Jeffery Folks has an article today at the American Thinker entitled Progressives Shalt Steal that discusses the proposed tax policies of the Biden administration and the Congressional Progressives. There are legitimate reasons for taxes, such as public infrastructure and the payroll of legitimate government employees. But much of what our government spends money on is not legitimate. One could rightly say that when government does this it is theft from We the People. Progressives thus impoverish the American people while enriching themselves and increasing their own power.
It’s election time, and you will hear a lot about “corporate greed” and “greedy billionaires” from the Democrats. Already, Joe Biden has unveiled plans to raise corporate taxes by one third and slam billionaires (and those making as little as $75,000) with higher tax rates, wealth taxes, and taxes on unrealized gains. A good word for this is “stealing.”
For his part, Sen. Bernie Sanders wants to restrict drug companies on the prices they charge for weight-loss and diabetes drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic. Granted, these drugs are expensive, but the cost of drug development, partly as a result of government policies and FDA approval delays, averages $350 million, and most drugs fail to gain approval. So drug companies invest literally years and hundreds of millions for each drug that makes it through. It’s necessary to charge high prices in order to defray this cost and make a profit. The alternative is to produce no new drugs and allow Americans to be a lot sicker.
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What Biden and Sanders are doing, in effect, is attempting to steal the profits of drug companies — and, truth be known, of every other company and person who has money, so as to put it under their own control to use for political power. That is the playbook of all socialists and all progressives.
Biden’s proposed taxes would be crippling to the U.S. economy. The immediate effect would be to shift capital overseas, where it already enjoys lower rates. By reducing re-investment in our own economy, the Biden plan would lower America’s growth rate and reduce job creation. It would also depress wages for ordinary Americans.
Folks provides some statistics to show the effect of the tax proposals on ordinary Americans. These can be tedious, but they are necessary to understand the full effect on our economy.
Above all, by slowing the economy over years and decades, Biden’s tax increases would punish workers seeking better wages. That slowdown has already begun. The U.S. economy is now growing at less than 2% (CBO estimate for 2024 is 2% but currently running at 1.6%). One point six percent is far below the long-term growth rate of 3%. Over just one decade, that divergence compounds at 16% — a decline in average standard of living of 16% over what it would have been, just at average growth of 3%. During Trump’s last year before the pandemic, the growth rate was 4.1%. That means that over a decade, relative to MAGAnomics, Bidenomics would lower the standard of living for ordinary Americans by 30%.
As for “greedy corporations,” one should not imagine that corporations simply funnel all the profits they earn to billionaire investors. Nor should one imagine that billionaires and others who invest spend the money on themselves: most earnings of wealthy Americans are re-invested, thus creating more jobs and productivity. And most corporate profits go into running and expanding the corporation, thereby maintaining and creating jobs.
It is not corporations or billionaires who are particularly greedy. It is progressives in government like Biden and Sanders who are envious of everyone else’s wealth and are obsessed with putting all wealth in their own hands so as to extend their control over the people of this country.
Years ago, I was reading a balance sheet for a petroleum company. The profit the company earned was 6 cents on each gallon of gasoline and diesel fuel sold. But the government at the federal and state levels took 60 cents on each gallon. One has to ask, who are the greedy ones? Please note that was the just at the corporate level. Then each employee of the corporation paid income taxes on the wages and salaries they earned. In addition, each investor paid taxes on the dividends received. Indeed, the government seems more like the Mafia, taking money from each and every corporation and person involved in the petroleum industry to make a "profit" for itself, while pretending to provide protection. So, why are they now trying to kill that industry? At least that industry provides a useful product, unlike the wind and solar energy scam they are pushing.
When progressives “deploy capital,” they do so in order to buy votes and gain power. None of their “investments,” as they call them, like investments in wind and solar, produces a profit, and none of them makes life better for the average American. I can think of only one major government program that made life better — the interstate highway system — and even that was carried out under the guidance of a wise Republican president who had thought deeply about the project’s importance for national security and the economy.
Progressives are enraged by the idea that anyone except themselves can deploy capital and make a profit, even if by doing so they make life better for everyone. Elon Musk is a hero for many, and he should be, because he has deployed capital to create many things of value, most recently via xAI, an investment that has the potential to improve health care research by speeding clinical workflows, and Neuralink, a Musk startup that aims to improve daily life for paraplegics. As he demonstrated with Tesla and Starlink, Musk is able to innovate where government cannot.
Folks points out that the Progressives (read Communist and Socialists, hiding behind the Democrat party label) want to impose the largest tax hike in American history. It is one more reason to not vote for any Democrat, or anyone who sympathizes with these people. Please read Jeffrey Folks whole piece.
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