DEAR EDITOR:
Robert Reich's article in the Tribune on Dec. 7, Pearl Harbor Day, was as short on truthful substance as he and I are in height.
Why is every socialistic response to solving this country's fiscal problems due to the rich not paying their share in fiscal responsibility? Reich stated, "Higher taxes on the rich don't slow economic growth, because the rich spend a much smaller portion of their earnings than does the middle class." Well, so what? This is not a reason that we must overspend, as a country, to make up for the poor rich knowing how and when to spend their earned income.
He also wrote about the Clinton administration balancing the budget in the 1990s. What was the makeup of the Congress, both houses, when this occurred? Didn't the revolution of change happen in 1994?
Yes, Reich did write that the budget (now, remember, the budget is not the same as the national debt) was balanced and there was faster job growth than expected. Job growth is really one of the largest reasons that we can get closer to a balanced budget. But, the job growth must be in the private sector where wages and benefits are paid for the private working personnel to accomplish work; not paid for by and with public funds from increasing taxation.
Also, Mr. Reich did not say that the housing industry was booming, which put thousands of people to work. Working people will spend to buy many things that non-working people can't. Remember the ballooning DOT COM companies that made millionaires out of so many people. All this took place in the 1990s. People were working, houses were being built and trickle down was at its greatest in over a decade.
Then, the DOT COM balloon burst because the companies were formed as corporations that did not produce anything but unnecessary service jobs, if any at all. The people building and buying houses were talked into frivolous purchase contracts that when the interest rates went from low variable to high fixed rates in several years, we had so many people going belly up. Or in the words of today: underwater. They could not pay their monthly payments which consisted of higher interest. The disaster of a sinking housing market now was "booming." People could not purchase or even keep their homes. We saw a failing economy. A couple of wars to boot and government spending began to put us into a greater deficit.
Now the president says taxing the rich and spending more will eliminate our problems. How? He says by borrowing. From China, of course. Who else wants to own us?
Patrick Liste
Girard