- We The 66
- Posts
- 🌊 Will Trump Tax the Rich?
🌊 Will Trump Tax the Rich?
Trump has floated taxing top earners. Can he shatter decades of anti-tax Republican policy?
Did someone forward you this? Subscribe here free!
By Max Frost
Running for president in 1988, George H.W. Bush made a promise: "Read my lips: no new taxes."
The pledge gained widespread popularity and became a staple of Bush’s campaign, helping him win that year’s election. Just two years later, though, reality kicked in: Congress had to cut the deficit, either by raising taxes or cutting spending. The cuts would have been too painful, so they raised taxes.
Bush had, fatally, broken his promise.
When he ran for reelection two years later, he lost to Bill Clinton.
The story became gospel among Republicans and shaped their anti-tax hike positions. Whether the tax hikes actually caused Bush to lose remains a matter of debate, though, with major implications right now.
31 years later, President Trump finds himself in a similar situation: Republicans have narrow majorities in the House and Senate, face a ballooning deficit, and have the debt ceiling quickly approaching. A complex fiscal situation in its own right, Trump has vowed to eliminate taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security, while boosting border spending, adding hundreds of billions to the budget. To get enough support to pass a budget, Trump has to get the deficit down – either by cutting spending or boosting taxes.
The debate about what to do next – cut spending, boost taxes, or both – is fueling a nascent civil war within the Republican party.
For decades, GOP orthodoxy has meant lowering taxes while limiting social spending. This has aligned with the party’s traditional free market, libertarian philosophy. Increasingly, though, that thinking is out.
As with free trade and tariffs, so with taxes and spending.
The rest of this report is for paid subscribers, who fund our journalism. If you start a two-week free trial today, you’ll be automatically entered to win a free year. Once you sign up, you can access all of our articles here!
Editor’s Note
Veeeery curious to hear your thoughts on this one. Should Trump raise taxes on the high-earners? Is that good politics or bad? Why hasn’t it happened yet?
Speaking of replying, lots of replies to yesterday’s story, part three of what has become our Free Speech Trilogy. A few examples of your responses are below, under our five most recent stories:
Shawn from Provo, UT wrote:
I actually just re-read 1984 last week for the first time since high school AP English days almost 20 years ago. Even more relevant as the years go on.
Crucially, most of the oppression that Winston and the other citizens of Airstrip One experience comes in the form of implied threats, social pressure, and relationship-based paranoia. Anyone who has read it or is familiar with the book probably thinks MUCH more about what people in that world can and can't say, that they are afraid of being turned in by a coworker/friend/child, and that they constantly self-censor even when they are "alone" to avoid trouble. It's only after Winston and Julia violate or avoid all these invisible barriers that the trap is sprung (spoiler for a 75 year old book) and they are arrested, tortured and "re-educated".
Oppression and lack of free speech don't start with a boot knocking down your door. But look at any totalitarian society (whether 1984 or real life) and that's where they end after you've been squeezed into a box by guilt, paranoia and social pressure.
Keep on truckin', guys.
Tim wrote:
Having not read the full article on the UK/Censorship story (sorry, I'm not a paid subscriber, but I do get the point you're trying to convey)....but what struck me is your use of George Orwell..
"Unpopular ideas can be silenced, and inconvenient facts kept dark, without the need for any official ban."
It's a very ominous quote. But if "I" were in journalism, and I get it, I'm no journalist, wouldn't I want to dig my heels in even further and say no, this is too important of a story to withhold from the rest of the world. If this was a staring contest, I'd say you blinked first and you're trying to justify it.
Thus for George Orwell I give you Ben Franklin
"“If all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed.”
And lastly, Josh:
What a great article! I think the way that you described society’ involvement in censorship , and not just the government, really paints another perspective that I had not thought about. It is true. Cancel culture is society’s censorship weapon, which ultimately works as a tool for governments to use.
As a British citizen, I barely speak my mind on topics either because of fear of cancel culture, or because of the UK government’s dystopian watch on the internet.
How would you propose we can build and cultivate a society of free speech, undoing the work that has been put in to silence us, while not being churned up by the censorship machine?
Editor’s Reply:
That’s a great question that I want your thoughts on. So, to the audience: “How would you propose we can build and cultivate a society of free speech, undoing the work that has been put in to silence us, while not being churned up by the censorship machine?”
Sincerely,
Max and Max