Closing tax loopholes is the key. The tax rates could stay where they are as long as the ultra wealthy are not allowed to shelter funds. The whole Buffett pays at a lower tax rate than his secretary was overblown, but there still was some truth there.

As for raising the minimum wage, that affects less than 20% of the country, and unless you are talking about a 50% increase, those people will still be living in poverty:
40 hours X $7.25 X 52 weeks = $16 K a year. amazingly low number

Trickle-down works based on what? As long as American workers are competing with workers in low wage countries then wages will NOT rise. Are you kidding? Do we want to be China now? I don't get it. Companies move to countries with far less than a "living wage," and countries that they can pollute freely.

A book I read not too long ago, can't remember which one, talks about externalities. Those are costs that businesses inflict on someone else that they don't pay for. They give an example of a small business that is receiving an award at a ceremony in front of the store, but in the back there is a hill that slopes down to a stream and you can see that they're just dumping all of their waste products into the stream. If they'd been paying for the cost of disposing of their waste properly, then they might not even be profitable. Should they still receive this award? Should the government and law enforcement step in to shut this down?
A public option DOES NOT imply that health insurance is a right and it wouldn't necessarily add to the debt. Those tax cuts I mention for the are temporary to help the economy, everyone in my DOES pay taxes and all of the loopholes are gone.

I'm not saying that more government is necessarily better. I'm not saying that less government is better. I'm saying that better government is better.
A government that is responsible to the people instead of "monied interests."

Can't disagree with any of that, but the increase in the minimum wage I talked about wasn't necessarily to bring people out of poverty but to increase demand and bring the wage more in line with what it was at its inception.

Post of the thread! So the question then becomes when will enough of the populace realize this and vote accordingly?

It's sad that you think that.

I don't think it's sad at all actually. Yeah, the tax code needs work, but this country was not founded on "big" government. In fact this country was founded on anti-big government. The socialists do NOT have it better. Ask them. Don't ask the Socialism wanna be Californians. Ask the people living it.

Now, my friend from Russia thinks Communism beats Capitalism hands down. His perception is the Russia he grew up in was one where a government stayed out of the way but made sure everyone had what they needed.

Of course he is here. Not there. And this escapes him completely.

No, big government is not the answer. Getting back to the Constitution is the answer, and that means a lot of people in Washington will have to cease business as usual, which is the business of making the under class more and more reliant on government (them).

The only way we're going to legislate our way out of the mess we're in in to legislate big government back to the stone ages. Can that happen? I'm not so sure. As I've already said, I don't know that I have enough faith in American's anymore, but it will happen or sure as the fall of Rome the America my kids grow up in will be a mere shell of what the founders had in their vision. Hell. It already is...

You say that business as usual is "the business of making the under class more and more reliant on government." You might believe that, but I think you also see what I see. You see big corporations and the super rich making the rules. They control the purse strings that fund the campaigns of our congressmen. It's big business that lines up to suck from the government tit. There have been multiple studies that show that the wants on needs of the poor are completely ignored by government and the middle class doesn't fair much better, if at all. But the wealthy bark and they jump. I think you know that. I saw a video of Ron Paul talking about the "soft from of Facism" that he sees developing in the U.S. and it's because a couple of big corporations run the show.

The think you read the post about my economic plan, what did you think of it? Danno responded with talking points and republican dogma. I asked "Trickle-down works based on what?' The answer is nothing. It doesn't work. Bruce Bartlett, who is an economist who has worked for Reagan, Ron Paul, George H.W. Bush, and others, says it doesn't work. And this is a man who helped pioneer the idea. President George H.W. Bush called it "Voodoo economics." Danno talks about the FairTax and a Flat Tax, but Bruce Bartlett, in The Benefit and the Burden, gives a whole list of reasons that both of these ideas are terribly flawed. He talks about "over-regulation," but what regulations are bad and a lot of times it seems that people think all regulation is bad. Is the Dodd-Frank bill bad? I think so, but not because it over-regulates. The bill is over 2,000 pages long and an aide who helped write it said he was told to make it longer and longer so they could fit in all of the loopholes. Herman Cain talked about making bills three pages long (he may have sounded a bit nutty) but he was on the right track. The average America should be able to understand the law. The framers wanted that, but that's not how it works now. The Glass-Steagle Act was fewer than 40 pages and stabilized the financial system for decades. When I bring up Pygouvian, or good taxes, I referencing the work of Luigi Zingales, whose book A Capitalism for the People has praise from Congressman Paul Ryan on the back.

If my economic plan leads to job growth, reduces spending, stabilizes the financial system and would allow us get by without raising tax rates and, over time, would allow us to lower taxes for everyone, how doesn't that jive with the Constitution? Isn't my plan really at the heart of conservatism?

Oh, since you put it that way, :lol:, here's my two cents ... disclaimer: I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat and don't get along with the Ron Paul people either, I dislike them all equally and just try to cover my ass regardless of who's running the country, :mrgreen:.

Q: How do we get wages up? A: Do we need to, or do we need to bring outsourced jobs back to the US? That's where I'm at ... having the unions structured like they are in Europe as a single, collective union vs each individual trade acting seperately would help also. I don't agree with the raising of the minimum wage unless it's going to be raised to a 'living wage' and view it mostly as a safeguard for unskilled workers who would otherwise be taken advantage of by employers.
- I see wages up in the skilled labor sectors, down in the unskilled ... Michigan has been proactively retraining/preparing it's workforce to compete for these higher skilled/higher paying jobs with some success ... those are the keys, IMO, train the workforce, bring the jobs back. Employer based healthcare will be covered under the next question & I didn't quite understand the 'Pigouvian Tax' and am generally opposed to taxes.

Q: What about my health insurance? A: I would hope nobody begrudges a fellow human being that needs it, healthcare ... which is what we already do in the US ... you enter a medical facility through the emergeny room (excluding private) and you will receive medical care regardless of your ability to pay ... you may get your ass billed off later on and go bankrupt, but you'll get medical attention you need ... problem here is too many people are clogging up the emergency rooms with non-emergency type care. I don't understand why we need another program like Obamacare and don't just issue everyone a Medicare card so they can access Urgent Care or a regular doctor ... those receiving government assistance can be billed for their healthcare just like is done with Social Security recipients to help defray costs, and maybe the politicians could stop raiding programs like Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security so they can remain solvent, eh? The business tax could be reconfigured so employers contribute to the program, but only at a fraction of the cost they paid out to maintain their own healthcare programs. I don't agree with allowing health insurance to be purchased across state lines for the very reason you stated, it would lead to 'crappier' private insurance ... I've opted out many an employer's health plan because it was 'crappy' and didn't feel it offered any real value for my money ... that kind of stuff is just smoke & mirrors healthcare, and really isn't healthcare at all.

Q: What about the job creators? A: I'm tired hearing about 'the job creators' ... you mean the corporations we bail out with billions of tax dollars so they can discharge their creditors, remove legacy costs they promised to their retirees, close plants, layoff thousands of workers and pretend to pay back a portion of their debt to the American taxpayer with over-inflated stock where the price immediately plunges to less then 50% of the IPO? Last I heard, the 'trickle-down' affect there was a $38 billion dollar loss to the American taxpayer ... nah, I rarely see 'trickle-down' working, at any level ... instead of giving tax breaks to corporations, I'd rather see a penalty for them incorporating offshore (a popular method of avoiding US taxes) and/or outsourcing jobs offshore ... it's only right if you want access to US markets/consumers and do business here. I don't focus on small business because I think the whole notion that they're the largest source of jobs in the US is a farce ... they're the ones paying minimum wage, not offering health insurance or any kind of benefits and generally abusing their employees in my neck of the woods.

Q: What about taxes in general? A: In general, I'll vote against any tax because I don't trust any politician on any level to apply tax dollars as they are intended, case in point: Social Security/any local millage applied to a 'general fund'. I don't care anymore if the 'Bush (now the Obama) tax-cuts' expire and support going back to the tax rates of the Clinton era, which were much lower then previous tax levels anyway, but still provided enough revenue to run the country. I wouldn't mind a flat-tax or a consumer-tax in that you could control how much you pay ... don't consume, don't pay tax ... why should I be subsidizing some eco-snob to purchase an overpriced, under-engineered Chevy Volt? Get rid of all tax-breaks, you say? If you do your own taxes, you should have noticed this is being done already.
- I'll touch on the small-business tax code briefly ... in Michigan, it's a mess and they have/are revamping it to make it more small-business friendly ... I don't mind, my whole neighborhood is Mom & Pops and I don't begrudge anyone going into business for themselves ... but I also know these places are not sources of long term employment, pay minimum wage, offer no healthcare/benefits, cut corners where they can and consider their employees as an 'expense' rather then an 'asset' ... any breaks they get 'trickle down' into their personal budgets rather then into 'creating jobs', which is why I have a problem considering small business as 'job creators'.

Q: With our current political system, how does this get done? A: It won't, partisan-politics and special-interests will be the death of the country ... SloMotion - "out".

http://images.sodahead.com/polls/002..._1_xlarge.jpeg

Nice post. Exactly what I was hoping for. Thoughtful and original, not talking points and dogma.

I'll try to explain Pigouvian taxes better. With quotes, instead of my garbled non-sense.

"The goal of this type of tax (named Pigouvian after Arthur Pigos, the British economist who invented it) is to correct distorted incentives, not to raise revenue. If it does generate revenue, however, we have a double benefit: we improve efficiency and we save the need to impose distortionary taxes to pay for government expenses. The tax on tobacco is an example of a Pigouvian tax, if we consider the cost of Medicare and Medicaid to be a cost imposed on the rest of society." (pg222) A Capitalism for the People by Luigi Zingales

I'll go on quoting to try to explain the tax on the financial system: "A better solution is a tax on short-term debt, especially that held by financial institutions. By taxing the use of short-term debt (with maturity of less than a year, for example), we can discourage both excessive leverage and short-term leverage, preventing a crisis. Also, a 1 percent tax on outstanding short-term debt would raise $21.5 billion annually just among the top nine institutions. This is equal to the total amount of taxes raised from the 65 million households making less than $30,000 a year. So this tax could exempt 65 million households from paying taxes, while stabilizing the financial system and preventing a new crisis." (pg223)

He says it "could exempt" but doesn't necessarily advocate for it. I take it a step farther and say that, for five years, those 65 million households could be exempted and this would put $107.5 billion dollars in the hands of the people most likely to spend it and increase demand dramatically. Then, those taxes on the 65 million households could be phased back in over the next five years to avoid a dramatic increase in taxes from one year to the next on people who functionally poor or working poor.

I hope that helps. Zingales doesn't mention it, but I think a Cap and Trade tax on carbon would be a great example of a Pigouvian tax, because it would curb carbon emissions and raise revenue. And before any Cap and Trade haters get up in arms, we've done it before under President George H.W. Bush to deal with sulphur dioxide and acid rain. It was really effective.

I have a question for you, SloMotion. How do we deal with health care costs that have been rising faster than inflation for years now? I like the idea of Medicare for all, but, until we can curb those costs, wouldn't it explode the debt? The purpose of my version of a "Public Option" is, for the most part, to hedge against this growth. No one is compelled to join, so we don't have questions about infringement on liberty, and because it's designed to be revenue neutral, if the cost of health care goes up, then the rates participants pay go up. No added cost on taxpayers not participating. If the public option ends up accidentally turning a profit, then those profits can be rebated to participants or go to pay down the debt.

Thanks, I don't necessarily know what I'm talking about, it's just what I see and my own experience.

Alright, I understand the Pigouvian Tax theory when you explain it as a sin-tax ... not that I have any vices, ;) ... and that does kind of correlate with my opinion of flat/consumer type taxing ... if you want to play, you got to pay and in the same way I'd agree with that 1% taxing of financial institutions on short term debt (which they would pass on to the consumer, of course), with hesitation but in the knowledge that I could avoid that tax simply by limiting any short-term borrowing, ie credit.

- I'm on the fence with Cap & Trade, mostly because I see how easy it is to get around by simply 'trading credits' ... you get a guy like Al Gore who promotes it, then jets around the country abusing it by offsetting his actions with 'carbon credits' or something like that ... IDK.

The real problem, I've been told, with rising health costs, is people visiting emergency rooms with non-emergency illnesses ... my assumption is if you give these people access to urgent care or a regular doctor, they quit abusing the emergency room & you get control of this aspect of runaway health costs. I'm not for forcing people into taking anything, just providing it as an option for those who can't afford health insurance. IDK how you'd avoid not taxing everyone for this, but as we pay Medicare/Medicaid taxes already, I don't see the big deal. If anything & hypothetically, people would leave private insurance rolls, creating a huge competition for the remaining private insurance customers and drive the cost of private insurance down. As for costs like pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, private insurance, et ... I'm all for supply,demand & competition controlling those costs.

Of course, it all seems so simple to me, but I'm sure there's some good reason our politicians have such a problem with this ... something like some special interest isn't going to make a few million and be able to contribute to a PAC fund or whatever ...

You say you'd like a flat/consumer type tax and I'm on board, but Bruce Bartlett, who I mention in other posts, lays out the problems with the FairTax and flat taxes that most people espouse. He does that in The Benefit and the Burden, but he goes on to advocate a type of tax on consumption, called a Value-Added Tax, that many other countries already have in place. I support moving in that direction eventually, but Bartlett makes the case that we have to have a healthy economy first and I don't think there are many out there who think our economy is healthy right now.

You say that the tax on short-term debt would lead to less credit and maybe it would, but not for the general public. I think he's talking about the money that banks lend to each other.

You're on the fence about Cap and Trade, but it is the compromise, right. In the past, the left wanted CAP and the right wanted, um, NOTHING, so they settled on Cap and Trade to regulate sulphur dioxide and it worked. Now the left wants Cap and Trade and the right seems to want, um, NOTHING. The compromise I see us getting at this point is a Cap and Trade bill that is littered with loopholes and ineffective. A system that costs money and doesn't regulate $%!^. Cap and Trade is good.

...It could be good, but with the current political system, where candidates move to the extremes to avoid being beaten by a primary challenger, a system where politicians depend on "monied interests" to fund campaigns, a congress that doesn't play by the same rules we do, writes laws with loopholes ON PURPOSE, and has a filibuster that legislating difficult/impossible, we're boned. We know how to fix those things. Sadness. :-(

Ancient Aliens is on RIGHT NOW! I don't know how it can be coincidence.

I know who Bruce Bartlett is. There is another key member of the Reagan Administration who now preaches hard against the policies of the time. As Bill Cosby once said, "He's just an old my trying to get into heaven now." He bailed on the administration to work for a college. I'm not going to mention his name because I don't want to promote the man. We can all look back from 30 years up the road and look brilliant when we speak of past policies. That's what they say about hindsight.

Don't you find it odd that these men are for what's hip and hot right now? You're intelligent and thoughtful. I can see that.

The whole economic debate comes down to which side of the fence you're arguing from. If you're a small player in the gas industry, for example, you want less government. You want less regulations. You want less interference in general. I know this first hand.

If you're the part of the democrat base you want more. That's just true. That party markets itself to the poor by telling them what they want to hear, and they buy it hook, line, and sinker. That's why all those people who'd never pulled a lever in their lives came out from under the woodwork to Vote for Obama. They didn't know what you and I know. Obama, as a candidate, didn't reinvent the wheel. He just marketed to ignorant people who didn't know any better. Half of them have turned on him because he didn't give them the free ride he promised. Sadly that isn't enough and he will likely get reelected.

Government invades our lives in ways it was never supposed to. I'm NOT saying the government shouldn't regulate and create laws and so on. Of course it should, but by agreeing with Danno's post my point is the ONLY plan that will work is a plan that gets government back to where it was intended, because that's what made American great once, and it can never be great again unless and until the business of politics is changed.

Economists can and will argue over what's right. That's what they do. None of it is accurate, because it's all based on somebody's agenda. You don't find the Economists educated at Berkeley disagreeing with one another though. Go figure. I am a disciple for none of them.

You're looking for specific answers to specific problems. I'm telling you that I'm looking at the bigger picture.

True Dat! As long as there are enough "Moochers" (for those in Rio Linda, those abusing the system to undeservedly improperly reap personal benefit) around to re-elect "Looters" (for those in Rio Linda, the representatives who pass legislation, many times by mischaracterizations and deceit, benefiting those Moochers solely to remain in power), not much will change, sadly.

Not too much I can disagree with here. But, I think, the great thing about hindsight is that it is 20/20 and we can evaluate and re-evaluate what worked and what didn't. The economists that I've read, seemingly regardless of the side they come down on, don't come down very far apart. I think...no, I know that most people listen to politicians and pundits (who don't even hide their agendas, they're flaunted) when we want to learn about how the economy works and that's a huge mistake.

My argument IS for less government spending and IS for less government intrusion in our personal lives, but, I think, when people see that the plan DOES require government to do something, they tune out or slap the big government tag on it. It's disappointing.

I guess the thing I'm most disappointed about, is that Gov. Buddy Roemer was completely shut out of the Republican debates despite polling as well as some of the candidates that made the cut. His main focus is Lessig-style campaign finance reform. A Republican I could vote for, despite many disagreements, and someone, I think, we could have been proud of.

Lawrence Lessig, who I mention frequently, wrote "Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress and a Plan to Stop It." It's incredible (incredible meaning it's awesome and not meaning it lacks credibility)! If Lawrence Lessig were to run for president in 2016, which is less than likely, it would prove the existence of a higher power. I don't trust most politicians, and he isn't a politician, but I'd trust him completely. If it turned out that he disagreed with me on something, I guess I'd just have to assume I was wrong. He's like a balding half-human half-angel hybrid with glasses.

Thanks for the response.

The truth is that Danno and I are cut, essentially, from the same mold on these topics. He and I are both Conservative. He and I both loved Reagan.

I loved Reagan not because he was conservative. Not because he was an actor. Not because my grandpa (a card carrying Dem by the way) met with him in New Orleans while he was Governor of California. It is because, in my humble opinion, he was a true leader of men. In my opinion he was the last true leader of men to live in the white house, and maybe before him you have to get all the way back to Kennedy.

Let me say this about trickle down: I'm not smart enough nor am I well read enough to comment intelligently - I think I was in the 6th grade at the time. What's funny to me is the people who DESIGNED it are now preaching against it. I guess that's a large part of my point.

I have an uber-liberal co-worker/friend. He and I are alike in many ways. We both love music, appreciate art, and have many other similar beliefs. We talk and typically disagree a lot, but it's healthy. I see his point clearly. He is extremely articulate. Sometimes he's wrong. Sometimes he falls too far on the side of PC in the face of common sense. But common sense doesn't always cut it either, in a country as dynamic as ours. The answers are almost never as clear as I might want them to be, and he calls me on that. What's interesting is that he's a black man from Baltimore and I'm a white Conservative from the deep South. Go figure.

Why our politicians can't interact with one another similarly hacks me off. I mean, I know why. I get the reasoning behind why they do what they do. The ONE thing I'd like from my government is to regulate the politicians, because if you do that, 70 percent of your problems go away overnight.

This is the crux of everything that is wrong with our current government.

Once elected they look at opposing party members as lepers. No bi-partisan work gets done, and if a bill does get through to a vote, it rarely passes unless there is a true majority, or there is some compromise where the other party adds two three items in exchange for the vote.

Sad that the 11th hours negotiations are as close to compromise and unity that our can accomplish. Can you imagine a Fortune 500 company being successful if everyone only agreed on their individual ideas?

It's truly scary, what things in Washington have become. Our nation is more diverse than ever, and that is a contributing factor, but those politicians aren't there to serve anything other than their own backsides. It's maddening.

We need a leader. Not a good marketer. Not a good speech writer. Not a guy that looks good on TV. We are desperate for one. Where is he/she?

... that pretty much sums it up for me & I especially like the 'regulate politicians' viewpoint ... some kind of term-limits would work wonders at unclogging the log jam you see daily in Congress ... serve your country to the best of your ability, then go home! ... they make the military retire after 20yrs, why not Senators or Representatives?

I don't disagree, but I think term limits for members of congress were deemed unconstitutional a while back. A system of publicly financed campaigns would, hopefully, do wonders. A system that makes politicians and potential politicians dependent on the people. Also, in Australia, 96% of people show up at the poles. 96%! It's not magic; we know how they did it and we can do it too. We don't need "safe-seats" for our representatives, we need competition. Getting rid of gerrymandering is doable. We don't need red states, blue states, and red and blue districts. We need a purple country, where the best candidate with the best ideas wins the nomination and, hopefully, the election.

That is a very good question. Where is he/she.

Colin Powell could have been such a leader, he would have made an awesome president IMHO, but he got thrown under the bus by the Republicans with the "aluminum tubes" business and then the Tea Party reviled him further, for speaking common sense instead of towing the party line of Tea Party dogma. Numerous "Blue Dog" Democrats had a shot at being bi-partisan, and were primary-challenged by their own party and then nuked by the rise of the Tea Party in 2010, making them a dwindling and largely irrelevant group today. John McCain in 2000 was very well respected and was not hated by Democrats at the time (and still is respected by many today as a voice of reason) and would very likely have defeated Al Gore in 2000. But Karl Rove and the religious right destroyed McCain with negative attack ads in the 2000 primary season, in favor of the less experienced, more hard-right George W. Bush... McCain in 2000 was an extremely viable candidate, and would have made for a VERY different decade in America IMHO, but by the time McCain ran again in 2008 it was too late, the damage had already been done.

Many on the right side hate and revile her, but in her actual track record Hillary is actually a pragmatic moderate and a decent statesperson...But of course the Democrats dumped her in favor of an unproven candidate with whom the Republicans (driven by the Tea Party) have openly declared they will choose not to work with him at all. In 2004 Howard Dean had a track record of being socially liberal, while fiscally conservative, which is in line with what polling data suggests that "average Americans" have said they want, or what works best with leading a divided country such as ours. If the country is evenly split, then socially liberal, fiscally conservative policies are the historically proven way to go, at least based on the past. Dean's actual track record as governor was moderate and implemented many Republican fiscal ideas...he had endorsements from elements of the left (Al Gore) and elements of the right (NRA)....but then he kind of imploded with The Scream, and the media on both sides absolutely torched him, instead of saying, hey, well at least the guy is human.

So it seems to me, the potential for real leaders are there. It's just not being implemented on either side.

Gawd this post is so full of BS my eyes are turning brown.

Name one thing the TEA party actually stands for that you don't like.

George W hard right? Are you freaking kidding me? The hard right despised GW for his frequent caving to the left and his spending like a Democrat.

My gawd I didn't think anyone could be this mislead. I guess thats how a Marxist like Obama comes into power. Hitler called you guys useful idiots. I just disagree with the useful part.

This birther thread has digressed into GOP vs. Demo name calling... it was about birthers guys.

Sadly, thread closed.