Economy Stupid
I know very little about economics, despite having been exposed to some amount of economic theory. It just didn't stick with me, either due to a lack of interest or ability to understand on my part. As a result, a disproportionate amount of my economic thinking is formed by the learned opinions of others that I trust.
Being a liberal-minded (if not Liberal) person, I tend to look to what other liberals are saying about economic issues. Without a proper background in economics, I am unprepared and unwilling to subject these liberal thinkers to a proper critical analysis. I take what they say at more or less face value, pending further information. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, I'm just being honest.
Paul Krugman's editorial in today's New York Times is a great example. Krugman sees major trouble on our economic horizon, because of the Bush Administration's jihad against taxes, at a time when our economy can absolutely not do without the income that those taxes will provide. That all makes a lot of sense to me. But does it make sense because I want it to, because it bashes Bush and fits into a nice and simple "need money to pay bills" logic? Or does it make sense because it is fundamentally correct?
Based on what I have read, it seems that the Bush plan is forever searching for a sponsor, a noted economist who will tout the plan. They seem to be in very short supply. In fact, people are running away from this plan. Not even the Republicans are fully prepared to support it, and in this time of lock-step GOP partisanship, that tells me everything I need to know.
What I want is for someone to tell me this: Is Bushco pushing this because they think it will work, or because this is what their primarly support groups want? And is this idea of continued tax cuts as bad as Krugman and many others make it out to be?
I get so annoyed with people whose primary political motivation is to cut taxes. Way to get involved! I'm not saying that we should just write governments blank checks, but doesn't anybody notice that we get a lot of stuff for that money? To say that "private interests" could better manage those services misses the point. The advantages from the better management never funnel back to the public. And that's the entire point of taxes in the first place, right? The better good?
12:42:55 PM 
|
