal tax rates prevented a small stream of jobs losses from becoming a tidal wave.
But Bush's tax cuts blew the outsourcing gate wide open, causing a tsunami of US jobs to rush out, while creating an upward geyser of money from labor cost reductions—which flowed out of the pockets of American workers and the middle class—and into the pockets of America's rich Corporate elite.
Bush's tax cuts have been counter-productive in every way, shape, and form. Even many conservatives are now seeing the light. And this latter occurrence is one of the more encouraging trends in politics today. Hopefully, political candidates will acknowledge this new trend, and act accordingly.
But I'm not holding my breath.
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1. www.vdare.com/roberts/060227_economics.htm