Skip to main content

The Revenue Act of 1964

By

Not surprisingly, Paul Ryan got his facts wrong when crediting Kennedy for the first tax cuts.  The Revenue Act of 1964 was signed by Johnson, after an arduous battle where Johnson had to convince Congressional conservatives that the 20% tax cuts wouldn't bust the budget.  Here is his radio address on the signing of this historic bill.

We have now had decades of substantial tax cuts to the point that the corporate tax base is now lower than it has been since the 1930s, with the average actual corporate tax paid being less than 12 per cent. Yet, here is Romney and Ryan suggesting another 20 per cent off the top while keeping the Bush tax cuts in place.  They have failed to show any evidence that these new tax cuts can be balanced without removing substantial loopholes that would actually raise taxes for the middle class, which Biden pointed out in the debate.  Why Obama let Romney slide on this one remains a mystery.

Even when the income tax rate was an astronomical 92% for the highest income level, there were many loopholes and deductions so that no wealthy individual with a good accountant would pay even half that much.  As for corporate tax rates, it is the profit that has been taxed with corporations able to write off virtually everything in the way of expenses, to the point that many corporations continue to pay zero corporate taxes.

Yet, we find that Romney and Ryan are simply not being held accountable for their assertions.  Thanks, Joe, for pointing out what they have to say is "a bunch of malarkey!"


Comments

  1. avrdsOctober 12, 2012 at 4:31 PM

    In fairness, though, weren't tax cuts being promoted by Kennedy when he was killed? Funny how the republicans have found one more area to pander to their "base."

    ReplyDelete
  2. James FergusonOctober 12, 2012 at 5:56 PM

    As Caro noted, the bill was bogged down in committee because the Kennedy team wouldn't bring the budget down to $100 bn (those were the days). It took Johnson to do the dirty work, cutting military as well as domestic programs until he had a budget that satisfied the finance committee. But, such nuances are beyond the grasp of someone like Ryan.

    ReplyDelete
  3. avrdsOctober 15, 2012 at 3:48 PM

    A good commentary -- I like Freeland:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/14/opinion/sunday/the-self-destruction-of-the-1-percent.html

    ReplyDelete
  4. avrdsOctober 15, 2012 at 10:53 PM

    And an excerpt and interview with her about her book:

    http://www.npr.org/2012/10/15/162799512/a-startling-gap-between-us-and-them-in-plutocrats

    ReplyDelete
  5. MartiOctober 20, 2012 at 10:48 AM

    Chrystia Freeland will be on the next Bill Moyers & Company with Matt Taibbi. Airs Sunday on my public television station.

    http://billmoyers.com/segment/matt-taibbi-and-chrystia-freeland-on-the-one-percents-power-and-privileges/

    ReplyDelete
  6. James FergusonOctober 20, 2012 at 2:10 PM

    Excellent discussion. Taibbi comes across much different in person than he does on the page.

    ReplyDelete
  7. avrdsOctober 20, 2012 at 3:40 PM

    Thanks for the heads up. I've become a huge fan of that show. I usually listen on the radio but I'll be on the road again. I'll try to catch it on TV Sunday. I like both of them.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire

By
  Welcome to this month's reading group selection.  David Von Drehle mentions The Melting Pot , a play by Israel Zangwill, that premiered on Broadway in 1908.  At that time theater was accessible to a broad section of the public, not the exclusive domain it has become over the decades.  Zangwill carried a hopeful message that America was a place where old hatreds and prejudices were pointless, and that in this new country immigrants would find a more open society.  I suppose the reference was more an ironic one for Von Drehle, as he notes the racial and ethnic hatreds were on display everywhere, and at best Zangwill's play helped persons forget for a moment how deep these divides ran.  Nevertheless, "the melting pot" made its way into the American lexicon, even if New York could best be describing as a boiling cauldron in the early twentieth century. Triangle: The Fire That Changed America takes a broad view of events that led up the notorious fire, not...
229 comments
Read more

Team of Rivals Reading Group

By
''Team of Rivals" is also an America ''coming-of-age" saga. Lincoln, Seward, Chase et al. are sketched as being part of a ''restless generation," born when Founding Fathers occupied the White House and the Louisiana Purchase netted nearly 530 million new acres to be explored. The Western Expansion motto of this burgeoning generation, in fact, was cleverly captured in two lines of Stephen Vincent Benet's verse: ''The stream uncrossed, the promise still untried / The metal sleeping in the mountainside." None of the protagonists in ''Team of Rivals" hailed from the Deep South or Great Plains. _______________________________ From a review by Douglas Brinkley, 2005
293 comments
Read more

The Searchers

By
You are invited to join us in a discussion of  The Searchers , a new book on John Ford's boldest Western, which cast John Wayne against type as the vengeful Ethan Edwards who spends eight years tracking down a notorious Comanche warrior, who had killed his cousins and abducted a 9 year old girl.  The film has had its fair share of detractors as well as fans over the years, but is consistently ranked in most critics'  Top Ten Greatest Films . Glenn Frankel examines the origins of the story as well as the film itself, breaking his book down into four parts.  The first two parts deal with Cynthia Ann Parker and her son Quanah, perhaps the most famous of the 19th century abduction stories.  The short third part focuses on the author of the novel, Alan Le May, and how he came to write The Searchers. The final part is about Pappy and the Duke and the making of the film. Frankel noted that Le May researched 60+ abduction stories, fusing them together into a nar...
123 comments
Read more