Economix Blog: The Golden Age of Republican Deficit Hawks

I’ve written a few pieces in the last several days about the history of deficit reduction packages, and how Republicans used to be on board for tax increases. I suggested that at the very least, Republicans were more willing to compromise on using tax increases to cut deficits, even if they preferred to balance the budget wholly through the spending side.

Several readers wrote in, asking whether Republicans were ever really pro-tax, or if they merely put up with higher taxes in the name of fiscal discipline.

The answer is that once upon a time, Republicans did indeed advocate leaving taxes alone, opposing tax cuts.

In the 1950s and 1960s, federal deficits were relatively small compared to the size of the economy, but even during those flush years, Republican leadership was reluctant to advocate tax cuts. In 1953, for example, Dwight Eisenhower said the country “cannot afford to reduce taxes, reduce income, until we have in sight a program of expenditures that shows that the factors of income and of outgo will be balanced.”

And when his successor, John F. Kennedy, proposed sharp tax cuts in 1963, the more conservative Republicans in Congress initially opposed them because the cuts would expand the deficit.

The legislation eventually passed (after Kennedy’s assassination), but over the objections of about a third of the Republicans voting. Here’s the House vote, and here’s the Senate vote.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=3fdd1e790c04be04c4fbc5bfb6bcce90