Al Franken: Surprise! Surprise! Republicans Care About Deficits Again!

[babylonsister]

February 5, 2021 8:00AM ET
Surprise! Surprise! Republicans Care About Deficits Again!
Al Franken: The GOP only cares about deficits when Democrats hold the Oval Office
By Al Franken


On Monday, President Biden met with 10 supposedly moderate Republicans in the Oval Office to discuss their scaled-down $618 billion Covid-relief proposal. Even though the economy is still reeling from the pandemic and tens of millions of Americans are struggling to feed their families and put a roof over their heads, they are very concerned about the $1.9 trillion price tag on Biden’s plan. Lately, it seems, Republicans have taken renewed interest in deficits and our growing national debt. That’s because a Democrat is in the White House.

When a Republican is president, deficits don’t matter. In fact, that means it’s time to cut taxes — on the wealthy. Republicans’ purported thinking is that tax cuts on high-income earners will incentivize economic growth and thus, as calculated through something called “dynamic scoring,” will produce far more revenue, which in turn more than pays for the tax cuts. This actually never happens. Remember the Laffer Curve? If not — look in the dictionary under “discredited.”

You may remember that I wrote a book titled Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations. Undertaking the painstaking — I’m sorry, painful — research, Rush did make an arguably valid point about the Laffer Curve. “If you had to pay a 100 percent tax rate on your income, you wouldn’t work!” Of course, Rush was absolutely right. Almost everyone should pay somewhere between 0 percent and 100 percent in order to optimize productive economic activity and everyone’s well-being.

And, yes, out-of-control debt can be an existential threat to a nation. The question becomes: “When is it out of control?” To Republicans, the answer is simple: “When a Democrat is president.”

more...

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/al-franken-republicans-deficits-1122888/

[alwaysinasnit]

1. Maybe Dems should offer an offset to this stimulus/recovery bill by repealing the 2017 Tax Scam

Act of 2017. I wonder how the RepubliQans would respond to that?

[mitch96]

2. +1. That's how I feel also. There is a ton of cash there... nt