Tag Archives: McCain

The Return of Voodoo Economics

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Paul Krugman’s column in the New York Times today talked of the revival of “Voodoo economics” by some Republican politicians.  This refers to the Laffer Proposition that a cut in income tax rates stimulates economic activity so much that tax revenue goes up rather than down.   Gov. Sam Brownback, who is running for re-election in Kansas, has had to confront the reality that tax revenues went down, not up as he argued they would, when he cut state tax rates.

I disagree with one thing that Krugman wrote in his column: the idea that there was a long break,  particularly after George W. Bush took office, during which Republican politicians did not push this line.  To the contrary, I have collected many quotes from George W. Bush and his top officials claiming the Laffer Proposition during the decade of the 2000s.   The quotes are on pages 35-39 of “Snake-Oil Tax Cuts,” RWP 08-056, Harvard Kennedy School, 2008.   Here is one of many from him: “The best way to get more revenues in the Treasury is…cut taxes to get more economic growth.“ It is true that the chairmen of Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers did not support the Laffer Proposition, known as the centerpiece of “supply-side economics”.  But then that was also the case in the Reagan Administration. read more

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Four Magic Tricks for Aspiring Fiscal Conservatives

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Politicians who advertise themselves as “fiscal conservatives” sometimes campaign on crowd-pleasing pledges to cut taxes and simultaneously reduce budget deficits.  These are difficult promises to deliver on in practice, since the budget deficit equals government spending minus tax revenue.

Aspiring fiscal conservatives may be interested in learning four innovative tricks that are commonly used by American politicians who like to promise what seems impossible.   Each of these feats has been perfected over three decades or more.  Indeed they first acquired their colorful names in the early years of the Ronald Reagan presidency: read more

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Good International Exposure for Obama and McCain

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Senator Obama is on a vist to the Middle East and Europe.   Senator McCain went to visit Colombia earlier in July.   These trips suggest a seriousness of purpose that American presidential candidates often lack.    They offer us hope that the candidates want to learn how to do the job well.   Furthermore, they offer a hyper-attentive world grounds for hope that the next president will have a higher level of interest in other countries than did his predecessor.

 

So far as I know, it is unprecedented for the two party candidates to do foreign policy trips before the election.    I can think of three reasons why we are seeing this now.    First, because the primary elections started early this year, there is a hiatus between the end of the primaries and the party conventions.   Thus the candidates can spare the time to go abroad.   Second, foreign policy has risen much higher on the agenda of concerns of typical American voters, since September 11, 2001, and since the invasion of Iraq.   (And of course Obama wants to put to rest McCain’s past jibes about not having visited Afghanistan and Iraq.)   Third, Barack Obama and John McCain are not the usual inward-looking, domestically-oriented parochial governors that we all too often get as presidential candidates.    Both are US Senators, and both in their youths had very formative adventures in foreign countries (both in Southeast Asia, as it happens).    Thus both, if nothing else, have the cosmopolitan outlook that a world leader needs. read more

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