The Republican caller on C-Span this morn.

[rwork]

Talking about reducing taxes raises revenue. Loud mouthed and arrogant.He mentioned in the 90's they raised taxes on "Yacht Building".He said it destroyed the yacht industry.What a tragedy.

[gratuitous]

1. So he's saying he's in favor of more gov't spending?

Nutzoid.

And yet, for all this "increase" in government revenues, the Republicans who control the government are still running massive, record-breaking budget deficits.

[Cassandra]

2. The luxury tax didn't work well.

It targeted US businesses (many small and family-owned), catering to people who could easily buy imported luxury goods. I'm in the jewelry business and it was seen as really a major problem. One particularly annoying rule said that if a customer brought in a diamond or a piece of jewelry to be remounted or redesigned, they were taxed on the entire value of the finished piece, no matter the value of the parts already owned by the customer. How many times do you want to be taxed on something you already own? This made a major dent in retailers' remount business, which left less open-to-buy for the rest of us.

[ItsTheMediaStupid]

3. Clinton's change to the tax code in 1993 was very successful

It is the reason we were running a surplus when he left office.

While it was a fiscal success, it was a political problem and part of the reason we lost congress in 1994.

The luxury tax was not a good idea. Nobody is perfect, espcially when changing something as enormous as our tax code.

One thing we know for certain is that "supply side" tax cuts have resulted in huge defecits both times they have been implemented. This happened early Reagan's presidency and again with W's binge of tax cuts for the wealthy.

[Dr.Phool]

4. That's a meme from the Reagan Administration

Never was proven, but they claimed that Carter destroyed the yacht-building industry in New England with a luxury tax.