Republican Oklahome Goes Down The Economic Tubes.

[Cheerful Charlie]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/m/e4a2afef-d4cd-343e-8ee9-b50955647b80/ss_after-slashing-taxes,.html

Four years ago, Oklahoma’s oil patch was booming, unemployment was falling, and lawmakers were debating what to do with a $200 million surplus. Republicans who control state government successfully pushed to reduce the top income tax rate, slash the oil and gas production tax rate from 7 percent to 2 percent, and give more tax incentives to industry. Now, the once-unwavering confidence in the wisdom of lower taxes has given way to a growing panic over how to pay for basic services, including schools, health care, and public safety. The situation has deteriorated to the point where Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers have been warned not to fill their fuel tanks, and drunk drivers have been able to keep their licenses because there are not enough administrative workers to revoke their driving privileges. ...

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But don't worry. Just because this sort of tax cut madness didn't work in Oklahoma, Kansas, Louisiana or Illinois et al, it doesn't mean the Trump/GOP national tax plans will also fail for the same reason.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Flush with cash and working on massive expansion within their industries, the monied ones are working quietly in the background. Soon, the good jobs for good hard working folk are going to rain down like manna from heaven. There'll be so much disposable income flowing through the economy, government coffers will be stuffed and ready to take care of everything except those lazy poor people who still don't wanna work.
Just wait. It's gonna be fantastic. Trust me. I know these things.

 

[BH]

What is going on is the leaders of business and the country, who are the same people, have pretty much figured out they do not need a prosperous population for them to be prosperous as well. People do not realize that on reason we were so powerful economically and resulting in high living standards was because we were the only country not tore up by World War Two. And, we had to be paid well and given good living standards so we could see how much better we were than the Russians so we'd fight them if we were told to by our rich overlords. We are just going back to what we were pre World War Two where there were a few rich, a very few middle class who serve the rich directly, and then a great mass of rather poor people. Let's face facts, for the great masses of people to do well means less money for those well off wanting even more. The well off know they can impoverish the population by low wages, poor benefits, or moving stuff overseas and the general population will not do anything. And they know with money, connections, and power they will always have access to high tech and medical and it isnt important if the rest of the population doesn't. They'll make sure enough medical and high tech skill is around to serve their needs and no more. If there is some sort of crisis economically they will just use their connections to dip into the government trough to get their busiensses out of it. That is how things were generally in the past and that is how they are going to be in the future.


Part of this is the fault of the general population wanting to live in a fantasy land that we are number one and deserve everything to fall into our laps and this had led to a lot of folks into being complacent, ignorant, and lazy defending their interests. Part of it too is the collapse of your Eastern Bloc economies that served as a reason for the well off over here to make sure that the populations prospered economically . "You rich want us to support your gravy train, well, you better see to it you offer us better material rewards than the commies can give us". Third is just basic economics. With one third to two thirds of the world either under communist control or possibly going to fall under their control you (rich folks) have limited options on where to put your industries and invest money in with it being relatively safe to do so. You also have a much limted amount of people to pool as a workforce and have to pay more to keep your people. And fourth is it just rational and makes good sense if you care only for yourself or a few immediate family members and no one else. You get bookoos of money, an impoversed population does not have the means to oppose you on anything, and a weak government controlled by people like you will always serve you and never the public like it does sometimes now.

You know, I watched He-Man cartoons as a little kid. I was flipping through the tv channels and an episode of He-Man came on and I watched some of it for fun memories sake. It amazes me how sorry the plots were and how poorly the film was spliced together looking back. But one thing I really laughed about and then said, no, that's kinda where we are heading now in the real word and it is this: The general population in He-Man seemed to be a bunch of poor peasants running around with horses and carts, yet the well off have flying machines, laser guns, and even space ships. That's kinda what we are probably heading too. You'll see your elites with all the goodies tech of the day allows and we the general population are going to live like they did 100 to 150 years ago.

 

[Rhea]

Our town has something like that happen. All the tea partiers tried to convince me to slash taxes. What a battle. I said, "no. It would be irresponsible of us to cut taxes in half KNOWING we'd have to double them in 7 years.". Still they argued. Every year. Vociferously. About " illegally stealing their money.. ". Nope, I think you'd be better off taking that money, paying down debt, and putting the rest in reserves to keep takes low for decades.

Still they argued. I couldn't disagree more. It was ugly at times. But we kept them from having their way. Now we're a town with no debt and enough in the bank to stay out of debt.

I'm happy. Those tea partiers still think I stole their money. But their taxes are lower today because of it. No shame no guilt for me. I'm proud of how we handled it.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

And this is the problem with members of the far right. They cannot learn from experience. We had the economic disasters of Nixon, Reagan and Ford, Bush 41, Bush 43, Kansas, Lousiiana, Illinois, and now Oklahoma, and despite years and years of experience, they simply can't learn the lesson. Of course Faux and right winger babbling radio jerks don't help spewing nonsense and lies 24/7.

Obviously Trump really has no understanding of economics, nor do the leaders of the GOP House and Senate. And as experience in Kansas shows, no amount of economic failure will make these politicians admit that their economic ideology is just plain wrong.

 

[James Brown]

And this is the problem with members of the far right. They cannot learn from experience.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"
--Upton Sinclair

 

[untermensche]

Republicans do not have any real economic knowledge.

Their beliefs are all fantasies, dreams, myths.

The myth of the free market.

The fantasy that markets know best.

The dream that giving more money to the rich will have a positive economic effect.

The US has an economy based on speculation and bubbles and bailouts.

That has been it's economy for the past 50 years.

 

[BH]

I know lots of people who own their own businesses and none of them have ever cracked open an economics textbook. Some dabble in the stock market and follow which stocks they think are best to buy but will freely admit they do not know that much about economics.


I manage a retail shoe and clothing store and I only have a degree in History. Any economics I know is self taught. The three district managers I have had in the past had degrees in Education, in Psychology, and the last I suspect did not even get a degree of any sorts.

I am glad I have done okay in life and I do not begrudge my DM's or local business people their successes either but it can be kinda dangerous that people can seem to do so well but still be kinda ignorant. We run the danger of thinking we know more about the world than we in fact do and can be lied to and taken advantage of easier. I think all these arguments about always needing to lower taxes is a prime example. It sounds good but most do not realize what the consequences will be in doing so. The harm it causes may very come back and bite your butt worse than paying taxes did.

 

[BH]

And this is the problem with members of the far right. They cannot learn from experience.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"
--Upton Sinclair

Good qoute. Another one is about being rational. What is rational for one person may not be rational for someone else.

 

[marc]

Still they argued. Every year. Vociferously. About " illegally stealing their money.. "

Debate needs to be reframed. Taxes are not 'stealing their money', they are the membership dues for being a part of the US. Avoiding them is freeloading.

 

[barbos]

Still they argued. Every year. Vociferously. About " illegally stealing their money.. "

Debate needs to be reframed. Taxes are not 'stealing their money', they are the membership dues for being a part of the US. Avoiding them is freeloading.

Yes, stealing happens during spending.

 

[Opoponax]

Still they argued. Every year. Vociferously. About " illegally stealing their money.. "

Debate needs to be reframed. Taxes are not 'stealing their money', they are the membership dues for being a part of the US. Avoiding them is freeloading.

But even that most basic understanding of what it means to live in a civilized society is something conservatives, by and large, don't possess. They are either bereft of, or outright despise the idea that we as citizens owe any obligation of any kind to the society we live in. That's because it vaguely smacks of collectivism/communism. Generally, they can't articulate either of those two things, but they have Limbaugh, Hannity, et al telling them that kind of shit hours a day, every day, year in and year out.

Like a nasty shart, the response tends to be something along the lines of "Big government is bad" or something equally fucking stupid.