An attempt at humor, something in short supply in this forum. I'm not that good at it here, although I'm considered kinda funny, "in real life." Keep D&D Civil.
Bingo! You win! My point in this posting was that even though the Times has been vilified by the Republican party they still post news stories that somehow don't tow a party line. An independent fourth estate is the only real friend liberty has. Protetestation about the liberal media are really attempts to limit information and opinion and are steps toward facsim. What most "conservatives" lable liberalism is usually thoughtful consideration for all sides of an issue, compassion, and selflessness. Sure tax cuts generate increased tax revenues; because they are taxing only part of the income from the upper 1%. They are paying more because they are making more and they are making a lot more than they are paying in taxes. (Sounds like a great time to raise the minimum wage) And why are they making more? because with lower taxes they are inspired with a more entrpenueraial spirit? Hell no, because deficit spending infuses the economy with artificial monies, monies that should rightly belong to our grandchildren. The money the rich are making now will be the debt of the general public in the future. I'm not sure you can create general wealth with a service economy. Without high wage manufacturing jobs you just expand the gap between the business owners and their minimum wage workers. The rich getting richer and the poor get poorer seems like a natural cycle that is only broken by revolution. The revolution can be geographic expansion though we are probably done with that, paradigm breakthroughs like industrialization, though it seems China will be the beneficiary of that, or political. The masses can be thought controlled through media manipulation for a while but at some point I'm guessing there will be a backlash of minimum wagers in this country. I know it would piss me off to be working my ass off for $14,000 a year and see some old man in an air conditioned office taking home $400 million bucks.
Wow, even with the news of steep rise in tax revenues, lowering the deficit, ppl still jumps in and takes a dump on GW. Just imagine if the news were no tax revenue growth. People can't even acknowledge a piece of good news for what it is.
Wow, some people are bragging and using this as a victory for conservative views? Did ya'll read the article? It basically said that "it's a pleasant surprise that the ballooning deficit isn't as big as we expected but we are still in deep ****". This is how desperate Republicans are for some good news.
Never said it was a "Victory" for the conservative. But regardless, deficit reduction should be good news for everyone, unless you are wishing for it to continue to balloon.
deepblue, I shouldn't have used your quote, I was really referring to other posters who seem ecstatic that the deficit this year will only be 300$ rather than the $400 that was expected. Just make sure everyone is on the same page. The deficit will not be reduced, it will be only added on to by only $300 billion rather than the $400 billion that was expected. So go ahead Republicans if you can claim this as some victory you are either the "half full" or "delusional" party, I'm not sure which.
I have an ingenious way of cutting the deficit. Raise the tax rate to 95% and make it permanent therefore shortly no deficit and the government will be awash in cash allowing it to help people. And no, I'm not an economist. I'm surprise I'm the first one to thought of this.
You are confusing deficit and debt. The budget deficit is being reduced. It was 400 billion, and now it is 300 billion. The debt is increasing, but that is not the same thing.
Bush touts deficit drop... http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/07/11/congress.guantanamo.ap/index.html Meanwhile... Even before the release of the figures, critics poked at the White House figures, citing, for example, how they are at odds from Bush's original budget released in 2001, which predicted a $305 billion surplus for the current year, even after accounting for tax cuts. Some budget experts say the steep rise in tax receipts looks more impressive than it really is since revenues are bouncing back from a three-year decline during Bush's first term, drops not seen since the Great Depression.
Five largest deficit of all time*: 1. 2004 (George W. Bush) $413 billion 2. 2003 (George W. Bush) $378 billion 3. 2005 (George W. Bush) $318 billion 4. 2006 (George W. Bush) $296 billion (projected) 5. 1992 (George H. W. Bush) $290 billion Heckava job W! * http://origin.www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy07/sheets/hist01z1.xls, number are not inflation adjusted or else our boy Ronnie would hav emade the list.
Interesting. So basically the strategy seems to be project a huge deficit and then when you beat the silly excessive number, claim victory! From that article, Bush promised to half the deficit by 2009, but started at over $500B as the estimate for 2004, which according to your numbers is $100B off.
Just like Wallstreeters talking down their earnings number so they can beat the estimates by a penny. Makes the stock go up and all the big boys get bonuses.
...These are impressive figures, but how much credit belongs to Mr Bush’s tax cuts? Fiscal loosening doubtless cushioned the 2001 recession and may have accelerated the subsequent recovery. But the tax cuts cannot be given all, or even much, of the credit for today’s strong revenues. Tax receipts often rise faster than the bean-counters expect during cyclical expansions. Since budget forecasting is more an art than a science, revenue “surprises” are surprisingly frequent. The prominence of corporate tax revenue is due largely to the peculiarities of the current cycle, where wage growth has been remarkably weak and where the share of the national economic pie going to firms’ profits has hit a record high. This has nothing to do with tax policy. Profits have been unusually fat in other rich countries too, and Mr Bush did not cut America’s corporate-tax rate. If anything, the expiration of temporary investment-tax break at the end of 2004 may be helping to boost corporate taxes. Strong growth in profits also helps explain the recent surge in individual tax receipts, as capital gains and dividend income has soared. Another possible explanation is America’s growing income inequality. In a progressive tax system, where richer people pay a higher average tax rate, more income going to top earners automatically means higher tax revenue. This effect may have been exacerbated by the Bush tax cuts, as higher earners tend to respond more to tax cuts than lower-wage workers. Elsewhere, the tax cuts may well have swollen the cyclical rise in revenue. The capital-gains tax cut, for instance, may have temporarily boosted revenues as people sold long-held assets. All told, Mr Bush’s tax policy may have played a modest role in boosting a temporary revenue surge. But that is very different from suggesting, as the White House does, that tax cuts were the main cause or that they permanently pay for themselves. Most serious economists have long laughed at the idea that Mr Bush’s tax cuts raise revenue. Now, it seems, the president’s own boffins agree. Deep in the Mid-Session Review is a claim that the Bush tax cuts could eventually raise the level of GDP by 0.7%, a relatively modest effect, and one that itself depends on the tax cuts being financed by lower spending. Look carefully, and Mr Bush’s own forecasts do not expect the revenue boom to last. Tax receipts are expected to grow by only 2.4% in 2007, largely because Congress recently passed a law that would stem the rise in the number of people who pay the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT), a tax originally designed to stop the rich taking too many deductions. The budget forecast, implausibly, assumes the number of AMT payers will soar again in 2008. Add together the cost of fixing the AMT and likely for the war on terror, and the budget deficit may stay well above 2% of GDP for the rest of the decade. That is an improvement on the recent past, but it is hardly a fiscal triumph. To his credit, Mr Bush repeated the urgent need for reforms to pensions and the government’s health-care system for the old, the two biggest drains on the public purse. Despite his diminished political standing, he seems determined to tackle these subjects next year. Sadly, by bragging about the rosy short-term budget figures, he may have made that task even harder. economist
