Government Policy and Budget Discussion Thread (no politics)

[847badgerfan]

To answer an earlier question, Biden got nominated because the primary system is broken.

There's no reason that Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina should have such disproportionate influence on who gets nominated, but that's how it is.

I think I suggested before that presidential primaries should be held in the order that the party got the most percentage of votes, so the Democratic side would start with states like Hawaii and DC and the Republican side with Wyoming and North Dakota.

All the primaries should be held on the same day, and "calls" should not be made until ALL the votes come in. This way, there is more incentive to vote.

Also, no "calls" on election day. Hawaii be like "Why bother. _______ already won." That's f'd up.

[CWSooner]

Here's data for you.  After we pay for Social Security, Medicare, interest on our debt, and defense, we are already deficit spending.  That means that every other thing the government spends money on is deficit spending.  Mind you, this was at a time of economic prosperity.  Bottom line:  We have to eventually raise federal taxes.  Nobody likes them.  Nobody wants to.  But we sorta have to.

Historically, it has been very difficult for the federal government to raise revenue exceeding about 17% of GDP.  And at some point, increasing tax rates results in lower tax revenues because people find ways to avoid paying the tax.  You're probably familiar with this concept, expressed in the Laffer Curve.  At a tax rate of 0%, no revenue would be collected.  But at a tax rate of 100%, there will also be no revenue collected, because nobody would work for anything that could be taxed at that rate.
So, while I agree that revenues do need to increase, we can't squeeze blood from a turnip.  The economy has to keep growing for us to get higher revenue, no matter what the top income tax rate is.  And the higher the taxes, the less the economy grows, all other factors being equal.
And we're going to have to cut spending too.  At some point, the debts have to be paid, and revenues of 17% of GDP cannot pay for the federal government spending of 21% of GDP, which is what it was in 2015, a reasonably prosperous, non-emergency year.
Bush 41 and the Democrat-controlled Congress made a deal ca. 1990--when the federal debt was about 1/3 of what it is now as a percentage of GDP--to raise taxes and cut spending.  Bush signed off on the tax increases, which may have cost him the 1992 election, but the spending cuts were--in GOP eyes, anyway--less than what had been agreed upon.
Since then, it has been accepted wisdom within the Republican Party that Democrats cannot be trusted on a revenue-and-spending compromise.  (And maybe the Democrats have some other lesson from that experience, I don't know.)  That was back when there was much less polarization than there is now.  It's hard now to see such a deal being passed, signed into law, and carried into completion.

[CWSooner]

I disagree.  It's akin to the Golden Rule, which I also disagree with.

I do my thing, you do your thing, everyone is happy so long as out things don't conflict.  You keep your helo separate from me on final and call your spots.

Utee probably will read something else into this.

I think you are pulling my leg here.
Something has to work.  Society has to exist and cohere, or your thing and my thing may involve fighting for the same fruitful part of the forest with the loser dying in the fight or starving to death.  And society doesn't work very well when everyone in it is following a policy of radical autonomy.

[Big Beef Tacosupreme]

Historically, it has been very difficult for the federal government to raise revenue exceeding about 17% of GDP.  And at some point, increasing tax rates results in lower tax revenues because people find ways to avoid paying the tax.  You're probably familiar with this concept, expressed in the Laffer Curve.  At a tax rate of 0%, no revenue would be collected.  But at a tax rate of 100%, there will also be no revenue collected, because nobody would work for anything that could be taxed at that rate.
So, while I agree that revenues do need to increase, we can't squeeze blood from a turnip.  The economy has to keep growing for us to get higher revenue, no matter what the top income tax rate is.  And the higher the taxes, the less the economy grows, all other factors being equal.
And we're going to have to cut spending too.  At some point, the debts have to be paid, and revenues of 17% of GDP cannot pay for the federal government spending of 21% of GDP, which is what it was in 2015, a reasonably prosperous, non-emergency year.
Bush 41 and the Democrat-controlled Congress made a deal ca. 1990--when the federal debt was about 1/3 of what it is now as a percentage of GDP--to raise taxes and cut spending.  Bush signed off on the tax increases, which may have cost him the 1992 election, but the spending cuts were--in GOP eyes, anyway--less than what had been agreed upon.
Since then, it has been accepted wisdom within the Republican Party that Democrats cannot be trusted on a revenue-and-spending compromise.  (And maybe the Democrats have some other lesson from that experience, I don't know.)  That was back when there was much less polarization than there is now.  It's hard now to see such a deal being passed, signed into law, and carried into completion.

We absolutely know we can raise our tax rate and increase tax revenue, because we are nowhere near the peak of the laffer curve.  Especially given our progressive tax structure.

Everyone knows what needs to be done, but nobody wants to actually say it out loud.  GB1 was a good man, he made a tough call, but it was the right one.  His son promptly cut those taxes and we've been running a deficit ever since.

[CWSooner]

Poll... How many of us have actually read the Citizen's United decision cover to cover?

(Just me?)

I read it about 6 years ago at a teacher workshop sponsored by the Bill of Rights Institute.
It seems to me that it just clarified freedom of the press to include institutions other than corporate media conglomerates.
Freedom of the press was written into the 1st Amendment to protect the right to publish criticism of the government.  That freedom belongs to everyone, not just The New York Times or Fox News.
If you want to rein in the influence of money in elections, you're going to have to do it some other way than abridging the freedoms of speech and press.
Most of the other teachers there disagreed with that interpretation.  But then most of them--as teachers--were Democrats and therefore supportive of Hillary Clinton, who was the target of the media criticism produced by the non-profit organization Citizens United.
I thought for a long time that the best way to rein in the influence of money was to make all recipients of political contributions have to publish the contributions within, say, 24 hours.  Just make everything transparent.  But I found out that there's a nasty history to laws mandating that.  Among other things, they were used to let white supremacist state governments and non-governmental groups find out who was contributing to Civil Rights groups like the NAACP.  So there's that.

[MichiFan87]

We absolutely know we can raise our tax rate and increase tax revenue, because we are nowhere near the peak of the laffer curve.  Especially given our progressive tax structure.

Everyone knows what needs to be done, but nobody wants to actually say it out loud.  GB1 was a good man, he made a tough call, but it was the right one.  His son promptly cut those taxes and we've been running a deficit ever since.

To be explicit, lower taxes correlate with worse income inequality. It's pretty clear.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/10/income-inequality-tax-rates-income/

[Big Beef Tacosupreme]

OK, so now it's a different topic. You're talking racism. Yes, that was different in some places. The guy in charge now is not black, but is hated by most blacks and browns, and 40 percent of whites. In many, it runs very deep. That I see in Chicago and other big cities like it.

Certainly in Chicago, 44 was revered by "his" people, who he did absolutely nothing for, by the way. Ask any local Rep from the South and West sides and they don't talk fondly of the man.

So, anyway, the Chicago Machine went to Washington.

I wasn't really talking racism, but I guess...I was?  I wasn't really thinking about it that way.  

I am not a fan DT.  I actually kinda feel sorry for the guy.  He's like everyone's old uncle that spends all day watching Fox News and yelling at clouds.

[betarhoalphadelta]

It seems to me that it just clarified freedom of the press to include institutions other than corporate media conglomerates.
Freedom of the press was written into the 1st Amendment to protect the right to publish criticism of the government.  That freedom belongs to everyone, not just The New York Times or Fox News.
If you want to rein in the influence of money in elections, you're going to have to do it some other way than abridging the freedoms of speech and press.

I took it a little differently. I think the critical aspect was this:


Essentially BCRA tried to limit the speech of "corporations". While it's been misconstrued as declaring corporations are people, what the decision said was that people retained free speech rights. Corporations are collections of people, and therefore do not lose the right to speech simply because they've organized. A group of people have the same rights those individual people would have. Forming a corporation doesn't forfeit those rights. 

Mdot was complaining about the money=speech point, but that came from a Supreme Court decision in the 1970s. Basically the only difference is that they said you can't stop corporations from USING their money for speech. 

Most of the other teachers there disagreed with that interpretation.  But then most of them--as teachers--were Democrats and therefore supportive of Hillary Clinton, who was the target of the media criticism produced by the non-profit organization Citizens United.

Motivated reasoning at its best, right? 

[SFBadger96]

Wow, you guys sure abandoned the "no politics" in a hurry.

[CWSooner]

"Not my president", "endless investigations", and "resist" all happened under Obama, too.  With a vocal minority, the anger was very real.  Donald Trump's campaign cultivated that anger.  "Make American Great Again."  It was enough to get him the republican nomination.

I don't think that Trump is a typical Republican, and I'm really curious where the party will be going after he's gone.  I'm hoping they go back to the civility of McCain, Romney, and Kasich.  Pipe dream?

I hope that your hope comes true.
Here's why I fear that it won't.  Those guys lost.  And at times it looked as if they would rather lose than step on the Democrats' toes.
Neither McCain nor Romney was my first choice for the GOP nomination, but I voted for them both, strongly believing that they would be better than Barack Obama.  But the McCain campaign sabotaged itself twice, first with the selection of Sarah Palin (who is not stupid but is also not serious as a politician) as the VP nominee, and then by working behind the scenes to undercut her.  And Romney, after handily (I thought) winning the first debate with Obama, seemed like someone told him that he'd better not do that again or people would think he was mean or aggressive or a racist or something.  Romney also didn't respond in kind when Harry Reid falsely accused him of not paying his taxes.
Neither made much of an effort to counter the mainstream media's negative coverage.  Neither seemed to have the fire in his belly to do what it would take to defeat the Democrat-mainstream media alliance.
I think that my feelings on this were shared by many people, not all of them registered Republicans.  And that's what got Donald Trump the GOP nomination.  Trump might be a bunch of bad things and not a bunch of good things, but he would fight.
For me, that wasn't enough.  I voted for Ted Cruz in the primary, and then in the general election for the Libertarian loon whose name I have to stop and think to remember.  But for millions, "he fights back" was enough.
Anyway, I fear that the day of the civil, gentlemanly Republican candidate is gone.  The GOP has become Trumpified, just as it became Reaganized (in a good way, IMO) after 1980, and it will take repeated failures on the national stage for that to change.

[CWSooner]

We absolutely know we can raise our tax rate and increase tax revenue, because we are nowhere near the peak of the laffer curve.  Especially given our progressive tax structure.

Everyone knows what needs to be done, but nobody wants to actually say it out loud.  GB1 was a good man, he made a tough call, but it was the right one.  His son promptly cut those taxes and we've been running a deficit ever since.

I was careful NOT to say that we could not raise our tax rate from where it is today without having revenues decrease.  My point was that at some tax rate, further raises reduce revenues.  Our tax system is so complicated, that it's hard to predict what can happen as a result of any change to tax policy.  And the fact that tax policy influences economic growth makes results even harder to predict.
This chart is interesting.


Here's one that breaks down revenue sources.


So it's not so clear that G.W. Bush's tax cuts caused a drop in revenue.  The revenue as a share of GDP dropped in 2000, before Bush 43 was even elected, much less before his tax reductions went into effect.

[betarhoalphadelta]

So it's not so clear that G.W. Bush's tax cuts caused a drop in revenue.  The revenue as a share of GDP dropped in 2000, before Bush 43 was even elected, much less before his tax reductions went into effect.

The sharp revenue rise of the late 1990s goes to one thing--the Dot Com boom. 

The immediate drop thereafter was from the dot com bust, followed by 9/11. It rose again from the housing boom, which ended in 2007-08.

[Big Beef Tacosupreme]

I was careful NOT to say that we could not raise our tax rate from where it is today without having revenues decrease.  My point was that at some tax rate, further raises reduce revenues.  Our tax system is so complicated, that it's hard to predict what can happen as a result of any change to tax policy.  And the fact that tax policy influences economic growth makes results even harder to predict.
This chart is interesting.


Here's one that breaks down revenue sources.


So it's not so clear that G.W. Bush's tax cuts caused a drop in revenue.  The revenue as a share of GDP dropped in 2000, before Bush 43 was even elected, much less before his tax reductions went into effect.

The CBO predicted that GW's tax cuts would cost the US about $500B in revenue annually.  And...that's exactly what happened.  I like those CBO guys, they area almost always spot on.

[CWSooner]

About the two-party system, primaries, etc.

I agree with Bwarb that our system is built for two major parties.  As CD pointed out, we have seldom gone for long with that not being the case.

So, since they seem to be here to stay, I would rather parties be stronger rather than weaker.  A major goal of the progressives from 1890 to 1920 was to weaken the political parties, which they viewed as corrupt and undemocratic.  Unfortunately, they succeeded all too well.
So now we've got parties that are at least superficially democratic, but they're no less corrupt.  But they are also weaker, so we voters can't really hold them responsible for anything.  A strong Democratic Party would not have nominated Hillary Clinton, who basically used her campaign apparatus to run the nominating process, including the primaries.  A strong Republican Party would not have nominated Donald Trump, who was a lifelong Democrat until about 10 minutes before he entered the campaign.
We probably can't do away with the presidential primary system--there's no will in either party to fade the heat if that were proposed--but we could do what the Democrats have actually done better than the Republicans.  That is, have a lot of "super-delegates"--party regulars who will be less likely to be swayed by a fearless leader on a white horse than the small fraction of the electorate that shows up to vote in primaries.
Make the primaries only count for half of the delegates and the convention, and the rest of them be grimy political hands who make deals in smoke-filled back rooms to find the most electable candidate who will advance the party's agenda.
De-democratize the process to give the voters a better choice in the general election.