Today's Wall Street Journal has a long, and interesting, article (page A1 of the print edition) on where the Democrat-controlled Congress might take economic policy if they have their druthers. On the let's-pay-for-things side of the ledger:
The Senate Finance Committee, with the blessing of both parties' leaders, is circulating a list of ways to shrink the "tax gap" between taxes owed and taxes actually paid. Most are aimed at upper-income taxpayers, such as requiring stock brokers to report not only the price a client got for shares, but also the original purchase price paid.
Boosting taxes on upper-income Americans would reduce disparities and provide revenues for other attacks on inequality. Raising the top two tax rates, now 33% and 35%, by a single percentage point would yield $90 billion over five years, the Congressional Budget Office estimates.
Another favorite Democratic target is the lower tax rate -- a maximum of 15% -- on capital gains and dividends.
But then there is this list, which includes expanded tax breaks for low-income workers...
Enlarging the earned-income tax credit, viewed by many economists as a smart alternative to a higher minimum wage, is an option likely to figure in Democratic tax deliberations. The credit offers up to $4,536 to a family with two or more children to offset payroll taxes that the working poor pay. And it offers a cash bonus if the credit exceeds taxes paid, rewarding low-wage workers without raising employers' costs...
... expanded social insurance for displaced workers...
One direct response to workers' anxiety is expanded government programs to cushion the fall of those who lose jobs in today's rapidly changing economy...
Lori Kletzer of the University of California at Santa Cruz and Howard Rosen of the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, for instance, would offer eligible dislocated workers up to half the difference between weekly earnings at their old and new jobs, up to $10,000 a year. This isn't cheap: They put the price tag at between $2.6 billion and $4.3 billion a year, financed through general tax revenues or an expanded payroll tax.
... larger expenditures on education...
Democrats are focused on doing more to help Americans pay for college, especially important since the typical college grad earns 45% more than the typical high-school grad. Ms. Pelosi's platform calls for making up to $12,000 a year in college tuition tax-deductible -- or the equivalent in a $3,000 tax credit -- as well as cutting interest rates on student loans and increasing the maximum Pell Grant for low-income students to $5,100 from $4,050.
A coalition that spans the political spectrum is pushing more government support of Pre-K education. The case: Low-income children are behind when they arrive at kindergarten and never catch up; spending more on them sooner would have a big payoff.
... and incentives to induce more private saving
... such as replacing current tax breaks for retirement savings with universal 401(k) accounts into which the government would match family savings -- a 2-to-1 match for low-income families, 1-to-1 for middle income families and perhaps 0.5-to-1 for high-income families.
... an idea suggested by Clinton economic adviser Gene Sperling, described in an online companion article.
These are all responses to very legitimate concerns -- how do we encourage more saving, how do we ensure opportunities to develop the skills that so clearly separate the haves from the have-nots, how should we view society's responsibilities to people who are harmed by economic change through no fault of their own? And though the ideas above may or may not be the best approaches to dealing with these questions, they are certainly worthy of discussion.
But how should that discussion proceed? An awful lot of people seem to feel that just reversing past tax cuts will somehow lead us to the promised land, but the arithmetic looks pretty shaky to me. That's why I think this is a good place to start:
New House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has vowed to restore a 1990s rule requiring new spending to be offset by spending cuts or tax increases...
First, a means to institutionalize priority setting. Then, on the specifics of those priorities, we can talk.