mike777, on 2011-August-08, 17:45, said:
Hopefully some compromise that centers around:
1) cuts in marginal tax rates in personal and corporate income
2) reduce rates of growth in entitlement spending through means testing, raising the ages.
3) revenue enhancements in the form of cuts in tax loopholes/deductions/govt subsidies to corps.
4) revenue enhancement via some sort of "other" tax increases
5) increased spending in some form of the social safety net/basic science research
6) decreased regulations in such areas as USA based energy production
I'd disagree with a lot of these. It's not clear to me why marginal tax rates need to be lowered. These rates are near to all-time lows, and the economy was doing much better at times in the past (i.e. Clinton presidency) when rates were substantially higher than they are today. Means testing for social security would potentially cost more money than it saves (because of the need for tracking wealth rather than just paying every retiree), and would turn social security into a welfare program for poor seniors which was never the intent. Raising ages for entitlements is bad too; medicare is a much better/more efficient system than private insurance so why should we force 65-67 year olds out of medicare? I'm all for revenue enhancements by cutting tax loopholes in principle, but in practice it's often tough to point to the "bad" loopholes that we want to cut. Sure, subsidies for ethanol and oil companies are on the chopping block, but these are small potatoes in the larger scheme of things. Increased spending on social safety net pretty much contradicts (2) doesn't it? As for regulation of USA energy production, if we had
more regulation we might not have had that awful oil spill in the gulf a while back, and we might not have to worry so much about stuff like coal miners dying in unsafe mines (like happened sorta recently in west virginia).
With that said, I agree with the larger goals of jobs and growing gdp. What I'd like to see:
1) Redesign the way taxation of foreign profits works, so that companies are not rewarded for using accounting tricks to make it appear that their revenues are in some low-tax country (like Cayman islands) and then refusing to "repatriate" the funds. My (maybe naive) idea would be to have a corporate minimum tax rate (say around 25%) and demand that
all profits be taxed at this rate or higher. Taxes actually
paid overseas would be treated as an exemption.
2) Raise capital gains rates. The supposed benefits of having amazingly low capital gains rates have not really materialized (i.e. lousy economy despite 15% rate). At the same time, these rates create unfair situations where super-wealthy hedge fund managers pay lower rates than working class folks.
3) Give a tax break to companies that employ people here in the US (proportionate to the number of employees). This could be funded through the first two ideas, as well as eliminating the most ridiculous tax loopholes for businesses.
4) Reduce the number of tax exemptions for individuals. It is somewhat ridiculous that almost 50% of people are paying zero income tax. Asking working people to pay a very small amount (say 1% of income) would be mostly symbolic, but over massive numbers of people it could add up. Perhaps a more serious issue is that over a thousand tax returns came in last year with over a
million dollars in income and zero tax liability.. something that really ought to be dealt with.
5) Lower the enrollment age for medicare. That's right,
lower it. Perhaps counter-intuitively, this could actually save money if we ask the younger people (i.e. 55-65) signing up for medicare to pay higher premiums than the older folks. This would act as a "public option" at the upper end of the age scale, with the effect of reducing the cost of insurance for everyone else (a huge boon to business) by taking the oldest people out of the insurance pool. If most people in the 55-65 range took advantage of this deal, they could easily pay in more than they cost. The idea is to take baby steps towards single-payer, hopefully accruing some advantages along the way without totally dismantling the existing system.
6) Offer a short-term deal where people could retire early (say 60) and be fully eligible for social security. This would cost money, but would act as stimulus (retirees on social security spend most of their money) and also help the unemployment rate (some older unemployed could retire, some older employed folks might retire especially from blue-collar jobs allowing younger unemployed people to find work).
7) Reform immigration policy to make it easier for entrepreneurs, graduates of US colleges, and non-citizens serving in the US military to become legal residents.
8) Seriously reform military spending. We obviously want our military to keep us safe. At the same time, there are hugely expensive projects that were designed to fight a large-scale war against a super-power (i.e. cold-war era stuff) that will be of little practical use in the modern world. We can cut these. We don't need military bases all over the world; let our wealthy European allies defend themselves now that the threat of the Soviets is long gone. At the same time that the military budget is insanely high, we have sent troops into battle without adequate body armor! I believe that we can save a lot of money by cutting military spending, but even more important is to realign our spending to match our real needs (mostly counter-terrorism, elite strike forces like the seals, etc).
Adam W. Meyerson
a.k.a. Appeal Without Merit
Help
