4 ms·

The problem is that half the political system thinks you can cut taxes and grow revenues. Which is an intentional strategy to repeal social programs that they’

The problem is that half the political system thinks you can cut taxes and grow revenues. Which is an intentional strategy to repeal social programs that they’d never get the votes to do so via legislation

ModernMech 2mo ago
Right they (the politicians) don't actually think that, they just say that to get cooked projections. Once those revenue projections turn out to be false, it doesn't matter because they already have their tax cuts baked in. Then everyone can blame the other side for deficits and campaign on fixing it. Rinse and repeat.
- thenewnewguy 2mo ago
  Let's be clear and not do this both sides thing - by "they" we mean Republicans. You may not agree with their policies or what they want to spend money on, but Democrats (at least in aggregate) live in the real world where they acknowledge for the government to spend money they will have to raise taxes. Republicans are the only party that in the 21st century acts as though we can simultaneously cut taxes and increase spending and everything will be fine.
  - ghastmaster 2mo ago
    As far as I have seen, in federal politics, the majority(left and right) spends, while taxes in general have not been significantly increased or decreased(percentage). What you are talking about is their rhetoric, which may be rhetorical itself. What does change(and is more important) is Debt/Revenue: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=TZfm https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=TZfm The ratio is looking like it is trending in the right direction. If GDP decreases while nominal tax receipts increase, GDP does not change the debt, while the debt/Revenue ratio looks good for paying bills, while not boding well for economic health. What is this "real world" you are referring to? There has to be a balance between current and future expenditures and economic health to facilitate these. Nothing exists in a vacuum.
  - win311fwg 2mo ago
    There are two ways to tax the people: By destroying money or by creating money. Republicans may generally prefer creating money over destroying money, but that doesn't mean they aren't applying taxation. "Tax cuts" in normal speak just means a reduction in how much money is being destroyed. It does not refer to a reduction in your tax burden.
    - SlightlyLeftPad 2mo ago
      I’m not an economist but when trillions of dollars are created doesn’t that create an illusion of sorts of economic growth (revenue growth) in the form of inflation while also having the effect of making the general population poorer by reducing their buying power?
      - win311fwg 2mo ago
        > making the general population poorer by reducing their buying power Exactly. Also known as a tax. You can make someone poorer by taking their money and destroying it, or you can make someone poorer by letting them keep their money and devalue it by creating more. Same coin no matter which side you want to look at it. There is no such thing as a free lunch. The taxes are always going to get paid in the end. The only choice is in exactly how you want to pay it. Each method has its own set of tradeoffs, so, like with everything, different groups understandably believe in different methods. In practice, both methods will be used. Nobody, apart from the previous commenter, is ever completely hardline "money must only be destroyed" or "money must only be created", but groups will still debate over what is the optimal ratio.
  - rayiner 2mo ago
    Democrats absolutely do not "live in the real world" regarding taxes: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/07/19/medicare-for-all-means-taxes-for-all/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/07/19/medicare-... "Taxing billionaires" is the left's version of "cut Medicaid fraud." It's a message for low-information voters who have a gut feeling that free stuff will require more taxes, but get confused converting from billions to trillions: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/06/msnbc-suggests-that-america-has-population-327/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/06/msnbc-sug... That's why Democrats say "we're the only developed western country without universal healthcare," but never "we're the only developed western country without a 15%+ VAT."
bilsbie 2mo ago
[flagged]
- elteto 2mo ago
  You made a tiny mistake, you forgot the $800 billion for the military!
  - chasd00 2mo ago
    > you forgot the $800 billion for the military! I agree but i wouldn't be that upset if that money was spent on soldier's pay and buying things or R/D from US companies built in the United States while employing US citizens. To me, that's a decent tax/spend jobs program. Now, military money flowing overseas and propping up some other economy? There could be valid reasons but that deserves to go under a microscope.
    - 8note 2mo ago
      youd be pleasently surprised to find out that same as most aid the US gives out, military aid is mostly in the form of cheques from which to buy US equipment and materiel the people who came up with these spends thought hard about what to do and how
  - hyldmo 2mo ago
    1.5 trillion next year!
  - ericmay 2mo ago
    No you forgot the wasted spending on Social Security, Medicaid, and other subsidies! See, other people can throw in snide remarks too. There's room to debate military spending, but if you view the world as a dangerous place and that the US should not become isolationist, we have to spend the money and have equipment ready and capable whether that's in Europe or in Asia. Alternatively we can disband much of the military, stop paying for this stuff, withdraw from NATO, remove overseas bases in countries like Japan and South Korea, and leave the world to deal with its own problems.
citrin_ru 2mo ago
It's a difficult tradeoff. By taxing more and more it's easy to send the economy into the death spiral so to grow the revenue without killing the economy you need economic growth. Cutting taxes will not give the growth aromatically but carefully designed tax system with low taxes where it helps should be a part of the strategy. In practice though tax cuts usually make rich richer without helping the economy to grow (because of lobbying/corruption).
- hvb2 2mo ago
  > In practice though tax cuts usually make rich richer without helping the economy to grow (because of lobbying/corruption). This is being generous. It's much simpler. The poor don't pay any federal taxes at all so you can't give them a tax cut because they don't pay any. You can give them a credit at best. Edit: Some data > Another 60.3 million returns showed AGIs of less than $30,000. The average effective tax rate for those taxpayers was 1.5%, even before refundable tax credits were applied. From: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/18/who-pays-and-doesnt-pay-federal-income-taxes-in-the-us/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/18/who-pays-...
  - citrin_ru 2mo ago
    > The poor don't pay any federal taxes at all so you can't give them a tax cut Even if we exclude poor there are many options how to split taxes between different income brackets, how to tax salaries vs capital gain, how to split taxes between individuals and businesses, how to avoid loopholes e. t. c. (e. g. in the UK I see small business struggling because of rising taxes while multinationals pay little taxes by moving profits offshore and reporting no profits in the UK).
  - SlightlyLeftPad 2mo ago
    37% of personal returns below the standard deduction is way more than I would have expected.
rayiner 2mo ago
> The problem is that half the political system thinks you can cut taxes and grow revenues. And the other half thinks you can pay for a European-style welfare state without European-style middle class taxes. Americans are Disney adults.
- bhelkey 2mo ago
  The US spends $2 Trillion dollars on Medicare + Medicaid a year [1][2]. Given that the US has a population of 342.7 million people [3], those two trillion dollars divides out to $5800 per resident per year. The UK's universal healthcare system costs ~$4700 per person per year (~£3,500)[4]. If we could spend healthcare dollars as efficiently as the UK, the current government spending in the US is enough to support a single payer healthcare system covering every resident without raising taxes. [1] https://www.cms.gov/data-research/statistics-trends-and-reports/national-health-expenditure-data/nhe-fact-sheet https://www.cms.gov/data-research/statistics-trends-and-repo... [2] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/medicaid-financing-the-basics/#870ed126-45c3-4465-8b9a-ae0eea487dcf https://www.kff.org/medicaid/medicaid-financing-the-basics/#... [3] https://www.census.gov/popclock/ https://www.census.gov/popclock/ [4] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy7zvp5xrqo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy7zvp5xrqo
  - rayiner 2mo ago
    > Given that the US has a population of 342.7 million people [3], we could have single payer healthcare for every resident without raising taxes if it cost less than $5800 per person per year. The UK's universal healthcare system costs ~$4700 per person per year (~£3,500)[4]. Except we couldn't. For the same reason our public schools can't get Finland's test scores while spending $3,000 less per student pear year than the U.S. For the same reason our public transit systems can't build subways for $100 million per km, like Spain.
    - UncleMeat 2mo ago
      Can you explain this reason in detail?!
    - 2mo ago
_DeadFred_ 2mo ago
They do not think this. They pretend to still believe this in order to continue their 'starve the beast' strategy, but their actual goal is to damage the government/run up debt, not the pretend 'trickle down economics' they claim.
pjjpo 2mo ago
And the other half thinks you can raise taxes and grow revenues while keeping the loopholes for their elites. The only thing intentional in politics is preserving your personal status and wealth. This is bipartisan.

ModernMech 2mo ago

Right they (the politicians) don't actually think that, they just say that to get cooked projections. Once those revenue projections turn out to be false, it doesn't matter because they already have their tax cuts baked in. Then everyone can blame the other side for deficits and campaign on fixing it. Rinse and repeat.

thenewnewguy 2mo ago
Let's be clear and not do this both sides thing - by "they" we mean Republicans. You may not agree with their policies or what they want to spend money on, but Democrats (at least in aggregate) live in the real world where they acknowledge for the government to spend money they will have to raise taxes. Republicans are the only party that in the 21st century acts as though we can simultaneously cut taxes and increase spending and everything will be fine.
- ghastmaster 2mo ago
  As far as I have seen, in federal politics, the majority(left and right) spends, while taxes in general have not been significantly increased or decreased(percentage). What you are talking about is their rhetoric, which may be rhetorical itself. What does change(and is more important) is Debt/Revenue: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=TZfm https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=TZfm The ratio is looking like it is trending in the right direction. If GDP decreases while nominal tax receipts increase, GDP does not change the debt, while the debt/Revenue ratio looks good for paying bills, while not boding well for economic health. What is this "real world" you are referring to? There has to be a balance between current and future expenditures and economic health to facilitate these. Nothing exists in a vacuum.
- win311fwg 2mo ago
  There are two ways to tax the people: By destroying money or by creating money. Republicans may generally prefer creating money over destroying money, but that doesn't mean they aren't applying taxation. "Tax cuts" in normal speak just means a reduction in how much money is being destroyed. It does not refer to a reduction in your tax burden.
  - SlightlyLeftPad 2mo ago
    I’m not an economist but when trillions of dollars are created doesn’t that create an illusion of sorts of economic growth (revenue growth) in the form of inflation while also having the effect of making the general population poorer by reducing their buying power?
    - win311fwg 2mo ago
      > making the general population poorer by reducing their buying power Exactly. Also known as a tax. You can make someone poorer by taking their money and destroying it, or you can make someone poorer by letting them keep their money and devalue it by creating more. Same coin no matter which side you want to look at it. There is no such thing as a free lunch. The taxes are always going to get paid in the end. The only choice is in exactly how you want to pay it. Each method has its own set of tradeoffs, so, like with everything, different groups understandably believe in different methods. In practice, both methods will be used. Nobody, apart from the previous commenter, is ever completely hardline "money must only be destroyed" or "money must only be created", but groups will still debate over what is the optimal ratio.
- rayiner 2mo ago
  Democrats absolutely do not "live in the real world" regarding taxes: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/07/19/medicare-for-all-means-taxes-for-all/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/07/19/medicare-... "Taxing billionaires" is the left's version of "cut Medicaid fraud." It's a message for low-information voters who have a gut feeling that free stuff will require more taxes, but get confused converting from billions to trillions: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/06/msnbc-suggests-that-america-has-population-327/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/06/msnbc-sug... That's why Democrats say "we're the only developed western country without universal healthcare," but never "we're the only developed western country without a 15%+ VAT."

bilsbie 2mo ago

[flagged]

elteto 2mo ago
You made a tiny mistake, you forgot the $800 billion for the military!
- chasd00 2mo ago
  > you forgot the $800 billion for the military! I agree but i wouldn't be that upset if that money was spent on soldier's pay and buying things or R/D from US companies built in the United States while employing US citizens. To me, that's a decent tax/spend jobs program. Now, military money flowing overseas and propping up some other economy? There could be valid reasons but that deserves to go under a microscope.
  - 8note 2mo ago
    youd be pleasently surprised to find out that same as most aid the US gives out, military aid is mostly in the form of cheques from which to buy US equipment and materiel the people who came up with these spends thought hard about what to do and how
- hyldmo 2mo ago
  1.5 trillion next year!
- ericmay 2mo ago
  No you forgot the wasted spending on Social Security, Medicaid, and other subsidies! See, other people can throw in snide remarks too. There's room to debate military spending, but if you view the world as a dangerous place and that the US should not become isolationist, we have to spend the money and have equipment ready and capable whether that's in Europe or in Asia. Alternatively we can disband much of the military, stop paying for this stuff, withdraw from NATO, remove overseas bases in countries like Japan and South Korea, and leave the world to deal with its own problems.

citrin_ru 2mo ago

It's a difficult tradeoff. By taxing more and more it's easy to send the economy into the death spiral so to grow the revenue without killing the economy you need economic growth. Cutting taxes will not give the growth aromatically but carefully designed tax system with low taxes where it helps should be a part of the strategy. In practice though tax cuts usually make rich richer without helping the economy to grow (because of lobbying/corruption).

hvb2 2mo ago
> In practice though tax cuts usually make rich richer without helping the economy to grow (because of lobbying/corruption). This is being generous. It's much simpler. The poor don't pay any federal taxes at all so you can't give them a tax cut because they don't pay any. You can give them a credit at best. Edit: Some data > Another 60.3 million returns showed AGIs of less than $30,000. The average effective tax rate for those taxpayers was 1.5%, even before refundable tax credits were applied. From: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/18/who-pays-and-doesnt-pay-federal-income-taxes-in-the-us/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/18/who-pays-...
- citrin_ru 2mo ago
  > The poor don't pay any federal taxes at all so you can't give them a tax cut Even if we exclude poor there are many options how to split taxes between different income brackets, how to tax salaries vs capital gain, how to split taxes between individuals and businesses, how to avoid loopholes e. t. c. (e. g. in the UK I see small business struggling because of rising taxes while multinationals pay little taxes by moving profits offshore and reporting no profits in the UK).
- SlightlyLeftPad 2mo ago
  37% of personal returns below the standard deduction is way more than I would have expected.

rayiner 2mo ago

> The problem is that half the political system thinks you can cut taxes and grow revenues. And the other half thinks you can pay for a European-style welfare state without European-style middle class taxes. Americans are Disney adults.

bhelkey 2mo ago
The US spends $2 Trillion dollars on Medicare + Medicaid a year [1][2]. Given that the US has a population of 342.7 million people [3], those two trillion dollars divides out to $5800 per resident per year. The UK's universal healthcare system costs ~$4700 per person per year (~£3,500)[4]. If we could spend healthcare dollars as efficiently as the UK, the current government spending in the US is enough to support a single payer healthcare system covering every resident without raising taxes. [1] https://www.cms.gov/data-research/statistics-trends-and-reports/national-health-expenditure-data/nhe-fact-sheet https://www.cms.gov/data-research/statistics-trends-and-repo... [2] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/medicaid-financing-the-basics/#870ed126-45c3-4465-8b9a-ae0eea487dcf https://www.kff.org/medicaid/medicaid-financing-the-basics/#... [3] https://www.census.gov/popclock/ https://www.census.gov/popclock/ [4] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy7zvp5xrqo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy7zvp5xrqo
- rayiner 2mo ago
  > Given that the US has a population of 342.7 million people [3], we could have single payer healthcare for every resident without raising taxes if it cost less than $5800 per person per year. The UK's universal healthcare system costs ~$4700 per person per year (~£3,500)[4]. Except we couldn't. For the same reason our public schools can't get Finland's test scores while spending $3,000 less per student pear year than the U.S. For the same reason our public transit systems can't build subways for $100 million per km, like Spain.
  - UncleMeat 2mo ago
    Can you explain this reason in detail?!
  - 2mo ago

_DeadFred_ 2mo ago

They do not think this. They pretend to still believe this in order to continue their 'starve the beast' strategy, but their actual goal is to damage the government/run up debt, not the pretend 'trickle down economics' they claim.

pjjpo 2mo ago

And the other half thinks you can raise taxes and grow revenues while keeping the loopholes for their elites. The only thing intentional in politics is preserving your personal status and wealth. This is bipartisan.