re: Curious as to board’s opinion on KS austerity...

I don't see spending cuts in there.

Failure? The only failure was the government not reducing spending.

New business flourished under the plan and the economy grew despite the massive downturn in oil and gas revenue.

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voluntarily giving up my tax savings gets me the bad of paying taxes without even getting the good of avoiding the bigger deficit. it would be irrational to do it. calling this position hypocritical is pure cynical trash

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The deficit isn't in a vacuum. Oh, and to reiterate, 1.4T is 2% of the TOTAL budget in the next 10 years.

But, in any case. You can bet your rats fricking arse that if ALL Hillary voters decided to simply take half of what they get extra and apply it to helping the people they believe need help............the "need" the govt has to address would go down.

Sheesh. How the frick do people not understand this?

The govt isn't the only vehicle for addressing need.

Even if those 60M employed an average of only $1K extra into community involvement, that would be $600B over the next 10 years!

Don't fricking sit there and tell me that 60B per year in people actually DIRECTLY helping wouldn't reduce need.

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to reiterate, 1.4T is 2% of the TOTAL budget in the next 10 years

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i agree the tax cut is small potatoes in the big picture

about $260billion in annual deficit-fueled stimulus, in an economy of ~$18trillion. predicting a boom is (without hyperbole) about as silly as what the dems are doing

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You can bet your rats fricking arse that if ALL Hillary voters decided to simply take half of what they get extra and apply it to helping the people they believe need help............the "need" the govt has to address

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i said the downside was the deficit. i didn't say "the needy" or whatever

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i said the downside was the deficit. i didn't say "the needy" or whatever

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Call me completely nuts but last I checked, a substantial portion of Federal spending is due to "need". From medical spending, to educational programs, to child care for the needy........and on and on.

So, like I said. That doesn't exist in a vacuum.

I mean, if there were ZERO need, the deficit wouldn't be so high.

So, go reduce the need!

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So, like I said. That doesn't exist in a vacuum.

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That doesn't mean you get to strawman others by telling them that they either need to donate to charity or they're hypocrites. I said the downside was the deficit increase, and that's what I meant. And no matter what I do with my savings, I can't undo that deficit impact. Your argument is cynical and I'm pretty sure you know it.

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Vacherie Saint

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Hmmm

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What? It's objectively a swamp donkey bonanza and yet I still agree with the tax cuts. I don't think these are incompatible positions.

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Um, I'm in no way a fiscal liberal. Also, nice strawman. Where did I say that this was a unique policy?

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If it isn't unique, then there are 2 immediate questions

1. Have other places engaged in similar policy and gotten different results?

2. Have places that did NOT engage in the same policy also encounter fiscal difficulty.

Since you and I both know the answer to 1 & 2 are "yep and yep", the entire thread becomes null.

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Try to focus on the actual discussion. You are free to start your own thread to discuss these examples in your own pointless thread.

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I am.

In order to discuss the "economic fallout of KS policy", you have to actually show that the economic fallout was CAUSED by it. See questions 1 & 2 above. What you have at the moment is correlation, not causation. Worse, you have correlation where others didn't experience the same correlation.

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I don't know where to begin to dissect this absurd argument, but I've no doubt you believe you're making some brilliant point.

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Yep. It is brilliant.

EVERY fricking day, liberals claim to care about helping people more than the rest of us.

Then, you give them a chunk of change in their pockets and, do we see them employ that in accordance with their words?

Well, turns out, the answer is nope.

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How do you not understand that if YOU help a person, the government doesn't need to help him as much?

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The government is who needs to understand that. We could eradicate poverty tomorrow and people in DC would still come up with excuses why programs like WIC, SNAP, Medicare, etc were necessary to the survival of the country.

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That a very different story than the data appear to tell.

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I mean inflation doesn’t just go away because you cut spending. And that is just one slice of the Kansas budget.

But I guess I’m not really seeing the point you are trying to get at?

The argument from Brownback and Republicans has been that tax cuts, especially tax cuts targeted at the wealthy and wealthy businesses, will produce enough new revenue from jolting growth that it will actually increase revenue. Neither of those things happened in Kansas. Brownback famously promised 100,000 private sector jobs from his tax policy. He added 14,000. Which even lagged neighboring states.

Brownback absolutely did cut spending, and cut spending in those places Republicans always go on about: education, healthcare, public safety, environment, pensions, transportation, payroll. But the immediate problem with that is those cuts often have a growth depressing effect. You are taking money away from programs that often are immediately spent or used. At least at a much higher rate than the tax cuts you are replacing them with. So it becomes a double problem. You are simultaneously attempting to cut taxes as a means to stimulate growth, but you are cutting off your nose by simultaneously cutting spending that depresses GDP.