New World Man

Jonathan Chait published a just fantastic article at TNR, exposing the homonymity between Reagan’s laudable “tax reform” act of 1986, and Bush’s ill-defined and potentially harmful proposed “tax reform” of 2006.

ne of the great episodes in the lives of policy wonks everywhere–and, let’s face it, they don’t have many–occurred when Ronald Reagan signed the Tax Reform Act of 1986. It was an almost shockingly beneficent piece of legislation, lauded by economists and political scientists across the ideological spectrum. It did not, however, happen without a fight. Passing tax reform–which lowered tax rates and cleansed the tax code of countless loopholes, credits, and other acts of unjustifiable favoritism–forced Reagan and his allies to fight for nearly two years against an army of K Street lobbyists seeking to preserve their clients’ privileges. It was a rare moment when the GOP’s principles smacked up against the interests of its donors, and principle won.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 21st, 2005 at 19:43 and is filed under politics, economics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.