Why is Ronald Reagan such a hero to the right?

[CADsortaGUY]

If you actually believed that, you'd be delusional.

The New Deal led to the greatest period of broad based prosperity in this nation's history after WW2 because it imposed some stability on the boom and bust nature of capitalism. It was only the methodical dismantling of those constraints that allowed the current situation to develop, and anybody with a lick of sense realizes that.

lol, try again junior. The new deal had little to do with what you talk of. The economy changed dramatically due to the war. Women worked outside of the home - which changed the whole scope of the economy. Dual incomes, increased talent pool, etc. But yeah, leave it to the FDR knob slobbers to try to claim it was the new deal that caused the prosperity. Fools...

 

[daishi5]

Look at the median income for the bottom 3 quartiles. It hasn't changed relative to inflation for a very very long time. Then look at the top quartile. The gap is widening at the top.

This is not a strawman argument, its proof that it helps one cross section of the population, and not the entire population.

Furthermore, there is no proof, anywhere, ever, that cutting income taxes for the rich influences job creation based on history.

Can you think of a society that functions well with massive poverty? Throwing more money to the people at the top only skews averages.

I will be honest, I think there is a severe problem with how we have been measuring income over time in the last few decades. I know what the numbers say, but it does not seem to match up with the reality of the increased consumption and the quality of their consumed items compared to the supposedly same income level 20 years ago. So, while I know the numbers aren't moving, I personally think it is because of a bad metric.

I was refering to a strawman as his argument is that everyone would get richer from a trickle down, while you were arguing that the rich got more richer than the lower brackets, which does not invalidate his argument. Attacking his real argument is a lot harder, because it requires coming to some form of conclusion on how to measure income over time. First we would have to agree on whether or not median incomes have improved over time or not. But, I think strawman was the wrong word. Your line of argument is not actually a strawman, but you did switch the criterion of judgement from increased wealth to wealth distribution.

The third statement, has there been enough tax cuts on the rich to even try to measure if such cuts have an impact on job creation? The number of times the marginal tax rates for the highest incomes has seems to be very low to me, but I really haven't studied the history of tax rates in the US. Are there any studies out there that examine the rate of job creation as a function of the top marginal tax rates? But from a hypothetical point of view, let me propose two extremes. Suppose we tax all income over $100,000 per income earner at 99%, and there are no tax exclusions that can protect that income. Do you believe that a tax cut at that level would not induce them to increase their income through some form of investment or work? If we taxed all income at 2% above $100,000 and we cut it to 1%, do you think anyone would care, or suddenly rush out to make more money because they got to keep 1% more of their increased income? The question of effective tax policy for growth is stupid when stated in forms such as "tax cuts for the rich never work" or "tax cuts are the solution." The best answer is probably a moving target between the extremes. I think we need to simplify the tax code, because for all its complexity and changes over the years, we almost always seem to collect the same percentage of GDP (the Bush tax cuts seem to be the only real deviation from 17% since the 50s.).

I believe that a massive income gap was the normal distribution for most societies up until this last century, until right after the last world wars. And your wording reveals one of the issues with your measure of poverty. If people become richer by making more stuff, or making other people more efficient and thus making more stuff, then their becoming richer does not negatively impact the people whose income did not change. I agree it is probably preferable to have a more evenly distributed income range, rather than an all or nothing, but just because the rich became richer does not mean I became poorer.

 

[Craig234]

I believe that a massive income gap was the normal distribution for most societies up until this last century, until right after the last world wars.

I've long said, that the norm in human history is oligarchy - a few elites and many serfs.

The American progressive era with a strong middle class is an exception that people take for granted, artifically created with government policy for the public to do well.

Time to drag out the Buffet quote, there's one side fighting a class war and winning - his.

And your wording reveals one of the issues with your measure of poverty. If people become richer by making more stuff, or making other people more efficient and thus making more stuff, then their becoming richer does not negatively impact the people whose income did not change. I agree it is probably preferable to have a more evenly distributed income range, rather than an all or nothing, but just because the rich became richer does not mean I became poorer.

Utlimately, yes it does. Money is really meaningless except as a relative measure of wealth. If everyone else's money doubles, your money-based wealth just halved.

Imagine you're bidding on a house, and the other buyers' wealth just went up tenfold. You are not going to lose out on that house?

Of course on a micro level, it doesn't affect much - when someone wins the lottery, the rest of the nation isn't much poorer.

But the massive transfers of wealth to the rich and indebtedness of the masses is big.

 

[daishi5]

Utlimately, yes it does. Money is really meaningless except as a relative measure of wealth. If everyone else's money doubles, your money-based wealth just halved.

Imagine you're bidding on a house, and the other buyers' wealth just went up tenfold. You are not going to lose out on that house?

Of course on a micro level, it doesn't affect much - when someone wins the lottery, the rest of the nation isn't much poorer.

But the massive transfers of wealth to the rich and indebtedness of the masses is big.

This is only true if the amount of wealth stays the same while everyone elses income doubles. If the total amount of stuff and services doubled at the same time that everyone elses income doubled, then my wealth stays the same. I don't have a good idea how much wealth is being generated in the US to compare to their gains income, so I really don't know if everyone else is being squeezed out by their increased income. I suspect that they aren't, because I doubt that the extra millions the rich make are chasing the same goods that a middle class American's money is chasing.

My pet theory, that I don't have any evidence for, is that if we include the populations of China, India, and the many other countries we have a lot of trade with, the total income gap is shrinking. The recent gains in China are promising: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2093898

I don't worry too much myself because, as I pointed out to Acanthus, I think the median income is rising in ways that are not being captured. I just don't see how the average American is so much worse off than his equivalent was 20-30 years ago.

 

[WHAMPOM]

I figured it out! Reagan did nothing, but took credit for everything!!! A perfect Republican hero!

 

[Craig234]

This is only true if the amount of wealth stays the same while everyone elses income doubles. If the total amount of stuff and services doubled at the same time that everyone elses income doubled, then my wealth stays the same. I don't have a good idea how much wealth is being generated in the US to compare to their gains income, so I really don't know if everyone else is being squeezed out by their increased income. I suspect that they aren't, because I doubt that the extra millions the rich make are chasing the same goods that a middle class American's money is chasing.

My pet theory, that I don't have any evidence for, is that if we include the populations of China, India, and the many other countries we have a lot of trade with, the total income gap is shrinking. The recent gains in China are promising: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2093898

I don't worry too much myself because, as I pointed out to Acanthus, I think the median income is rising in ways that are not being captured. I just don't see how the average American is so much worse off than his equivalent was 20-30 years ago.

For one thing, you don't see it because you are not looking at the massive increase in debt.

http://fedupusa.org/2010/07/06/amer...-class-americans-into-perpetual-debt-serfdom/

 

[jackace]

For one thing, you don't see it because you are not looking at the massive increase in debt.

http://fedupusa.org/2010/07/06/amer...-class-americans-into-perpetual-debt-serfdom/

Also a lot more families today compared with families from 30 years ago have both parents working. These families have doubled the numbers of workers, but have not seen a doubling of their income.

 

[nobodyknows]

Ronnie Raygun is a hero to the right because he busted unions, built up the miltary, cut taxes, enabled off-shoring and set the stage for millions of illegals to come in to the country to keep labor wages artically low. Every rich persons wetdream.

 

[daishi5]

For one thing, you don't see it because you are not looking at the massive increase in debt.

http://fedupusa.org/2010/07/06/amer...-class-americans-into-perpetual-debt-serfdom/

Three points, 1. Credit cards need to be reigned in, no person should be subject to a contract that a company can change on them without the person signing and agreeing to the change. You get a progressive, republican, or purple monkey to propose that regulation and I will support it.

2. They mention the huge rate of housing cost inflation, and it is happening mostly in two places, California and the upper East Coast. My house in the mid-west cost less than $100,000. My own income before marriage put the cost of my mortgage at less than 25% of my income. Now that I am getting married, it will drop to almost 12%. I also have way more house than I need, I have a basement and a bedroom sitting empty because I could not find a nice smaller house in an area I liked.

In california, they have put in place a lot of laws regulating new developments, and in many cases putting very large portions of the land in the area off-limits to development. This is a huge reduction in the number of available houses in an area. Going back to the example of relative income and houses, if we cut the number of houses in an area in half, everyone ends up much poorer. California is a perfect example of this, the average household in the Bay Area now spends almost 50% of their income on their mortgage, while at the same time the city and county have placed most of the land off-limits to new development. In effect, the residents created a law that prevented new people from purchasing land as cheap as they had, and thus drove the prices of the land they owned up at the expense of the new-comers.

Home mortgage costs are not really a sign of the rich gouging the poor, but the old landowners placing regulations that hurt people who have not yet moved there.

3. I still think that banks that were bailed out should have been taken over and the pieces sold off. The people running the banks that gambled and lost should be out of a job right now. We should have bailed out the banks depositors, not the people running them.

 

[Zebo]

Ronnie Raygun is a hero to the right because he busted unions, built up the miltary, cut taxes, enabled off-shoring and set the stage for millions of illegals to come in to the country to keep labor wages artically low. Every rich persons wetdream.

Good succinct post.

 

[Zebo]

For one thing, you don't see it because you are not looking at the massive increase in debt.

http://fedupusa.org/2010/07/06/amer...-class-americans-into-perpetual-debt-serfdom/

Yeah we got "rich" alright...only someone retarded would call debt rich.

 

[Jhhnn]

lol, try again junior. The new deal had little to do with what you talk of. The economy changed dramatically due to the war. Women worked outside of the home - which changed the whole scope of the economy. Dual incomes, increased talent pool, etc. But yeah, leave it to the FDR knob slobbers to try to claim it was the new deal that caused the prosperity. Fools...

Aw, I just love it when you're reduced to ad homs. It means you've run out of argument, and therefore enter denial to validate your beliefs.

You're right that WW2 changed a lot of things about America, but it didn't provide the constraints on capitalism that the New Deal did. SEC. State and Federal banking regulators. Glass Steagall act. SS. Unemployment insurance. FHA. FNMA. FDIC. And more.

Which Republicans despised all along, and gradually succeeded in largely dismantling or compromising to serve their purposes.

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_bubble_economy

Not that you'll actually read it- It's not just soundbite slogans strung together like so much of the rightwing drivel presented as fact. Perhaps others who actually think will do so, however...

World Economy! Free Market! Reaganomics! Self-regulated banking! Cut Red Tape! Ownership Society! Creative Financing!

That's just a start, of course... It wasn't enough that deregulation of the S&L's cost the taxpayer upwards of $350B- huh-uhh. That was just a taste of things to come. And it hasn't been enough that the top 1% nearly tripled their share of national income from Saint Ronnie forward- huh-uhh! Or that America's financial elite has established a permanent subsidy for themselves by owning the national debt, collecting interest rather than paying taxes. They needed those tax breaks to, uhh, stimulate investment, yeh, that's it... which translated into offshoring jobs as fast as they possibly could...

When did all this really get rolling? When Ronnie suckered the electorate, that's when, and he's still suckering many today, even from the grave.

 

[Zebo]

Aw, I just love it when you're reduced to ad homs. It means you've run out of argument, and therefore enter denial to validate your beliefs.

You're right that WW2 changed a lot of things about America, but it didn't provide the constraints on capitalism that the New Deal did. SEC. State and Federal banking regulators. Glass Steagall act. SS. Unemployment insurance. FHA. FNMA. FDIC. And more.

Which Republicans despised all along, and gradually succeeded in largely dismantling or compromising to serve their purposes.

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_bubble_economy

Not that you'll actually read it- It's not just soundbite slogans strung together like so much of the rightwing drivel presented as fact. Perhaps others who actually think will do so, however...

World Economy! Free Market! Reaganomics! Self-regulated banking! Cut Red Tape! Ownership Society! Creative Financing!

That's just a start, of course... It wasn't enough that deregulation of the S&L's cost the taxpayer upwards of $350B- huh-uhh. That was just a taste of things to come. And it hasn't been enough that the top 1% nearly tripled their share of national income from Saint Ronnie forward- huh-uhh! Or that America's financial elite has established a permanent subsidy for themselves by owning the national debt, collecting interest rather than paying taxes. They needed those tax breaks to, uhh, stimulate investment, yeh, that's it... which translated into offshoring jobs as fast as they possibly could...

When did all this really get rolling? When Ronnie suckered the electorate, that's when, and he's still suckering many today, even from the grave.

Republicans will win ITLR. 2/3 of our people are kept on life support by debt, however, no system can go on forever with too much debt and too little production. Simple math tells us we are fucked when interest payments consume 100% of revenue. I read something about Obama looking to cut SS and Medicare through some Commission he set up ...that's just a start. Wait until they stop laoning to Feds. Private slow down of credit extension is killing us already but we have seen nothing yet when govt cant borrow.

 

[Jhhnn]

Republicans will win ITLR. 2/3 of our people are kept on life support by debt, however, no system can go on forever with too much debt and too little production. Simple math tells us we are fucked when interest payments consume 100% of revenue. I read something about Obama looking to cut SS and Medicare through some Commission he set up ...that's just a start. Wait until they stop laoning to Feds. Private slow down of credit extension is killing us already but we have seen nothing yet when govt cant borrow.

You may be right- we may be past the point of no return, thanks to the efforts of Dick and W. Hard to say. The govt isn't like business or families, however, so a lot of comparisons don't apply. They can print money, raise taxes, and actually change the distribution of income in many respect thru a variety of methods. Whether or not any of that will happen remains to be seen.

I think the main thrust of Obama's commission is to deal with Medicare rather than SS, but, again, we'll have to wait and see... There are changes that can be made to SS that won't really hit people very hard. The current deal where some seniors can work & earn as much as they want while collecting SS is one example...

 

[Acanthus]

You may be right- we may be past the point of no return, thanks to the efforts of Dick and W. Hard to say. The govt isn't like business or families, however, so a lot of comparisons don't apply. They can print money, raise taxes, and actually change the distribution of income in many respect thru a variety of methods. Whether or not any of that will happen remains to be seen.

I think the main thrust of Obama's commission is to deal with Medicare rather than SS, but, again, we'll have to wait and see... There are changes that can be made to SS that won't really hit people very hard. The current deal where some seniors can work & earn as much as they want while collecting SS is one example...

It's fixable, ultra high tax bracket for personal income with an extra 5% tacked on until the deficit is erased.

move to a progressive tax system for businesses that has the same ultra-high bracket.

Tax the F*ck out of high volume trading that dramatically increases market volatility. ($20 per trade of the same stock within 48 hours).

Tariffs on nations that don't meet wage standards.

 

[gingermeggs]

Ronnie Raygun is a hero to the right because he busted unions, built up the miltary, cut taxes, enabled off-shoring and set the stage for millions of illegals to come in to the country to keep labor wages artically low. Every rich persons wetdream.

My sentiments exactly.

 

[gingermeggs]

It's fixable, ultra high tax bracket for personal income with an extra 5% tacked on until the deficit is erased.

move to a progressive tax system for businesses that has the same ultra-high bracket.

Tax the F*ck out of high volume trading that dramatically increases market volatility. ($20 per trade of the same stock within 48 hours).

Tariffs on nations that don't meet wage standards.

You could add environment standards too!

But countries like china and India will pay for this neglect in the future naturally.
It's taken the west along time to repair some of the environmental damage to Air, land and water courses, caused by dumb-assed, profit motivated industrialization.
"Wealth Creation" will be translated into Resource Exploitation in future human history.
To the rich and powerful, human life is just another form of resource to be exploited.

 

[gingermeggs]

Raygun was a puppet president and a shit actor!
And all of them, after him have been puppets too and many before!
There is an evil immortal living amongst the rich,
how do we find which one it is?

 

[Zebo]

It's fixable, ultra high tax bracket for personal income with an extra 5% tacked on until the deficit is erased.

move to a progressive tax system for businesses that has the same ultra-high bracket.


Tax the F*ck out of high volume trading that dramatically increases market volatility. ($20 per trade of the same stock within 48 hours).

Tariffs on nations that don't meet wage standards.

Of course it fixable in theory but there is soooooooo much money required to run, especially now. Republicans are getting 3x as much money as in 2008 thanks to SC decision. Democrats of today are already neo-liberal in economic policy and R's are just worse. Instead of basic sustenance so half the country does not riot they want nothing. Both parties depend on same corporations and top 1 percent to get them there and thus do nothing to upset them. (see jokes of CC bill or banking bills or talk of nixing inheritance tax by both parties)

BTW great suggestions. As I've said 100x I don't understand paying our people to sit at home AND paying Chinese to build iPhones. That must be remedied quickly because we can't pay people at home forever. Wage/pollution/right to organize/no child labor need to all be there to trade. If not we don't. If we choose to 'compete' with that we will become like them. Race to the bottom with entrenched and monied interests bearing all the fruit. See guided age. Why do we have to repeat history?

 

[hal2kilo]

Well my main issue with him is that those marines were murdered by terrorists and he was too weak willed to respond. It makes me angry to this day.

This/

 

[piasabird]

Reagan was a a great communicator and got the people on the Left to vote his way on some key issues. I would not say he is my hero. However, he did convince the soviet unioin to tare down the berlin wall.

 

[Craig234]

However, he did convince the soviet unioin to tare down the berlin wall.

No, he didn't.

 

[Craig234]

Also a lot more families today compared with families from 30 years ago have both parents working. These families have doubled the numbers of workers, but have not seen a doubling of their income.

When our economy was based on more liberal policies, one income could meet the needs of the family. Getting a second income was an option, which could make the family wealthier, but at the expense of the family of having a spouse (almost always the wife) dedicated to the family at home full-time. It was somewhat frowned upon socially.

But when more and more people got the second income, it wasn't about getting a lot more money - it was about maintaining your standard of living to compete with other 2-income families. When everyone goes from 1 to 2 incomes, for example, the competition for housing remains relatively the same - if they could buy houses at the 40% percentile, they could still buy houses at the 40th percentile - but the prices would be higher for everyone.

This was a real boost for the economy, increasing productivity, but at the price of the quality of life of the 1-income household.

The crime is that the families who made that sacrifice (most families) did not get the benefit, really, when I recall 1 statistic that since Reagan took office, something like 94% of all of the increases in the economy have gone to the top 20%, concentrated heavily at the top of that 20%. Now, the incomes of that very top less than 1%, with all the new productivity coming in, saw their incomes skyrocket many times over, after inflation.

The growth of the American middle class's size and prosperity in the 20th century was a historic event, and the taking of the middle class's wealth since Reagan is another.

One poster recently said he doesn't see the middle class worse off - debt hides the facts.

The great wealth of the United States is largely being extracted for the benefit of others.

And along with the reduction of wealth comes the reduction of global power, and with the reduction of global power comes the reduction of the best of the US's 'freedom' principles.

The American people's complacency - allowing for things like the propaganda of the right-wing movement to win elections - is allowing for the decline of global freedom.

 

[Steeplerot]

Reagan was a a great communicator and got the people on the Left to vote his way on some key issues. I would not say he is my hero. However, he did convince the soviet unioin to tare down the berlin wall.

A little history of this stuff most don't care to read about.
The Soviet Union had enacted huge reforms in the 80's in the name of "economic freedom" and along with a endless war in Afganistan pretty much deep sixed their command economy which at least _somewhat_ worked up until the late 70s. (Remember, the Soviets were able to at least make good attempts at the moon. And had a semifunctional economy even though isolated by the rest of the world) By 1991 the economy was ruined by glasnost. The concept of a command economy with half-assed free market reforms just led to bureaucratic officials being corrupt and cashing in at the expense of the country. Russia still has major problems with this.

The DDR (East German Govt) and Poland were already sick of Russia's crap and were at least built up enough after ww2 to carry on without. (with help from the west in the 90s) Reagan did not start the soviet war with afganistan nor was he part of the reform movement in the 1970's USSR that actually killed it. A lot more things added to the fall, Chernobyl was a total clusterfuck in a lot of ways and was a big part in the Afganistan fail as many troops were pulled out to clean, lot of equipment had to be liquidated from fallout. Anyhow, I could go on, but saying Raygun waved his wand and ended the SU? This is laughable from a historical perspective if you look into what was actually going on in the SU during that time of turmoil and change.

Most Americans do not remember or realize that the long breadlines and empty shelves you see in Russia are of the post glasnost "free-market" Soviet union in the 80s. The homeless, hungry masses showed up again not seen in Russia since Stalin was in power after the mess Germans made of the Soviet Union in the 40's.

DO not click here unless you wish to peek into the evil Communist Mother Hive -The Soviet Union life in the 1960s. It is unspeakably evil, right-wingers, I would not go unless you have heart medication. It is worse then the pits of hell itself.
http://englishrussia.com/index.php/2007/08/15/ussr-life-in-the-sixties/

And the 1970s
http://englishrussia.com/index.php/2007/07/26/more-pictures-of-ussr/

Luckily Raygun saved us!