By Michael Tanner
Wednesday, October 07, 2015
As Hillary Clinton continues to stumble, her leading
opponent, Senator Bernie Sanders, is having quite a run. Sanders continues to
lead Clinton in New Hampshire, is running close in Iowa, raised nearly as much
money as Clinton during the last quarter, and attracts Trump-like crowds at his
events. And, if Joe Biden jumps in, splitting the Democratic establishment
vote, he could become an even bigger threat to Hillary’s coronation. Maybe,
then, it is time to take Bernie, as his campaign posters style him, seriously.
Sanders calls himself a “democratic socialist,” but he is
not a socialist in the Jeremy Corbyn “nationalize industry” sense. He’s more of
a tax-and-spend politician — on steroids.
You recall the old saying, “Don’t tax you; don’t tax me;
tax the fellow behind the tree”? Well, Bernie wants to tax you, me, the fellow,
and the tree too. He famously delivered an eight-hour Senate speech calling for
higher taxes. So far, he has proposed, among other tax hikes, increasing the
long-term capital-gains tax rate from 23.8 percent to a whopping 39.6 percent.
At the same time, he wants to impose a transaction tax on every stock trade,
which would wreak havoc with the average American’s pension fund and 401(k). He
would end tax breaks for the coal, gas, and oil industries, and end the rule
that allows U.S. corporations to defer taxes on earnings of overseas
subsidiaries. He would also increase the estate tax and lower the threshold at
which it applies. In addition, he would levy a 12.4 percent payroll tax on all
earnings above $250,000, without a corresponding increase in benefits.
If that’s not enough, he has also pushed for a carbon
tax. Moreover, although he hasn’t formally proposed it yet, he has said that he
would not be opposed to a 90 percent top income-tax rate. And, while most other
Democratic and Republican candidates — and even President Obama — would cut the
corporate tax rate, currently the highest among major industrialized countries,
to make us more competitive, Sanders hopes to raise corporate taxes.
Altogether, he would increase taxes by $3 to $6.5
trillion over ten years.
But all those new taxes wouldn’t come close to paying for
his spending plans. Sanders calls for $1 trillion in new infrastructure
spending, free tuition at public universities for everyone, federally financed
family and sick leave, federal subsidies for private pensions, universal
pre-school, and a special youth jobs program. Where most observers look at
Social Security’s almost $26 trillion in unfunded liabilities and see a
problem, Bernie calls for increased Social Security benefits. He also wants a
single-payer health-care system. The initial price tag for his spending plans
has been put at $18 trillion (though this may be too low, since it could
underestimate rising health-care costs).
That means Sanders would pile an additional $12 trillion
or more onto our national debt over the next ten years. It’s worth recalling
that, even without this additional spending, our debt is scheduled to approach
$27 trillion in a decade. Sanders would take that to something approaching an
astronomical $40 trillion. Perhaps he should run for president of Greece.
In case any businesses have somehow survived his tax
plans, he would finish them off with a host of new regulations. He favors a $15
federal minimum wage. He would require all businesses to offer employees two
weeks of paid vacation and twelve weeks of paid family leave. He would cap the
pay for CEOs and other corporate executives. He backs all manner of new
environmental, health, and safety mandates and regulations. He doesn’t think
Dodd–Frank went far enough in regulating Wall Street. He would impose price
controls on new drugs. He even has “serious problems” with Uber.
It’s not just crowds that Bernie has in common with
Trump. He also embraces the same sort of knee-jerk protectionism. He has
opposed every major trade agreement starting with NAFTA. It took about 30
seconds before he pronounced the Trans-Pacific Partnership “disastrous” and
promised to lead the fight against it. On immigration, he has twisted himself
into something of a pretzel trying to square his belief that immigrants take
jobs from American workers with traditional Democratic support for immigrant
rights. He now says he favors a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants
who are already here, but opposes increased immigration, dismissing it as “a
Koch brothers proposal.”
On foreign policy, Sanders has been consistently opposed
to U.S. military intervention abroad. He not only opposed the Iraq War, he also
voted against the first Gulf War (although he did support the use-of-force
resolution on Afghanistan). Unlike many anti-war activists, he did not change
his stance when Barack Obama entered the White House. He has opposed the Obama
administration’s intervention in Libya and Syria. And he can sound a bit like
Rand Paul in denouncing the Patriot Act and NSA surveillance.
Social issues have never been a priority for Sanders, but
he takes standard pro-choice, pro-gay-rights positions. On gun control, he has
been scrambling to the left, but his position historically has been somewhat
more moderate than, say, Hillary Clinton’s.
Even if Bernie is unlikely to actually become the
Democratic nominee, he has already succeeded in driving the Democratic debate
even further to the left. He is a serious candidate. Unfortunately, his
policies would be a serious disaster for our economy.
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