how many people believe in this trickle down theory Reagan started?

Question

do you think the rich wanna give there money back to the workers while cutting losses to the stock owners? why do you think the average wage for this country has stagnated while the ceo's are getting these retirement packages in the hundreds of millions

well who cares who made it up reagon put it into action with his reagonomics plan, while he crushed the unions

cb: did you know the average tax payer did not get a tax break? it only helped the major corporations one that dont need help in investing it is the smaller ones that do, for example microsoft does not need to extra tax breaks and neither does the majority of these companies that got the break

i believe big money was involved, a lot of under the table deals and " political donations" got this passed and it worked for them and not us

Answer 1

Oh he trickled on us all right!

With all due respect to Mr. Reagan - he was a genius in terms of foreign policy - his economics damned near killed us.

And our current president is liable to finish the job!

Oh - and the average wage has stagnated because we have had a net loss of over four million new jobs over the last 6 years. New jobs are being created by American companies in foreign lands.

The CEO's still get a paycheck - but the people who earn that money don't work here anymore.

Answer 2

CB has provided some good detail also, but there are a couple of points that should be made.

First, the economy was a disaster when Reagan took over, and was thriving 8 years later when he left office. I don't know how you can condemn him for that.

Second, the idea that Reagan proposed was not called trickle-down economics - that was a derisive term the leftists made up to insult him. Still, if you think about it, even the rich spend money. They have no incentive to hoard it. They either invest it or spend it, and either way, it goes back into the economy. But that wasn't Reagan's plan. He simply suggested cutting taxes ACROSS THE BOARD. This helped the economy, and frankly, our economy has grown so well since then because no one has fully reversed all the cuts he made. Reagan deserves a lot of the credit for the success we still have today.

Answer 3

Wow, I am impressed by the number of testimonials for the trickle-down theory but I guess they are not aware of the neo-trickle-down theory that will be presented by the president at the State of the Union address. Neo-trickle says why send taxes to the government at all, they are too inefficient, instead send your taxes directly to the wealthy. I have done some research for you to make this as easy as possible. It turns out that 5 of the top 25 richest persons in the world are Waltons. So, you can just send your pay check (or what's left of it) directly to the Walton family. Imagine the trickle effect of not only directly contributing to those pillars of capitalism but hitting 20% of the richest of the rich with a single stamp! I think at that point, all we need to do is sit back and wait for the next wave of trickle.
PS If you want some extra trickle for your buck, look up some of those retired (or fired) CEO's that were mentioned in the question and write them a check also. It's an extra stamp but that's what neo-trickle is all about, investing in the future.

Answer 4

the trickle down theory has worked. if you look at the last 25 years the 4 times the economy fell were the Pres. Bush tax increase, Pres. Clinton tax increase and the dot com bursting and 911. the increase in economy came on Pres. Reagen and W Bush tax cuts and under the dot. com boom( and a wall street economy is bad for average Americans) the principle of trickle down is that rich people will buy more products and increase jobs. which does works but we have had an administration that signed NAFTA, free trade with China and Vietnam.

Answer 5

Historically, you're not wrong at all. Supply side economics theory was around long before Reagan but Reagonomics and supply side theory should not be confused-even though the two terms are often interchangeable. Supply side economists actually criticize trickle down economics. This from Wikipedia:

Arthur Betz Laffer, Sr. (born August 14, 1940) is a supply side economist who became influential during the Reagan administration as a member of Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board (1981-1989). Laffer is best known for the Laffer curve, a curve illustrating tax elasticity which asserts that in certain situations, a decrease in tax rates could result in an increase in tax revenues. Although he does not claim to have invented this concept (Laffer, 2004), it was popularized with policy-makers following an afternoon meeting with Dick Cheney.

Two things here-the Laffer curve was the big difference between "old" supply side economics and Reagonomics. The 2nd oddity is ....Dick Cheney????

Yes, I agree, Reagonomics started our current spiral downward.

Answer 6

Trickle Down Economics does work. It is not about anyone "giving their money back". I do not think you understand how it works.

In a stripped down explanation it is only designed to create more of those average wage jobs not "give" them more money. The idea is that if you allow the private sector to use/invest money they will create jobs. They do and it does work.

Reagan presided over the greatest peacetime growth this country had seen. The very low rates of unemployment of late are owed to the reduction in taxes and can be attributed to Reaganomics.

Middleclassandnotquiet-
For your information Art was right. Every time we have ever lowered taxes it has resulted in larger tax revenues demonstrating that we are overtaxed and that government redistribution of wealth is inherently flawed.

j_smith_7- Actually, historically speaking you are wrong. Regan was preaching the virtues of supply-side economics long before Thatcher was PM. His views on the subject date back to his term as Govenor of CA.

Update-
Corporate taxes and individual taxes are not the same thing. Reagan and Congress completely revised the tax code in 1986 effecting every taxpayer.

The big picture is that those companies will take the money they did not have to pay in taxes and reinvest it within creating growth. The major consequence of that is that there is a need to hire more employees. That is how trickle down works.

It is not designed to increase the economic position of most taxpayers but rather create more of the average taxpayers. Reagan did not believe in government redistribution of wealth. LBJ's Great Society was and is a blight on this country.

Which tax break are you referring to? It is impossible to respond unless you give more detail.

Answer 7

Well, let's see. The Fed has said that although corporate profits have been rising briskly, the percentage of GDP made up of wages is the lowest it has been since the Great Depression.

I guess I would say that as stewards, corporate CEOs make great slum lords.

Answer 8

They have to pass it down to get more qualified employees for their jobs to make themselves more money. Force in increased wages and higher taxes will help a few but bring higher prices to cover them on everything. The price of gas went up and you may have noticed products in the stores have gone up.

Answer 9

It doesn't even come close to working. It was a stupid idea to begin with, and it's a stupid idea now. People seem to forget that many hoard their wealth, and the young groups are th ones that put the most into the economy. They also happen to be the one least likely to qualify for those tax breaks.

Answer 10

I think the trickle down theory does not work, because someone near the top will always fill their bucket, scarcely leaving a drop to spill over to the one below.