Hey, What’d I Miss? OTE Summary, 9/17 – 9/23

Sep 24, 2012 at 11:44 pm

• Looking at the question of “who pays taxes?”:  this just in from the facts department — it’s just flat out wrong to conflate “federal income taxes” with “taxes.”
• Breaking down the misguided nature of the makers vs. takers debate:  it misses the dynamics of real lives in America, and in its place creates a false and divisive framework.
• Taking a broader view of the teachers’ strike in Chicago:  if you think teachers unions are the reason too many kids aren’t learning enough, you’re wrong.
• Considering the housing market:  new evidence on policy interventions and the cost of hitting bottom.
• Explaining that redistribution thingie:  in a system like ours with so many tax and benefit cross-currents, there’s always a lot of redistributing going on — and it goes both ways.
• Pointing out the lack of evidence that lowering the top tax rates correlates with greater investment, savings, productivity, or income growth, with a tip of the hat to this blog by my CBPP colleague Chye-Ching Huang.
• Recapping an AEI debate on international trade policy, slides and all.

Music:  this week’s Musical Interlude, featuring Doris Day.

Bonus:  I wrote a haiku on makers and takers (in strict 5-7-5 format, of course).

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