Has Dean Baker Joined Team Republican? The dishonesty ab out the Trump tax cut for the rich from certain Republican leading conservatives are been extensively noted so let’s not go there. But why is Dean Baker writing this? There are two ways in which we can say that a deficit/debt is will hurt our children. The first is by slowing economic growth and therefore making the economy and our kids less wealthy in the future than they otherwise would be. The...
Read More »What Republican Iowa Senator Grassley Really Thinks . . .
of His Constituents. Iowa Republican Senator Grassley came out publically stating he wants to eliminate the estate tax to help Iowan farmers stay on their family farms. In rebuttal, the Des Moines Register had this to say: Of the numbers of Iowans paying the estate tax, they can be quantified in the dozens each year. Out of the 1.45 million Iowans filing federal tax returns, the numbers of Iowans over the last five years paying estate taxes numbers...
Read More »The Great Awokening
The Great Awokening There’s a theory about the sins and shortcomings of society: they are all due to our failures of consciousness. If people were purer, given to understanding and following the true path, the problems of this world would cease to exist. According to this view, poverty and inequality are the result of greed, wars occur because people fail to see the humanity in the “enemy”, and bigotry feeds on fear and ignorance. The solution is to...
Read More »Flynn Bails, but Don’t Get Your Hopes Up
Flynn Bails, but Don’t Get Your Hopes Up I haven’t seen anything yet to convince me that the Putin-Trump collaboration was a big deal. Ugly and unprincipled, sure, but politically consequential, probably not. A contrary view, expressed by Harry Litman in today’s New York Times, is that this is the beginning of the end for the Trumpster. The evidence is accumulating that, between his election in November of last year and his inauguration on January 20...
Read More »Ballance
[embedded content] Douglas Holz-Eakin balanced with Kimberly A. Clausing in the NYT. Link in the picture. To think that looting could be so calmly described with ballance.
Read More »Predictions on Republican Tax Cut and Elections 2018
Bruce Bartlett: “Prediction–EVERY Republican senator will whore himself or herself to pass this tax monstrosity. They should all go to Hell.” Bruce Bartlett: “Prediction–Democrats will stay home on Election Day 2018 because that’s what they always do best(last word is mine)” Predictions
Read More »Medicare and Social Security reductions?
AARP notes a planned reduction in Medicare funding. I have not hear much from them as in times past. If you read through the umpteen pages of the Senate tax bill, you won’t find a clause that says it dramatically cuts Medicare spending. But the effect of the legislation being debated this week would be to slash up to $25 billion from the health program in 2018 and possibly more in the future. That’s because the tax measure would prompt the...
Read More »Tolerance And Terrorism In Saudi Arabia
Tolerance And Terrorism In Saudi Arabia On the one hand this past week, Thomas Friedman at the New York Times has written a praising column about Crown Prince Muhammed bin Salman (MbS). He is going to bring a new “wave of tolerance” into Saudi Arabia, along with more generally modernizing it. This claim is not totally without substance given his setting up for women to drive starting next June as well as letting them go to sports events with men and also...
Read More »A Race To Suppress Academic Freedom?
A Race To Suppress Academic Freedom? The race is between the two nations competing for global dominance, the US and China. This post is triggered by an unnamed editorial in today’s Washington Post (probably authored by Fred Hiatt) criticizing China for imposing ideological limits on Chinese universities. Since the recent party congress, 40 universities have set up centers for studyiing Xi Jinping Thought. 14 universities have come under attack for...
Read More »The Leprechaun Long Run
The more people think about the Republican proposal to cut corporate taxes the worse it looks. Most people dismiss the argument that the benefits will trickle down to workers. Supporters’ argument is that reduced taxes on profits will cause increased investment which causes higher production and wages. There are strong arguments that the tax cut won’t cause firms to invest more. But aside from that, increased investment wouln’t cause (all) of the...
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