You are right, I'm aware of the presence of tax shelters in that time. I did not mean to say that the flow of money to the middle class was primarily through the conduit of income tax. On your final paragraph, I also agree. We can no longer afford to pay our own citizens well, because the other guy, overseas, is not paying his well. Though, thanks to the commies over there, that is changing a bit.
There is only one way to level the global playing field and keep America prosperous. The way it's being done now will only result in a dramatically lower standard of living for the general public. Taken from another board in which I'm in full agreement: U.S. companies move their businesses and manufacturing as well as Blue and White Collar jobs OVERSEAS.....because THEY CAN! Why can they? Its because over 20 years ago Ronald Reagan destroyed this country's Import Tariff Tax and Trade Laws that had been in existence from the birth of this nation until the 1980's! America had sensible trade-Tariff taxes and laws that kept both Corporate America honest from leaving the U.S. for cheap labor while dis-employing America workers and discouraged if not out right prevented 3rd world country with exploited cheap labor and dumping/sending their goods and productions into the U.S. Economy unfairly and cheaply. Prior to Reagan blowing up our country's "FAIR TRADE" Import Tariff Tax Laws, American companies had to think twice before just shutting down Companies and moving overseas in search of cheap labor and profits w/o having to deal with the reality of getting charged an import tariff tax equal too how much those same products would have cost to be produced in the U.S. Likewise, foreign companies could not dump their cheaply made products into the U.S. economy if their products were made with cheap exploited labor. These 3rd world countries were also made to pay a tariff tax equal to the amount it would have cost to produce the same products in the U.S. These import tariff tax-trade laws were in place? It was to prevent what we see happening today and over the last 25 years, where the U.S. now see's its trade imbalances in the neighborhood in the $100's of billions with no end-in sight! Prior Reagan destroying our U.S. import tariff tax laws this country did not have the monetary trade imbalance as we see today. Since the 80's over 42,000 U.S. manufacturers have left the U.S. to take up business for cheap exploited 3rd world labor. And 75% of those manufactures employed 500 U.S. workers or more! From the founding of this country, our operational principle was: If there's a dollar's worth of labor in a pair of shoes made here, and you can make the same shoes in some other "cheap labor" country with 10 cents' worth of labor, there will be a 90-cent import tax (tariff) when you bring them into the country, to protect our domestic industries and our manufacturing jobs. Tariffs level the field for both American business and American labor. Without tariffs the only winners are the East India Company's modern incarnations-- the multinational corporations (which is why the multinationals push so hard for the WTO and other such institutions, treaties, and trade agreements). This is not a new idea, by the way-- it's how America has protected its economy from the founding of this nation right up until Clinton signed NAFTA and GATT. The first law imposing tariffs was in place before the Constitution was ratified in 1789. Tariffs represented 100 percent of federal government revenues from the founding of this nation until around the time of the Civil War and about a third of our total federal revenues up to World War I. They were still a major source of revenue right into the 1980s, when Reagan first took a whack at them.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul21.html Dr. Ron Paul explains very clearly why tariffs don't work.
His article, like so many others, offers interesting critique without offering any solutions, other than free markets without any government intervetion. How's that been working? What's been proven time and again is this. Corporate America, along with the Financial Industry will exploit the system till they break the system, and then will demand the system save them, always at the expense of the working class. That's neither free market, or capitalism. It's a risk free ride on the backs of the working class.
<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/BlkQRGZEycI?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/BlkQRGZEycI?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object> Milton Friedman on Tarrifs.
Pat Buchanan on Tariffs and more http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Pat_Buchanan_Free_Trade.htm http://buchanan.org/blog/the-isolationist-myth-165 Napoleon said of the Middle Kingdom, "Let (China) sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world." The shaking has begun. So the question arises: Who put us in this predicament? Who awakened, fed and nurtured this tiger to where she is growling at all Asia and baring her teeth at the United States? Answer: the free trade uber alles Republicans. http://townhall.com/columnists/PatBuchanan/2010/11/19/who_fed_the_tiger/page/1 You want the reality of it all, then read up on Pat Buchanan and his experience. The guy has been around the block, a couple of times. He's been on the right and wrong side of it all. He knows where the bodies are buried. Has made and seen his share of mistakes. He'll give you the truth, both barrels of it. The truth isn't always pretty, often times damned ugly, and rarely easily swallowed, but as the saying goes, it is what it is. I write him in every election.
Tariffs don't work as many have said here already. It always triggers counter actions. Our best exports are agriculture products especially grain. We are able to undercut the world market price by direct subsidies to farmers and corporate framers. Europe , Africa always complain but it is hard, legally in a World trade court, to counter what we do with our farmers. The WTC can easily rule against tariffs. I would propose that all USA domestic manufacturing that is exported have all its income taxes waived. This will drop our cost by 20-30% enough to compete in the world.
Perhaps we are selling our grain too inexpensively. We are deplete our water table. Lets stop subsidizing grain sales. And intelligent tariff programs has to work. Just look what protectionism did for, Japan, then Asian tigers and now China. Europe has or had its own version as well. Tariffs are far better for the home country than quotas. So you either have tariffs or very high standards for import.
the problem with with the premise of that video is that during the great depression we were the exporting country to Europe. Their recession was far less painful because they erected barriers to trade.) Now we are the importer and we are not in a free trade environment. China pegged our currency and other countries target industries.