by Dan Mitchell | Dec 4, 2017 | Blogs, Economics
The late Mancur Olsen was a very accomplished academic economist who described the unfortunate tendency of vote-seeking governments to behave like “stationary bandits,” seeking to extract the maximum amount of money from taxpayers. I’m not nearly as sophisticated, so...
by Dan Mitchell | Dec 2, 2017 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Taxation
Since the House has passed a tax cut and the Senate has passed a tax cut, it’s quite likely that there will be a consensus deal that will be signed into law. Which makes me happy since any agreement presumably will include a lower corporate tax rate and...
by Dan Mitchell | Nov 28, 2017 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Taxation
I’ve been grousing all year that tax cuts and tax reform are jeopardized by the failure to restrain the growth of federal spending. At the start of the year, I pointed out that it would be possible to both balance the budget and approve a $3 trillion tax...
by Dan Mitchell | Nov 21, 2017 | Blogs, Taxation
Time for a confession. My left-wing friends are correct. I’m an idiot. Why? Because I’m an anti-tax libertarian, yet I keep writing favorably about a provision that will raise my taxes. I’m talking specifically about the provision, currently in both...
by Dan Mitchell | Nov 17, 2017 | Blogs, Economics, Taxation
Left-wing columnists at the Washington Post have hit upon a theme. In late October, Ruth Marcus wrote a column asserting that tax cuts are “dangerous.” I explained why her argument was nonsensical, but that clearly didn’t have any impact since Robert Rubin has a new...
