Thursday, May 21, 2015

Jeb Bush Adopts Voodoo Economics

Jeb’s father in 1980 got it right with his phrase “voodoo economics”. Of course Papa Bush had to settle for being Reagan’s Vice President. We know George Jr. listened to the Three Stooges (Art Laffer, Lawrence Kudlow, and Stephen Moore). Daniel Strauss reports:
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) voiced support for House Republicans' move to switch to a type of budget scoring that assumes tax cuts create economic growth and counterbalance lost revenue. Speaking in New Hampshire on Thursday, Bush was asked about House Republicans' move to adopt the "dynamic scoring" method for scoring budgets. Although critics argue that this approach to scoring is essentially "fairy dust" and "cooks the books" on budget scoring, many Republicans and even a few conservative Democrats have pushed for using the controversial method. In December of last year, House Republicans opted to not reappoint Doug Elmendorf as the head of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, essentially paving the way to adopt dynamic scoring. At the beginning of 2016, House GOPers passed a rule requiring all budgets to use dynamic scoring in budget estimates. Bush first said he was "all in" for eliminating the "bean counters" who use the traditional "static scoring" method. "The House has done this and I think it's the right thing," Bush said in New Hampshire on Thursday. He went on to praise House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI), who, in Sept 2014, actually floated the idea that the CBO adopt dynamic scoring. "One of the guys I most respect in Washington D.C. is Paul Ryan. He's thoughtful, he's optimistic, he believes that if you create the right conditions all of us interacting amongst ourselves will create far more benefits for far more people," Bush said.
Hey – I’m no fan of bean counters but could someone tell Jeb that Paul Ryan’s accounting is fraudulent?

4 comments:

Monsieur Boeuf Le Tet said...

Am I correct in thinking that the dynamic scoring only takes place on tax expenditures, and not on any traditional government spending?

So for instance an infrastructure spending bill wouldn't be dynamically scored?

Sandwichman said...

Mais oui, Monsieur...

http://econospeak.blogspot.com/2015/01/dynamic-scouring.html

http://econospeak.blogspot.com/2015/01/dynamic-scouring-ii-cold-war-hot-planet.html

Monsieur Boeuf Le Tet said...

Ha! Now I know where I got that notion, I read it here.

reason said...

Can someone tell me why cutting taxes is called "supply side economics" even though there is no evidence at all that it increases supply, whereas spending on infrastructure and education isn't whereas there is plenty of evidence that it increases supply. Supply side economics, isn't supply side economics, it is just regressive demand side economics.