I wrote a column for the Wall Street Journal last week about the policy debate over whether it’s better to lower tax rates or to provide targeted tax cuts for parents. Since this meant I was wading into a fight between so-called reform conservatives (or “reformicons”) and traditional conservatives (or “supply-siders”), I wasn’t surprised to learn that not everyone […]
read more...Since I’ve been in Washington for nearly three decades, I’m used to foolish demagoguery. But the left’s reaction to corporate inversions takes political rhetoric to a new level of dishonesty. Every study that looks at business taxation reaches the same conclusion, which is that America’s tax system is punitive and anti-competitive. Simply stated, the combination of […]
read more...I’m in Australia for Consilium, an annual conference which is hosted by the Centre for Independent Studies. I spoke on fiscal policy and pontificated on the need for nations to restrain government spending. That’s an important message (at least in my humble option), but I thought it was more interesting to learn more about the tax and […]
read more...Some folks on the right in Washington, generally known as reformicons (short for reform conservatives), want the Republican Party to de-emphasize marginal tax rate reductions and instead focus on providing tax relief to parents. There are many leaders in this movement and, if you want to learn more about the tax proposals being discussed, I […]
read more...What do cigarettes and capital gains have in common? Well, they both start with the same letter, so maybe the Cookie Monster could incorporate them into his favorite song, but I’m thinking about something else. Specifically, both cigarettes and capital gains tell us something important about tax policy, the Laffer Curve, and the limits of political bullying. […]
read more...I like to think that very few people despise Obamacare more than me. I don’t like Obamacare because it’s a fiscal boondoggle. I don’t like Obamacare because it’s bad healthcare policy. I don’t like Obamacare because it generated an embarrassingly bad decision by the Supreme Court. I don’t like Obamacare because it is driving people out of the labor forceand into government […]
read more...I don’t like international bureaucracies because they generally push for policies that expand the burden of government and undermine economic growth. But I recognize that there are some good people who work at these institutions and I’m always willing to acknowledge when they publish good research. The IMF said that Greece had reached the tipping point where […]
read more...Last month, I put together a list of six jaw-dropping examples of left-wing hypocrisy, one of which featured Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew. He made the list for having the chutzpah to criticize corporate inversions on the basis of supposed economic patriotism, even though he invested lots of money via the Cayman Islands when he was a crony capitalist at Citigroup. But it turns […]
read more...I’m a long-time proponent of the flat tax for three simple reasons. 1. It replaces the discriminatory “progressive” tax with a single tax rate at the lowest possible level, thus reducing the tax penalty on productive behavior. 2. It gets rid of all forms of double taxation, such as the death tax and capital gains tax, meaning economic activity is never taxed more […]
read more...This article appeared in The Daily Caller.
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