The tax receipts for individual income have fallen off a cliff, far worse than the 2001 recession. This collapse of tax receipts reflects unemployment, under-employment, job sharing to avoid layoffs, and shorter work weeks.
Notice when this started... mid-2008, the last year of Bush's presidency. This is the real Bush legacy: he smashed the economy with his right wing deregulation and "government's the problem, not the solution" political philosophy.
If you don't collect taxes, and if you have to spend more to cover those falling through the social safety net and you have to spend to stimulate the economy... well, you end up with a $9 trillion hole. Thanks to Bush. Thanks to the Republicans. Thanks to ideologues who don't understand economics and used their political philosophy as a bulldozer to run over, back up, and run over again the economy until they pretty well squeezed the life out of it.
Only when the economy recovers, which will start in this quarter and slowly build steam throughout 2010, will you get tax revenues back up and start to cover the deficit. It will be a long haul. Will the voters remember that this wasn't Obama's problem. This was Bush's when they go to the polls in November 2010 and November 2012?
No comments:
Post a Comment