Tax Cuts A Go-Go
Few things in life are certain. One of those is that when one party gains traction on tax cuts, everyone joins in on the fun. Such is life now that Bush is pushing for making his 10 year tax cuts permanent. The NY Times runs a peice on a Split in the Ranks of the GOP & business. Slight overstatement, if only to me, because I imagine a "split" as being one party saying yes, with another saying no. That ain't the case here. Nobody wants to miss out on tax cuts.
The only point of difference is where those tax cuts go: to businesses? ... to individuals? ... to poor/middle class individuals? The story recounts that the Business Roundtable has sort of broken off from other business groups in calling for tax cuts on individuals. Yet even one of their 3 points for cuts is aimed at spurring investment in stocks, not necessarily putting dough in the pockets of Joe Sixpack. Hardly an earth-shattering split.
The Times article basically gets to the crux of the matter here:
Many business lobbyists insist that a top priority must be tax breaks aimed directly at corporations, because business spending is the weakest segment of the economy.But a growing number of business and political leaders, including at least one influential industry group, want to funnel more money to lower- and middle-income taxpayers in an effort to generate more demand for goods and services.
White House officials have stepped up their work on a major tax-cut package, and some lobbyists say Mr. Bush could announce it within the next few weeks.
But even among Republicans, there is enormous debate about how to persuade companies to invest in new factories and expand hiring.
"I am genuinely concerned that Republicans not be chastised for only helping business and the wealthy," said Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, who will become chairman of the Senate Finance Committee in January. "There has to be a balance between incentives for consumers and for investment."
Yet even with the $150 billion tax bill that Bush is pushing for, or the $300 billion that the Roundtable is asking for, you know its tax cutting season when Robert Reich comes up with a $700 billion proposal. I gotta admit, I like his plan the most. Mickey Kaus has other thoughts on Reich's other ideas on what to do about taxes. I say anything that features cutting payroll taxes is going to be a bigger winner than something that puts more money back on Wall Street. But what do I know?
Getting back to that "soak-the-poor" theme, Slate has basically started a watch for all politicians who take up this theme. Ed Meese is the latest. He broaches the subject, without being as blunt as others.
Well, it's very unfortunate that we have the situation in our country now, where as I believe someone pointed out a short time ago on your program [Note: Chatterbox tried and failed to track down who that is], that we now have a constituency that pays no taxes whatsoever. And it makes it very easy for demagogues on the left to try to raise taxes. And soon we're going to have only an even smaller faction paying the taxes.
Yeah, that's a real problem that I'm not paying any taxes Ed ... cept for the fact that I am. Thanks for the thought, though.