A reader sent me this the other day. Interesting concept. You can develop your own goals for the federal government, assign spending, and so on. Anyone care to be KIng of the U.S. and set spending the way they'd like to see it? ;-)
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Government spending will never go down. The only thing we can do to help is to grow the economy by cutting/reallocating taxes, particularly to those that account for the greatest amount of consumer spending. I would start by reducing the 25% bracket to 15%, then eliminate taxes altogether for the 10% income bracket. I would keep the top rate at the current level of 35%, keep the inheritance tax, start reducing the mortgage interest deduction to 10%, reduce capital gains taxes to 5%, eliminate corporate income taxes, allow 100% depreciation on capital equipment in the first year, raise a national cigarette tax of $5 a pack, extend tax credits for solar and wind generation, raise CAFE standards to 35mpg, cut farm, dairy, and oil company subsidies, toll existing interstate highways, RAISE the federal gas tax to 25 cents/gallon, replace our bridges and fix our infrastructure....(I'm sure I've left something out)
I look forward to your vote in November!
Posted by: Mark | May 23, 2008 at 12:51 PM
Thanks for helping me kill 30 minutes! Cut the spending, cut the taxes!
Posted by: Ryan | May 23, 2008 at 02:31 PM
Is it just me or does this "game" have a real liberal bent to it? Items that provide the most "benefit" are bringing home the troops, greatly increasing taxes, greatly increasing taxes on the righ, cutting green house gases, and cutting military spending.
Nothing is mentioned regarding the possibility of growing the economy by cutting taxes and reaping the benefit of a larger tax base.
In this game the only way to not bust the budget is to greatly increase taxes. Making all possible budget cuts still ends up with a budget bust in the next 40 years. The only way to "win" is with a big tax hike. This seems very short-sighted in terms of real world scenarios.
Posted by: Paul | May 23, 2008 at 04:40 PM
This game completely ignored Hauser's Law: No matter what the tax rates have been, in postwar America tax revenues have remained at about 19.5% of GDP.
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB121124460502305693.html
Posted by: stonecutter | May 23, 2008 at 06:20 PM
Why don't we just repeal the 16th ammendment and make the govenment go to big business to get financed everytime they get these crazy
tax & spend ideas. The original consitution forbid the government from levying takes against personal assets. This changed however
when the senate overruled the supreme court in a fit of greed.
The US had NO fed income tax from 1776 - 1913 (first 150 years)
Repeal their right to tax and spend and they'll have to balance the budget or quit paying themselves their everincreasing salaries.
http://www.claremont.org/publications/pubid.477/pub_detail.asp For basic details
Posted by: Edward | May 23, 2008 at 07:47 PM