Who Really Creates Jobs? ? JONATHAN TURLEY

Respectfully submitted by Lawrence Rafferty (rafflaw)- Guest Blogger

We have heard for years now that the wealthy and corporations need their tax cuts because without them jobs will not be created and the economy could fall back into recession. I guess I first heard of this concept during the Reagan years with the so-called ?trickle down? economics.? The claim that economic benefits and improvements trickle down from the very wealthy to the middle class and the poor was one that helped ride Reagan into office and continues to be claimed by some as the way out of recession.? Indeed, the Republicans, since the George W. Bush administration have been insistent that the tax cuts for the wealthy are the key to promote increased employment for the country.

It is time that we look deeper into the claim that lowering taxes for the wealthy and for corporations will actually increase employment and separate the truth from fiction.? ?Based on IRS figures, the richest 1% nearly tripled its share of America?s after-tax income from 1980 to 2006. That?s an extra trillion dollars a year. Then, in the first year after the 2008 recession, they took 93% of all the new income.? Wealth is even more skewed. The richest 10% own 83% of financial wealth, which they?ve skillfully arranged to be taxed at just 15%, ostensibly because they pump that money back into job-creating ventures.?? Common Dreams ?

If I read those numbers correctly, the richest 1% continued to increase their wealth during the first year after the start of the recession while the middle class and the poor took significant hits in employment and income.? Basically, if the Right?s call to continue the Bush tax cuts and to cut corporate taxation in order to increase employment and wealth for all is to believed, would we not have already fully recovered from the recession since the tax cuts have been continued to this date and the effective corporate taxes are far below the actual corporate tax rate?? Just what did the Bush tax cuts do for President Bush?s record in creating jobs?

?The current President Bush, once taking account how long he?s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records.?? Wall Street Journal? The Wall Street Journal wrote those words just as President Bush was leaving office and they compared all prior President?s records at job creation during their terms. It surprised me that even the much maligned Jimmy Carter administration had a far better record in job creation than President Bush, according to that same Wall Street Journal article. With that recent record of poor job creation, why would anyone believe that reducing taxes on the wealthy would create a bonanza of new jobs?

We have also heard repeatedly that the economy won?t grow jobs because corporations are taxed too much.? This refrain is one that baffles me.? Especially since I and others have written in the past of the many large United States companies that have paid little or no effective Federal taxes in recent years.

?Many corporate leaders have noted that other OECD countries have lowered their corporate tax rates in recent years, but fail to mention that these countries have also closed corporate tax loopholes while the U.S. has expanded them. As a result, the U.S. collects less corporate taxes as a share of GDP than all but one of the 26 OECD countries for which data are available.? Citizens for Tax Justice?

These same corporations make Billions and pay a lower effective tax rate than the poor of this country.? ?Corporations even pay less than low-wage American workers. On their 2011 profits of $1.97 trillion, corporations paid $181 billion in federal income taxes (9%) and $40 billion in state income taxes (2%), for a total income tax burden of 11%. The poorest 20% of American citizens pay 17.4% in federal, state, and local taxes.?? Common Dreams

The numbers tell us that it is not the wealthy and big corporations that create jobs, but the middle class.? According to that same Common Dreams article linked above, ?A recent study found that less than 1 percent of all entrepreneurs came from very rich or very poor backgrounds. They come from the middle class.? That deserves repeating. Entrepreneurs come from the middle class.? Not surprisingly, then, since the middle class has been depleted by the steady accumulation of wealth at the top, the number of entrepreneurs per capita has decreased 53% since 1977, and the number of self-employed Americans has decreased 20% since 1991.?

If the numbers tells us that jobs are not being created when the tax cuts for the wealthy and for large corporations are continued or even increased as has been suggested by the Right, then why should we believe those calls for continued lower taxes on the wealthy?? What do you think is the truth and what ideas do you have to increase employment?? And before I forget, Go Bears!

Additional Sources:? The Taxonomist

Source: http://jonathanturley.org/2012/09/09/who-really-creates-jobs/

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