One Good Result and One Bad Result of Obamacare

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 9, 2015 | Blogs, Economics, Health Care, Taxation

Today I’m going to say something nice about Obamacare. Not because I like the overall law, but because honesty is the best policy. Regular readers know that our healthcare system is screwed up by bad government policy. More specifically, spending programs such as...

The Left Is Salivating for a New Energy Tax on American Consumers

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 7, 2015 | Big Government, Blogs, Energy, Taxation

Because of the need to control the size and scope of government, it’s critically important to reject all tax hikes. Simply stated, once politicians think there’s a possibility of more revenue coming to DC, any commitment to spending restraintand entitlement reform...

The Left’s Position on the Laffer Curve and Dynamic Scoring: Being Exactly Wrong Is Better than Being Inexactly Right

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 4, 2015 | Blogs, Economics, Laffer Curve, Taxation

Since I’m a big advocate of the Laffer Curve, that means I favor dynamic scoring. This is the common-sense observation that you can’t figure out the effect of tax changes on revenue without first estimating the impact on taxable income. And I’ve shared some very...

What’s a “Fair Share” for Upper-Income Taxpayers?

by Dan Mitchell | Jan 2, 2015 | Blogs, Economics, Laffer Curve, Taxation

Barack Obama and the rest of the class-warfare crowd act as if “tax the rich” is an appropriate answer to every question about fiscal policy. I’m not joking. Here are some of the President’s main tax hikes that have been enacted or proposed. Obama imposed higher...

Crocodile Tears for the IRS

by Dan Mitchell | Dec 21, 2014 | Big Government, Blogs, Government Spending, Taxation

I can’t help but wonder whether the song made famous by The Grinch Who Stole Christmas should be the theme song for the Internal Revenue Service. After all,that bureaucracy is “as cuddly as a cactus” and “as charming as an eel.” And it appears that having “the tender...