Posted on 11/19/2012 8:23:34 AM PST by LucianOfSamasota
The Twinkie, it turns out, was introduced way back in 1930. In our memories, however, the iconic snack will forever be identified with the 1950s, when Hostess popularized the brand by sponsoring “The Howdy Doody Show.” And the demise of Hostess has unleashed a wave of baby boomer nostalgia for a seemingly more innocent time.
Needless to say, it wasn’t really innocent. But the ’50s — the Twinkie Era — do offer lessons that remain relevant in the 21st century. Above all, the success of the postwar American economy demonstrates that, contrary to today’s conservative orthodoxy, you can have prosperity without demeaning workers and coddling the rich.
Consider the question of tax rates on the wealthy. The modern American right, and much of the alleged center, is obsessed with the notion that low tax rates at the top are essential to growth. Remember that Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, charged with producing a plan to curb deficits, nonetheless somehow ended up listing “lower tax rates” as a “guiding principle.”
Yet in the 1950s incomes in the top bracket faced a marginal tax rate of 91, that’s right, 91 percent, while taxes on corporate profits were twice as large, relative to national income, as in recent years. The best estimates suggest that circa 1960 the top 0.01 percent of Americans paid an effective federal tax rate of more than 70 percent, twice what they pay today.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
If you want another reason, read the work that got him his noble prize and then read his articles.
His work in favor of free trade and analysis got him the award, but for the last decade or so, he has essentially been bashing it (and indirectly, his own work).
I.E. He has indirectly renounced that which gave him credibility (not that it matters, the left ignores the fact that the guy is a former enron economist).
dont forget western europe and Japan were still devastated by war
The patently sophomoric tripe “Dr” Krugman aside, just go take a look at the comments on that assrag!
It is a disgustingly putrid rehash of the most inane and foolish comments not born of ANY experience in the matter or in its history. Urbane, articulate idiots more interested in kissing this poofter’s ass than making sense.
I’ll tell you what, the next time NYC gets bashed, nuked, disastered, etc. you won’t find me crying one bit. It doesn’t exist for me.
If 91% is good, then 100% would be better.
Krugman is such a douchebag.
The inmplications of Hauser's Law are bunk. There is over a 1% GDP difference between tax cut years and tax hike years (graph from this article) in collected federal revenue. That is a huge number in dollars. It would be an even larger difference if you factored out the Reagan payroll tax increases from the tax cut years.
Higher marginal tax rates on the wealthy will not lead to higher tax revenues as the GDP will shrink accordingly.
Except that GDP has been lowering as marginal income tax rates get lower and conversely historically higher GDP growth eras have typically also been higher marginal income tax rate areas (see this CRS report).
lol
Krugman is a GENIUS!
If Obama had doubled the U.S. corporate tax rate, then Hostess would never have had to go bankrupt!
And tripling the corporate taxes on Hostess, etc would have increased Hostess profits tremendously!
Genius, sheer genius!
And in the same logic, raise income taxes on the poor from the current nothing to 90 percent and they will all be rich!
Wow! Brilliant thinking (for the incurably insane).
bump
I propose an Idiot Tax. Using a rate of 50 % on every failed liberal idea, I propose to wipe out our current National Debt and extablish a 6 trillion dollar surplus within the first 48 hours of my new tax’s implementation.
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| Tokyo after the firebombing. | Essen, the heart of German heavy industry. |
If the 50s were so great, then why did Kennedy propose a massive cut in tax rates?
If high marginal tax rates worked so well, then why did Jimmy Carter fail and Ronald Reagan succeed?
Idiot.
Krugman’s ideas are very much like twinkies; spongy fluff empty of any nutritional value and inscrutably durable.
There are, let’s face it, some people in our political life who pine for the days when minorities and women knew their place, gays stayed firmly in the closet and congressmen asked, “Are you now or have you ever been?” The rest of us, however, are very glad those days are gone. We are, morally, a much better nation than we were. Oh, and the food has improved a lot, too.
Hahahahahaha! Morally better?
There are 1.3 million unborn children aborted a year. The group that does the bulk of these is funded by taxpayer dollars, and they teach a graphic sex ed program to kids in schools. Forty percent of the children in this country are born out of wedlock. Some put the divorce rate as high as 50%. People want to redefine marriage, adopt children to gay couples, and teach the gay lifestyle to kids in schools. America has a multibillion dollar porn industry. America has a growing STD rate. The advent of computer and phone technology has enabled more hookups, adultery, and easy access to porn than ever before. Reality TV is filled with desperate, attention seeking people who are getting paid to act a fool. The Billboard charts are full of songs with foul language, sex, disrespect of women, etc. Even scripted movies and TV is filled is filled with cheap sex jokes, foul langauge, and violence because it's easier for the writers to do that than write an intelligent script, and the masses lap it up. We campaign against bullying, but yet we hear about suicides of bullied kids frequently. Adding to that, go on the internet, say something the oh so tolerant left disagrees with, and you'll see how against bullying they are. God is being continually kicked out of the public square. People are ridiculed for conservative Christian beliefs. Conservative Muslims get know heat for being conservative, though, even though they are much more conservative. Secular humanism and moral relativity are the religion of the masses. Now churches are being forced to fund birth control against their beliefs.
Things are getting better? Maybe to Krugman this is progress, and things are getting better, and that's just sad.
41% illegitimate birth rate.
53% among mothers under 30.
Was 4% when I was growing up.
$750,000,000,000 Federal to support these illegitimate ‘families’.
Another $250,000,000,000 from the states.
We could almost balance the Federal budget if we simply returned to the 1950’s method of getting married BEFORE we pop out children, and then supporting the children in a two parent family.
But, there I go with my hate speech again!
Bump
James Taranto frequently reminds his readers that Krugman was on the Enron payroll.
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