Well, Charlotte’s liberal friends might tease her about caring about the proposed new tax hike on publicly traded partnerships, but I won’t — because I understand that the proposed tax hike would have negative consequences on economic growth (and that is bad news bears for everyone).
Larry Kudlow had a great column on the Baucus-Grassley plan over at NRO yesterday. Kudlow pointed to the root cause of the push for the Baucus-Grassley plan (and several over tax hiking measures that are in the works):
“Class envy is behind all this. It’s an envy that despises the investment clout of buyout firms, even though these buyouts create leaner, more-productive, more-efficient companies that are better able to compete in the era of globalization. These buyouts are a necessary capitalist churning, but many politicians would prefer the status quo. In particular, labor unions are pushing their Democratic allies to stop the buyout movement in order protect inefficient jobs and oversized benefits.
“Ironically, all this is happening while low-tax Reaganomics is spreading worldwide. Hence, this would be the exact wrong moment for U.S. politicians to raise taxes and impair American economic competitiveness.”
Kudlow sums up the argument about the proposed tax hikes better than I ever could:
“Point is, whether we’re talking individuals, corporations, or cap-gains, if you tax something you get less of it. If you take away the tax advantages from private partnerships, future deals will dry up. Or they will go offshore, where no taxes will be paid at all. And since capital is the seed corn of future economic growth, the Democratic war against prosperity will soon include the middle class as collateral damage.”
Check out the rest of Kudlow’s article here and check out Charlotte’s post below with more details on the bill in question.