[Futurework] Spring Training - Batter Up

[Karen Watters Cole]

Three pitches, commentaries and/or analysis of what can be expected from Bush tomorrow.  Should the headline be More Regurgitated Reaganomics?  Same old, same old?  Give Trickle Down a Chance?  If only they could bring Jack Kemp and Newt out of hiding, but it’d be too obvious. - KWC Analysis Finds Little Gain in Tax-Cut Plan 2 Economists Assess Dividend Proposal By John M. Berry, Washington Post Staff Writer, Monday, January 6, 2003 Eliminating taxes on dividends paid to individuals, the centerpiece of President Bush's stimulus package, would do little to spur economic growth or reduce the nation's jobless rate, according to an analysis this weekend by two prominent economists.  Bush is to provide details of his plan in a speech tomorrow. Allen Sinai of Decision Economics and Andrew F. Brimmer, a former Federal Reserve Board member who heads a consulting firm, said that even a much broader combination of additional spending measures and tax cuts worth nearly $500 billion over the next five years would raise growth by only about a half-percentage point and reduce the unemployment rate by only one-tenth or two-tenths of a percentage point this year and next. The impact of a stimulus package much larger than the one the administration is expected to propose is so small, Sinai told a panel session at the annual meeting of the American Economics Association here, because "the economy is so large" relative to the amount of stimulus. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14740-2003Jan5.html The perils of short-term tax cuts By Gene Sperling in The Financial Times of London, Published: January 5 2003 22:08 Although John Maynard Keynes dubbed the "long term" as the time when we are all dead, it is the precisely the time-frame on which countries should focus when pursuing policies of fiscal discipline. Unfortunately, honest debate about rising deficits and fiscal discipline in the US is being hampered by those who consistently blur the distinction between the short term and the long term. There are three critical distortions in the case now being made by Republicans for further tax cuts. First, the case for a short-term stimulus is being used as a rationale for giving up on long-term fiscal sanity. Basic Keynesian economic theory dictates that, in a slow economy, it makes sense to use temporary tax cuts or spending increases to boost spending. So when policymakers say we should not worry about a temporary rise in the deficit in a time of economic weakness or war they are right. But the crucial words are "temporary" and "time of economic weakness or war". http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1039524179720&p=1012571727092   WP Editorial: The Tax Cut Trap Monday, January 6, 2003 @ http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15014-2003Jan5.html LET'S SEE IF we have this right. President Bush plans to propose a stimulus plan the centerpiece of which will have little or no stimulative effect.  At a time when some people badly could use help, Mr. Bush's tax cut mostly will help those who need it least.  And while the president is warning Congress to restrain its spending on basics such as education and aid to the poor, the tax cuts will further inflate his growing budget deficit.  No wonder that Mr. Bush, even before officially unveiling the plan tomorrow, waved his magic "class warfare" amulet, seeking to obscure the obvious -- another tax cut for the rich -- by preemptively accusing his accusers. Outgoing mail scanned by NAV 2002