State of Utah= HUGE ATM MACHINE for Romney's campaign.
And btw, I'm still waiting for someone to answer my questions on trickle down economics. If we can't find examples on how they've worked or are working, then we should probably stop framing our whole tax structure around it. Like fast too, before the middle-class disappears completely.
You are not getting an answer because:
1. You have made a claim based on the logic that "you can't prove a negative." I can easily say, "the middle class would be much worse off if it were not for trickle down economics." It is the same as "I brush my teeth and floss every day, yet I still had two cavities, therefore I am not going to brush and floss everyday." I could easily say, "If i did not brush and floss my teeth everyday, I would have had 4 cavities instead of two."
2. There is some debate as to if the middle class is actually disappearing, when this supposed disappearing actually began, and what are the root causes of it. Although your assertion that trickle down economics is the root cause, this is a non-starter at worse and a bastardization of correlation does not equal causation at best. Education, decline of two household parents, globalization, movement of individuals between the classes, etc are all contributing factors. Given the complex nature of global economics the statistical chances of just tax rates being the sole cause of the decline of the middle class is virtually next to zero.
3. Your theory is based on several false assumptions that nobody wants to admit:
First, the general mantra is that the "income" gains have largely flowed to the 1% in lieu of the 99%. While the income gains have flowed to the 1%, most of this income is the result of compensation not available to and not at the expense of the workers. Nearly all CEO compensation comes at the expense of shareholders, not company underlings. Berkshire Hathaway is a perfect example. Buffett pays himself next to nothing, yet his employees are no better paid than anybody else. Private companies can do what they want. Let's use a private business example. If the Utah Jazz cut player payroll in half, they are not going to float the player salary differences down to the lower level employees. That is not the way business works and not the way business will ever work.
Secondly, and most importantly, you don't recreate the middle class by compressing down the upper class. Yet, this is exactly what the left proposes. What you and virtually all others that are up in arms over the 1% fail to ARTICULATE IS A STRATEGY by which that even if you raised marginal rates on the 1% to WHATEVER rate you like, you are not going to improve the middle class. WHY? Because you are funneling all tax receipts to a third party...the US Treasury and the whims of Congress. THE ONLY way to directly improve the middle class via this route is set up a mechanism by which all tax revenues collected above and beyond earmarked for the treasury as a normal course of business be directly divided up between all middle class and lower class families.
You don't feed a starving man by making the rich guy on the hill cut his dinner steak in half and throw it away. By raising tax rates, sending it to the treasury you are doing the same thing. Sure, you can make a case for collecting x amount of tax revenues from the 1% and launching some massive stimulus program...fine, but if you believe, Congress will do it effectively, efficiently, fairly, and timely, than you are dreaming. Sorry, but taking x amount of dollars from the private sector and leaking a large part of that into the heavens so you and others can feel good is worse than knowing the 1% is sitting poolside eating caviar. The problem with Keynes economics is the same problem with Austrian economics, great in theory, but impossible to implement by humans.
