President Obama didn’t offer a budget plan yesterday. The White House hasn’t released anything beyond a set of talking points. But that’s not terribly surprising since his speech was really the opening salvo of his 2012 reelection fight. And it’s clear that a central…
Daily Analysis
Obama’s Tax Increase Trigger: Punishing Taxpayers with Automatic Tax Hikes When Politicians Overspend
Responding to widespread criticism of his AWOL status on the budget fight, President Obama today unveiled a fiscal plan. It already is being criticized for its class warfare approach to tax policy, but the most disturbing feature may be a provision that punishes the…
Happy Tax Freedom Day!
If you are an average American, today is a great day. According to the Tax Foundation, you have finally worked long enough and earned enough money to satisfy the annual tax demands of federal, state, and local governments. This means you now get to keep any additional…
Reckless IRS Regulation Would Put Foreign Tax Law over American Tax Law and Drive Investment out of the United States
I’m not a big fan of the IRS, but usually I blame politicians for America’s corrupt, unfair, and punitive tax system. Sometimes, though, the tax bureaucrats run amok and earn their reputation as America’s most despised bureaucracy. Here’s an example. Earlier this…
Congressman Ryan’s Budget Is a Big Step in the Right Direction
The Chairman of the House Budget Committee, Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, will be unveiling his FY2012 budget tomorrow. Not all the details are public information, but what we do know is very encouraging. Ryan’s plan is a broad reform package, including limits…
Senator Corker’s CAP Act: A Better Version of Gramm-Rudman to Reduce the Burden of Government
This Thursday, April 7, Senator Corker of Tennessee will be the opening speaker at the Cato Institute’s conference on “The Economic Impact of Government Spending” (an event that is free and open to the public, so register here if you want to attend). The Senator will…
A Victory for the Laffer Curve, a Defeat for England’s Economy
A new study from the Adam Smith Institute in the United Kingdom provides overwhelming evidence that class-warfare tax policy is grossly misguided and self-destructive. The authors examine the likely impact of the 10-percentage point increase in the top income tax…
Jeffrey Sachs and the Fictional “Race to the Bottom” Caused by Tax Competition
Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University is a big booster of the discredited notion that foreign aid is a cure-all for poverty in the developing world, but he is now branching out and saying silly things about policy in other areas. In a column for the Financial Times, he…
Why General Electric’s Non-Existent Tax Bill Is Both Good News and Bad News
General Electric has received a lot of unwelcome attention for paying zero federal income tax in 2010, even though it reported $5.1 billion in U.S. profits. This is a good news-bad news situation. The good news is that GE’s clever tax planning deprived the government…
Yet Another Scheme to Fleece (and Monitor) Americans: A Tax on “Miles Driven”
I commented yesterday about the silly idea, being promoted by a few politicians, to impose a tax on toilet paper. That post mostly was an opportunity to have some fun mocking greedy government because even a dour pessimist like me doesn’t expect that idea to get very…