Tom:

Maybe I’m seeing what I want to see but this graphic illustrates a point I’ve harped on for years: while increasing productivity can — in theory – produce better pay for workers, the people who decide the pay can always decide to keep the fruits of the productivity for themselves.

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My wry smile looking at this graph is the same one I wear when politicians — straight faced — laud Reaganomics.

“Trickle-down economics” … in United States politics to refer to the idea that tax breaks or other economic benefits provided by government to businesses and the wealthy will benefit poorer members of society by improving the economy as a whole.

The term has been attributed to humorist Will Rogers, who said during the Great Depression that “money was all appropriated for the top in hopes that it would trickle down to the needy.” The term is mostly used ironically or as pejorative. …

Republicans would like you to believe that — if you give me $100,000,000 I’ll create jobs. But why?

Why wouldn’t I buy a Caribbean Island instead? And live out my life in excess?

The driving force that “creates jobs” is customers.

If people won’t pay for your work, you shouldn’t have a job.

The economist John Kenneth Galbraith noted that “trickle-down economics” had been tried before in the United States in the 1890s under the name “horse and sparrow theory.”

… ‘If you feed the horse enough oats, some will pass through to the road for the sparrows.’ …

The men who supported George W Bush — Dick Cheney and cronies — were mainly in it to shovel dollars from the poor to the rich. It’s so easy — the poor are uneducated enough to believe rhetoric like Reaganomics. Whatever FOX News tells them.

… I’ve got more faith in Romney. But not much. 😦

Watching the lies, damn lies and statistics on U.S. political ads is depressing.

Obama, Romney campaigns accuse each other of lies

The misinformation. 😦

What do economists believe?

JUSTIN WOLFERS:

… There’s remarkable agreement among economists on most policy questions.

… the stimulus succeeded in reducing the jobless rate. On the harder question of whether the benefit exceeded the cost, more than half thought it did, one in three was uncertain, and fewer than one in six disagreed.

Or consider the widely despised bank bailouts … while the public may not like them, there’s a striking consensus that they helped: The same survey found no economists willing to dispute the idea that the bailouts lowered unemployment…

How about the oft-cited Republican claim that tax cuts will boost the economy so much that they will pay for themselves? … The Booth poll couldn’t find a single economist who believed that cutting taxes today will lead to higher government revenue – even if we lower only the top tax rate.

freakonomics – The Secret Consensus Among Economists

NPR Planet Money:

One: Eliminate the mortgage tax deduction, which lets homeowners deduct the interest they pay on their mortgages.

Two: End the tax deduction companies get for providing health-care to employees.

Three: Eliminate the corporate income tax.

Four: Eliminate all income and payroll taxes. … Instead, impose a consumption tax, designed to be progressive to protect lower-income households.

Five: Tax carbon emissions.

Six: Legalize marijuana.

Six Policies Economists Love (And Politicians Hate)

(via Kottke)