In a recent interview at Yahoo! News, Amity Shlaes discussed her new book entitled “Coolidge”. The interview began with Yahoo news announcer Lauren Lyster, explaining that one of the big issues of
Obama’s second term was tax reform and what could be learned from Calvin Coolidge.
Shlaes explained that: “The cutters; Reagan, Kennedy and going back to Coolidge all ended up with more money on the books due to extra business activity.”
These are irrefutable facts. Most every conservative and I have used the same argument for years. Cutting tax rates spur economic activity and growth, which leads to more jobs, more taxpayers and more revenue for the government. So let’s cut tax rates. It’s a proven winner. If you are a
conservative, you know you’ve also use this argument.
Even Lindsey (woolsey) Graham, hardly a conservative, stated recently that flattening the tax code amongst other things could generate an additional $600 billion for the government coffers.
And there you have it. Graham has properly summed up the whole flawed tax cut argument in one sentence.
Well, I’m here to confess that I’ve been wrong. All these years of hammering tax rate reductions. I am man enough to admit it.
Now all you liberals reading this; don’t get too excited. To my conservative friends, buck up. I have not gone over to the dark side.
What I have had is an epiphany of sorts. It dawned on me that us freedom lovers have actually been arguing all these years for bigger government.
Think about just we’ve been advocating for; cutting taxes to get more tax revenue. Well, what will that additional revenue be used for? To grow government of course. So we are at least partially to blame for the growth of government.
In fact, we may be more to blame. Liberals and progressives are voted into office, raise taxes and ruin the economy. Then, what happens?
They are thrown out, conservatives are voted in, cut taxes, decrease regulations and voilà, increased revenue to the government. It doesn’t seem fair, does it?
In my humble opinion, the only way to save this country is not through tax rate reductions; capital gains rate cuts and the like. We know what will occur with their proper implementation; additional food for the beast.
We need to begin to advocate for smaller government. Decreasing the size of government is the only way of reining in spending at this point.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for keeping as much money as I can, but I think we are beyond that point.
By shrinking government’s size, the rest may take care of itself. It’s been too often proven that we can’t starve it. Government will always find more money somewhere.
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