Monday, February 2, 2009

Use tax cuts to ignite incentives

Voltron says: It'll never happen, but it's a good idea.

From NPR Marketplace:

Todd Buchholz: There's a scene in "The Godfather" when hot-headed Sonny Corleone gets whacked by two thugs. The senior thug turns to the younger and says, "Leave the gun, take the cannoli."

Our hot-headed housing and banking sectors have been whacked, and now we wonder: What firms do we rescue? Which do we leave for the undertaker? The free market is not a pain-free market. Some live and some die.

Preventing failure is like trying to put the economy in a lockbox -- safe from damage, but unable to move ahead.

The end of the Cold War left thousands of aerospace engineers jobless. Now many work at Cisco and Apple.

Thank goodness Theodore Roosevelt didn't put the economy in a lockbox -- or we'd never have driven a car, flown on an airplane, or expected to live past age 50.

Neither Republican nor Democrat leaders have even a rule-of-thumb for rescuing firms. Lehman dies, AIG limps on. Heck, Larry Flynt is lobbying for a bailout of the porn industry. Great, even our national libido needs a stimulus package.

Now Congress wants to contort President Obama's $825 billion fiscal plan. Congressmen can't wait to put their names on bridges, tunnels, roller skating rinks for senior citizens. Lobbying in Washington is so crowded, corporate jets can't get landing slots.

This is a mess.

Rather than bailing out those who've failed, rather than tax rebates where we all just send checks to each other, rather than paving every road with gold-plated blacktop, let's ignite new incentives. Cut taxes for companies that hire new employees. Cut taxes for jobless workers who take a new job. Cut taxes for companies that buy new equipment. Cut taxes for tech firms that add to their R&D budgets. This is not tax-cutting gone foolishly wild.

Foolish is when you waste money giving it away to make up for past blunders. Foolish is when you give in because some CEO puts a gun to your head and says, "The whole world will end unless you give me money."

Enough foolishness. Leave the gun. Take the cannoli. Bet on the future

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Ummm, that scene quoted was actually when Fat Clemenza and an un-named button-man killed Paulie. Remember, Paulie sold out The Godfather, enabling Solazo to attempt to assinate The Godfather.

Fat Clemenza told the hitman, after shooting the turncoat Paulie, "leave the gun, take the canoli."

Sonny was The Godfather's son and was killed on the causway at the tollbooth.

Just wanted to set that straight...