Don’t Tax; Spend Even More!
The old insult hurled across the aisle is “tax and spend Democrats!”. In a new twist, the current crop of conservatives (in name but not policy) have managed to both cut taxes and significantly increase spending. To spin the phrase, “don’t tax and spend even more!”
This article from the NY Times gives a good brief. And don’t worry, they mostly quote from the Cato Institute and the Heritage Foundation which are libertarian and conservative think-tanks (respectively).
Some interesting stats:
While there may be explanations for higher spending, including the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Brian M. Reidl of Heritage says the federal budget has nonetheless grown at a rate of 7 percent a year under Mr. Bush, about twice the 3.5 percent rate under Bill Clinton.
Even if you excuse the war spending (which you shouldn’t):
But both Mr. Reidl and Mr. Edwards say that even so-called nonmilitary discretionary spending — the portion of the budget that a president can rein in, because it does not go to entitlement programs like Medicare and Medicaid — has grown faster under Mr. Bush than Mr. Clinton.
Why did this happen?
When Republicans ran Congress, Mr. Bush never vetoed a spending bill, despite calls for him to do so from fiscal conservatives, including Jim Nussle, the former chairman of the House Budget Committee who has just become Mr. Bush’s new budget director. Peter Wehner, a former domestic policy adviser to Mr. Bush, says the president sometimes deferred to the House speaker at the time, J. Dennis Hastert.
So there you have it. While blaming the Democrats for all ills, the President has actually presided over a period of massive increases in government spending, ironically caused by a Republican controlled legislature. Please take this note to heart so you can correct the next person who uses the “tax and spend” line.
Filed under economics, politics : Comments (2) : Sep 22nd, 2007 by tadfad
September 24th, 2007 at 8:04 pm
Nice post. The don’t tax spend more theory does have a little basis in fact. Below is an article from the Cato Institute exploring some Tax cuts in the 20’s. There has been studies that have shown lower tax rates and taxation can lead to higher tax revenue.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/tbb/tbb-0302-13.pdf
September 24th, 2007 at 10:47 pm
In response to Brandon’s post: the point I was trying to make is that the rhetoric doesn’t match the reality. The Republican party has historically stood upon the guise of cutting taxes and curbing growth in government spending, while accusing their Democratic partners of doing just the opposite. In a strange turn of events, the Republicans are now the leaders in big government spending with the Democrats playing the role of fiscal conservatives. Surprising how quickly a party can change its platform.