We can learn lessons from state's failed 'Progressive' programs.
Most good conservative thinkers make the Federalist argument that we should strive to limit the power and reach of the federal government, and instead leave most matters to be handled by the individual states.
However, recent events might give many conservatives pause concerning this cornerstone philosophy, given that some states have been acting like teenagers who have been handed the keys to the liquor cabinet and family car on the same key chain.
Take for instance articles from today concerning three of the most prominent 'Blue' states.
New York - The Obsolete New York Model: Where a tax-eating majority votes itself a permanent income....Struggling under the accumulated burden of eight decades of “progressive” government, we New Yorkers can serve as a warning to our fellow Americans as President Obama, following the New Deal playbook, seeks to use the current financial crisis to provide a new rationale and legitimacy for the gargantuan machinery of the federal government.
California - Following Calif. Off A Green Cliff: Climate Change: A 2006 California law meant to lead the way on global warming looks like an economic disaster in the making. So far, Congress and Obama have ignored the warnings.
Massachusetts - Bay State Rationing: Health Care: Massachusetts' universal medical program is no longer universal. Coverage is being dropped for 30,000 because not enough money is around to pay for everyone. There's a lesson in this for Congress.
The running theme here is that these states have implemented unsustainable government largesse, and show us exactly what President Obama's proposed programs will bring us on a national scale. They are the cure that makes the disease worse.
Of course, one only need compare these examples to other states that have fared much better. To be parochial, I will trumpet my adopted home state....
Texas - Going Alamo: Why jobs and companies are flocking to a big small-government state. If you want to know where the future is headed, look where the people are going. And if you want to know where the people are going, check with U-Haul. Here's an interesting indicator, first noted by the legendary economist Arthur Laffer: Renting a 26-foot U-Haul truck to go from Austin to San Francisco this July would cost you about $900. Renting the same truck to go from San Francisco to Austin? About $3,000. In the great balance of supply and demand, California has a large supply of people who are demanding to move to Texas. There's a reason for this.
God help me if I ever get orders to PCS to California!
Today the Washington Post ran an editorial that had a lede ('The Deep-Pockets Mirage: House Democrats would have us believe that the rich can pay for it all') that would make you believe that it might opine against higher taxes, but in the end it was the same old call for a "more progressive" tax system. In other words...tax the rich.
THERE IS a serious case to be made that the U.S. income tax system should become more progressive. The average rate paid by the top 1 percent of households shrank from 33 percent in 1986 to about 23 percent in 2006. At the same time, the share of adjusted gross income claimed by that highest-earning sliver of American society doubled, from 11 percent to 22 percent. So, in principle, higher taxes for the well-heeled could make sense -- as part of a broader rationalization of the unduly complex tax code.
Now, I don't mind if newspapers hold opinions about the way our country is run (as long as they keep them confined to the Editorials like this one), but why do they have to use wholly incorrect and unattributed numbers to try to make their point??
In the citation above, WaPo say that the tax rate paid by the 'Top 1%' shrank from 33% to 23% between 1986 and 2006. And they also state that during the same time period, the share of gross income for the same people doubled from 11% to 22%.
However, these numbers do not match up with those recently published by the Congressional Budget Office (Hat Tip: Heritage Foundation). Given that the WaPo doesn't cite any source for their numbers, it is hard truly judge, but I don't think I am willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.
In their report, 'Data on the Distribution of Federal Taxes and Household Income', the CBO's numbers show the following:
- Between 1986 and 2006 the 'Effective Tax Rate' on the Top 1% rose from 25.5% to 31.2%...a 22% increase, rather than the 31% decrease that WaPo claims.
- Between 1986 and 2006 the 'Average Household Income' of the Top 1% did rise from $880k to $1.75mil (a doubling), but the 'Share of Income' rose from 14% to 18.8%...a 34% increase vice the 100% that the WaPo suggests.
Now, before digging into the numbers, I had intended to simply point out how the WaPo had conveniently ignored the total amount of the tax pie that the Top 1% and Top Quintile actually pay.
Since the WaPo seems to want to suggest that since the mid-80s that the rich have gotten richer and also paid less taxes at the same time, lets stick with that same time frame.
The CBO's numbers also show the following about who really shoulders the burden of the tax system:
- Between 1986 and 2006 the 'Share of Total Federal Tax Liabilities' paid by the Top 1% increased from 17.1% to 28.3%...an increase of 65.5%
- Between 1986 and 2006 the 'Share of Total Federal Tax Liabilities' paid by the Top Quintile increased from 57.5% to 69.3%...a 20.5% increase
So what we can see here is that, yes, the rich have gotten richer, but they have also already paid more and more taxes. In fact the share of taxes for every Quintile except the "Rich" has decreased, even though every Quintile has seen its average income rise....
Ultimately we already have a very progressive tax system, and it keps on getting more progressive. The fact that the WaPo wants to make it even more so means that it probably won't be happy until the 'Share of Total Federal Tax Liabilities' on the Top Quintile is 100%.
Methinks a lot of that Quintile will begin hanging out in a hidden valley with John Galt.....
While attempting to set a new standard for media butt-snorkling idolatry, the AP inadvertently exposes an inconsistency in President Obama's foreign policy stances....
America's president and Africa's son, Barack Obama dashed with pride onto the continent of his ancestors Saturday, challenging its people to shed tyranny, corruption and conflict in favor of peace. Campaigning to all of Africa, he said "Yes you can."
[...]
"Africa doesn't need strongmen," Obama said. "It needs strong institutions."
The son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya, Obama bluntly told Africa to take more responsibility for itself but proclaimed: "America will be with you."
Hmmm...those words have the distinct odor of the previously officially shunned policy of "meddling".
OK, so it isn't really meddling, but it is certainly much stronger rhetoric than we saw out of the President when it came to the uprising in Iran, where he went out of his way not to "meddle".
It would have been nice to see the sycophantic AP print the following graph during the Iran crisis:
America's president, Barack Obama, challenged the Iranian people to shed tyranny, corruption and conflict in favor of peace. Campaigning to all of Iran, he said "Yes you can."
[...]
"Iran doesn't need mullahs and strongmen," Obama said. "It needs strong democracy and freedom." Obama bluntly told Iran: "America will be with you."
Would that have been so hard for the President??
Both Campaign Spot and Instapundit highlight this great little piece of tut-tutting by Clintonista Robert Reich:
When Will The Recovery Begin? Never.
July 9, 2009, 5:02PM
The so-called "green shoots" of recovery are turning brown in the scorching summer sun. In fact, the whole debate about when and how a recovery will begin is wrongly framed. On one side are the V-shapers who look back at prior recessions and conclude that the faster an economy drops, the faster it gets back on track. And because this economy fell off a cliff late last fall, they expect it to roar to life early next year. Hence the V shape.
Unfortunately, V-shapers are looking back at the wrong recessions. Focus on those that started with the bursting of a giant speculative bubble and you see slow recoveries. The reason is asset values at bottom are so low that investor confidence returns only gradually.
That's where the more sober U-shapers come in. They predict a more gradual recovery, as investors slowly tiptoe back into the market.
Personally, I don't buy into either camp. In a recession this deep, recovery doesn't depend on investors. It depends on consumers who, after all, are 70 percent of the U.S. economy. And this time consumers got really whacked. Until consumers start spending again, you can forget any recovery, V or U shaped.
No recovery, ever? Never, ever? An interestingly pessimistic view from the left side of the ailse. What makes it ever more interesting is that not even 4 months ago, Robert Reich predicted a smooth recovery:
My Recovery Prediction
There's a reason it's called the "business cycle."
Robert B. Reich | March 25, 2009
I've got something of a reputation as an economic soothsayer. Last March I predicted the economy would slide off a cliff in six months. Six months later, it did. How did I know? I'll get to that later. Now, I'm predicting the economy will start to recover in the second quarter of next year.
First, look at the economic fundamentals -- such as historic ratios of home values to rents and incomes and of stock prices to corporate earnings. At the rate houses and stocks are now dropping, they'll be terrific bargains by the middle of next year. Meanwhile, given how fast business inventories are now dropping, firms will probably start rebuilding by then. Business investments in plants and equipment are now nearing a standstill, so by the third quarter of next year companies will need to replace lots of aging equipment. On the consumer side, the sharp falloff in spending on durables means lots of cars and appliances will begin wearing out by the middle of next year.
I guess even 'economic soothsayers' can stop patting themselves on the back long enough to change their predictions.
However I think the best part is Reich's inference in both articles that the economy won't turn around until "consumers" start spending money again. That seems a far cry from the current Democratic mantra that only President Obama's Good-Time, Happy, Nanny State Government® can spend us out of the recession.
To me, it sounds like Reich is making a great case for tax cuts, especially of the payroll variety. No better way in my mind of getting people to start spending more than to immediately put more money in each and every paycheck.
I doubt we will ever hear that out of the mouth of Robert Reich though. It might get him blacklisted from the tony parties in Washington, Manhattan, and Cambridge on the Charles.....
Instapundit was ruminating about the fact that you can by 1 Terabyte of storage now for under $100.
That got me thinking about my first home computer, which I also got for under $100.
I present to you, the Timex-Sinclair 1000:
The thing could almost pass for a Blackberry today...except that it has no screen. And on the issue of storage, it was unlimited! Or only limited to the number of blank cassette tapes you had lying around....
But the thing I always remember, was that we had to buy a memory expansion pack (seen attached in the pic above), and that got us all the way up to 16K of system memory!! Yes...16*K*... God bless the early '80s.
This beauty is still in cold storage somewhere in my parents house...so when my boy gets around to asking for his first computer......yes, you know where I am going with this....heh heh heh.
Thanks to Dinocrat (via Larwyn), we can read and compare the first Fourth of July speeches given by the last two Presidents.
I took the liberty of putting the two transcripts into Wordle, to see what might pop out.
So you tell me, which of the following word clouds actually looks like it's subject is 'Independence Day'?
Maybe some speechwriters have a different feel for what words people associate with Independence Day, but I have to tell you, word cloud #1 does not jump out at me. Word cloud #2 does.
I leave it up to you to figure out which speech was given in 2001 and which in 2009....
Instapundit:
ANOTHER “CRISIS” REQUIRING EXTRAORDINARY MEASURES! US-Russian Arms Negotiators “Under the Gun,” Might Temporarily Bypass Senate Ratification for Treaty.
Here’s a hint — if you bypass Senate ratification, it’s not a treaty.
Funny, in an administration filled with lawyers and led by a former CONLAW Professor, there is a surprising ignorance about the Constitution.
Or perhaps it is just the opposite...perhaps they are *soooo* smart about the Constitution, that they have all sorts of nifty ways to get around it when it is an inconvenience.
Of course neither option is very comforting....
