From Southernappeal;
The House voted Thursday to preserve tax cuts for investors through the rest of the decade, safeguarding the centerpiece of the Republican tax agenda in a $56 billion package of tax breaks.
The bill, passed 234-197 along mostly party lines, would keep the 15 percent top tax rate for capital gains and dividends in place in 2009 and 2010, two years after their scheduled disappearance at the end of 2008.
The Republicans are still weak. Initially, the RINOs boulstered elimination of the capital gains tax... but we'll take all the breaks we can get. Right Pat?
The good thing about keeping some capital gain tax alive is to ensure that old Yankees from the Landings will keep paying Hancock Askew & Co. to plug in their menial capital gains into a computer every Spring.
2 comments:
Disclaimer: the stuff I'm about to talk about is really boring. Don't even bother reading it.
One of the things the media/politicians love to do is talk about how these are tax "breaks", as if the government is gratuitously awarding taxpayers an additional handout; thus we hear how the wealthy are catching all of the "breaks" while the poor suffer.
But this isn't a "break" at all, and I don't even like calling it just a tax "cut" either. They are simply tax rate reductions. Before 2003, investors had to pay 30% of everything they earned on capital gains to Washington. Bush and company simply reduced the rate from 30 to 15. Investment has skyrocketed over the past 2 years, as investors have greater incentive to take risk. 4.5 million new jobs have been created, GDP growth is the fastest it's been since the mid 1980s, productivity growth continues to stun, unemployment is at a very mild 5%, and the deficit continues to shrink.
Investment, not spending, drives growth. The media always talks about how consumer spending has luckily "kept things chugging along", but, that if people don't buy enough stuff during the holidays, the economy will be derailed. Complete nonsense. Sure, Dillards and JCPenny would get hurt, but that's about it. All spending does is simply transfer money from A to B. Investment, however, creates new wealth by expanding the capital stock. The more people save and invest, the more capital firms and entreprenuers have to expand production, invest in new technology, and thus increase productivity, which, ultimately, leads to a higher standard of living for everyone, rich and poor.
Unfortunately, all Democrats and most Republicans don't understand this, and continue to waste money like drunken sailors. Actually, that's unfair to the sailors, because at least they waste their own money.
Thanks for the disclaimer, Pat. Seventeen links in one post. I think we have a new record.
Post a Comment