Economist Stephen Moore joins John to discuss the notion of the rich paying “their fair share” of taxes. http://www.LibertyPen.com
Again to dispute the economic fallacies of Bernie Sander’s Socialism and the far Left economics of Obama and Hillary, the Lexington Libertarian will offer evidence that socialism does not work and that over taxing the rich is destroying the spoon that feeds you.
Socialism has not worked in Russia and China, both of whom, have given it up as has most of Eastern Europe. Western Europe that still clings to it and is tettering on the precipice of bankruptucy with economies that refuse to grow and tax burdens that cannot be met. Closer to home Venezuela and Cuba are showcases for the failure of Socialism.
Uncle Bernie would like to tax the millionaires and billionaires out of existence. But it is these very people who pay most of the taxes. So if you want to be able to fund government, the best policy is to have more millionaires and billionaires. These rich people are also the creators of jobs – good paying jobs. Have you ever had a poor person offer you a job?
What is so important to the argument is that the rich by becoming rich do not take anything away from those less well off. This is not a zero sum game, a stagnant economy that never grows and therefore must be divided up into fair shares. Inventors and entrepreneurs financed by rich Capitalists increase the wealth of a nation without taking anything away from anybody. And lower taxes actually bring in higher tax revenues than higher taxes.
The Left wants to create a “fairer” America by bringing everybody down to the lowest common denominator. That way everybody is equal – equally miserable. In the proces of punishing success they take away the motive to strive to get ahead and achieve more. Thus they defeat the American Dream. And in the process they punish success and punish the job creators.
The Right, instead of chopping off the top and leveling everybody down, wants to do the exact opposite – lift the bottom up. Instead of making millionaires and billionaires poorer the Right wants to make the poor richer. And they accomplish that by both allowing the economy as a whole to grow and grow and grow so that there is more opportunity for everybody and also by creating a classless society where an individual can build his or her own individual success without having it over regulated or confiscated by the government.
Don Feder writing for the American thinker says:
The USSR collapsed under the dead weight of decades of five-year plans. North Korea doesn’t have an economy. Cuba is a basket case. China started on the road to prosperity by abandoning Maoism.
Sandersistas cry foul. Those are failed communist experiments, they counter. (What is communism but socialism with a gun?)
But what about Venezuela, with the world’s largest oil reserves and an inflation rate of 720%? A January 29 headline in the Washington Post warned: “Venezuela is on the brink of a complete economic collapse.”
Sweden has an income tax that takes 55% of GNP and a value-added tax as high as 22.5%. Altogether, the Swedish government controls roughly two-thirds of the nation’s economy. Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad told Forbes that Swedish bureaucrats often accuse him of exploiting workers and “only wanting profits.” The nerve!
A quote often attributed to Winston Churchill goes: “If a man is not a socialist by the time he is 20, he has no heart. If he is not a conservative by the time he is 40, he has no brain.”
Here in lies the big differences of the 2016 Presidential election – Socialism versus Free Market Capitalism.
Lexington Libertarian 