The same old debate
Arguing over taxes is like comfort food
After a year of tumult, I found the debate over the tax bill reassuring. Sure, it was full of vitriol and backbiting, but at least it was familiar.
Republicans argue that their corporate tax cut will make America more competitive in the global marketplace, thereby increasing employment. They tout their personal income tax cut as a boon to middleclass families. Democrats argue that this is just a payoff to the wealthy and well-connected, blowing a hole in the deficit and leaving struggling Americans behind.
If you are suddenly struck with a sense of deja vu, you are not alone. Republicans and Democrats have been making these competing arguments for generations.
When he accepted renomination for the presidency in 1984, Ronald Reagan said that his “tax program” provided “incentives to increase productivity for both workers and industry,” and touted the average American’s increased purchasing power.
The Democrats saw things differently. In his 1984 nomination address, Walter Mondale blasted Reagan’s tax cuts. “What happened was,” Mr. Mondale argued, “he gave each of his rich friends enough tax relief to buy a Rolls-Royce — and then he asked yourfamily to pay for the hubcaps.”
It goes back further than the 1980s, too. More than 100 years ago, Democrats and Republicans were arguing over taxes. Back then, it was not the income tax but rather tariffs. Republicans wanted higher tariffs to protect domestic industries, which they believed would boost wages and profits. Their 1892 platform said “that the prosperous condition of our country is largely due to the wise” tariff program of the GOP. Democrats disagreed. In their 1892 party platform, they“denounce[d] Republican protection as a fraud, a robbery of the great majority of the American people for thebenefit of the few.”
In fact, if you go back another 100 years, you will see the exact same argument! In 1791, Alexander Hamilton proposed a system of industrial protection — tax policies meant to fertilize nascent American businesses. He acknowledged that the agricultural majority would have to pay in the short term. But in the long haul this “temporary expense … is more than compensated, by an increase of industry and wealth, by an augmentation of resources and independence.” James Madison and Thomas Jefferson saw things differently. Madison wrote that “a just government” does not impose such “arbitrary restrictions, exemptions, and monopolies” as Hamilton was proposing, for they “deny to part of its citizens that free use of their faculties, and free choice of their occupations.”
So, Americans have been having the same debate, again and again and again. Should the government favor business and capital interests in the short term, in the expectation that in the long haul it will benefit the nation at large? Or is that just a giveaway to the wealthy special interests that purchasea seat at the table?
Far be it from me to try to resolve this particular dispute. The chances are that you already have firmly held views, anyway. You’re either with Madison, Mondale and the Democrats, or Hamilton, Reagan and the Republicans.
Instead, let’s breathe a sigh of relief that our political battle at the end of this year seems so downright normal. After all, wasn’t the worry that things were growing increasingly deranged in our politics, spiraling into conflicts that would undermine our system of government itself? And yet, here we are, having the same old debate that our country has had for more than two centuries.
It seems like everywhere we turn these days, people want us to think that the world is coming undone. That’s the story in the news media, amplified by social media. But, as it turns out in the case of the tax bill, it’s been more of the same. I’m going to count that as good news.