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The Economics of Soaking the Rich
- zepto 8y agoI agree with most of this, however it misses out the obvious. The issue of taxes isn’t just about how much is raised, it is also about what it is spent on. Asserting that it’s optimal to raise as much tax as possible is based on the assumption that the government is better than anyone else at deploying resources. This is the assumption that conservatives challenge, and which is at the root of the drive to lower taxes. An extreme conservative position would be that the government should be as small as possible and taxes should be minimized. The opposite extreme would be to maximize tax revenue, and hence maximize the power of the government. Krugman is making the case here that AOC is taking a well informed but nevertheless extreme position whose goal is to maximize government. We can argue about whether this is the appropriate policy for our current situation, but it’s clearly at the extreme end of what’s possible.
- dragonwriter 8y ago> An extreme conservative position would be that the government should be as small as possible and taxes should be minimized. No, that's an extreme libertarian position. While conservatives often adopt libertarian arguments when the subject is an area where liberals prefer active government (and, conversely, liberals do so, though less often, when the area is one where conservatives prefer active government) [0], conservatives aren't generally minarchists the way libertarians are. [0] As well as spending, this included taxes, hence why Reagan presided over both a historically large tax cut and a historically large tax increase that together amounted to a massive tax burden shift down the income scale.
- zepto 8y agoAgreed - that’s a fair correction, although it doesn’t change the point about AOC and Krugman assuming the extreme goal of maximizing government.