Why Congress Should Let the Bush Tax Cuts Expire

The modern Republican argument about taxes seems to boil down to two principles, both misguided: Taxes can be reduced, but they can never be allowed to go up. And whatever level taxes are at, they are too high.

Think back to the beginning of the Bush administration tax cuts. It seems almost impossible to believe, but the argument then was that the budget surplus was too large. There was, or so President George W. Bush assured us, ample cash to cut taxes for everyone and protect the Social Security surplus and set aside $1 trillion over the next decade for "additional spending needs" and pay down the national debt.

"The people of America have been overcharged, and, on their behalf, I'm here asking for a refund," Bush told Congress in February 2001.

You know what happened next. The refund came. The supposed surplus evaporated. The Social Security surplus was spent. Instead of being paid down, the $3.3 trillion national debt ballooned to $9 trillion.

The only thing that remained the same was the clamor for tax cuts. Same argument, different rationale. The Bush tax cuts are set to expire at the end of this year, and the argument now is that they must be extended -- for everyone. This time not because the fiscal bottom line is too healthy but because the economy is too shaky.

I expressed frustration a few weeks back with the denialism among some liberal Democrats about the need to curb entitlement spending and the conviction that simply socking it to the rich would solve the fiscal problem. But the Republican position seems even more intransigently divorced from reality. Perhaps there is some magical point at which Republicans might accept the reality that the government needs more revenue than it is currently set to take in -- but I haven't heard it yet.

Source: Washington Post | Ruth Marcus

marcusr@washpost.com