WSJ celebra il 25° della
“Reaganomics” in una summa trionfalistica
della linea liberista:
- 25 anni di prosperità, dopo la stagflazione degli anni ’70;
- su 276 mesi, solo 15 (il 6%) in recessione,
- creati 43 milioni di posti di lavoro,
- e 30 trilioni $ di ricchezza, più di quanto prodotto nei 200
anni precedenti. - Principi della reganomics:
- moneta sana (unico scopo di politica monetaria:
stabilità prezzi), - basse aliquote fiscali (che ora sono mediamente la
metà che anni ’70; quasi tutti i paesi hanno seguito gli USA). - Gli avversari prevedevano inflazione, ma la produzione
crebbe più della domanda e l’inflazione scese dal 13 al 4%. Dopo la recessione
1981-2, con l’entrata in vigore dell’ultimo stadio degli sgravi, iniziò un boom
che durò oltre 7 anni. - Il deficit pubblico crebbe negli anni ’80, ma non i tassi.
- Quando la borsa crollò 1987, JK Galbraith predisse la fine
della reaganomics, ma dopo due mesi la Borsa si riprese e l’espansione continuò
fin quando Bush alzò le tasse nel 1990. - Secondo i detrattori della reaganomics [Rubin, “Rubinomics”
–vedi sotto] gli aumenti delle tasse di Clinton (1993) posero fine ai deficit
di bilancio, ridussero i tassi, producendo il boom degli anni ’90. In realtà il
deficit non si ridusse quasi, mentre furono le elezioni del ’94, che portarono
in Congresso una maggioranza rep. anti-tasse, a produrre il boom della seconda
metà anni ’90, che portò anche il primo surplus di bilancio in 30 anni. - Nel 1997 Clinton firmò nuove riduzioni fiscali, che spinsero
l’investimento e la Borsa [preparando il successivo crollo e la recessione, su
cui li commento sorvola –ndr]. - L’ultimo capitolo sono i tagli del 2003 alle
imposte su redditi e investimenti: nei 2,5 anni successivi aumento della
produzione e delle entrate fiscali.
January 20, 2006; Page A14
Twenty-five ears ago today, Ronald Reagan
was inaugurated as the 40th President of the United States promising less
intrusive government, lower tax rates and victory over communism. On that same
day, the American hostages in Iran were freed after 444 days of captivity. If
the story of history is one long and arduous march toward freedom, this was a
momentous day well worth commemorating.
All the more so because over this 25-year
period prosperity has been the rule, not the exception, for America — in
stark contrast to the stagflationary 1970s. Perhaps the greatest tribute to the
success of Reaganomics is that, over the course of the past 276 months, the
U.S. economy has been in recession for only 15. That is to say, 94% of the
time the U.S. economy has been creating jobs (43 million in all) and wealth
($30 trillion). More wealth has been created in the U.S. in the last
quarter-century than in the previous 200 years. The policy lessons of this
supply-side prosperity need to be constantly relearned, lest we return to the
errors that produced the 1970s.
The heart and soul of Reagan’s economic
agenda were sound money (making the dollar "as good as gold,"
as Reagan used to put it) and lower tax rates. On monetary policy,
Reagan has won a resounding victory. Today, nearly all economists agree with
Reagan’s then-controversial belief that the sole purpose of monetary policy
should be to keep prices stable. Double-digit inflation is a distant memory
unlikely to recur anytime soon.
On tax policy, Reaganomics has also carried
the day, if somewhat less completely. Tax rates in the U.S. are on average
half as high now as they were in the 1970s, and almost every nation has followed
the Reagan model of lower tax rates. Even Bill Clinton only dared to raise
the top marginal income tax rate back to 39.5%, not 50% or 70%.
Nonetheless, tax cuts still stand in
disrepute among most of the media, academics and Democrats in Congress,
albeit for shifting reasons. When Reagan proposed his 30% across-the-board
tax-rate cut, his critics howled that this would cause demand to rise and lead
to hyper-inflation. In fact, supply rose faster than demand, and inflation
fell to 4% from 13% and has fallen even lower since. When the economy went
into a deep recession in 1981-82, Reagan’s adversaries (and some of his own
advisers) declared his tax cuts a failure. Reagan said stay the course, and the
moment the final leg of the tax cut took effect, in January of 1983, the
economy roared to life with an expansion that lasted more than seven years.
When the budget deficit rose in the
mid-1980s, the liberals warned that if Reagan would not raise taxes
interest rates would skyrocket. He didn’t and rates didn’t. After the 1987
stock market crash, liberal John Kenneth Galbraith wrote that "this
debacle marks the last chapter of Reaganomics . . . and the irresponsible
tax cuts." Again, Reagan refused to buckle and two months later the
stock market recovered and the expansion roared on — an expansion that didn’t
end until George H.W. Bush reversed course and raised taxes in 1990.
The Gipper’s critics have written an economic
history of the 1990s that they portray as a repudiation of Reaganomics. In
this telling — known as Rubinomics — the Clinton tax hikes of 1993
ended the budget deficit, which caused interest rates to fall, which produced
the boom of the mid- to late-1990s. In fact, the budget deficit hardly fell at
all in the immediate aftermath of the tax hike, and while long-term
interest rates fell in 1993, they shot back up again in 1994 almost precisely
through Election Day (rising by some 230 basis points from October 1993
to November 1994).
On that day, voters repudiated the Clinton
tax hikes and the specter of HillaryCare and gave Republicans control of
Capitol Hill to govern on the Reaganite agenda of lowering taxes and shrinking
runaway government. Both the stock and bond markets turned upward precisely on
Election Day in 1994, beginning a whirlwind six-year rally. By 1998, growth
and fiscal restraint delivered a budget surplus for the first time in nearly
30 years. In 1997 President Clinton signed a further reduction in the capital
gains tax, which propelled investment and the stock market to even greater
heights
The latest chapter of this story is the
2003 income and investment tax cuts enacted by the current President Bush.
As in 1981, opponents insisted those tax cuts would harm the economy by
increasing the deficit and driving up interest rates. But in the two and a half
years since those tax cuts passed, the economy and tax revenues have both
surged.
Where Republicans have most strayed from
the Reagan vision has been on controlling federal spending. But most still adhere to his tax-cutting lessons, with a few
prominent exceptions (notably Senator John McCain). They should all recall the
Gipper’s words in his inauguration speech 25 years ago: "It is no
coincidence that our present troubles parallel and are proportionate to the
intervention and intrusion in our lives that result from unnecessary and
excessive growth of government."