by Dan Mitchell | May 26, 2012 | Big Government, Blogs, Economics, Laffer Curve, Taxation
I’ve mocked France on several occasions, and I thought Sarkozy was so bad that I figured (in the long run) the election of Hollande was a step in the right direction. But in certain ways, France isn’t as bad as the United States. The New York Times has a big story...
by Dan Mitchell | May 14, 2012 | Blogs, Taxation
President Obama’s fiscal policy is a dismal mixture. On spending, he wants a European-style welfare state. On taxes, he is fixated on class-warfare tax policy. If we want to know the consequences of that approach, we can look at the ongoing collapse of Greece. Or, if...
by Dan Mitchell | May 12, 2012 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Taxation
Last year, as part of the fight over the debt limit, Congress created a “super-committee” that was designed to produce at least $1.2 trillion of “deficit reduction.” The statists saw this super-committee as a vehicle to seduce Republicans into a tax hike. They knew...
by Dan Mitchell | May 7, 2012 | Blogs, Economics, Laffer Curve, Tax Competition, Taxation
Even though he is a foolish statist, I wanted Francois Hollande to win the French presidency. Sarkozy was a statist as well, after all, and my “Richard Nixon Disinfectant Rule” says that it’s better to have the out-of-the-closet statist prevail in such contests in...
by Dan Mitchell | May 4, 2012 | Big Government, Blogs, Taxation, VAT
I’ve written before how “The Value-Added Tax Would Be a Money Machine for Big Government.” Writing for Bloomberg, Josh Barro has a piece entitled, “Value-Added Tax Would Raise Tons for U.S. Coffers.” So you might think we see eye to eye on this issue, but that would...
