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The Republican-controlled house and senates of Kansas voted to increase taxes and to override the governor's veto of a bill to increase taxes.
The current governor pushed through tax cuts, intended to grow Kansas' economy, but during the tax cuts, Kansas' growth was lower than the country's overall growth.
The increase follows years in which the state was unable to balance its budget, and the funding for education was found to be unconstitutionally low.
In my view, state budgets are likely to take a hit from Trump's stealth tax increase: by reducing funding for programs and forcing the states to step in, the states will have to find extra money to fill the gaps.
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Kansas' Experiment with Reducing Taxes Ends in Failure, Republicans Override the Governor's Veto
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Fascinating is a word I use for the unexpected.
-- Spock, "The Squire of Gothos", stardate 2124.5
(Score: 3, Insightful) by FakeBeldin on Thursday June 08 2017, @08:57AM (27 children)
Did I read that correctly? Did Republicans overrule a veto to ensure taxes could be increased?
While the reasons provided in the summary sound more than sufficient for this: isn't this sort of the opposite of what Republicans stand for??
(Score: 2, Troll) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday June 08 2017, @09:35AM
I'm a Republican, I mean, I think I'm a Republican. And it's the opposite of what I stand for. Honestly, folks, I've always stood for paying the least taxes. The least amount of taxes that is legal. And privacy, I've always said that tax returns should stay private. What Obamacare did was very unfair, to our great health insurance industry and the executives there it was unfair. Because an insurance company could only deduct the first $500,000 of an executive's pay. So I doubled that, I made it a million. One million dollars. Plus unlimited bonuses, I call it performance pay. Because a great performance by an executive means a great performance for his company. For his or her company. Because we have women executives now. Women executives are great. Carly Fiorina, great gal. Not her booms, I mean, she could use a boob job. But a great leader. I've always said, women make great leaders. Some of the best leaders. Like Ivanka, she runs a company, has her own company. I mean, she's not running it right now, she put it in a trust. She's not making the decisions right now, not influencing it. But she gets the profits. And it's doing great, I guarantee you it's doing great for her. Walk a mile in her shoes, you'll look great. I promise. #TRUMP2020 #IvankaShoes
(Score: 2, Informative) by realDonaldTrump on Thursday June 08 2017, @09:39AM (1 child)
Boobs, I meant boobs. Not booms. Had something else on my mind. There's a lot going on in Washington today. A lot that's going to happen. Don't know how to delete my tweet, but it was supposed to say boobs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @05:03PM
Well, as long as it is not bombs … ;-)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday June 08 2017, @09:47AM (17 children)
Welcome to U.S. politics. A kid in gradeschool could tell you that cutting your income without cutting your spending isn't going to work out well in the short term. Over the moderate term it could very well increase revenue if targeted properly but it's not going to be immediate.
You're also supposed to cut luxuries when your budget shrinks, not the payments on the car that you depend on to get you to work on time.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:04PM
That is so, but a slimmed-down pig doesn't put bacon on a politician's table. Reelection out-weighs sound management every time.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:29PM (4 children)
A kid in gradeschool could tell you that cutting your income without cutting your spending isn't going to work out well in the short term.
Sure, a kid in grade school could tell you this, but average Americans simply can't understand it, nor many politicians.
With the way Americans and their politicians manage money, it's really a wonder this country isn't completely bankrupt by now.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday June 08 2017, @02:49PM (3 children)
From a quick search it looks like the national debt is around GDP anyway, so one could argue we're already bankrupt...
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @06:52PM (2 children)
Doesn't matter that much as long as:
1) The debts are in a currency the USA can create
2) Most other countries continue to use that same currency to trade and hold large amounts of it.
e.g. it doesn't matter as long as the USA can be a Mugabe and the rest of the world lives in the USA's Zimbabwe. The USA prints money (aka Quantitative Easing etc) and everyone else with/owed US dollars gets poorer.
Not the same as you owing the bank in currency you can't create or control.
The real problem for the average US citizen is less and less of the USA's created money is going to help them and more of it is going to help others.
By the way where does the DoD get those trillions from and where is it really going: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-audit-army-idUSKCN10U1IG [reuters.com]
6.5 trillion per year... For comparison the total US household debt is about 13 trillion.
(Score: 3, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Thursday June 08 2017, @09:00PM
This is insightful, but it's important to note it only applies to governments that control their own sovereign debt. It doesn't, for example, apply to Kansas, which could actually go bankrupt in a meaningful way, because Kansas doesn't control the creation of dollars.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @11:55AM
If the US massively inflates its currency, 2) stops happening. So the US is significantly limited to what money creation it can do (basically what the export-oriented countries like China and Japan are willing to sop up).
No, that's over the life of the military service. I'm sure the accountants gave up after a few decades, but it's not all generated in a single year else we would have far more epic problems. Further, this is just typical government accounting (and probably done in large part to hide funding to intelligence projects throughout the government, hence, unlikely to ever stop). There is no branch of the US government that would do better and the entitlement programs hide worse problems IMHO.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Whoever on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:46PM (4 children)
Is there evidence that it works in the medium term, or is that just an excuse for the failure? Note that the tax cuts were initially implemented sufficiently long ago that medium term effects should be starting to show by now.
But let's take a simple view: no one wants to live in a state that can't provide education for their kids because the state can't pay its teachers.
Question: what do you call someone who wants to run a budget in such a way that you can't pay your essential bills? Answer: a Republican Governor.
Seriously, here we have a concrete example that tax cuts don't work in the way claimed by Republicans and what is the response from the right-wing posters here? Either crickets, mental gymnastics or lame attempts to deny the facts.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @05:50PM
Depends on the state in which you are. Over in Washington, they're called Democrats. (Hi, Christine!)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday June 09 2017, @12:24AM (2 children)
You also have the 80s and the 90s showing that they can in fact help quite a lot. Really though our entire tax system needs scrapped and rewritten from the ground up. Preferably without relying on theft which is all involuntary taxation is.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 09 2017, @10:39PM (1 child)
You actually believe a country will function, in a positive way for it's citizens, based on running it with 'voluntary' taxes? That's awesome, but I'll bite. Can you cite an example of a society that does that and which you would like the US to emulate?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday June 10 2017, @10:22AM
Well from personal experience I'm rather fond of the Chickasaw Nation's approach. They rake in enough through gambling and assorted investments that it pays for the whole tribe's healthcare entirely, quite a lot of municipal and county improvements for the areas we operate in, and a good deal more to boot.
Of course that would require quite a lot of rewriting to scale to the entire national population but I'm confident it could be done and cover governments actual essential jobs, though I utterly fail to care if it could keep up the entitlement spending which makes up the majority of our budget every year. Being my daddy is not an essential, or even desirable, government function.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:47PM (5 children)
Yeah, about that: Ever since Arthur Laffer drew that totally speculative graph on a napkin, governments have been telling us that. And not once has it worked out.
And why should it? Imagine, if you will:
- Company A, which is selling an extremely popular product with revenue growing at 50% and the market far from maxed out, subject to a 20% tax.
- Company B, which is selling an OK product, with revenue growing at 5%, with no tax.
Which would you be happier to invest in? Investment follows demand more than it follows tax breaks. The tax breaks are for the benefit of the people who invested in Company A and would have invested in Company A over Company B any day of the week, but would rather get a 50% return than a 40% return.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @05:58PM (1 child)
It has been reported repeatedly that the Laffer curve actually does have an effect when you start at a marginal tax rate of 90 percent. [google.com]
In the years since JFK, however, the feedback loop on the economy from tax cuts has been weak.
Those have served to empower the already-rich (giving us an ever less democratic government) while harming the actual economy (ordinary folks buying ordinary stuff).
If a tax cut doesn't have strong strings attached (must actually create jobs), the claimed advantage doesn't appear.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @03:27AM
And we should believe those reports why? I'll note there seems to be better evidence for the current highest tax bracket of 40% being closer to the actual peak, though still on the high side. Further, it bears repeating that Laffer curve is not a magic invariant. It depends on many factors, such as what the taxes are paying for. For example, the usual approach of taxing people and dumping it into worthless or even negative value things generates a Laffer curve with a much lower peak than where that tax money is used to generate paradise. The US is notorious for being very wasteful and even destructive (such as the recent war in Iraq) with tax revenue. That real world depression of the Laffer curve peak isn't going to be revealed in fantastical studies which conclude the outcome that is desired.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @11:25AM (2 children)
And the rent seekers and cronies that the taxes are collected for would rather have the money than a lower tax rate. There's plenty of conflicts of interest here. It's not just wealthy investors who get screwed by high taxes.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Friday June 09 2017, @12:49PM (1 child)
Yes, yes, all taxes are evil, we get it.
That carefully ignores my point, which is that the governments' ability to change investors' minds about where to put their money is far smaller than other factors like customer demand for the product and how efficient the company is at producing said product.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @06:02PM
That still means it is a big factor even if there are larger factors out there. And taking 20% of investors' profits in the above example, means they have 20% less to invest elsewhere, including the consequences such as creating more jobs and more things of value. The opportunity costs of taxes are routinely ignored.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @12:20PM (3 children)
Trickle down economics don't. That was last re-learned 20-30 years ago.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:04PM
The entire world economy has been based on trickle down economics since basically the 1970s. The fed loans money to huge banks, when they have more of it they are more likely to loan it to you.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by SpockLogic on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:05PM
Unfortunately the current GOP and tiny fingered, Cheeto-faced, ferret wearing shitgibbon, minority 45, have yet to learn this.
Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @11:30AM
When the US experienced a remarkable period of growth despite competition with parts of the world with labor costs a fraction of the US's labor costs. For example, in the 1980s, the US was perceived as losing to Japan economically. Both the US and Japan experienced significant recessions in 1990-1992, but the US recovered and grew substantially through 2000 while Japan didn't. So what lesson again are we supposed to learn from the most successful period of economic growth for the US in recent times?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:26PM
Sam Brownback [wikipedia.org] must be a secret Democrat. There's no other explanation for this behavior.
(Score: 2) by boxfetish on Friday June 09 2017, @09:34PM
Republicans stand for beating "Tribe D". Nothing else. The antithetical is also true.
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Thursday June 08 2017, @12:32PM (12 children)
That is not what "tax increase" means (there is so much Orwellian language in the spending/taxing debates in the US). As to the federal services in question, why shouldn't they be done by the states directly? Let us keep in mind that there is this weird paradox. The states that benefit the most from federal funding (that is, get more back in federal funds than they give to Washington in taxes) are the states most opposed to the scheme of federal funds going to states while the states most in support are the ones paying more in taxes than they get in return.
I think that indicates there's something deeply wrong with our understanding of who benefits from federal funding of states, but suppose the above observation is correct. Then the states that most oppose Trump's "stealth tax increase" are the states that would most benefit because the stealth tax increase would be lower than what their citizens currently pay! Sounds like a time to call a certain orange politician's bluff and get your state to provide those currently federal services at lower cost to yourself.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Whoever on Thursday June 08 2017, @01:52PM (5 children)
Wow, the mental gymnastics going on there in a failed attempt to refute the point.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:04PM
Haven't I seen an info graphic that shows the relative outflow and inflow of federal money with the individual states? Obviously this is subject to lots of interpretation, for example, does it count military contracts that give federal funds to companies in many states?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:36PM (2 children)
I suppose it doesn't help that "stealth tax increase" is already mental gymnastics in search of a soundbite. The goal of the soundbite is to influence people with short attention spans who can't even hope to understand the executive summary of any of the policies their representatives in government are considering. On its face, shifting funding responsibility from the federal level to the states seems to me also not to be a tax "increase" of any kind. It's not a tax cut, either.
Really, the federal government has no business levying an income tax. The 16th Amendment should be repealed. That can be the business of states... with complications and side-effects I hope to touch on without getting too long-winded.
Personally, I would that states be more self-sufficient. khallow raises the good point that federal funding comes disproportionately from blue states. As somebody who is ever seeking to move to a blue state (with sensible gold [lp.org]-colored leanings) but cannot due to obligations, I think it absolutely is a good idea to let states more directly control their funding.
I live in a red state that receives more in federal funding than it contributes. I think forcing my state to cover all of the welfare benefits many residents claim would be an eye-opening wake-up call for many people here. Frankly, they've become fat and lazy, and it boggles the mind that they vote for the red team despite their dependence on welfare. Either they need to start getting bootstrappy, or they need to rethink the kinds of politicians they elect.
However, if taking the madness that's infested the red sports team lately to its insane conclusion is the only way for people to realize they need to rethink a few things and get back in touch with their values, then why not? Let's do this. I can't claim not to care, otherwise I wouldn't have posted, but I'm excited that at least I got to witness firsthand an empire collapsing due to pointless politicking and the desire for a leader whose most relevant qualification is being loudmouthed idiot whose hobbies include pussy grabbing.
Something has gone terribly wrong. We simply need to stop spending other people's money. It's the only thing I know that might have some hope of restoring some semblance of sanity.
If Kansas believes that raising taxes is in Kansas' best interests (and it probably is), then good on Kansas for raising taxes. Perhaps if they must do it again next year because federal money is slowed to a trickle, then at least they might have a little more confidence about doing it a second time. The first time is always the scariest for any new experience. Kansas will be taking care of Kansas, as it should be. Nobody knows what Kansas' problems and hopes are better than people in Kansas.
Budgets absolutely must be balanced, or what is the point of even having a budget?
(Specifically I wonder which people would want more if the choice were forced by a lack of funding provided by blue states: is it worse to risk bathroom rape due to lack of bathroom police or risk homelessness and starvation due to lack of welfare? These are important decisions that red states must face. It's always easy to spend other people's money.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 09 2017, @12:17AM (1 child)
I keep pointing this out in these kind of conversations, but the federal government runs a huge deficit. It's entirely possible for the majority of (or even all) states to get more from the federal government than they contribute to it. No-one ever seems to break the numbers down far enough to take that into account, though.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @03:06AM
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @02:58AM
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:02PM (1 child)
This might be true, but even so, I don't want too many Mississippians to die during this experiment.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @11:46AM
I can't really tell from your post what you think is more important - semantics tail-chasing to further someone's talking points or the lives of Mississippians. A lot of people say certain things are important to them - and then act differently. And such "important" things seem introduced, as in this case, to matters where they're quite irrelevant. It's not going to matter to the lives of those people you mentioned whether the Trump action actually were a tax increase or not.
It probably does matter to the lives of said Mississippians to a modest degree how gullibly people respond to such language, but to be honest, anyone who would be persuaded by such language probably is already anti-Trump and in opposition to the current Trump scheme. I see this more as an example of cognitive impairment where someone is accepting of a rather contrived narrative because it confirms a desired bias rather than because it's going to have a misleading effect on peoples' political opinions.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:50PM (1 child)
Right, so the states on the Coast are not the primary beneficiary of a CROSS FUCKING COUNTRY highway system that links both coasts?
This nonsense about comparing in-flow and outflow of money is pure utter bullshit. A lot of the Federal spending in Red states is for shit they either don't want or don't use. And the things that do benefit them directly by generating economic activity, are good for the nation as a whole. It allows for spreading of capital around the country, which also spreads the population around the country. Last thing you want is your whole country's population in two fucking places. It would be an economic, environmental, and strategic disaster.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NewNic on Thursday June 08 2017, @09:51PM
Actually, no.
There is this small project called the Panama canal. It makes shipping products from coast to coast by sea very practical.
What you are saying is that landlocked states that would have very poor access to both the big coastal markets and ports benefit less than the coastal states from interstate highway system? LOL.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 4, Insightful) by tekk on Thursday June 08 2017, @06:38PM (1 child)
It seems reasonable enough to call it a stealth tax increase: Federal gov. is reducing its funding to the states without decreasing taxes, therefore forcing the states to raise their taxes to make up for the shortfall to maintain the same level of service.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 09 2017, @02:55AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:23PM (8 children)
"during the tax cuts, Kansas' growth was lower than the country's overall growth."
Except, this isn't the relevant comparison, which makes it clear that this is a political spin. The useful comparison is: was Kansas' growth higher before or after the tax-cuts and can we identify confounding variables?
(Score: 3, Informative) by Thexalon on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:49PM (4 children)
Before. Next question?
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @04:34PM (3 children)
Way to miss the point. The question should have been asked and answered in the article and summary, rather than in the comment section of a news aggregation site. Instead, we got a comparison that tells us nothing about the results of the different policies.
(Score: 2, Funny) by aristarchus on Thursday June 08 2017, @07:44PM (2 children)
Obviously, the budget for answering things in the article or summary was cut in the last decade by Brownback of Brokeback and his Kansawian Republicans, so we'll be having none of that.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @08:15PM (1 child)
I see now that the article was constructed in this fashion in order to provide you with an opportunity for self-congratulation, since at least you are not as dumb as those stupid hicks from Kansas. That being the case, the articles omission of any useful data makes sense. Carry on.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday June 10 2017, @03:31PM
Nobody is as dumb as those stupid Republicans from Kansas, not even the Republicans from Kansas who are in the Legislature and voted to over-ride the Republican Gov'ner's veto. There was a book a while ago, titled "What's Wrong With Kansas". You should read it. But you can read, can't you? I have about had it up to here with all the Mu-fu**ing Republicans on this Mu-fu**ing Plain States!
If you seriously cannot read, and still believe in trickling-down economic theories, there is also a movie: at the Whatsthematterwithkansas [whatsthematterwithkansas.com] web site. My Gawd, y'all, there's even a sequel?
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @03:53PM
What, you think anyone (and more specifically, anyone in Kansas) will listen to a reasoned analysis, using actual data? I wish you all the luck in the world, but I give you the same odds as an ice cube in hell.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Thursday June 08 2017, @07:57PM (1 child)
In what way is it not relevant?
A before/after comparison can be hugely misleading. The before may be during a national recession time and the after during a national recovery/boom time, or the reverse.
No. State to nation over the same time period is the only comparison that makes sense.
You, sir, are an idiot who is desperate to believe in failed policies, despite ample evidence of their failure. In other words, a Republican.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 09 2017, @04:33PM
I just tested my faucets and found out that yes, water is still wet. Not all conservatives have such massive logic and factual failures, but enough of them do. Until you clowns clean up your act and start correcting the dummies who think they're smart, well we're gonna keep having a bad time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @04:18PM
Welcome to Kansas.
(Score: 4, Touché) by DannyB on Thursday June 08 2017, @04:42PM (3 children)
Brownback is a republican. Cut taxes. So he did. To an extreme and ridiculous level.
Plenty of us predicted this would not work out. But I don't go fully into it because I'm trying to keep this short.
On March 2, the Kansas Supreme Court said that Yes, Kansas actually is a gunna has to pay foe public schools to edumacate the chillens. [nytimes.com].
The money must come from somewhere. OMG, we have to raise taxes back to a level that can fund public education. So the legislators did so. But this is just wrong on so many levels. With public education now funded, our poor children will learn about evil things like (gasp) Sex Education. And Birth Control. And Eviloution. And Climate Change. And all kinds of other things that are of the devil. All that learnin' when they should be stayin' home and workin' on dah farm.
Think of the children!
I hope that is a helpful summary.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Thursday June 08 2017, @05:57PM (2 children)
I mean if shit like this happens is it unethical to put your house on market claiming low taxes etc etc, and flee the state before shit hits the fan, fuck-all the sucker who bought your house?
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday June 08 2017, @06:08PM (1 child)
People with l33t math skillz, who understand addition and subtraction, were able to abstractly model taxes and spending, and understand that this wouldn't last. And it didn't.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 08 2017, @07:20PM
Don' be trustin no expuurts naw.