The insufferable whining of the rich about high tax rates has nothing whatever to do with reality. The following chart demonstrates that fact by showing relative tax rates since the inception of the Federal income tax.
My addition is the Presidents who were in-office at the time. The start of each name is when that President took office.
(WIKI: Taxation in the United States)
Harding collapsed the tax rate and set the stage for the Great Depression. Coolidge did nothing about it. Hoover tried to buy the country out of it but he wasn't aggressive enough and FDR followed.
Ronald Reagan slashed the tax rate in the eighties and it looks like Johnson did that previously because it's not likely JFK would have waited. That needs to be verified but it appears the great her of the new society gave almost as much of a break to the rich as Reagan ... except Reagan did it twice.
Any attempt to mitigate Reagan's cuts since his administration have not achieved much. Clinton brought it up a little bit and Bush dropped it back down to about half of what Clinton's increase had done. Obama has also apparently raised it back to where Clinton left it ... which is still a far cry from where it was when America was most powerful and prosperous. Prosperity when it only benefits the rich only causes revolutions. Ever since Reagan, Presidents have only played political patty cake with the tax on the rich with none seriously addressing it.
Something you may also notice is Reagan dropped the tax rates on the poor as well. He was evil but not entirely evil. George Bush corrected that generosity and raised the tax rate on the poor and Clinton did nothing about it. Where his father had raised taxes on the poor, the next Bush lowered them so that family really doesn't know it's ass from a hole in the ground for direction.
The last time of a major slashing of tax rates was post-WWI and they remained that low until the Great Depression. Hoover tried but FDR followed more strongly, tax rates went up and the government started spending. The rates went up further for WWII but dropped in the mid-sixties while the cost of Vietnam went to the budget deficit with the same approach being taken with any conflict ever since. Fuck it, let it roll over to the national debt. WWII was the last time the country made any serious attempt to pay for it.
My addition is the Presidents who were in-office at the time. The start of each name is when that President took office.
Harding collapsed the tax rate and set the stage for the Great Depression. Coolidge did nothing about it. Hoover tried to buy the country out of it but he wasn't aggressive enough and FDR followed.
Ronald Reagan slashed the tax rate in the eighties and it looks like Johnson did that previously because it's not likely JFK would have waited. That needs to be verified but it appears the great her of the new society gave almost as much of a break to the rich as Reagan ... except Reagan did it twice.
Any attempt to mitigate Reagan's cuts since his administration have not achieved much. Clinton brought it up a little bit and Bush dropped it back down to about half of what Clinton's increase had done. Obama has also apparently raised it back to where Clinton left it ... which is still a far cry from where it was when America was most powerful and prosperous. Prosperity when it only benefits the rich only causes revolutions. Ever since Reagan, Presidents have only played political patty cake with the tax on the rich with none seriously addressing it.
Something you may also notice is Reagan dropped the tax rates on the poor as well. He was evil but not entirely evil. George Bush corrected that generosity and raised the tax rate on the poor and Clinton did nothing about it. Where his father had raised taxes on the poor, the next Bush lowered them so that family really doesn't know it's ass from a hole in the ground for direction.
The last time of a major slashing of tax rates was post-WWI and they remained that low until the Great Depression. Hoover tried but FDR followed more strongly, tax rates went up and the government started spending. The rates went up further for WWII but dropped in the mid-sixties while the cost of Vietnam went to the budget deficit with the same approach being taken with any conflict ever since. Fuck it, let it roll over to the national debt. WWII was the last time the country made any serious attempt to pay for it.
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