(08-23-2017, 09:18 AM)David Horn Wrote:It is a form of austerity used as an excuse to cut taxes while mollifying conservatives who still recollect that Republicans used to be fiscal conservatives. The fact that it is an easy putt is why it is pursued. Austerity means painful policies (tax increases or spending cuts) enacted to bring budgets into balance. New-Dealers (Keynesians) believe austerity should rely on higher taxes as well as spending restraint, and should be applied during peacetime expansions when it hurts working people less.(08-22-2017, 02:22 PM)Mikebert Wrote:(08-21-2017, 04:00 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: One of the keys to the mystery is, how did the American people change from a people who could support austerity to a people who despised austerity?
That's no mystery. Austerity used to mean fiscal discipline in the form of higher taxes and restrained spending, including that for national security. The costs of the old austerity were shared by rich and poor alike.
Austerity proposed today is limited to discretionary domestic spending and typically comes as the expense of the poor. Furthermore this is on top of inflation control policy whose cost is already completely borne by working people. So non-rich people quite rationally do not like the new austerity.
But is that austerity or just an excuse to cut taxes the easy way? It's easy to move things through Congress using Reconciliation, but you have to follow the rules. Cutting benefits to the poor, who neither vote nor contribute to either party, is a easy putt. Cutting taxes on those who fund politics is easy too. That may be overly cynical, but it matches the rhetoric and actions of today's politicians.
Gold standard Republicans believed that austerity should involve both taxes and spending restraint and should be applied during peacetime, regardless of business cycle position. Post-Volcker Republicans believe austerity is never necessary, but can still serve as a political tool to justify tax cuts to fiscal conservatives.