Grover Norquist's wet dream

Paul Ryan's budget and economic scheme using the tax code it as an enabling mechanism is all but done.His proposed budget already demonstrated  his desire to cut back on Medicare, Medicaid, food stamp programs and any other federal program designed to help out the underprivileged. Now with the tax cuts he has justification. But that is only the start of it. Ryan has always had this naïve belief in magical growth solving all problems that would result from tax cuts to corporations and wealthy people. But he probably believes it . The person really licking his chops right now is Grover Norquist. You remember him and his organization called something like" The Club for Greed". He wanted to shrink the Federal government to a size where it could be drowned in a bathtub. This harebrained budget and tax bill is perfect for him. The first thing that is going to happen is a massive reduction of federal tax revenues in 2018. It will probably be worse than those  accompanying Reagan's 1981 tax cuts. That will require even more Federal spending cuts and you know upon whom those will be inflected. There will be further cuts in things like Government sponsored research which  has already shrunk dismally, much-needed infrastructure spending and diminish Federal programs generally including things like the CDC. The effect of that will be reduced aggregate demand , which will in turn lead to diminished Capital expenditures, research and development and wages and hiring. This will delight Grover Norquest who is sort of a latter day Andrew Mellon and who just wants a smaller federal government, whatever the consequences.

This is the worst time for tax cuts for the well-off. It is as thoughtless as the Bush administration tax cuts. One does not cut taxes when the economy is rolling along well. One should not be so foolish as to think that cutting the taxes of corporations and wealthy people who already have more money than they know what to do with is going to create stimulus. In fact, what is highly likely is that in the next two or three years we are going to have a recession because of these stupid policies. In the face of the recession one of the corrective measures is a tax cut which is now been squandered. Another wasteful byproduct of this tax bill is that the one off tax revenues from corporate affiliates of US companies held overseas will not be used for infrastructure building but for these ridiculous tax cuts. The Republicans also don't seem to realize that government sponsored research has led to innovations which have spurred private enterprise innovations that can drive the economy. Think of Google Amazon etc. and the earlier private development caused by innovations in the space program years ago. We are going to be collectively left with an aging infrastructure and a diminished capacity for innovation. The economic future of this company is going to be largely dependent upon innovation leading to greater productivity and economic growth. With this ignorant administration and Congress we are shooting ourselves in the kneecap.