Yes, the ridiculous spending of the Republican Party between 2000 and 2006 is part of it.
BUT a tax cut without cutting spending to match IS just the same as spending and contributes to the deficit. Tax Cuts, if they are not properly targeted and matched with spending cuts, are the same as spending and contribute to the deficit.
If you take a job that pays you $4000 less in revenue, isn't that about the same as if you kept the same job and spent the $4000?
Tax Cuts are magically little glorious things that make the economy grow. Sometimes they do. Sometimes, as was the case with the Bush tax cuts, they merely redistribute wealth - in this case upwards. They are the reason that you saw growth in the economy, but you saw it concentrated in the top 10% of earners while the bottom 90% of earners split 12% of the growth post-early 2000s recession. Even before the Great Recession began, his period in office was THE WORST for creating jobs growth since Hoover. I thought those tax cuts were supposed to create jobs? They didn't. They didn't work.
The only way to create jobs right now is to create demand for American products and services. Right now, the wealthiest Americans are still spending for products and services because they still have money. All signs point to the fact that their economy has improved (
Wealthiest Americans see their net worth bounce back sharply - MSN Money), while for the middle and working classes, things have not improved.
You fix the economy by focusing on the middle class and the working class. Give them the stimulus of further tax cuts. I would also cut all interest on student loans (those in good standing), reducing monthly payments which will spur more spending. When people start spending more, then they will increase demand, which will create more jobs, which will get people back to work.
For the wealthiest classes and corporations, I would eliminate the Bush tax rate (go back to Clinton rates), but I would institute a tax incentive based on number of new hires of American employees. If they hire enough new people (only full-time with benefits would count), they could actually pay $0 in taxes. But they have to do it through hiring, not through hoarding cash (
Companies pile up cash but remain hesitant to add jobs).
I don't think these are crazy liberal ideas. It's just a more fair way of using tax code to spur the economy into action.
Call it crazy liberal if you want. But I think it would work. Simply cutting taxes for the rich hasn't done damn thing for the working and middle classes, as their economy during the 2000s was essentially stagnant and was a terrible decade:
Rising prices, stagnant income pinch families
Aughts were a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers - washingtonpost.com - and it was bad for them even before the recession.
The recession was such a disaster because their income had been stagnant since 2000, which means they weren't prepared for crisis.
How can you not see that when it was there all along?
The Bush tax cuts did dick for the economy; except contribute to the deficit (because they weren't matched with spending cuts, and we were not asked to sacrifice a thing for TWO wars).
CBO Data Show Tax Cuts Have Played Much Larger Role than Domestic Spending Increases in Fueling the Deficit — Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
