[quote=faterikcartman]I burned myself out on my last post so I’ll try to be brief.
Again I find myself disagreeing with the assumptions. Education spending is a black hole with returns that don’t match the investment when compared to our performance vis-a-vie the rest of the world. Clearly there is a problem; but it’s not spending.
I read one post as touting those “shovel ready jobs” we were promised. Even the president now admits those weren’t real. So the money was spent, but not on the things you say would help. Moreover, FDR tried the same thing and actually created shovel ready jobs; but current non-idealogical research finds they didn’t help either.
As for demand side vs. supply side, I think you misread my post and missed my overarching point about how economies work. Let people keep their money and spend it themselves because their purchases reflect real demand. Central planning, or government directed spending, IMO, does not reflect real demand. It generates artificial demand. For reasons I tried to explain, this sort does not provide real, or sustainable growth. Again, history points this out.
I do realize, however, that politics and ideology drives things, not economic reality. I am of fan of Thomas Sowell chronicling of this phenomena and encourage everyone to read his column for an alternate view.
The bottom line is I’m not a totalitarian. I believe in individualism and free men and women. Ultimately I favour letting people keep what they earn rather than the collective stealing of the fruits of their labour to be distributed to those who did not earn it. Again, history has shown that when the other view is pursued there reaches a tipping point where people are inclined to either stop working so hard or flee. History is happening right now with people fleeing New York.
One can yammer on about how such and such did or did not work during a period of time and we can argue whether it was the result of tax policy, macroeconomic monetary policy, business cycles, population growth, or fill-in-the-blank. But if we continue further and further down the road we’re on — unsustainable government borrowing and spending — from the USSR to today’s Greece, there are mountains of evidence suggesting impending disaster, but not much suggesting that borrowing and spending our way out of trouble is going to work. That’s why I took the time to underline some fundamentals about how it all works. Many people get hung up on the formulae and talking points and seem to lose sight of the basics.
When I studied economics at the University of California I was both lucky to have only one professor easily identifiable as a lefty, and a natural skepticism. I’m constantly suspicious of today’s education system being more indoctrination than education. Obviously things are worse for those who only get their economic info from the NYT and MSNBC. YMMV.
I’m sure I missed addressing a lot of points but I have to let it go as my wife says I’m going to have a heart attack getting exorcised over internet posts. How about that Riviera Supper Club get together? We can fight over this stuff combined with the magical effects of alcohol![/quote]
Yes, basic scientific research (don’t forget the NIH!), physical infrastructure, legal infrastructure, military defense, etc., etc. All of this has to be paid, somehow.
While it’s perfectly understandable that people don’t want to pay taxes, can you show us a single country that has very low/no taxes, yet has the same outcomes that the more socialist countries do WRT health, literacy, quality of life/happiness, per capita GDP, etc. for its citizens? After all, if 100% pure capitalism and zero taxes are the key to great wealth and success, why is it that most successful countries have higher taxes and more robust social safety nets?
