Quote: (12-31-2012 03:38 PM)speakeasy Wrote:
In the 1950s the USA's top tax rate was over 90%...just to put things in perspective. As much as people complain about taxes, by historical standards, they're damn low. At least marginal income tax.
Quote:Tenderman Wrote:
But when it comes to economics, the left has at root incredibly flawed and incredibly destructive ideas. The main rotten notion the left has is what I would call the "Zero-Sum Static Pizza Pie Concept." Namely, that the economy is one static pie that doesn't grow, and that rich people take bigger slices than less rich people. The left would have the government get out the knife, and re-slice the pie according to their idea of "fairness."
Of course the pie can grow for everyone. Problem is, the pie may grow rapidly for one demographic and hardly at all for another. We don't have just one economy. We don't all suffer equally when the shit hits the fan. Nor does the rising tide lift all boats. Incomes for normal people in America haven't changed in 30 years relative to inflation. Incomes at the top echelons have exploded in the same time-frame.
Think about something like the GM bailout. The stocks our government bought have been at a loss. But the rich will eventually pay for it. This will allow lower and middle class people to keep working. When you step back and look, it's a great example of an indirect transfer of wealth. And probably about the most benign type you can have. Rather than paying people welfare to sit at home, you are paying people to do something productive. If the rich have the money, then it's money well spent in my opinion.
The reason the wealth of the top echelon of society has increased at a faster clip is due to globalization, as wealthy people can move capital overseas where as most people are stuck trading their labor domestically. Don't forget, the Soviet Union collapsed and China opened up adding billions of people to the global labor market who were excluded due to their governments.
Only 10,000 Americans were subject to over an 81% tax rate in 1958 (figures available are for 81% and above). Ten thousand out of 45.6 million tax filers, that's all, and there were a lot of deductions that existed then that do not exist today - so people weren't paying the full rate.
See this Wall Street Journal op-ed by Peter Schiff.
Let's not pretend that these so-called "progressive" (marxist) income taxes with a top rate of 91% actually helped our economy back then. They didn't. In fact, the tax burden of the wealthiest Americans has gone up, and the average or poor Americans tax burden has been reduced from 1958 to present.
No, if we want to return to 1958 level prosperity then we should start World War III overseas, destroy the productive capacity of the rest of the world until we are 70% of the industrial base with 5% of the population of the planet. Of course we need to make sure that we don't suffer any infrastructure losses domestically, and stay the world reserve currency with the U.S. dollar. Raising the top income tax rates to 91% isn't going to help, quite the opposite actually. See France.