And you please show where I stated you specifically said anything vile about Reagan or his condition. If fact, when I made this “I have no problem with anyone who disagrees with the beliefs of Reagan, or wants to debate his accomplishments (or lack of) that’s of course, your right,” I had you specifically in mind. So take a bit of your own medicine and read what I said.
And although Congress eventually voted to discontinue support for the Contra’s, I also remember several votes to provide aid to them. It ain’t as black and white as you apparently think it is.
Now, you also have crapped on the idea the idea of the prosperity of the Reagan years by claiming it wasn’t a “longterm” prosperity. As we all know, even you, if you would examine it critically, the president has little far-reaching or long-term economic influence. Besides, can you show me any instance of “long-term” prosperity in America?
You must, however, admit the fact, that during the Reagan years, whether he’s directly responsible or not, the country had quite a financial turnaround. Hell, when Reagan took office, we had double-digit unemployment, interest rates around 20%, and a top marginal income tax rate of 70%. In addition to this, we had Carter poo-pooing America’s spirit when he spoke of the “creeping malaise” that infected our society. Mr. Reagan restored the spirit and partiotism of society and returned that “can-do” attitude to U.S. citizens. There’s his probably most important accomplishment.
And you are the only one in this thread talking about Clinton. You’d be best to drop that entirely, or I’ll begin to draw comparisions about the relative levels of corruption between his and Reagan’s administration, since you seem so obsessed with that.
FWIW, I thought my little syllogism was making fun of God, not Reagan.
Re economic turnarounds: it seems that every economic slowdown of the past 30 years has been caused by one thing, and one thing only: a spike in energy prices. Reagan and Clinton were blessed with good luck in this department; Ford, Carter, and Bush (Sr.) weren’t.
That said, Reagan’s tax cuts stuck us with $4 trillion of debt, which Clinton’s tax hikes have (or is it had?) put us in the position of being able to pay off.
Also, when “the economy” thrives, the question is still, who shares in the bounty? For most people, it’s meaningless to be in an economy where some high-fliers are getting rich, but you’re stuck in the same old place. Prosperity means nothing if it’s limited to a few; by and large, the economic gains under Reagan were realized by the rich. Clinton at least did what he could to make sure the economic gains during his administration were shared, to some extent at least, by all classes.
OTOH, while there’s no doubt that the Soviet economy was even worse than it looked during the 1980s, and that they couldn’t afford to keep spending to keep up with us, arms-wise, I for one am willing to give Reagan’s defense buildup the credit for an assist, at the very least, in the Soviet Union’s breakup. Keeping militarily competitive at a 1970s level may or may not have been feasible for the Soviets; doing so at the level Reagan forced on them clearly wasn’t.
Still, IMO, the main factor there was the unexpected rise to power of a Soviet leader - Gorbachev - who actually believed Communism could and should serve its people, and was determined to make that happen. (Remember glasnost and perestroika?) His idealism and glorious failure were what brought the Soviet Union to its end, IMO.
While I’m not personally knowledgeable in the details of the relative corruption levels of the Reagan and Clinton administrations, I recall we’ve had threads where this issue’s come up. I’d love to watch another.
Koop grew in office. He gets credit for facing the eruption of AIDS responsibly and energetically. However, let’s not give Reagan undue credit for the nomination. Koop was picked because he was an ardent anti-abortion activist. That was just another example of his willingness to play that age-old game of pretending to be throwing a bone to his supporters on that issue without intending to actually do anything about it.
Now, regarding his “miraculous” effect on the economy: The budgets he submitted were indisputably responsible for tripling the national debt, turning the US from the world’s largest creditor nation into the world’s largest debtor. The temporary boom in prosperity was exactly the equivalent of your going on a spending spree at the mall, running up your credit cards to the max, and feeling like you have an improved lifestyle. But all you’ve really done is make yourself, or your descendants, pay for it later with interest.
I’m still having trouble understanding how anyone could still believe that was not only fiscally responsible but actually heroic, and even add contemptuous remarks about “tax and spend Democrats”. Sorry, but Reagan’s “borrow and spend” approach was far LESS responsible, wasn’t it? Now Quincy is apparently copying it rather than accept responsibility for paying down the debt.
I could add numerous other examples of how Reagan’s actions were demonstrably opposite to the actions he (or his undersupervised administration, or Nancy’s astrologer) took, but this thread is already full of them. The one that galls me the most is how his worshippers use him as an icon of conservative “family values” while failing to note that he not only was the only President ever to have given up on a marriage, but that he refused to even speak to two of his own children. If he’d been a Democrat, he’d have been pilloried for his personal conduct by the same people who use him as an ideal.
Uh-oh - make that his words were opposite to his actions. 'Course you all knew that’s what I meant, 'cause we’ve all been there, right?
I’d still like to hear a good, fact-based summary of what his main achievement was, besides helping some people feel good about supporting hypocrisy and irresponsibility.
I’d still like to hear a good, fact-based summary of what his main achievement was, besides helping some people feel good about supporting hypocrisy and irresponsibility. **
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I’d be happy to participate, but I think the topic would be better served in another thread. I think we should leave this one to the relative merits, (or demerits) of the Reagan’s legacy. There’s no need to sidetrack this on now that we’ve finally gotten beyond the pointless demonization.
I also suppose I’ve not made my feelings on Reagan clear. While it should be no surprise to anyone, I think Reagan, overall, did a pretty decent job as president, but he’s far from the Republican ideal. I have the same complaints about his spending policies that many of you do, although I believe he was abetted by Congress more than some of you wish to admit. Finally, I think the massive military build-up was more than a good thing, it was required. However, like any bureaucratic function, it could certainly have been accomplished more efficiently.
I believe that Reagan has taken some unfair hits in this thread. In actuality, the poor guy simply had no clue. He didn’t know a thing about economics. He didn’t understand foreign policy. He wasn’t learned in anything useful for a president or any decision-maker, and therefore didn’t understand the consequences of his decisions. I mean, despite appearances, he was a tool of the right wing slowpokes. This was where his one strength (Acting) came in handy. He acted like he was in control even when he was just a puppet. (Incidently, I believe that this is where GW Bush will fail. He will not be able to hide his deficiencies in the way that Reagan did.)
Come on, who really believes that Reagan could converse intelligently about the strengths and weaknesses of trickle-down economics? Does anyone think that he could understand the destructive impact that his tax cuts would have on the recovering economy? And was he capable of understanding the illegality of his arms dealings? In all fairness, Reagan’s goal, similar to GW Bush’s, was to gain immortality by being president. Perhaps he wanted to establish some sort of legacy, to be looked upon favorably by future historians. But history will show that Ronald Reagan was just a seat-filler.
And his greatest accomplishment? Leaving the US economy in such bad shape with his tax cuts and spending, that Clinton was eventually left with a lot to clean up. Give it another decade. You’ll see that Clinton will begin to receive much more of the credit that he deserves, while Reagan’s greatness ranking will continue to plummet.
According to Andrew Sullivan in the Sunday Times last week, Reagan cared about “two simple but indisputably big things: the expansion of freedom at home and the extinction of tyranny abroad.”
The expansion of freedom at home? Can some Reagan supporter explain this analysis?
Or maybe I’m mixing up “freedom” and “civil liberties” again.
you nailed it in one, jackknifed juggernaut. he acted his way thru eight years; he even managed to conceal the onset of alzheimer’s. and thats hard to do.
What Jackmannii said. I’d also like an explanation of the “extinction of tyranny abroad” part: sure, Reagan called the Soviet Union an “evil empire” and quarreled with Iran, but there were quite a few other repressive political movements, besides the ones mentioned in this thread, that we were quite chummy with in the Reagan years! El Salvador, Nicaragua, the Philippines…as long as they were anticommunist, Reagan’s policies seldom made much practical distinction between tyrants and others. He was simply canny enough to label all the communist-leaning regimes “tyrants” (which many of them were, of course) and all the anticommunist dictators and guerrillas “democracies” or “freedom fighters” (which damn few of them were), and Sullivan seems to have bought the hype.
Guys, if you want to rag on Reagan, at least try and get the facts straight, okay? Let’s take some of the latest wacky assertions one by one:
Jacknifed Juggernaught said:
Reagan had a degree in Economics. What was your degree in, again?
As for his foreign policy, his presidency was one of the most challenging when it came to foreign affairs. During Reagan’s administration the world was a powder keg, and he handled it extremely well. Need we repeat that he presided over the collapse of Communism? That he managed deeper cuts in nuclear arms than any previous president? That he was co-nominated for a Nobel Prize with Gorbachev? (I’m not sure why Gorby got sole credit - I distinctly remember a nomination of a joint prize for both). In short, Reagan distinguished himself in foreign affairs, albeit with a few failures (the Beirut bombing probably being the worst, along with Iran-Contra).
Jacknifed Juggernaught continues:
Reagan made a name for himself in the Republican party by being able to give electrifying speeches on just these topics. He rose to political prominance in 1962 when he gave a phenomenal speech for Barry Goldwater’s election campaign (a speech that is now widely considered to be one of the greatest political speeches of all time).
Your portrayal of Reagan as an idiot doesn’t wash. Unlike many other presidents, he was famous for coming up with unscripted one-liners and off-the-cuff remarks that hit right at the heart of an issue. A lot of what he said was unscripted, and a lot of the scripted stuff he said was written by himself.
Reagan’s intellect was constantly underestimated, and he used that to great advantage. Just ask Gorbachev, a supposedly brilliant man who was badly outmanoevered by Reagan both on the public stage (where you could argue that his advisors and cabinet did all the work), and in their private bargaining sessions (where you can’t make that claim at all).
Jackmannii asks:
Sure. Reagan’s main goals for freedom at home were a reduction in the size of the federal government, a reduction in the number of regulations that Americans are subjected to, and a reduction in taxes. And in fact Reagan did manage to reduce the number of regulations in the Federal Register quite substantially, although it has crept back up again (and to his credit, so did Clinton). Reagan of course managed to cut taxes. But he didn’t do much for the size of government.
You see, there is more to freedom than the existance of government handouts. There is freedom to keep what you earn, freedom to run your company without the oppressive hand of government stomping on you, freedom to sell your products at the price you choose, freedom to choose where to send your children to school, freedom to buy and sell products without the government standing in your way or slapping tariffs on you, etc.
ElvisL1ves said:
And RTFirefly said:
This is the biggest enduring myth about Reagan - that his tax cuts caused the deficit. It’s an indisputable fact that tax revenues increased substantially under Reagan.
When Reagan was elected, the Federal Government’s total revenue was 517 billion dollars. 8 years later, government revenue was 919 billion dollars. An increase of 78%.
Now, the next 8 years saw two major tax increases - one under Bush, and one under Clinton. Over those 8 years, revenue increased from 991 billion to 1.453 trillion, an increase of only about 46%. In absolute dollars, the 8 years of Reagan’s term (with his tax cuts) saw as big an increase in revenue as the next 8 years (which had two major tax increases). In inflation-adjusted terms, Reagan’s revenue increase was MUCH higher.
So how can you cut taxes and increase revenue? Simple - grow the economy. Tax cuts cause growth, which increases government revenue. This is the essence of supply-side economics, and I note with some amusement that even Democrats are buying into this now. I heard Dick Gephardt say yesterday that some tax cuts were ‘needed’ to help stimulate the economy. That he can say that with a straight face and then turn around and claim that supply-side economics was wrong indicates who the real economic moron is.
The other knock against Reagan is that his military spending caused the deficit. This is simply not true. At the end of 8 years, military spending was only about 100 billion more per year than it was at the start. But domestic spending ballooned, and that’s the real culprit. Total government outlays in 1981 were 678 billion dollars. In 1989, they were 1.14 trillian, an increase in spending of almost 500 billion dollars per year. And remember, only about 100 billion of that increase was military spending. Entitlement spending went from 339 billion to 550 billion per year.
If you want to know the main budget busters in the Reagan years, look no further than the elderly. Medicare spending increased from 41 billion to 94 billion per year. Social Security increased from 137 billion to 240 billion. Those two items alone accounted for more spending than the entire military budget. Retirement and disability benefits increased by 20 billion a year.
Means-tested spending (welfare, food stamps, medicaid, other aid for the poor) under the ‘heartless’ Reagan increased from 54 billion to about 89 billion dollars.
Reagan deserves some criticism for being unable or unwilling to control domestic spending, but let’s remember that the real driving force behind domestic spending increases was the Democrats in the Senate and House. Most of the budgets Reagan submitted were declared Dead-On-Arrival by the Democrats, who tacked on billions in additional spending. Reagan almost always backed down. However, he did once stand up to them and refuse to sign the pork-laden budget they submitted. The result was a standoff that shut the government down. And who got the blame for that? Reagan. The political heat put on him by the media and Congress caused him to cave in again.
So while Reagan shares some blame for the deficits, the real culprits were the Democrats who never saw a spending bill they didn’t like.
By the way, these numbers are courtesy of the Congressional Budget Office, and they’re not in dispute. If you want to continue the argument that Reagan’s tax cuts caused the deficits, the onus is on YOU to explain these numbers.
Wow, I had no idea! I knew he was smart, but everything I ever read about the man, mostly derogatory, failed to bring this little tidbit to light. Excellent post Sam!
Yeah, I figured that was the “freedom” being extolled. But if we’re being that loose about defining freedom, we’ll have to add in the freedom to run up monstrous deficits, the freedom not to choke to death on the horrible pollution caused by having too many trees, the freedom to ignore overpopulation, the freedom to glom too much credit for the collapse of the Soviet Bloc, the freedom to ignore a seditious operation to bankroll the Contras, etc. ad nauseaum.
Actually, supporting tax cuts to stimulate the economy is not the same as supply side economics. If you give the tax breaks to the poor and middle class, you are primarily stimulating the “demand side”.
Ya gotta be real careful with these numbers…They depend a lot on the exact years you choose, etc. The official revenue numbers in the Year 2000 budget from OMB are as follows:
1975: 279 bill
1976: 298 bill
1977: 356 bill
1978: 399 bill
1979: 463 bill
1980: 517 bill
1981: 599 bill
1982: 618 bill
1983: 601 bill
1984: 666 bill
1985: 734 bill
1986: 769 bill
1987: 854 bill
1988: 909 bill
1989: 991 bill
1990: 1032 bill
1991: 1055 bill
1992: 1091 bill
1993: 1154 bill
1994: 1259 bill
1995: 1352 bill
1996: 1453 bill
1997: 1579 bill
1998: 1722 bill
1999: 1827 bill
2000: 1956 bill (estimate)
A few points to make: You accidently went over 8 years (1980–1988) for the Reagan estimate and 7 (1989–1996) for the next one! If you had gone over the eight years 1989–1997, that 46% would become 59%. If you look at 1991–1999, you get 73% increase and that is probably over a time when inflation was lower than in the 80s (although I’m not exactly sure on that. [These number are not in constant, i.e. inflation-adjusted, dollars.]
At any rate, one would have to be very careful about when exactly what taxes were cut and raised. You can see for example that for Reagan’s first big tax cut, which I assume went into effect in 1982, revenues only went up from 599 to 618 bill and that in the next year, they actually fell, so by 1984, revenues were only 11% higher than in 1981, which may be one of the worst showings over any 3 year period.
Anyway, careful studies can be done of this. I’m just pointing out that yours isn’t one.
Also, one should also look at who “won” and who “lost” over the Reagan years. I.e., while taxes may have been cut, the cuts were mainly on the wealthy. In fact, I believe the 80s were a period when real incomes of the lower half of the population did not do very well. (This, in fact, is true through the mid-90s, I believe. It is really only during the latter half of the Clinton years that the poor and middle class saw much benefit of the economic boom.)
Hiya everyone, I’m a longtime lurker, first time poster… I’m a student of economics, and threads like these I find particularly fascinating. There are a couple of points that I’m not sure are entirely clear in Sam Stone’s post, and a few that I disagree with. If I don’t format any of this correctly, please forgive me, I’m new to this format!
Yes, those are fiscal years 1980 through 1989, for total federal receipts (I’d argue that income tax revenue and capital gains and such are more relevant, but we’ll go with these numbers).
In case it wasn’t clear here, these numbers are for 1989 through 1996. If we wanted to make this a straight-forward Reagan to Clinton comparison, total receipts in 1992 were 1.091 trillion, and the estimate I have for 2000 is 1.956 trillion… a 79% increase (I believe this estimate is from the OMB, the spreadsheet I have it in doesn’t give a citation, but I could quickly check if anyone is interested.)
No, the growth in GDP really isn’t what was so interesting (or controversial) about supply-side economics… nor should it amuse you that Democrats are agreeing with it. This effect has been well understood for decades and is dealt with in just about any undergraduate macroeconomics course. It was, after all, Kennedy’s goal with his tax cuts (Art Laffer once described himself as a “Kennedy Democrat” and has wrote copiously on this topic). Of course, this isn’t to say that Supply-Siders ignore this effect (it features prominently in the whole scheme, of course!) Supply-siding has a lot more to do with the rejection of one of Keynes’ key points, that economic recessions (or Great Depressions) are the result of deficiencies in aggregate demand. There is also a notion that tax cuts will give people less incentive to evade taxes and more incentive to work harder as they get more return on their “investment” of labor. Yeah, tax cuts cause economic growth, every economist worth his salt agrees on this, it’s just a matter of how much.
This really isn’t my area of expertise here (I’m more of a forecasting and time-series guy) but I hope it helps elevate the debate a little…
Another point before I go to sleep: one should really look at gross receipts from income taxes only if one wants to analyze the effect of income tax cuts. In particular, I thought I remember reading that there were rather hefty hikes in the Social Security tax during the Reagan era; if that is right (and, I could be confused…it could have been under Bush) then that could start accounting for some of the growing revenues in the latter part of the Reagan Presidency. I’m not sure…I just want to throw this out as something that needs to be considered in a more careful analysis.
Sorry to post like crazy here…This is what happens when it gets late. But, actually, I realized that the budget document has lots and lots of tables addressing things like receipts in constant dollars and receipts by source. Download it yourself at http://w3.access.gpo.gov/usbudget/fy2000/maindown.html (look for “Historical Tables”)! [Better yet, you can go to the Fiscal Year 2001 one for more up-to-date info…I failed to notice that, so I’m operating with the FY2000 one.]
I’ll throw a couple tidbits out: In constant dollars, 1980–1988 saw a rise in receipts of 21%. By contast, 1989–1997 saw a rise by 28%!!! Sort of looks different in constant dollars, doesn’t it!!! [1992–2000estimated saw a 52% rise in constant dollar terms!]
Also confirmed my guess about the relative amounts of the revenue rise attributable to income taxes and SS receipts. SS receipts went up by 111% and individual income tax receipts by 64% during 1980–1988 (back in unadjusted dollars). Corporate income tax receipts lagged at just 46%.
I know nothing about politics. I know even less about Reagan. I do know that before Reagan…my dad was rich…after Reagan my dad was poor. I’m not blaming him for anything…I wouldn’t know why to blame him…I was 3 when he was elected. I can definatly say he is not God.
Sam Stone, this doesn’t tell me anything. Regardless of whether or not he had a degree, he clearly had a very minimal understanding of economics. I know people with economics degrees who can’t seem to understand that lower national savings (or higher debt) leads to higher interest rates, which restricts investment. This slows down growth in the country. It takes away jobs. Only service sector (or McDonald’s-type) jobs increase in this environment. This of course forces our children and grandchildren to pay back our debts. Should our children be forced to work hard to pay for the shotty financial tactics of a fool?
Now, this is the scenario that Reagan left us with. Any idiot can go up there and cut taxes and increase spending to stimulate the economy. However, as president, you must not only make decisions on how the US economy is going to perform today. You have to understand the impact that your decisions will have on the country a year from now, and 5 years from now.
Reagan’s ignorance on economic issues was revealed by the decisions he made. And as president, he is the one politician who’s constituency is EVERYONE. So even if some members of the House and the Senate propose something, they are only responsible for their own state or district. It is the president’s responsibility to look out for everyone’s interests. This is something that Clinton did, and this is why he was the most successful of the recent presidents. And this is something else (add it to your list) that Reagan had no clue about.
And as for me. Well, I have a Bachelor’s in Statistics and Actuarial Science. And I also have a top 10 MBA in Finance. So I’ve taken my share of Economics classes. And my ex-roommate is a Ph. D. in Economics. He also taught me alot. Hey, you asked…
