Ever hear from your conservative friends about how well the economy is doing because of the Bush tax cuts? Putting aside the issue of income inequality, which means our economy is doing well for a smaller and smaller percentage of Americans, we now find that the economy is hardly growing at all. In fact, factor in inflation and the economy may very well be at a standstill or actually experiencing negative growth:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The economy limped ahead at just a 0.7 percent pace in the first quarter, the slowest in more than four years, as some businesses clamped down on spending given uncertainties about the severity of the housing slump. […]
Even though the economy slowed in the first quarter, an inflation gauge picked up speed.
The inflation gauge tied to the GDP report and closely watched by the Federal Reserve showed that core prices — excluding food and energy — rose at a rate of 2.4 percent in the first quarter. That was higher that previously estimated and was a sizable pick up from the 1.8 percent pace seen in the fourth quarter. The Fed has said that inflation poses the biggest potential danger to the economy.
I don’t know about you, but food and energy prices have a big effect on my lifestyle. Still, core inflation is 2.4% while GDP growth for the last quarter is 0.7%. You do the math.
And there are many other signs that our economy is in deep doo-doo, beyond lame GDP growth and increasing inflation. Bankruptcies? Up. Number of manufacturing jobs? Down. Housing sales? Down. Mortgage foreclosures? Up.
But hey, there is some good news. Corporate profits? Way up! Tax burden on the wealthiest Americans? Way down!
Mr Buffett said that he was taxed at 17.7 per cent on the $46 million he made last year, without trying to avoid paying higher taxes, while his secretary, who earned $60,000, was taxed at 30 per cent. Mr Buffett told his audience, which included John Mack, the chairman of Morgan Stanley, and Alan Patricof, the founder of the US branch of Apax Partners, that US government policy had accentuated a disparity of wealth that hurt the economy by stifling opportunity and motivation.
But who cares what Warren Buffett says about taxes or the economy, right? More tax cuts is what we need according to Republicans running for President. More and more and more and …
“Government is simply too big; state government is too big, the federal government is too big,” he says. “It’s spending too much. I’m going to cut spending, I’m going to cut taxes.
“Lower marginal tax rates for all Americans. Get taxes down, make them simpler and flatter and lower.”
By suggesting that he would make tax rates flatter, the ads suggest that Romney would not only take steps to cut taxes further, but to redo the tax code in significant ways.
I believe him completely about his promise of more tax cuts, by the way. After all, look what all those tax cuts have gotten us so far. The largest deficits in our history, a monster of a national debt and the largest transfer of wealth from the lower and middle classes to the upper classes in our history. What a country, eh?
