The “WWHD Conference — What Would Howard Ahmanson, Sr., Do?” — was held August 1, 2018, the year marking the 50th anniversary of my father’s death. I decided I wanted to sponsor it, mostly to honor him. In the tumultuous year […]
Taxes
An Addendum to the Manifesto: My Youth as a Deficit Hawk – Howard Ahmanson
It occurred to me that during the first period in my life that I was a conservative, which was in my youth, I was motivated mainly by deficit hawkery. I was ten in the year that Nixon ran against Kennedy, […]
The Gasoline Tax: Charles Krauthammer Breaks with Republican Orthodoxy
Charles Krauthammer, generally regarded as a conservative writer, declared more than a year ago that he had been for a gasoline tax increase of $1 a gallon for 32 years. That would be, if I calculate right, since 1983. I’ve […]
Which Taxes to Raise – A Revision
In earlier posts I suggested that the top bracket income tax could be raised to up to 40%, as in the Clinton era, without hurting government revenues or damaging the economy. It still might not, but I have decided that […]
The Upper Middle Class Versus the 1%?
Matt Miller, Californian commentator, comments in his book The Tyranny of Dead Ideas that it probably will be the upper middle class, or ‘lower upper’ as he calls it, that will lead the opposition to the so called 1%, and […]
Edward Kleinbard Says, Don’t Soak the Few and the Rich
Edward Kleinbard, a professor at the University of Southern California, has pointed out that despite and in the face of extreme income inequality, not only is America’s tax system fairly ‘progressive’, its spending is fairly progressive in that the less […]
Man of the Left George Skelton Admits California Income Tax is too Top-Heavy on the Rich! Plus, Apparently Man of the Left Thomas Piketty Endorses Proposition 13!
George Skelton, LA Times columnist and generally a ‘progressive,’ admits, that the California state income tax is too top-heavy on the few and the rich. A welcome insight from someone on his side of the political spectrum. Note that Mark Paul, […]
Raise Everyone’s Taxes, Including Mine
A number of millionaires are fine with their taxes being raised. I myself could live with slightly higher taxes, though I don’t like the idea of going higher than the Clinton era levels on federal taxes. The Clinton-Gingrich era was […]
Proposition 13 — The Good and Bad
As I’ve said before, the famous part of Proposition 13 – the part that protected existing homeowners from being gouged by their own rising home values – should be kept. Large cash taxes, when cash or liquid assets are not […]
‘Smart Growth’ or Housing Opportunity
John Crawford, of Sierra Madre, misunderstands the proper purpose of SB 375. Yes, it is a form of social engineering, but so are the existing policies in those towns forbidding high density housing. Yes, it is mistaken if it is trying […]