Via Matt, Hendrik Hertzberg in The New Yorker:
The Republican argument of the moment seems to be that the difference between capitalism and socialism corresponds to the difference between a top marginal income-tax rate of 35 per cent and a top marginal income-tax rate of 39.6 per cent.
If you have questions about the moderation policies here, please read this post. Short version: treat other posters with respect.
If your submitted comment fails to appear, without even an error or "waiting for moderation" message, then our spam-blocking software may have blocked your comment. Please contact the moderators immediately so we can rescue your comment. If this happens repeatedly, you might visit Akismet's comment form to tell them they're falsely identifying you as a spammer.
October 29th, 2008 at 10:41 am
Which means we’ve already lived through socialism: Obama is proposing the tax rates that existed 1998-2000 under the Clinton Administration (39.6% top marginal federal income tax rate; 20% top federal capital gains tax rate). Incidentally, the top capital gains rate actually got LOWERED during the Clinton years; Reagan’s 1986 tax reform treated capital gains like regular income, which meant it was taxed at a top rate of 28%. The rate got lowered in 1997 to 20%. The only reason the return to Clinton-era tax rates is being hyped as “socialism” is that these rates got dropped by the Bush tax cuts — which John McCain voted against. He and Chafee were the only Republican senators to do so.
This comment was written by PG.Report this comment to the moderators
October 29th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
Though I agree with the gist of your comments, PG, It’s worth nothing that the argument, “It’s not socialism, after all Clinton did it too,” just might not hold weight with the kind of delusional right-wingers who actually believe Obama is a socialist. I mean, for them, that’s like saying, “It’s not all that evil. After all, Beelzebub did it too!”
—Myca
This comment was written by Myca.Report this comment to the moderators
October 29th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Myca,
I suppose I mention that because it indicates that the U.S. had its longest peacetime economic expansion, the explosion of the tech industry and a surge in the stock market all during “socialist” tax policies. But you’re right that I’m probably giving too much credit for logical thought by making this argument; if someone just equates “socialist” with “evil” instead of realizing that it is a specific kind of economic policy, saying that we had it under Clinton probably will just make them think that Obama can’t keep his pants zipped either.
This comment was written by PG.Report this comment to the moderators