The Impossibly Expensive Promises of Bernie Sanders

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 15, 2020 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Socialism

I’ve written about some of Elizabeth Warren’s statist proposals, but watching last night’s Democratic debate convinced me that I need to pay more attention to Bernie Sanders’ agenda. When he ran for president last time, I warned that his platform of $18 trillion of...

A Practical Reason to a Support a Spending Cap Instead of a Balanced-Budget Requirement

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 13, 2020 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending

I gave a speech this past weekend about the economy and fiscal policy, and I made my usual points about government being too big and warned that the problem would get much worse in the future because of demographic change and poorly designed entitlement programs....

U.K. Election Week, Part I: The Threat of Corbynomics

by Dan Mitchell | Dec 9, 2019 | Big Government, Blogs, Taxation, Welfare and Entitlements

I’m currently in London for discussions about public policy, particularly the potential for the right kind of free-trade pact between the United States and United Kingdom. I deliberately picked this week for my visit so I also could be here for the British...

Wealth Taxation and Confiscatory Effective Tax Rates

by Dan Mitchell | Nov 15, 2019 | Blogs, Economics, Taxation

With their punitive proposals for wealth taxes, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are leading the who-can-be-craziest debate in the Democratic Party. But what would happen if either “Crazy Bernie” or “Looney Liz” actually had the opportunity to impose such levies?...

The Paris-Based OECD’s Ongoing Effort to Replace Tax Competition with Tax Harmonization

by Dan Mitchell | Nov 13, 2019 | Blogs, Taxation

Ever since the bureaucrats at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development launched their attack on so-called harmful tax competition back in the 1990s, I’ve warned that the goal has been to create a global tax cartel. Sort of an “OPEC for politicians.”...