For the record: As a Libertarian, I firmly believe that fewer taxes are always a good thing. It’s our money, not the government’s and they should take the bare minimum from us and provide only the basic things the country’s founding called them to, such as national security.
I also know those days are long gone and we’re on the fast track to Quasi, if not full on, Socialism.
With that said, the recent tax bill passed by congress is a disaster that will help almost no one in America that isn’t already part of the top .01% and should, if there’s any justice left in society, be the end of the modern day Republican Party. Burn it down and start over kids, because you’re as lost and pathetic as the modern day Democratic Party. Reagan and JFK are both spinning in their graves and ironically, it’s for almost the exact same reasons.
I have hesitated talking too much about this tax plan because that’s all it was…a plan. And it has changed massively over the past few weeks as I predicted it would. And, also as I predicted, it has changed massively for the worse. While we don’t know the exact final details of what will ultimately become law, what we do know borders on horrifying.
Let’s start with the premise of what’s called “trickle down economics,” something made famous by President Ronald Reagan and the economic boom he brought to America in the 80’s (and some say into the 90’s). Trickle Down is the theory that if you enhance the ability of people with money to keep and spend and invest that money, they will do so by buying more products and creating jobs, thus creating a rising tide of all boats. While modern day liberals decry the theory as false, it is provably true when enacted properly, something the new tax bill fails miserably at.
If you were to find a way, as Reagan did, to allow today’s upper middle class of America to keep and spend more of their money, the American economy would explode and jobs would be aplenty. It is people in the Upper Middle Class, those who are not living paycheck-to-paycheck but are also not yet independently wealthy, who want to travel, buy, and consume. They are also the ones who will start small businesses which, by definition, creates jobs. There are thousands of such people in this country with ideas and even plans, but they just can’t quite make the idea work on paper. A massive tax cut for them would do the trick. But that’s not going to happen.
As for the Middle and lower class, remember that 50% of our population pays no income tax to begin with. Cutting the lower tax rate is meaningless. We could help these brackets in two very simple ways; creating jobs as laid out in the previous paragraph (please keep in mind that the federal unemployment rate is an absolute joke and does not represent the record high number of Americans out of work and not looking today), and by cutting payroll taxes. Take less out of the lower classes’ paychecks each week by slashing payroll taxes and watch them spend that money immediately, improving both their quality of life and the American economy. But that’s not going to happen either.
Instead, your elected officials have crafted an absolutely massive economic Christmas present for the top .01% of the financial population of America. Not the top1%, the top .01%.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not like most people, I don’t hate or resent the rich. I want them to keep as much of their money as they can, as long as the same rules apply to all of us, which they don’t with this abhorrent tax bill. I also understand that big government is as dangerous and big business if and when you allow either to run the nation. We have both, in bed together, doing exactly that.
Here’s the sales pitch on this turd: We are going to, correctly, cut the corporate tax rate from a worldwide high of 35% to 20%. Excellent…that absolutely should happen and will, over time, make us more competitive and keep more American businesses at home. However, it will not create jobs in the immediate. In fact, Forbes did a survey last year of Fortune 500 CEO’s about what they would do with new found revenue and the overwhelming response was “buy back our own stock.” Wow, that will create a total of ZERO jobs. Excellent. How do we know all of this? Because the pathetic attempt at justifying this from the White House is that when large Corporations have more money, they create more jobs. Allow me to scream from the rooftops the following: NO THEY DON’T! If that were true, the Obama administration would have created the most jobs in history, which, for the record, it did not. Not even close. That distinction still belongs to Bill Clinton and Obama ain’t even in the top 40 (and we’ve only had 45 for those of you counting).
During the 8 years of Obama, American corporations made record profits. They quite literally had money to burn. What did they do with it? NOTHING! They hoarded it, and gave massive bonus payouts to their top corporate officers, and there is absolutely no indication that will change moving forward. When you have an elite class of super-wealthy, successful corporations and a vanishing middle class, the elites know that the people who want to work will do whatever and anything they are asked to do to keep their paltry jobs. Why hire 3 people when 1 person is willing to work himself quite literally to death to save his middle class job? This is our reality and your elected representatives just made it the new permanent normal.
Want more proof? Check out the stock market, which has absolutely nothing to do with the American economy. It has soared since trump got elected and boomed as this tax plan has moved forward, particularly the DOW which represents the 30 biggest companies in the country. Gee, I wonder why the 30 biggest companies are so happy and upbeat about this tax plan? Hmmmmm.
Anyone claiming, at this point, that I am upset because I won’t benefit personally from this tax plan is beyond stupid and completely ill-informed. First of all, there is a difference between tax rates and effective tax rates, the latter being what people actually pay. I’m in the same bracket as Mitt Romney, and I pay the same effective rate, and have for years…18%. When all is said and done, that’s the percentage of my earnings that goes to the government, despite being solidly in the top 1% of earners. This tax bill will not change that in any way. It will also not, in any way, as a small business owner, help me to create more jobs, and that is what upsets me. Not only do small businesses (the true drivers of employment and our economy) get absolutely nothing of value out of this idiotic plan, the ever vanishing middle class also gets nothing, and most of my friends, employees, and family fall into that category. Contrary to popular belief, I do, at times, actually care about people and those that I care about will not see their lives improve at all.
What will be interesting to watch over the next couple of years is what, if any, effect this has on President Trump, who has seemingly never had his political base care at all, whatsoever, about his long list of stupidity and incompetence since getting into office. When congressional elections come along in fall of 2018 and almost no one in trump’s base has seen any sort of improvement in their financial situation, will that be enough to turn the House and Senate over to the Socialists…ooops, I mean Democrats? Or, will it take until 2020 when, all things being equal, the stock market has reached record highs, including the DOW being over 30,000 while Trump loyalists have the same, if not less, to show for their hard work, for the country to be turned back over to the party of Stalin…ooops, I mean the Democrats again. Sorry about that.
The election of Donald Trump as the rise of Bernie Sanders were supposed to be signs of the American public being absolutely fed up with modern day politics. Now that President Trump has an actual achievement to point to, let’s see.
