the logical outcome?

[awm]

Suppose? Sorry. No quibbles with anything else in your post.

 

"Smarter government, not bigger government" is a standard Republican talking point. However, I have not heard Mitt Romney in particular say it (although I suppose/assume that he has). It is also weird to say that I agree, when I agree with the phrase itself but the underlying definition of what "smarter government" means is diametrically opposite.

[blackshoe]

It seems to me that a relatively high marginal tax rate of 60% on income above $500,000/yr is warranted until such time as the budget is back in balance. It's only fair that the people who voted for the guy who bankrupted the country should chip in to un-bankrupt the country

And if someone at that income level says he didn't vote for that guy, do you give him a lower tax rate?

[luke warm]

Clinton was the greatest president ever because he balanced the budget, raised the standard of living for all, and brought us prosperity.

like it or not, he couldn't have done any of that without gingrich... and i agree that clinton was a good president, just not the "greatest...ever"

 

Obama is a mediocre president whose biggest mistake was pretending that compromise with Republicans was possible and worth seeking.

he had the entire gov't for two years, and 2/3 of it the rest of the time, so you can hardly blame republicans for obama's abysmal failure

 

It's only fair that the people who voted for the guy who bankrupted the country should chip in to un-bankrupt the country.

you mean hollywood millionaires and wall street bundlers and "green energy" contributors?

 

Repugs will mewl about punishing 'job creators' and 'small businesses' but we know that's a lie.

do we, now? who do you think creates jobs, the gov't?

 

It is also weird to say that I agree, when I agree with the phrase itself [smaller gov't] but the underlying definition of what "smarter government" means is diametrically opposite.

okay, how do *you* define it?

[awm]

okay, how do *you* define it?

 

We need to look at government spending more as an investment. Spending on infrastructure or education has a great return in the future, and will likely increase revenues over the long haul. Spending on preventative health care (for everyone!) may well reduce spending on medicare down the road, and allow people to work (and pay taxes) for a greater portion of their lives. Rather than cut spending on these things, then use the revenue loss later down the road (because people are too uneducated or sick to work) as an excuse to cut spending further, we need to invest.

 

We can spend less money on military adventures. We can spend less money subsidizing profitable companies (we spend quite a bit either in direct subsidies or tax breaks for companies making billions a year). We can make the tax code more rational -- why does a big profitable company like Exxon or GE pay a lower tax rate than a struggling small business? Why does Mitt Romney pay a lower tax rate than a teacher or a construction worker? Why does the alternative minimum tax contain no exception for state taxes paid (such that upper-middle class people whose only significant deduction is state taxes paid get hit by it) while it does contain exceptions for capital gains rate and for mortgage payment on second home?

 

We should be taxing people and companies who have money to spare, especially ones whose contribution to the economy is dubious (like the financial sector, or big polluters) and using the money to invest in things we need (like alternative energy, startup businesses, education and training, basic health care for all). We should allow medicare to use its leverage to negotiate with drug companies.

 

Obama did two great things that every fiscal conservative should support, that get very little press. First, he stopped overpaying for medicare advantage. The Republicans have attacked him on this ("cutting medicare") but the reality is that he just realized the government could save money by spending medicare dollars on healthcare for senior citizens, rather than wasting a good percentage of it subsidizing already-very-profitable gigantic insurance companies. Isn't this an obvious case of waste and abuse? Yet Republicans attack on it, and Democrats don't want to talk about it. Second, he stopped sending student loans through big banks. These loans are government guaranteed, so making them through banks was basically giving the banks free money. By not doing this, he recovered a bunch of government funds, some of which he used to increase Pell grants and the rest to fund ACA. Regardless of what you think about Pell grants (which I think are great) and ACA (which is okay)... why were we giving free money to big profitable banks? Stopping this practice is a great idea!

 

Romney has proposed almost exactly the opposite of everything above. He wants to repeal ACA and replace it with nothing (undoing both the great changes above). He wants to cut government help for wind energy (which we need) and keep in place government subsidies for big oil (which are insane). He wants lower tax rates for the wealthiest Americans, and pay for it by "broadening the base" (i.e. raising taxes on the poorest Americans). He doesn't even think smaller class size can improve education (in defiance of facts). He wants to increase military funding (huh?) while turning over medicare to insurance companies (i.e. more overpayment for medicare advantage-type care, or else more payment for seniors who can't afford it). Like I said... dumber government. :(

[jonottawa]

I'm gonna pass on continuing this, thx Luke, enjoyed.

 

I really like Adam's last post and I don't think I'm going to top that.

[blackshoe]

Spending on infrastructure or education has a great return in the future

Maybe. Depends on what you mean by "infrastructure" and what you mean by "education". I get the impression that these days what passes for "education" in this country might more properly be called "indoctrination" in some cases, and "useless" (not because of subject matter, but because of poor methods) in others. As for infrastructure, I well remember some 35 years ago meeting a man who had been active in local politics in Rhode Island. In particular, he had been on the committee that planned and got funding for the Narragansett Bay Bridge connecting Newport with Connecticut. He was incensed at what politics had done with this project, because the original plan was to charge a toll on the bridge until its construction was paid for, and then either eliminate the toll, or reduce it to just cover maintenance of the bridge. Instead, once the bridge was paid off, the politicians then in power not only kept the toll, they increased it, and put the revenues from it in the general coffers, so they could use it for other things. This is not spending, of course, but the point is they had a setup whereby the users of the bridge would pay for its maintenance, and for political reasons they abandoned that setup in favor of more power (in the form of control of money) to the politicians. This is not the way to do it, IMNSHO.

 

We can spend less money on military adventures. We can spend less money subsidizing profitable companies (we spend quite a bit either in direct subsidies or tax breaks for companies making billions a year). We can make the tax-code more rational -- why does a big profitable company like Exxon or GE pay a lower tax rate than a struggling small business?

All very good goals, but... be careful about characterizing the uses of our military as "adventures". Much of it these days unfortunately is, but some at least is not. Killing Bin Laden was an expensive military undertaking, but I consider it was a necessity, not an "adventure". Subsidizing industry, profitable or not, needs to be approached a lot more carefully than the government is doing, and perhaps more carefully than the government is capable of doing. I'm not at all sure that latter point shouldn't lead to the conclusion that government ought to stay out of the subsidy business altogether. As for the tax-code, I'd love to see a rational (and simple) tax code but I gave up on the idea more than thirty years ago. It's just not going to happen as long as we elect politicians whose driving force is garnering power for themselves (most of them). Frankly, we should only elect honorable people who don't want the job, who we will then drag kicking and screaming to the Capital. :D

[luke warm]

Rather than cut spending on these things, then use the revenue loss later down the road (because people are too uneducated or sick to work) as an excuse to cut spending further, we need to invest.

in the final analysis, it comes down to ones philosophy of gov't... believe it or not, some feel that it isn't the job of the gov't to pick winners and losers, because it isn't very good at it... as obama has shown us, he is very poor at such "picking"... let the free market do the picking then, if necessary, the gov't can help out in the form of tax credits, etc...

 

the objection to this is, why would anyone invest in something the success of which is so nebulous? but that's exactly the kind of thing that has gone on throughout our history... many entrepreneurs went broke, some more than once, before their investments paid off

 

having said that, i do agree there are some things in which the gov't should "invest"... infrastructure would be one... almost any (proven) weapons- and/or health-based technology would be another

 

As for the tax-code, I'd love to see a rational (and simple) tax code but I gave up on the idea more than thirty years ago. It's just not going to happen as long as we elect politicians whose driving force is garnering power for themselves (most of them). Frankly, we should only elect honorable people who don't want the job, who we will then drag kicking and screaming to the Capital. :D

i'm not positive this data has the latest version of his plan, but part of it reads:

 

Individual income tax rates decline by 20 percent, as shown:

 

Current Rate 10% 15% 25% 28% 33% 35%

New Rate 8% 12% 20% 22.4% 26.4% 28%

 

Of particular importance are details of applying the exemption of investment income (long-term capital gains, dividends, and interest income) for most taxpayers with income less than threshold amounts ($200,000 for married couples, $100,000 for single returns and $150,000 for heads of households). We assume that all other income is counted first in determining whether investment income is subject to tax. Therefore, for any married couple with income from other sources above $200,000, all capital gains, dividends, and interest would continue to be subject to current tax rules.

 

i'm not crazy about his plan, though it is much better than what we have... it doesn't address spending that i can tell, and it's not simplified enough for me, but i might have just missed those parts...

 

has anyone read up on the mack-penny plan? nothing is ever as simple as one would hope, but this plan basically cuts one penny of every dollar spent and, beginning in 2018 (i think), caps spending at 18% of GDP... a lot of people, even liberals, have come out in support of this

[lalldonn]

Very well said by AWM

 

believe it or not, some feel that it isn't the job of the gov't to pick winners and losers, because it isn't very good at it...

Some others might think that when it comes to certain things (foremost among them education and health care IMO) there shouldn't be any losers. I don't mean that either for or against anything in particular the government has done, and I'm not guaranteeing it's even possible. But I certainly mean it against offering up either of those things in any sort of free market approach, which guarantees there will be losers. I would rather the government try, somehow, to prevent there from being losers.

 

I doubt you stated your point very well since I don't believe you would think it's the job of the government to "pick winners and losers" even if they were good at it.

[luke warm]

I doubt you stated your point very well since I don't believe you would think it's the job of the government to "pick winners and losers" even if they were good at it.

you might be right... in any case, it's a moot point since the fact is, gov't is not very good at it

[VMars]

Very well said by AWM

 

 

Some others might think that when it comes to certain things (foremost among them education and health care IMO) there shouldn't be any losers. I don't mean that either for or against anything in particular the government has done, and I'm not guaranteeing it's even possible. But I certainly mean it against offering up either of those things in any sort of free market approach, which guarantees there will be losers. I would rather the government try, somehow, to prevent there from being losers.

 

I doubt you stated your point very well since I don't believe you would think it's the job of the government to "pick winners and losers" even if they were good at it.

 

 

I don't have the ability to upvote, but I completely agree with your statement that in education and health care there SHOULD NOT be losers, especially when it's based on such things as parents' income levels.

[mike777]

But in fact there are many many losers when it comes to spending on education and health care.

 

to say there are no losing/wasted options is just silly and naive.

 

Just one example is education spending has basically doubled the last 4 years by the fed govt for almost little or nothing to show for it, yet people want even more spending.

 

Yet you claim there have been no losers or there SHOULD NOT BE LOSERS? silly.

 

This is the great conceit, the great lie, that some bureaucrat sitting in Wash is smarter than the decisions of the free market.

[hrothgar]

 

Just one example is education spending has basically doubled the last 4 years by the fed govt for almost little or nothing to show for it, yet people want even more spending.

 

 

Mike, this comment is stupid even for you...

 

First and foremost, the four year time span is (essentially) meaningless. As the following chart shows, the increase in federal educational spending is dominated to absurd extent by the 2009 spending for the stimulus program. You're comparing apples and oranges.

 

http://febp.newamerica.net/background-analysis/education-federal-budget

 

Furthermore, any kind of analysis needs to consider spending per capita. As I recall, the number of students has increased dramatically during the down turn as people delay entry into the job market.

[blackshoe]

Some others might think that when it comes to certain things (foremost among them education and health care IMO) there shouldn't be any losers. I don't mean that either for or against anything in particular the government has done, and I'm not guaranteeing it's even possible. But I certainly mean it against offering up either of those things in any sort of free market approach, which guarantees there will be losers. I would rather the government try, somehow, to prevent there from being losers.

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income". Seems a rather impossible goal, to me. Somebody always has to be last. That said, we can, I hope, arrange things so that everyone has access to necessary health care and to an education that will prepare them to be good and productive citizens (including why we need an informed electorate and what it takes to ensure they are a part of it).

[mike777]

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income". Seems a rather impossible goal, to me. Somebody always has to be last. That said, we can, I hope, arrange things so that everyone has access to necessary health care and to an education that will prepare them to be good and productive citizens (including why we need an informed electorate and what it takes to ensure they are a part of it).

 

 

well said

 

 

with all of that it seems the debate is over a powerful all knowing central govt that controls education or

 

more local control with competition in education.

 

Given that my mother was a union teacher in Chicago(very union) who taught EMH(not sure what the proper term is today) kids. Granted when I went to chicago schools we did not call them emh kids.....:(

 

She spent most of her time on...lesson plans....getting the kids to have warm coats...boots...and some food.

 

 

teaching was far down the list.....

 

I want to add this because Obama is not the problem....whatever the problem is ..it was there...35 years ago..

[hrothgar]

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income".

 

Who?

[hrothgar]

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income".

 

Who (and when)

 

A direct quote would be nice

[PassedOut]

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income".

Are you talking about Stu Workjoke? So far as I know, he's the only one who has made that claim.

 

But it is true that politicians often make utterly stupid claims of that sort. I actually heard an old Texas drooler named Dick Armey who was once House Majority Leader claim on TV that cutting taxes would bring in more revenue (and you don't have to search far to find others who've made the same claim). In the case I recall, Lou Dobbs (with a straight face) then asked Armey, "How much would the tax rates have to be cut to eliminate the deficit entirely?"

:D

[blackshoe]

Who (and when)

 

A direct quote would be nice

And I would have given one, if I could remember who and when. I think it may have been a late 19th or early 20th Century President. McKinley perhaps, or Wilson. But this particular memory is 50 some years old at least, and more than a bit hazy.

 

No, it wasn't Stu Workjoke, whoever he is, or any recent politician.

[blackshoe]

well said

 

 

with all of that it seems the debate is over a powerful all knowing central govt that controls education or

 

more local control with competition in education.

 

Given that my mother was a union teacher in Chicago(very union) who taught EMH(not sure what the proper term is today) kids. Granted when I went to chicago schools we did not call them emh kids.....:(

 

She spent most of her time on...lesson plans....getting the kids to have warm coats...boots...and some food.

 

 

teaching was far down the list.....

 

I want to add this because Obama is not the problem....whatever the problem is ..it was there...35 years ago..

Thanks, Mike. No, Obama's not the problem. I suppose the "education establishment" — the administrators and bureaucrats who run things — are the problem.

[Aberlour10]

I hope, arrange things so that everyone has access to necessary health care and to an education that will prepare them to be good and productive citizens (including why we need an informed electorate and what it takes to ensure they are a part of it).

 

 

The average education of US citiziens must be already at phenomenal level, even housewives, social workers etc are able to judge fast and precise hunderds of complex technological guestions and problems and give verdicts (Samsung vs Apple ) that are deciding for entire tech industries.

I am very impressed!.B-)

[hrothgar]

Thanks, Mike. No, Obama's not the problem. I suppose the "education establishment" — the administrators and bureaucrats who run things — are the problem.

 

Personally, I blame the American people who no longer (appear to) have the maturity necessary to function as a society.

 

In my experience, most of the administrators and bureaucrats are simply responding to their constituencies. And, for all Republicans like to bitch about the unions, the main constituency is whatever slim fraction of the electorate bothers to vote in the school board elections.

 

Even in MA when have a lot of trouble keeping the neanderthals off the school board.

From the looks of things, down there in Dixie the inmates are fully in control of the asylum.

[lalldonn]

Are you talking about Stu Workjoke? So far as I know, he's the only one who has made that claim.

 

But it is true that politicians often make utterly stupid claims of that sort. I actually heard an old Texas drooler named Dick Armey who was once House Majority Leader claim on TV that cutting taxes would bring in more revenue (and you don't have to search far to find others who've made the same claim). In the case I recall, Lou Dobbs (with a straight face) then asked Armey, "How much would the tax rates have to be cut to eliminate the deficit entirely?"

:D

I don't know who and I'm sure I'm messing up some details, but I was told there was once a politician (I want to say from North Carolina?) who introduced a bill into the state legislature that pi equal exactly 3, because as things stood he didn't understand pi so he thought it was unfair to the students.

[ArtK78]

I don't know who and I'm sure I'm messing up some details, but I was told there was once a politician (I want to say from North Carolina?) who introduced a bill into the state legislature that pi equal exactly 3, because as things stood he didn't understand pi so he thought it was unfair to the students.

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/805/did-a-state-legislature-once-pass-a-law-saying-pi-equals-3

[Cyberyeti]

I don't know who and I'm sure I'm messing up some details, but I was told there was once a politician (I want to say from North Carolina?) who introduced a bill into the state legislature that pi equal exactly 3, because as things stood he didn't understand pi so he thought it was unfair to the students.

There was somebody who set pi as 4 by law. There is some merit to this, if you are using pi to calculate how many straight bricks to use to build a circular structure, you are going to have wastage so you want to overestimate it.

[phil_20686]

I seem to remember a politician once upon a time who promised everyone "an above average income". Seems a rather impossible goal, to me.

 

Seems a perfectly ordinary goal to me. You are interpreting it to be a statement about redistribution, when it is a statement about economic growth: unemployment benefit in the UK today corresponds to a standard living will above the average income of the 1960's, and I have every confidence this statement will always be true looking backwards over 50 years or so.