$6.6 trillion lost on Bush tax cuts could pay all student loans, car loans, credit cards

[lovuian]

http://www.rawstory.com/2014/07/report-6-6-trillion-lost-on-bush-tax-cuts-could-pay-all-student-loans-car-loans-credit-cards/


new report argues that the Bush tax cuts actually cost Americans $6.6 trillion in personal income — more than enough to pay for every student loan, car loan and credit card debt in the U.S.

In an Al Jazeera America column on Wednesday, investigative reporter David Cay Johnston calculated the average income of Americans between 2001 and 2012 — the years President George W. Bush’s tax cuts were in effect. After adjusting for inflation he compared that income with the average income in 2000, and determined that $6.6 trillion was missing.

[world wide wally]

1. People are hypnotized by the term "tax cuts"

What they can't figure out is that every tax cut for the wealthy comes straight out of their pockets. The first thing they should think when they hear the words tax cuts is, "how much will this cost me"? Instead, they think that they are somehow saving money.
Republicans have the people well trained.

[Rex]

3. GOPers only know how to spend money, saving it is not only foreign to them but offensive.

And then when they have to depend on that very same government for a welfare check, they complain about it the most and want it dismantled.

[hifiguy]

6. They've been assiduously dumbing them down

for 40 years.

[SheilaT]

7. The other problem is that at least since

Ronald Reagan, people have been taught to believe that all taxes are evil, that there is absolutely nothing worth paying taxes for. Except for the military, but I suspect most people don't understand how much of their taxes go there. Or for corporate welfare. They think all their taxes go to support lazy welfare (read Black) mothers, people who are scamming the disability system, and allowing those on food stamps to live on champagne, lobster, and steak.

Sigh.

[SammyWinstonJack]

12. Just where do they think the money comes from to pay for those

tax cits that only benefit those who don't need thrm.

Someone going pay.......it's mind boggling.

[valerief]

27. Only the very wealthy ones and the stupid ones. nt

[Rex]

2. Of course they do, we live in a plutocracy that steals from the future generations.

When the PTB say, 'future generations' will have to pay for their crimes and neglect it was not a joke or but it was thrown out there rather casually.

We don't care, humans are just capital. Our system of government is totally sold out along with the media that supposedly keeps it in check.

[gratuitous]

4. Which means that by reversing those cuts

We could actually afford to educate, house, feed, and clothe our citizens. Yes, low-income folks might be out an additional $100 a year in taxes. In exchange for that, they'd get better schools, roads that didn't rip out the undercarriage of their cars, and better health care.

But a handful of people have convinced many citizens that that all that isn't worth $100 in taxes, or that their vote won't make a difference.

[SammyWinstonJack]

14. Pays for Bernie's proposals then, right?

Everyone wants something, but no one wants to
pay for it.

Don't tax me bro.

[SammyWinstonJack]

15. meh...well, don't tax me bro.

[hifiguy]

5. Johnston knows how to crunch those sorts of numbers

like very few do. KO used to have him on regularly and he's as smart as a treeful of owls.

[FairWinds]

8. All Obama had to do was NOTHING, and . .

let those tax cuts for the uber wealthy expire.

The idea of the 1% was to have no resources left over, after paying for the
Forever War, for health care, education, etc.

He sold us out.

[world wide wally]

9. He did let them expire

and that too was a battle against the GOP Congress

[RandiFan1290]

13. No they were extended

Then eventually made permanent

[smirkymonkey]

10. +1000

[SammyWinstonJack]

16. Pretty sure he was hand picked to do just that, sell us out.

Next up, Hillary.

[hifiguy]

24. Her job is to drive the last nails into the coffin of the

middle class and the Democratic party and complete the plutocratic takeover.

[malaise]

11. Yes but then the 1% could not make purchases like this one

What is more important???

[davidcay]

17. My column on the $6.6 trillion of income not realized

How fascinating that the people posting here give no hint that they actually read my column, which why incomes during the 12 years the Bush tax cuts were in effect were $6.6 trillion ($48,010 per tax household) lower than if we had maintained the income levels of 2000.

The whole premise of the GWBush tax cuts was that we would as a society all be better off and in October 2000 I carefully tied down the Bush campaign on its promise. Then when the data came out I went back and examined what happened. Why this is not every day journalism remains a mystery to me after almost a half century of reporting.

I encourage people who follow this website to read my column so they understand the facts and can marshal them in arguments about our federal tax policies, which subtly take from the many to redistribute upward:.

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/7/economy-bush-taxcutsgrowthjobs.html

If you click on my byline you can also read about who is seeing their wages rise (surprise, very top earners are in decline), how electricity prices are rigged to make them higher and other economic issues that get virtually no attention from any other journalist.

[lovuian]

18. Thank you very much

Your right journalism today is lacking

[FairWinds]

20. OK, I read your column and was very unpersuaded . .

What is the evidence that the lost income was due to the tax cuts?

To me, it is much more likely that most of the loss was due to the Bush financial melt-down.

Veterans For Peace

[lovuian]

21. I'll give this a shot

1. Iraq War put us in debt
2. Bush Financial Meltdown ...piled on the debt to Americans
3. The lost revenue from Bush tax cuts placed more debt
4.The Congress has not spent money to give services or help infrastructure in America because we were in debt

Which means a recession occurred and stock Market crash ...which took away wages, 401k's, retirements and veterans saw their benefits cut as well as other public employees do to the effect the government is in debt


When a government is in debt...the cuts made were at employees and services to constituents...but the rich paid less taxes and less taxes thus sucking out the American standard of Life

Just a shot

[FairWinds]

22. Thanks very much for the polite response . .

I think you are substantially correct, but I would give more weight
to the melt-down, and in addition the deliberate campaign by the
1% and the GOP to attack the middle class - just one example is the
decline in subsidies for higher education. That takes money from the
middle class and siphons it upward to the 1%; same for bankruptcy
"reform"; trashing unions, and much more.
It was and is quite deliberate.

And I read my Stiglitz, Dean Baker, Piketty, Reich, Krugman, etc.

Keep up the fine work !!

[hfojvt]

28. there isn't any

And George W. Bush kept moving the goalposts anyway. By early 2001 he was selling them as an economic stimulus, not to create more prosperity, but to revive the economy.

The whole calculation from the article is based on the idea that the prosperity of 2000 would continue indefinitely - something that has never happened in our history. In fact, thanks to rising gas prices and the FED continuing to tighten interest rates, the economy was already slowing down in 2000. In fact, in the last seven months of 2000, the economy only created 540,000 jobs - an average of only 77,000 per month.

The Bush tax cuts were not even pass until June 7, 2001 and except for the quick $300 checks, many of the high end tax cuts were going to phase in slowly over the next 3 or 4 years. By June 2001, the economy had lost 381,000 jobs, and it lost 197,000 in July and 148,000 in August.

Then something happened in September. I cannot remember what (something the media got all excited about) (yes, I know, it was more horrible than the Civil War, WWI, WWII and the flu pandemic combined). Anyway the economy lost 352,000 jobs in October, 298,000 in November and 239,000 in December.

Can any of that be blamed on the Bush tax cuts?

I don't see how that would be an honest attack to blame that on the Bush tax cuts.

Mind you, I detest the Bush tax cuts, but they cannot really be blamed for the economic troubles of 2001. In fact, I am fairly sure that they provided some stimulus to an ailing economy.

p.s. Keep in mind that my MA in economics IS from the University of Nebraska, and that that was long ago and far away...

[Vinca]

19. I've always wondered why the Wall Street bailout didn't travel through the consumer market

back to the bankers. Mortgages, car loans, etc., could have gotten a big subsidy making life easier for average people at the same time getting mountains of cash to the banks. Somehow average people end up at the bottom of the barrel and stay there.

[DirkGently]

23. Tax cuts, "tax and spend, "fiscal responsibility." All code.

Code for prioritizing monied interests over the collective good. All it ever was or ever will be.

[lovuian]

25. The Bush Debt created the Austere economy

Instead of creating revenue ....they decided to cut benefits


to Veterans
Federal Employees
Social Security
Medicare
Medicaid

Debt is the excuse to cut ......but yet what it does is


Economics 101....when the 1% owns the assets of a country
a Depression happens and what follows is a worker uprising...a social revolution

The Robber Barons are back but history repeats itself.....the next thing that follows is World Wars
because Billionaires will fight Billionaires....Kings fight Kings

[moondust]

26. Chart.

How The Clinton Surpluses Turned Into More Than $6 Trillion Worth Of Deficits