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Monday, February 09, 2009

Tax Cuts Are Not Stimulus

The Republican talking point is there is too much spending from states. States are having a hard time paying the bills. Arizona will have to borrow $2.5 billion and $5.7 billion next month. Florida can not even balance it's budget. Florida has to meet the state Constitutional requirements of the class size amendment.


Florida's popular class-size amendment may be put on ice, thanks to a weakening economy and a statewide budget crisis.

Despite strong public support, a broad consensus is forming that the goal of limiting class size is simply too expensive during the current economic crunch.

Even advocates of the amendment told the Orlando Sentinel this week that it might need to be scaled back.


In Maryland: the legislature is trying to shift the cost of teachers's retirements onto the counties. Slot machines were suppose to answer Maryland's budget woes. It never occurred to Gov. Tommy Carcetti Martin O'Malley that people would not want to gamble during an economic downturn and the state having it's highest unemployment in 15 years.

Republicans imagine all this government pork in need of cutting. Americans can hardly afford to buy bacon at the grocery store. The GOP implying government creating jobs (see: Steele, Michael) and repairing infrastructure is the same as a hip hop artist going to the jewelery store. That argument shows a lack of intellectual depth and curiosity in economics. In my adult life, I have never heard the GOP not say tax cuts are the soltion.

Surplus: tax cut.

Deficit: tax cuts

Recession: Tax cut.

Stimulus package: tax cut.

The Congressional Budget Office found without the Bush tax cuts, The United States would have been a surplus in early 2005. Bush billed his tax cuts as a stimulas plan. Republicans are arguing we need to cut taxes to stimulate the economy. For the love of this country, Republicans need to stop trying to stimulate the economy.

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