Usa Thread

[Steve]

Hillary would had an easier time of winning than Obama in 08.

[Bangkoktraveler]

Easy:

 

For tax years 1944 through 1951, the highest marginal tax rate for individuals was 91%, increasing to 92% for 1952 and 1953, and reverting to 91% for tax years 1954 through 1963.^[28]

For the 1964 tax year, the top marginal tax rate for individuals was lowered to 77%, and then to 70% for tax years 1965 through 1981. In 1978 income brackets were adjusted for inflation, so fewer people were taxed at high rates.^[29] The top marginal tax rate was lowered to 50% for tax years 1982 through 1986.^[30] Reagan undid 40% of his 1981 tax cut, in 1983 he hiked gas and payroll taxes, and in 1984 he raised tax revenue by closing loopholes for businesses.^[31] According to historian and domestic policy adviser Bruce Bartlett, Reagan's 12 tax increases over the course of his presidency took back half of the 1981 tax cut.^[32]

^{https://en.wikipedia...e_United_States}

 

Reagan 'forced' the States to raise their sales taxes, etc. and counties raised their property taxes because Reagan's Federal Government

provided less money to the States. In effect, his policies, which arestill with us now, actually raised taxes dramatically.

[Flashermac]

How to balance the budget:

 

Residents Alerted to Obamas' Hawaiian Holiday Plans

 

http://www.hawaiireporter.com/residents-alerted-to-obamas-hawaiian-holiday-plans/123

[kamui]

How to balance the budget:

 

Residents Alerted to Obamas' Hawaiian Holiday Plans

 

http://www.hawaiirep...liday-plans/123

 

You mean that the leader of the most powerful country on earth should not be able to spend Christmas holiday with his famliy at the place of his childhood?

 

:surprised:

 

While the President and his friends pay for their own rental homes, taxpayers pick up the cost of security and waterfront housing for the Secret Service, Navy Seals and Coast Guard as well as staff accommodations at a plush beachfront Waikiki hotel.

I guess you expect that he pays Airforce One and his security out of his own pocket?

 

I regard to Obama's and his familie's travels some US media and blogs are surprisingly petty-minded.

[cavanami]

His birthplace was in Africa!

[Flashermac]

The leader of the most powerful nation in the world was not raised in THAT neighbourhood. And his home for many years has been in Chicago.

[Steve]

This is my unscientific view on the tax rate thingy. I'm not an economist obviously. While i do think there are pros and cons to the different views of where the marginal tax rates should be and I tend to think that a lower tax rate overall seems logically better than a higher one, I don't think tax rates, within reason, are a huge determinant of if an economy will expand and grow.

 

Particularly to America, I think the one thing that has had the most impact on growth are Americans themselves. We've always been a country of entrepreneurs, ideas, and risk takers. Its pretty much in our DNA.

 

Most countries are like that. Not just America. There are tax rates of vastly different rates throughout the world and people have prospered in all of them. If you build a better mouse trap you will make money. No matter the rate. Some European countries have what seems to be a horrifically high rate to Americans but have produced great companies and billionaires.

 

It doesn't matter what the rate would have been in the '90s, the Internet and Tech boom was so big, it was going to overcome pretty much any obstacle. Many people actually got rich in the Depression era. Since '08, the Dow increased and pretty much most of the Forbes 400 got back their 'loss' (paper loss actually) from '08 and a good percentage are even richer. This during a financial crisis and slow recovery.

 

Economies go in cycles and trend up. Japan has been stagnated for almost a couple decades now and were still the number 2 economy unti recently.

 

I also think this business roundtable the White House has is all BS. Big business are always going to complain and always going to ask for way more than they need in terms of regulations, tax rates, etc. Why shouldn't they? If I were a CEO I'd do the same. What this roundtable needs are people from the consumer or taxpayer advocacy groups who call them on the bullshit. What corporation is going to say they don't need corporate welfare, when its clear they don't need certain ones. These business groups argue to keep it all the time. I'm not saying they don't have valid concerns but just taking them a their word is not wise either.

 

Government decisions can slow or kill growth or speed it up and visa versa. However, no matter what the government does, economic forces are always bigger. Those forces are what ultimately expands or contracts the economy. All the government can do is do what it can to help the boon times go longer or shorten the bad times. It can't stop either altogether.

[Flashermac]

It is not so many years ago that people were claiming Japan was buying up the USA. And look at Japan now.

[waerth]

Maybe they got infected by the American problems .....

[kamui]

It is not so many years ago that people were claiming Japan was buying up the USA. And look at Japan now.

 

The Japanese fucked up their economy on a major scale at the beginning of the 1990s and did never really recover from it. Their political system is completely intertwined with an extremely powerful bureaucracy which is run by a powerful and highly corrupt conservative elite - and both entities are closely connected to the most powerful business associations. On the other hand the Japanese leaders are extremely weak (very much different to the position and ability to lead of the US president) and - except prime minister Koizumi ("Lionheart" 2001-2006) - were and are inapt to change the course of the country and reform the economy.