This from today's Wall Street Journal. More proof that the 2003 tax cuts are having the same positive effects on government revenues achieved by the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts. Hooray for supply-side economics.
Budget Deficit Drops to $296 Billion
Under New White House Estimates
July 11, 2006 12:12 p.m.
WASHINGTON -- Thanks to unexpectedly strong government revenues, this year's federal budget deficit will be smaller than previously forecast, a development the White House believes validates its economic policies.
In its annual midsession review, the Office of Management and Budget Tuesday slashed its estimate for the fiscal 2006 budget deficit to $296 billion, or 2.3% of gross domestic product, a $127 billion decline from its previous projection.
"Today is a good day for the American taxpayer," President George W. Bush said in remarks at the White House. "Tax relief is working, the economy's growing, revenues are up, the deficit's down."
In February, OMB said it expected the current fiscal year's deficit to reach a record $423 billion, or 3.2% of GDP. At the time, it also forecast a deficit of $354 billion, or 2.7% of GDP, in fiscal 2007. That number has been revised to $339 billion, or 2.4% of GDP.
The budget numbers could improve further, even though most economists believe the economy will cool slightly in the months ahead. According to Lou Crandall, chief economist for market research firm Wrightson ICAP, administrations typically undershoot in their midsession review deficit projections for the current year. Those estimates have been too pessimistic in 13 of the past 16 years. Mr. Crandall forecasts the fiscal 2006 deficit falling to between $280 billion and $300 billion, down from last year's $318 billion budget gap.
The anticipated improvement keeps the administration on track to cut the deficit in half -- as a percentage of GDP -- earlier than the 2009 target date. OMB said the goal will be reached in fiscal 2008, when the deficit is expected to drop to $188 billion, or 1.3% of GDP.
But budget watchers and administration critics say the deficit-cutting goal is unambitious because the starting point was the White House's overestimated fiscal 2004 deficit projection. Mr. Crandall urged the White House to set another, bolder target.
"Having cut the budget gap in half already, it would be encouraging to see the administration commit itself to cutting the remaining deficit in half again by 2009," he said in a note to clients. "Unfortunately, there is no indication that the White House sees any advantage in tying its hands in that fashion."
'Tax Cuts Worked'
Mr. Bush has frequently highlighted unexpectedly robust government revenues, linking strong economic growth and deficit reduction to tax relief passed during his presidency and other Republican initiatives. "The tax cuts we passed worked," he said Tuesday, pointing to 18 consecutive quarters of economic growth. "Some in Washington say we have to choose between cutting taxes and cutting the deficit. Today's numbers show that that was a false choice."
Tuesday's report wasn't a surprise, given the increase in federal receipts. But critics say the upbeat deficit projections don't acknowledge the costs of fixing the Alternative Minimum Tax and don't include the full cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nonetheless, the improvement in the deficit forecasts will add fuel to the White House's contention that its tax cuts have bolstered economic growth, helping to boost revenues.
Government revenues are expected to grow 11%, or $246 billion, from 2005 to 2006, OMB said. So far this year, receipts have totaled $2.4 trillion, $115 billion higher than expected. That boost accounted for 90% of the reduction in the deficit projection.
"It's obviously good news that revenues are up, but the worst thing we could do with that news is take some kind of action on it and assume that the tax cuts pay for themselves," said Robert Bixby, executive director at the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan budget watchdog. "Revenues aren't sufficient to pay for government spending, and that's the point of revenues."
Much of the revenue improvement is due to strong growth in corporate tax receipts, a reflection of the healthy profits companies have reaped during the current economic expansion.
Despite the better short-term fiscal scenario, the long-term outlook remains challenging due to the looming explosion of costs associated with spending on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Critics say OMB's five-year budget window doesn't show an inevitable long-term surge in deficits and debt.
"This troubling outlook is not materially changed by the latest revenue figures," the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said in a report Monday. "Simply put, there is little reason to believe the new figures indicate substantial long-term fiscal improvement or are a true indication of revenue adequacy."
Mr. Bush acknowledged that the government can't rely upon revenue growth alone to shore up its fiscal standing, calling on lawmakers to curb discretionary spending, pass a line-item veto, and tackle the growth of entitlement spending.
"This administration's going to continue trying to work with Congress to deal with these issues," Mr. Bush said of entitlement spending. "The time of playing politics with Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid is over. We need to fix this for younger generations of Americans to come."
Constraining Spending
The president said new Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson -- looking on in the audience -- agreed to join the administration so he could take on tough issues like Social Security. Mr. Bush challenged lawmakers to "feel that same sense of obligation."
Stephen Slivinski, director of budget studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, called Tuesday's report "a mixed blessing" because the short-term good news could lessen the appetite to tackle difficult issues like entitlements.
"If anything, this probably reduces the pressure to cut spending," Mr. Slivinski said. "From what I can tell, we're still seeing pretty large increases in spending."
In his State of the Union address earlier this year, Mr. Bush pledged to form a bipartisan commission to examine the impact aging Baby Boomers will have on entitlement spending. The White House still hasn't unveiled the panel, however, and Democrats are said to be reluctant to participate unless taxes are on the table.
The commission "seems all but dead," Cato's Mr. Slivinski said.
The growth forecasts that underpin the mid-session review were released last month. Real GDP is expected to grow 3.5% year-over-year in 2006, up 0.1 percentage point from the Bush administration's previous forecast, which was released in December. That would be equal to the 3.5% expansion in 2005.
GDP growth is seen slowing to 3.3% next year and cooling slightly more in following years to a rate at or above 3.0% a year through 2011. CEA Chairman Edward Lazear said that suggests the economy is heading toward a soft landing.
Write to Henry J. Pulizzi at henry.pulizzi@dowjones.com
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Comments: 42
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
But seriously - as far as net effect on the economy is there any difference between supply and demand side economics? For sake of argument let's say there isn't. If that is the case then the only difference is that one is far more humane then the other. If the wealthy get more money they will not necessarily create more jobs unless the demand exists. However if the poor get more money demand for goods and services will rise accordingly - the bulk of that money ultimately going to business that will hire more workers and create more profits for their owners.
Also - regarding Mr Reagan and his tax cut - people forget that Reagan also raised taxes a number of times as well. He was smart enough to see that tax cuts were not a cure all for every economic problem and that sometimes taxes needed to be raised for the good of the economy, government and society.
Just my 2 cents - which is more then General Electric has paid in taxes some years :-)
"More proof that the 2003 tax cuts are having the same positive effects on government revenues achieved by the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts."
This lead-in to the article you pasted here doesn't even make sense.
You are absolutely entitled to post your opinions. But I don't think I've seen you post an opinion of your own.
More to the point, speaking as someone who has made his living as a writer and editor, it disturbs me when you post someone else's opinion without indicating whether or not you have the copyright owner's permission to do so. I should think that as an author yourself you would be sensitive to ownership of what's commonly called intellectual property.
Gene asks if there is any difference between supply-side and demand-side economics then postulates that there is none and Sandy says that I am being irrational when I say that "More proof that the 2003 tax cuts are having the same positive effects on government revenues achieved by the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts."
So where does the truth lie? The simple answer is that the truth lies in human nature, in what humans do in response to outside influences.
Keynesian demand-side economics states that if you increase demand, normally done by increased spending by government, that will cause production to rise and there will be more jobs. Sounds pretty much like what Gene said.
Unfortunately, that is not what happens. What happens is that since there are more dollars chasing the same number of goods, prices rise. This is plain vanilla supply and demand economics that they teach in school.
In addition, when the prices rise the consumers can't afford to buy as many goods and this decrease in demand causes businesses to cut back on production and to cut back on jobs.
But if the demand goes up why doesn't the production go up in response to the increase in demand? Because increasing production costs money and a business does not have more money to spend on production until well after sales have risen and the business realizes that they can sell more and that the higher rate of sales can be sustained. The point is that the first thing to change in demand-side economics is "demand" and that causes prices to rise and that causes less demand.
If you are a bit confused at this point, read on to hear my explanation of supply-side economics so that you can compare and see what makes sense.
Supply-side economics tries to increase supply instead of demand. The only way to increase supply is to get more money into the hands of businesses. Government can do this by decreasing taxes or reducing costs through less regulation or less restrictions on doing business. All of these raise the confidence of business people and keep in mind that it is the small businesses who create about 75% of all new jobs.
What does a business do with more money? The simple answer is that we don't know but who cares. Some of them use the money to buy goodies for the families, but more often they spend it on the business. They do more research of new products, improve old products, increase production facilities so that they can take more market share, expand into new geographical areas or countries, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. The possibilities are almost endless.
As it turns out, the above always results in more jobs, more of the existing products for customers and more new products for them as well. Increasing the supply causes the prices to go down and each consumer dollar goes farther and consumers can buy more so their standard of living goes up. Also there are more jobs meaning there are more buyers of goods so demand rises as well.
In addition, since supply-side policies cause greater economic activity government tax revenues rise as proven during the Kennedy, Reagan and now Bush administrations. To think that raising income taxes and taking money away from businesses, investors and or consumers somehow increases tax revenues is simplistic because of how human beings react. It is true for real estate taxes and charges for licenses and such, but not for income taxes.
Please don't hesitate to ask questions.
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
You don't have to believe this scenario. You only have to check history to find out the answer.
Being an independent, I still find some local Dems worthy of my vote, but not so on a national level. Very sad.
Thanks for your comment, Apu.
Best regards, Ben
As much as I am opposed to president Bush on so many levels even I have to admit that not everything he has done has been detrimental to this country.
When I postulated that there was no difference between supply and demand side economics it was for the sake of argument. What I was saying was that even if there was no difference on the net effect on the economy (and there is enough evidence to 'prove' both arguments) then we have to look at which is the more humane path to follow. We must not forget that the economy is something that should exist to serve people and not be something that people exist to serve.
Now before anyone starts calling me communist let me try and be clear. Capitalism seems to work pretty good at creating wealth and I'm not endorsing changing that. But all things being equal why is it better to enrich those who are already wealthy then those who are struggling? If $100,000 added to economy in the form of a luxury car is the same as $100,000 added to the economy in the form of home repairs, tuition, diapers and clothes for folks who are at the bottom and middle rungs of the economic ladder then why not enrich the economy and enrich peoples lives at the same time. We only have one chance to go through life - what's wrong with, all other things being equal, making it a better experience for as many people as possible?
As concerns my comment about Clinton, would you please tell me what actions Clinton took that had a positive effect on the economy and why that action was positive. If that is too big an order, just try to answer the first part. Please make sure to provide action and not something he said or proposed.
You chose not to comment on my explanation of how supply-side economics works compared to demand-side. Is that because you accept what I have said as true? If not, please tell me where I am wrong so that I may respond. If not, then I am unable to understand the next things you said as recounted below.
Mark, you asked "But all things being equal why is it better to enrich those who are already wealthy then those who are struggling? If $100,000 added to economy in the form of a luxury car is the same as $100,000 added to the economy in the form of home repairs, tuition, diapers and clothes for folks who are at the bottom and middle rungs of the economic ladder then why not enrich the economy and enrich peoples lives at the same time."
It would be great if all things were equal, but they are not as I explained in my post. I am not talking about spending by the rich compared to spending by the poor. I am talking about investing in business and enouraging those investments so as to create jobs for the poor and not discouraging them. And increasing demand is not the same as increasing supply because the former makes everything worse for those on the lowest rungs of the ladder while the latter makes everything better for those on the lowest rungs. If you answer my questions above, the answers to this one will become obvious.
I have no desire to enrich the already rich. I have known a few rich people in my life and they think entirely differently than I (I buy most of my clothes at Goodwill or Nearly New shops, with the exception of two business suits and their acoutrements). The vast majority of their expenditures are purely discretionary, meaning that they don't need to spend any of it. What they spend on necessities is very small by comparison to their wealth and their normal spending on discretionary items. They don't even need to make money if doing so makes them upset. The get upset when people try to get their money away from them in some scam or just because they are rich as when the government decides to "tax the rich". To get back at the government, they reduce their taxable income and hire more lawyers to get around the taxes. Like estate taxes. The very rich don't lose money because of them because they have many schemes to make up for the loss through insurance and a few other legal ways. Why not just get the money lost overseas away from the government's prying eyes? No, its not the very rich who are bothered by estate taxes but those just below that level who own assets that are far beyond their bank balances. To satisfy the taxes, these assets, often just one like a farmer or a family business has to be sold and then the 55% or whatever can be paid.
When you tax the rich, it is the middle class and those on the lowest rungs who can't get jobs or are laid off because the rich refuse to invest their money in a business and take risks. This is called supply-side economics because by doing the opposite of what is needed to increase supply results in a decrease in supply and less or negative economic growth.
I look forward to continuing the discussion, Gene, and most especially your answers to my questions.
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
From la-la land, I ask what actions Clinton took to decrease the budget deficits. As I remember, his administration was unable to understand why tax revenues kept rising but eventually just accepted it. If you are going to recite only his increase in tax rates as being the cause, don't bother. I have heard that one before and it is not relevant since increasing taxes always depresses economic growth. If you are going to recite Reagan's achievements and the deregulations over the 15 years prior to Clinton, you will be right.
Best regards, Ben
As far as Clinton goes - he did work towards reducing the deficit. Which is certainly not a bad thing considering the effect on interest rates etc. But that is a distraction from my main point.
You asked me to tell you where you were 'wrong' when it came to Supply side economics and I wont tell you you were 'wrong' because I've read enough about both schools of thought to draw the conclusion that there are merits to both. The reality is that no one knows absolutely what the perfect system is. You seem quite confident that you are absolutely correct and I can't express similar confidence that Demand side is "better". There are people far more educated then myself who are members of the "Demand side religion" and likewise there are people far more educated then myself (such as, I am sure, yourself) who are members of the "Supply side religion".
My point that I was trying to make was that, again, all things being equal, which is the more humane path to take. Can we justify massive tax cuts that favor the rich when we are spending money we don't have? Is paying down the deficit a better path? Economics isn't just about numbers, it's about human lives, the numbers are incidental.
You make interesting and well thought out arguments. My goal isn't to be 'right' and have you be 'wrong' but I am simply taking the position that an economy should exist to serve people and not have it be the other way around. If there was "proof" that Mr Bush and yourself were right my ego would survive (a little bruised perhaps, but I would get over it).
We can site the writings of Keynes and Friedman until we are blue in the face and if we are open minded we can see the value of what both these brilliant men had to say. I say "all things being equal" and you say that "all things are not equal". Fine - we are at an impasse on that issue. I am simply (and forgive me for repeating myself) saying that both have merits when it comes to the numbers, but I am talking about which has the most positive effect on the quality of real lives.
I hope I've communicated clearly.
Take care
Gene
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link
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mr simonton's website gives details of his 25 years in the navy, captain of a destroyer and a nuclear-powered cruiser, and his subsequent career in the fossil-fueled electricity industry.
mr simonton is now taking an active role in promoting and giving credence to the policies of the worst president/businessman in the history of the united states.
you're quite the patriot, mr simonton.
salute.
not coincidentally, the conservatives can only point to false propaganda as success. democrats don't really gain from republican failures. we all lose.
back-paddlling furiously.
(envision a canoe labeled Congress headed towards niagra falls, with the words November Election shimmering in the water)
Gene, like you my goal is not to be right but to advocate that which serves the poorest of our society. My reading of history makes clear that supply-side does exactly that while demand-side hurts the poorest the most. I recommend that you examine what has happened to the poor country of Ireland over the past 15 years or so. They went from poor to quite well off and the envy of many other countries by using supply-side techniques and getting rid of their demand-side policies.
Gene, for me these two "religions" as you call them are mutually exclusive and one is far superior to the other as measured by results, not by ideology or by "if Bush uses it it must be bad". I admit that Bush and his people do not do a good job of explaining what makes tax cuts effective, but if you actually care to find out read Hayek's book on Socialism or read Von Mises thought the later is far too heavy for me.
Gerald asked "What I want to know from la-la land is how you can believe that decreasing taxes raises revenue. (Don't give me yesterday's propaganda, which proves nothing of the sort. As noted in my post, revenues haven't even gotten back to 2000.)"
Gerald, I won't give you any propaganda. I have written why I believe decreasing taxes increases economic activity above and in my previous post I have explained it in detail. I wish that you would accord me similar respect by explaining what actions (not talk) Clinton took to achieve a strong economy.
And your contention that revenues have not gotten back to year 2000 levels is incorrect. Revenues in 2005 were a little over $100B
above 2000 and the revenue increase from 2003 when taxes were cut thru 2005 was about $270B, pretty fantastic for what you describe as a stagnant economy under Bush. How can you contend that our economy is stagnant with home ownership at record levels, unemployment at 4.6% (better than Clinton's average), and job growth healthy inspite of a war, 9/11, international unease, very high oil prices, and outright fear of more terrorist attacks? Stagnant? No way!
Gerald, you also said "Another factoid: the four largest budget deficits in the history of America all came under Bush. That's the true Bush record."
Budget deficits have two major components which are revenues and spending. Spending under Bush has risen faster than under Clinton, mostly because Clinton did not have the support of a Republican controlled Congress for a good part of his term and waging the war on terror and greatly increased homeland security spending. Besides, Republicans have changed under Bush becoming almost as big spenders as Dems.
Revenues, on the other hand, went down from their peak in 2000 of $1.982B to $1.747B in 2003, the low point, because of the recession, 9/11 and the war in 2003. That we were able to recover from all that so quickly is a great testament to the 2003 tax cuts and the resilience of the U.S. economy in general. Bush's 2001 tax cuts were an ineffective attempt at stimulation obvious to any supply-sider or anyone knowledgeable of the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts. He was cautioned but chose to ignore the advice.
Gerald, you also said "Also, how can you say that increasing taxes depresses economic growth? The economy grew splendidly under Clinton, tax increase notwithstanding; the economy is essentially stagnating under Bush."
Once again, what actions of a stimulative nature did Clinton actually take. Actions please.
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
Thanks for a spirited and interesting discussion.
I am actually not against the idea of tax cuts, I just think they have been directed heavily towards the wealthy. I also feel that there should only be tax cuts when we can afford them OR in certain short term situations where there is need for immediate emergency stimulation of the economy. And even in these cases I don't feel that such cuts should be so heavily weighed towards the wealthy. Also - in such situations by the time the tax cut goes into place (what with Washington moving as slow as it does) the recession, that the tax cuts were intended to help, is often over.
Believe it or not there are a lot of areas where I feel we should have a smaller government and eliminate waste. Of course one mans waste and pork is another mans "entitlement". I have spent many years working for and with government contractors. I notice that you have a long career with the military. We have probably both seen areas of crazy waste and inefficiency in the spending of our tax dollars.
Going back to Reagan. I give him credit that when he cut taxes he also eliminated a lot of tax loopholes and I give him credit for having the sense to raise taxes later when he felt it was necessary. The current president sees tax cuts as a cure all for everything. We have a surplus - we need a tax cut. We have a deficit - perfect time for a tax cut. Yet, as has already been said, where is the fiscal discipline?
I agree with you that, unfortunately, the Republicans have now become big spenders like the Dems were known to be. Maybe I'm weird but I like it when neither party controls house, senate AND white house. Gridlock isn't always a bad thing - a few checks and balances never hurt anyone. Maybe it this desire for balance and checks and balances that makes me appear without strong conviction as to which system is ultimately best. I see them as the Yin and Yang of economics. Maybe ultimately you can't have one without the other - who knows. You say they are mutually exclusive - I'm not so sure I agree. You have certainly given me food for thought. I still have a hard time with things like the oil industry getting huge tax breaks while reporting record profits and yet many folks complain that too much is spent on public health. And I'm not convinced that $1 less on a 1040 form for Bill Gates is better then $1 less on the 1040 for the single mom working at Taco Bell.
The interesting thing about economics is that as times (and technology) changes so too does economic thought. The ideas of the Physiocrats would not hold water in todays information based economy - yet in its day I suppose it served a purpose. Today we take for granted the concept of charging interest on money - yet there was a time usury went against what many economist/philosophers thought. I think if history teaches us anything it is the folly of holding too tightly to any ideology. Maybe the economy of 100 years from now will be one of such overwhelming wealth that supply/demand side debates such as this will be irrelevant and quaint. Maybe in 100 years the effects of global warming will have so devastated the planet that the heavy hand of government will be the only way to maintain any order.
May we live in interesting times.
I thank you for an interesting and thought provoking discussion.
Gene
well, he did stain that girl's dress. that must have been stimulating.
~~
why do you feel the need to prove bush right by asking about clinton?
I did not acknowledge that tax revenues went down because of the tax decrease because immediately after the tax cuts in June of 2003, tax revenues went up and have kept going up.
Since that date, economic activity has increased about 20% and that is a major achievement especially when you consider that 20% to be equal to the total GDP of China.
I still believe that the 2005 tax revenue exceeded that of 2000. I will share my data source with you if you give me yours so that we can compare.
Gene,
Thank you for a level headed debate and thanks for the thanks. I would not worry about the big oil (such as Exxon) company profits. They aren't very profitable. Their latest profits have been the best in a very long time and they did not get larger than 10% of sales, a very poor number for a company which must invest billions every year just to stay even much less grow. If you want a reasonable profit margin, normally north of 20% and often above 30%, invest elsewhere. The oil industry is a very tough business and capital expenditures made today don't start paying off for many years. Of course, I don't include executive pay since that may well be excessive, but I don't have enough facts to do other than suspect.
As for "crazy waste and inefficiency in the spending of our tax dollars", it is far, far worse than any normal civilian could ever imagine. My budget when serving in the Pentagon when I arrived was about $3.5B/yr. After about six months on the job, I concluded that we were not getting well less than 30 cents on the dollar and strove to raise that dramatically. What a battle.
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
~~
Clinton came into office inherting a deficit from Bush the Elder. He wiped out the deficit and left his successor with a considerable surplus.
George inherited a surplus and promptly turned it into the four largest budget deficits in U.S. history. By the time he leaves office, he will have run up the six largest deficits in history.
So Clinton turned a deficit into a surplus, while W turned a surplus into a deficit.
I leave it to you to look at the facts and decide who did the better job. If, that is, you can look at the facts.
Gerald Scorse
I asked you several times and you have not been able to provide anything Clinton did to energize the economy and lower the deficit because he didn't do anything but take credit for something other people had caused.
As for Bush, he inherited from Clinton a recession, a weakened military and terrorism out of control because Clinton failed completely to do anything to squash it after repeated signs that it was growing. How many bombings should it take before a president does something meaningful. Clinton did nothing but say things at the end to the new Bush team that bin Laden might be a problem as if that was somehow news. And from that we the public got 9/11. We were damn fortunate to have Bush in the White House because he has taken highly effective action to squash it everywhere in the world and hooray for him we have had no repeats in the U.S.
Am I worried about the Bush deficits which were pre-ordained by Clinton? No, because Bush like Reagan before him is addressing both the threat and the economy. Make no mistake, Democrat Carter actually handed Reagan tougher, though quite similar, problems than Clinton handed to Bush; our economy was a disaster with interest rates near 20%, a national malaise believing that the U.S. was going downhill fast (it was) and a Soviet Union which had been allowed to do whatever it wanted as we had unilaterally disarmed and did away with all our human intelligence (spies) in the CIA. Reagan's rearming of America was damned expensive after years of disarming and forced the Soviets to leave the field, while the Reagan tax cuts and various deregulations some on Carter's watch reenergized the economy, brought down interest rates and caused greatly increased tax revenues which eventually paid for the whole thing.
Make no mistake. Anyone who thinks the Democrats know how to do anything but create a weak nation and a weak economy is smoking the wrong stuff. Their record of being against every major weapon system we used to scare the Soviets out of the race and to defeat Saddam in the field twice, and their insistence that the Bush tax cuts be reversed tells the whole story.
The Dems also have a long record of preventing us from developing our own energy resources whether they be oil, natural gas or nuclear. Now we have great dependence on foreign energy sources while they blame the oil companies for our high gas prices. It would be a good joke if it weren't so damaging to our economy and our security. To fix that they give us ethanol which costs more in energy to produce than it provides --- real smart. The Brazilians have done it, but the Dems don't want us to know that the Brazilians use sugar cane not corn as their source of ethanol and converting it uses only one eighth of the energy to produce as it provides, quite a difference to our corn.
Our national problem is that the Dems very effective propaganda tool, the mainstream media, has convinced a lot of people that what I have said above though a matter of record, is not true or will have no negative effects such as reversing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. The future does not look bright for us.
I will repair to my foxhole and await the incoming rounds.
Best regards, Ben
Author "Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed"
According to Ben, the robust economy we enjoyed under President Clinton just happened accidentally. In fact, Ben goes a step further, as most cretins do, to actually assert the economy could have been better if President Clinton had done a better job.
Of course, Ben's rantings raise several questions: If President Clinton was so incompetent--yet produced a great economy--how is it the super-effective AWOL George Bush, with a completely compliant GOP Congress has produced such a poor economy?
And why is it the super-pinko-liberal Alan Greenspan hailed President Clinton's policies as producing the "greatest economy in 50 years?"
Ben has seemingly forgot that Clinton ran a campaign in 1991 to fix the economy. In fact, his campaign was so fixated on the economy as the central issue--an informal mantra of "It's the economy, stupid" was created to hammer that message home in every speech and appearance.
So how did President Clinton do it? Essentially, he proposed deficit cuts of $493 billion over 5 years; increased spending, most of it on longer term investments such as job training, rebuilding the nation's infrastructure, education, and promoting high-tech; tax increases of $246 billion (on the wealthiest 1.2%) over five years; and net cuts in federal spending of $247 billion.
This has several effects; first, by lowering the deficit, we were freeing up monies that normally would have gone to debt service. Second, these monies allowed greater investment in longer term infrastructure: education, advancement of info technologies and high tech, job training, etc.
This had several positive externalities--one, it gave private investment more encouragement and, most importantly, it increased productivity.
Clinton created 22M new jobs--AWOL George Bush's first term was marked by being the first administration since Hoover to have a net job loss.
Ben tries to revise history but he is badly equipped to do so; remember, the economy was so hot during President Clinton's tenure, the Fed actually had to enact policies to slow it down.
old george carlin routine - Some People Are Stupid:
"then, there are some people... they're not stupid... they're fullashit... eh? that doesn't take very long to spot, either - does it? you'll be listening to some guy, and say, "welll... he's fairly intelligent..... AHH! he's fullashit!"
Tesoro posted 29 cents of operating profit for each gallon of fuel produced at Golden Eagle in 2005, more than double the 12 cents a gallon in 2003.
~~
i know you think i'm a smartass, and have chosen not to engage me - you're not the first to clam up in the face of overwhelming snarkiness. you're also not the first to try and float complete crap past me and trying to appear intellectual about it. greg schiller preceeds you on that one.
at least bob parks has cajones to try and counter me.
i know my remark about monica's dress made you smile, because it's obvious that you have a sense of humor in there somewhere - "Make no mistake. Anyone who thinks the Democrats know how to do anything but create a weak nation and a weak economy is smoking the wrong stuff. "
that's funny!
true, the democrats are ineffectual, but your attempts at making a strawman out of bill clinton in order to make bush look good will always fall flat.
say, are you friends with admiral hoffman?
since you insist on promoting your book entitled
"Leading People to be Highly Motivated and Committed".
well, the "leading people" part is apt, anyway.
enjoy the new gather, everyone. same as the old gather.
You were right, I did smile at your Lewinski reference, but not because the dress thing was funny. No, what was funny was you, that you would take the time to say something so inane as if it was of value to someone. Probably speaks volumes of what you think about others on Gather and what you think of your own opinions.
You mentionned Tesoro and that they made 29 cents on each gallon produced at one of their refineries in 2005. You either believe that to be valuable info or are deliberately trying to mislead people on Gather. Well, this seems to be your way of doing things, that is citing facts which alone have no meaning and no value to assessing reality. Tesoro had a profit margin of 3.6% in 2005 making $591M on sales of $16.6B. If one compares that to the average company with a margin of 10-30%, they are doing very poorly, but then that is the nature of the refining business. They paid out 25 cents in dividends last year on an average share price of about $40 giving shareholders a very poor .6% return. Shareholders actually did very well in capital appreciation last year because the company had been making so much less in previous years that the share price dove to just over $1 in 2002 from an average of about $20 for previous years. Now the shares are selling at ~$70. If an investor had had a good crystal ball or faith that oil would eventually go up in price, buying in sometime in the past 5 years would have eventually returned some fair gains. But the company still doesn't earn much of anything and has had considerable difficulty getting the money to maintain their refineries.
You said "i know you think i'm a smartass, and have chosen not to engage me - you're not the first to clam up in the face of overwhelming snarkiness. you're also not the first to try and float complete crap past me and trying to appear intellectual about it. greg schiller preceeds you on that one. "
You are right! I have chosen not to engage you because I am unable to engage inanities. But I do not think that you are a smartass because I don't know you enough to be able to make such a judgement and besides I would not judge you because I am a firm believer in "judge not lest ye be judged". However, I must admit that I do have compassion for you and for those closest to you.
Best regards to you, Ben
some people find value in humor, yes. lord knows you could stand to lighten up.
"I must admit that I do have compassion for you and for those closest to you."
see - that's funny stuff!
that's not the first time that's been said, either. one girl here at gather pities my cat.
you're a slick one, though. you have chosen to try and support the record of this administration - so you bring this on yourself.
i'm a firm believer in "if it looks like b.s. and smells like b.s., it's b.s."
~~
keep posting, ben.
I agree that humor is good and you have given both my wife and I a lot of laughs, but not for the reasons you might think and I will leave inanities to you.
My compassion for you and yours is sincere.
I do not support the record of the Bush administration or that of any administration for that matter. I do support what is right no matter who does it or who proposes it.
Bush has done his share of bad things. For example he has signed every spending bill that comes his way without making an attempt to reign in runaway spending, not enforced our laws regarding illegall aliens and not protected our borders. I also believe that he has made a significant error in getting Congress to pass a medicare drug program because it is not something we can afford. But these do not diminish the good things he has done.
Your post about Tesoro sounds like a company statement meant to hype their stock and is not helpful to anyone interested in determining if buying their stock would be a good investment. As your post indicates, they exited their old business and entered into refining in a big way because liberals have prevented new refineries from being constructed. The old owners were pretty much unable to deal with the poor returns in refining and were willing to sell for pennies on the dollar just to get out and pursue the other parts of their business. Tesoro saw an excellent opportunity to concentrate solely on refining and took it. Valero, originally a pipeline company did likewise (I owned Valero stock way back when). As they say in the industry, the "crack" has been good.
Bye, Bye, Martin.
Best regards, Ben, delusional as ever
we have more in common than you may be willing to believe.
the tesoro tidbits were from wikipedia, public knowledge.
irrelevant.
"tax cuts cause increased tax revenues"
the joke isn't lost on me.
c-ya in the funny papers.
Caveat Deficit
By Jessica Holzer
07.11.06
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Bush administration trumpeted its improved forecast for the federal budget deficit on Tuesday, but budget experts were unimpressed given the bleak long-term picture.
"The economic growth fueled by tax relief has helped send our tax revenue soaring," said President George W. Bush….
But critics on the left and the right agree that the news is underwhelming in light of the sharp deterioration in the deficit under Bush and a looming fiscal crunch that will make General Motors ' woes look like a dream…
"It's hard to argue that there's much of an improvement when we're looking at swings from large budget surpluses in the beginning of the decade to large budget deficits now," says Maya MacGuineas, the president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget Deficit, a bipartisan group of budget experts. In 2000, the government recorded a $236 billion surplus.
Still, the surge in revenue--mainly from taxes paid by corporations and the wealthy--provide ample fodder for those who argue that the Bush tax cuts have been a crucial stimulus to economic growth that, in turn, generates a rise in tax receipts…
The jump in spending makes projections of government outlays in future years seem more than a little optimistic. The administration estimates that total discretionary spending, including on defense, will drop $41 billion from 2006 to 2009.
Says Slivinski: "We've never had a decline in overall discretionary spending of that magnitude--pretty much ever."
more here: http://www.forbes.com/business/2006/07/11/budget-deficit-taxes-cx_jh_0711budget.html