Wednesday, November 28, 2001
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Wednesday, November 28, 2001 |
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Lessons in economics: No rich-bashing here Hubris masquerading as knowledge is never a good trait in any columnist. Unfortunately our own Dave Hamrick excels at the practice of ideology over reality. Lacking any sound economic theory, he immediately jumps to the offensive against "you liberals" while expounding on the beauty of living among like-thinking "conservatives." Evidently Mr. Hamrick believes like-thinking "conservatives" also turn off their brains when confronted with such bombastic hot air. I'm curious who will keep their job because of corporate tax rebates? Corporations staff based on their needed projections, which of course are strictly market dependent. Now if one draws a giant loop and assumes this round of corporate tax give-backs will help spur the U.S. and world economy to recovery, I suppose Dave gets the Nobel prize. However, I failed to notice his supporting data that such an event was even possible, much less probable. And another thing. Corporations only pay income taxes on their net income after their gross income has passed through all the smoke and mirrors of standard accounting. If a company is making money and is laying off workers, why will it bring those workers back just because it made more money? I'm also curious about the all-too-true maxim (are there false maxims?) that corporations don't pay taxes, they merely collect them. Again, the Nobel Prize in Economics awaits the person who can formulate this connection. Let's blow off world supply, world demand, sector factors, meteorological influences, product lifecycle, etc., and go right to the heart of things: taxes. Hell, if it's that simple, maybe we should only tax corporations. The theory evokes a picture of Haliburton's CEO achieving an Archimedean epiphany whilst receiving a cell phone call in the bath telling him his corporate taxes have just been reduced, climbing into his towel and running through the streets of Houston yelling, "Eureka, we're making too much money, lower energy prices immediately!" But anyone can disagree on economic theory and the politics of taxes. Most disturbing was Mr. Hamrick's attitude toward the poor. "Temporary spike in the sales of Thunderbird and MD2020"? "If he had the intelligence to work through the equation?" I've never really been poor, but I think there are probably as many reasons for being poor as there are people. Mr. Hamrick seems to be implying a correlation between wealth and righteousness, rather a difficult theory to defend for a professed Christian. I'm certainly no expert on the New Testament, but I think Jesus drew an exact opposite relationship between wealth and righteousness. Anyway, we are now engaged in a great struggle and must inevitably pay for it. Taxes will be collected to that end, and contrary to certain Republican theories, you can eventually get on the negative side of the Laffer curve. If a correlation can be drawn between economic stimulus and corporate tax reductions, I'm all for it. However, it appears on the surface that this just may be another payback time for the very corporations who helped float the last election. As for the poor: growing up, we had a family friend, a retired NYPD cop we called Uncle George, who in his 28 years on the force had probably seen the worst of humanity. On the way to visit my mother in the hospital one day, he was giving out dollar bills to the "bums" on the street. My father, a true Yankee, was dismayed and informed Uncle George the "bums" would just blow the money on booze. His reply: "I wouldn't want to miss the one that needed it." There was a true Christian. Timothy J. Parker Peachtree City
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