John McCain, Supply-Side Economics, and Complete Idiocy

For years we have heard the Republican mantra of "Trickle-down" economics now commonly known as "Supply-side" economics and it continues to sound just as idiotic today as it did when Reagan first proposed it. The idea that giving tax breaks to suppliers instead of consumers will stimulate the economy and promote job growth flies in the face of common-sense economics. Demand always drives supply get that backwards and the economy collapses and jobs evaporate.

The housing industry collapsed because of interest-only adjustable rate loans but people defaulted on those loans because their homes did not appreciate like they thought they would. And why didn't those homes continue to appreciate? Because builders built more homes then there was a demand for. Investors and speculators began buying five, ten, fifteen, homes at a time, artificially inflating the price of homes by reselling them at a higher price and builders mistakenly believed that there were real families buying these homes so they built more But soon the investors were buying more homes than they could sell. The builders kept building and soon the market was flooded and there were more homes on the market then there was a demand for. Much more. In Las Vegas alone the number of resales on the market went from 1,400 homes to 26,000. Supply outstripped demand,home values plummeted, no one could refinance their loans before they were scheduled to adjust, so they began to default on their loans which drove home values down further as banks tried to discount these foreclosures in order to get them to sell. The rest is history. The entire economy collapsed. Still, there are idiots who don't get it. There are people who still don't see that without people buying things those who sell things will go broke no matter how many tax breaks they get.

John McCain believes that if we lower the business tax and the capital gains tax, it would make businesses more profitable and create more jobs. Now how would that work? I've been in the building industry for more than a decade and I can tell you that I have never heard of anyone hiring more workers because of lower taxes. You hire more people because of increased demand for your products and services. You wouldn't just hire guys to stand around doing nothing no matter how profitable you were. Even if you paid zero taxes that would just be an idiotic business practice. On the flip-side you would hire more people if demand increased no matter how high your taxes were. In fact, I have never, in my entire working career spanning more than 25 years, heard of anyone laying off workers because of high taxes. It just doesn't happen. People get laid off when products and services stop selling and products and services really stop selling when consumers have no money to purchase them. That's why supply-side economics is so mind-numbingly stupid. If you want to boost the economy you put more money into the hands of the consumer and that will inevitably end up in the hands of suppliers as the consumers go out and spend their money. You can cut all the taxes you want on corporations but if no one buys their products or services, because they just don't have the money to do so, that corporation will still be laying people off and eventually going under.

Now let's look at another claim John McCain has made about the reasoning behind his tax policies. He believes that cutting taxes on companies that ship jobs overseas will somehow woo them back to America. Because surely it's the lower taxes luring them to China and India and Mexico and not the cheap dollar-a-day labor. Come on Republicans, tell me you don't really believe this nonsense. Tell me that you just don't really care about the economy and its abortion and gay marriage that makes you want to vote for John McCain. Just don't tell me that you actually believe this idiotic notion that lower taxes will keep jobs in America. Do you realize that there are companies that raise chickens in America, freeze them, ship them to China to be cut up and then ship them back to America. Do you think they do that to avoid those high American taxes? The labor over there is so cheap that it is actually cost effective for them to ship meat over there to be cut up and then ship it back into this country and pay import taxes.

You know what would keep jobs in America? Taxing the living hell out of any company that moves their headquarters overseas. Since the Bush tax cuts went into effect have more companies relocated to America? No. Have companies that had moved overseas during the Clinton administration moved back to America? That answer would again be no. Have less companies moved overseas thanks to the Bush tax cuts then when their taxes were higher under Clinton? Once again, that answer is negative. So why do you think it would be different under McCain? Once again, republicans are doing the same things and expecting a different result. This is not the definition of insanity. It is the definition of stupidity.

Give tax breaks to Americans who make less than $250,000 so that they can afford to buy more stuff and you will see an immediate impact on the economy. If you are making more than $250,000 a year I seriously doubt that your lifestyle will be significantly impacted if your taxes go up a bit. You'll still buy just as much shit as you did before the election. And here's the other thing that should be fairly obvious, tax the living fuck out of any American company that ships jobs overseas, denounce them publicly and drive their asses into bankruptcy. Make examples of them. If the president of the United States were to declare that any company that shipped their jobs oversease was a traitor to the United States of America how eager do you think Ford would be to open a new factury in Korea? On the other hand, if we were to give them huge tax breaks after they closed a factory in Detroit and reopened it in Beijing, do you really think that would send the message that Americans were not going to tolerate companies that export jobs? I don't think so.