by Dan Mitchell | Sep 25, 2010 | Big Government, Blogs, Taxation
Warren Buffett once said that it wasn’t right for his secretary to have a higher tax rate than he faced, leading me to point out that he didn’t understand tax policy. The 15 percent tax rates on dividends and capital gains to which he presumably was referring...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 17, 2010 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
Not that we need more evidence, but here are two new items confirming the absurdity of thinking that bigger government is stimulus. First, we have a story from Los Angeles revealing that the city only created 55 jobs with $111 million of stimulus funds. This...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 15, 2010 | Big Government, Blogs, Economic Growth, Government Spending, Taxation
Alberto Alesina of Harvard’s economics department summarizes some of his research in a column for today’s Wall Street Journal. He and a colleague looked at fiscal policy changes in developed nations and found very strong evidence that spending reductions boost growth....
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 13, 2010 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post wrote this weekend that critics of Keynesianism are somewhat akin to those who believe the earth is flat. He specifically cites the presumably malignant influence of the Cato Institute. Keynes was right, and in this case it’s...
by Dan Mitchell | Sep 6, 2010 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Taxation
Like a terrible remake of Groundhog Day, the White House has unveiled yet another so-called stimulus scheme. Actually, they have two new proposals to buy votes with our money. One plan is focused on more infrastructure spending, as reported by Politico. Seeking to...