An editorial in the New York Times (“Surely They Can Read a Spreadsheet“) appeals to Big Business — and Small Business, for that matter — to support raising tax revenues. It would be not just the responsible thing to do; it would be in their own fiscal interest.
“A responsible argument by business for a balanced approach to reviving the economy and reducing the deficit could change the debate in Washington,” the editorial says. Maybe.
Corporate leaders may love their Republican allies, but do they love the GOP more than their own profits? Is the business community willing to gamble its earnings on the preferences of a radicalized party that nearly pushed the nation into voluntary default, even when private-sector leaders begged them not to play the game?
Private-sector leaders did speak out on the default, and while the establishment Republicans probably listened, the Tea Party element did not. My sense of things is that the baggers, in and out of office, are beyond worrying about the real effects of baggerism on the economy.
It’s a bit like Rick Perry’s weird defense of abstinence education. In the bagger mind, the inherent virtue they perceive in the “cuts only” approach outweighs any empirical evidence that it doesn’t actually work. So they are perfectly capable of seeing themselves as pro-business even as they ignore what business actually thinks about anything.
For a variation on this phenomenon, see Faux Nooz’s re-casting of Warren Buffett as a socialist after the billionaire’s call for higher taxes. That Buffett was arguing for the best policies to stimulate the economy — and thereby his own fiscal interests — flew right over their heads.
On the other hand, Steve M. argues that business isn’t hurting nearly enough to pry it loose from demands for tax cuts and deregulation.
So, just exactly how many small businesses would fail were the tax cuts for owners of small businesses making above $250,000/year rescinded? Ready? Three-percent of small business owners enjoy an income above 250 grand/year. 3% – and even then, the above-250 grand-bunch don’t necessarily make their pelf from their businesses – more likely there’s some invested, inherited money in the mix.
This is just one ‘fact’ (of many other ‘fictions’) used by baggers etc. when arguing against rescinding some specifics in Bush’s tax cuts.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – Republicans have no incentive to help the economy until they are in position to claim credit for it. NO credit can go to Obama or the Democrats – none, zip, zero, 0, zilch, nodda, nichts!
But you can bet your bottom dollar if there’s a Republican Presdient in 2013, that they’ll dust of Keynesian economics, and create a stimulus package to goose the economy. Oh, they won’t admit that it’s a stimulus package that even Keynes might have approved of. They’ll call it the “Milton Friedman/Ronald Reagan – Democrats Suck, So The Daddy Party Has to Come in and Give You Jobs and Save the Country Act!”
Also, too – that must be some powerful ju-ju Obama cast over an 80 year-old capitalist like Buffett, turning him into Karl Marx without the beard.
Maybe he ought to sprinkle some of that pixie dust on the Koch Brothers.
Or some anthrax… 😉
🙂
Baggerism is a religion, and you keep ‘believing’ when everything tells you that it just ain’t true. Tax cuts stimulate the economy; the wealthy pay all of the taxes already; Ronald Reagan never raised taxes; Obama has wrecked the economy (I actually wish this were true because it would then mean that he could unwreck the economy as well); abstinence education cuts teen pregnancy. It’s the same as Jesus was the son of god and died and rose again to save you from your sins. Only, with baggerism, there is proof that none of those things are true, whereas with Jesus, lets just say there is room for interpretation.
CUND GULAG -i agree republicans and particularly Teabaggers will tank the economy for political gain. When the economy ranked in ’08, trillions in wealth were wiped out. So a lot of powerful business people are opposed to that approach. The puppetmasers are not concerned with money as much as power. They want to deprive the federal government of the power to interfere. IMO, a lot of business leaders want to follow ecologically sound policies, but they don’t want to be at a competitive disadvantage with companies who have no scruples. So there’s *potentially* a rift between the normal republican CEO and the extreme platform of the teaparty/GOP. A lot of CocA types were lied to – IMO – by establishment GOP leaders like Boehner that the debt limit debate was under control. And it wasn’t. And Wall Street sees that now and they have no reason to approve of it.
The real question about the appeal by Buffett to raise taxes is no how it plays with me or with Fox news. How will it play in corporate bedrooms as presidential and CONGRESSIONAL races unfold? For that matter, how is it playing now with the militar-industrial complex facing a 600 billion dollar cut if the new catfoods commission deadlock?
Pingback: WORLD FOREX: Yen Weakens Amid Japan Intervention Watch | 1stpress.info
Pingback: Q&A: Will grocery workers strike? | 1stpress.info