Monday, March 4, 2013

Abolish all Taxes on Income, FICA and Medicare, and Let Our Public Spend to Provision Itself. No Treasury Bonds at All.

Commentary by Roger Erickson

We could do all that, easily. It's only a question of getting the practice to actually manage the altered but drastically simplified operations involved. Can we get to near-zero taxes and near max Output, Innovation and novel Capacity Addition? Let's find out. As far as I know Australia is the only country in recent memory to forego Treasury Bonds. Bill Mitchell discussed that in private email, and it's buried somewhere in one of his blog entries. The currency issuer only has to choose some other reference interest rate which all subsidiary bond issuers, buyers and traders can orient to.

Just use VAT (value-added or sales-taxes) to finely regulate both net and patterns of Aggregate Demand.

Marriner Eccles published some papers on some of those very topics while USA Fed Chief, in 1944.

February 8, 1944 - Possibilities of postwar inflation and suggested tax action
Address at the Tax Institute Symposium in New York City

November 16, 1944 - The post-war price problem - inflation or deflation
Address at Meeting of National Industrial Conference Board, New York City

"Curbing inflation through taxation", by Marriner S. Eccles (1944)

3 comments:

Dan Lynch said...

3 logical reasons to tax:

-- a consumption tax to control inflation (or a payroll tax would be close enough). Call this the Anti-Inflation Tax (AIT). The AIT should be indexed to core inflation.

-- a wealth redistribution tax (WRT). This could be a tax on high incomes, a progressive property tax, a financial transactions tax, etc.. The WRT should be indexed to the Gini coefficient

-- taxes to discourage specific behaviors like pollution. My personal preference is to regulate unacceptable behavior rather than to tax it.

Roger Erickson said...

The devil is in the implementation details. It's clear we cannot approach this complex task by proclaiming desired methods ahead of time.

Rather, describe the outcomes desired, get consensus on them, AND THEN BE WILLING TO DISCOVER AND USE "ANY" COMBINATION OF METHODS THAT ACTUALLY KEEPS US IN THAT OPERATING RANGE!!!

Above all else, we need operational agility.

justaluckyfool said...

The government can not win against ‘compound interest’ on debt for that can be infinite in amount. IF ‘compound interest were eliminated then there would be no “systemic failure”. Or better yet; take that most powerful weapon, use it for the people .
Let’s try this game: Substitute the words “Central Bank Working For The People” (CBWFTP) where ever” Private For Profit Banks” (PFPB) appears.
****PFPB have $100 trillion in assets as mortgages on residential and commercial real property (RE) loans. The average compound interest rate is 4% for a term of 36 years. The PFPB would have created that $100 trillion ‘out of thin air’ (Horizontal Money) which would have an attachment that would require $800 trillion to be paid to the PFPB. YES, take away the smoke and mirrors, this is a fact-the Rule of 72. Now we must replace (reduce to zero ) the Horizontal Money by subtracting $100 trillion leaving a profit,income,taxation from ‘somewhere else’ of $700 trillion. This amount goes as profits to the PFPB. Revenue they may use for their own selfish purposes. That’s not the bad news-what the bad news is :That $700 trillion is real money, real currency, sucked up by the PFPB,yes Vertical Money !!
NOW DARE YOU ; READ IT AGAIN,
BUT THIS TIME REPLACE “PFPB” WITH “CBWFTP”.
Why would you not want prosperity for yourselves and your children? Why would you not want $700 trillion THAT MUST BE PLACED BACK INTO THE ECONOMY IN ORDER THE PREVENT DEFLATION !
*********************
MAYBE,JUST MAYBE, PERHAPS ECONOMIST ARE BEGINNING TO GET IT !!
****************
Amazing that Adair Turner is suggesting Quantitative Easing for the People not for banks.http://t.co/P2o6J8ux9m Copying @ProfSteveKeen?
Adair Turner recommends Quantitative Easing for the People
neweconomics.net.nz
A breakthrough speech on Monetary policy by journalist and financial economist Anatole Kaletsky was published

Maybe,just perhaps you might read and improve : GOOGLE-"Justaluckyfool"
Try to disprove that " PFPB profit via taxation on their loans not only double but even quadruple the amount of the loans"