Ya, I mean, that doesn’t really make sense to me either. I think, if you’re a small business owners, you’d want to give raises or buy equipment as a way to reduce you personal tax liability, but that’s still tricky because you need to be able to actually pay for these things and still have enough profit left over to actually make a living as an owner. I wouldn’t pay 25% on $100K in EBT and then re-invest the profit of $75K into the business in the form of say raises. Rather I’d invest $100K into the business by giving raises (on Jan 1) or bonuses and then pay 25% on $0. Obviously, that’s a simple and likely somewhat flawed example, but I think it illustrates what I mean.
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Macro Economics!
This graph should clear it all up!
@treco: I think I need to toughen up a little. Also, I think that’s a realistically achievable physique.
Laffer curve is what you’re looking for here…
Kind of fundamental if you are a fan of Reaganomics
I’m aware of the Laffer curve, but it’s not exactly free from controvery…
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Seems generally agreed upon its existence, controversy is just with regard to what side of the curve we currently lie on.
If memory serves, it’s a bit more complicated than that, but my understanding of it is limited.
This is interesting:
The Rahn curve, hmmmm…
Can’t see it picking up too much steam, Rahn looks too much like a Bond villain.
Then again my old macro book was written by that crazy commie Krugman so what do I know…
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Never ever, ever, ever going to happen as long as this country exists.
Once you cede control of something like this to the government, it’s permanent. You may be able to shave entitlements here and their, but SS, Medicare/ Medicaid is here to stay. Broke or not, functional or not.
It’s the fastest growing military branch. They cannot put asses in seats fast enough. They do most of the heavy lifting in current combat situations. When we’re flying spaceships instead of planes this may make sense, but we’d just call it NASA. We need the Air Force, now more than ever.
The Air Force is redundant in a lot of ways. We don’t need F-22s, F-35B, F-18s, F-15s, etc, etc… all under different branches.
I would re-allocate necessary jobs & equipment to other areas under the DoD and/or Homeland Security if need be. You could probably save at least half of the Chair Force’s budget without a reduction in capabilities.
That’s like $140 Billion/year
Social Security will go bankrupt. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when.
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Sure and regardless, it will continue, hell or high water. I am not against getting rid of it, but reality is that it’s as stuck as stuck can be.
We need it all. And its the fastest growing branch. Even if you redistribute the Air Force across other branches, the money will still be needed to run all the equipment and people. I figure the F-15’s and the F-18s will get phased out over time. The F-22 still has some bugs, so they need the old reliables until they get the bugs worked out. Plus, we need more than one kind of plane. We had all kinds of different planes during WW2. Some planes are cheaper to run than others and there is plenty of them. And we can always sell them once the newer models come out.
Its the pilot-less planes that are getting all the attention and money right now. The program is in it’s infancy and I only see it growing.
I don’t agree. The military is just as bloated as every other government institution. I’ve seen it first hand. There’s no reason, imo, why we can’t work towards a leaner more efficient military. Warfare has evolved, but our military has not in a lot of ways.
I mean, each F-22 is like $70 billion dollars. I would invest in enough F-22s and F-35s to maintain air superiority and then scrap all other aircraft of a similar class/purpose. F-18s (which are limping to their death anyway) F-15s, F-16s, etc… It’s ridiculous that we still have these things anyway.
I just don’t think we need 3 F-22s for every conceivable enemy plane. Same goes for Carriers. China has 1 we have like a dozen. I think we have as many aircraft as China and Russia combined.
I don’t follow why that matters?
You wouldn’t need as many people to run/maintain the equipment and you certainly wouldn’t need nearly as much infrastructure, management, etc… You could close entire bases.
This is a pretty standard cost reduction measure when consolidating enterprises.
I’m in favor of a strong military. There’s no question that a significant portion of government spending should be on the military. I have no argument there, but we have to start spending money more intelligently.
USAF also does land and air nukes, satellites, cargo planes.
F-35 is supposed to trim a couple of ways and be only F/A, but it’s not only taken a long time to get it operational, it is optimized for A rather than F. No plane can really do it all.
Can’t you make the argument then that the Army, the Marines, and the National Guard are kind of redundant too, then? I mean, they all do similar things.
http://www.militarytimes.com/story/military/2015/10/05/us-russia-vladimir-putin-syria-ukraine-american-military-plans/73147344/
China vs. US
Aircraft
US: 13,444
China: 2,942
Russia: 3,547
That’s 2 vs.1
Yes, I understand. We should ensure we don’t lose any capabilities. Yes, that is a challenge, but doable.
The F-35 has a number of issues to work out for sure.
I think you can argue that some of what the Navy & Marine Corps does is redundant compared to the Air Force…
You want a superior Naval fleet since the world is like 80% covered by water. You need an amphibious assault force, aka, the Marine Corps as your deployable force off ships and for our quick strike capabilities. Finally, I believe the National Guard should serve as a last line of defense against ground invasion (ie non-deployable) so maybe you could make some adjustments there.
Some of what the Corps and the Army do overlap and, ya, I think those redundancies should be addresses as well.
Abolishing an independent Air Force would not only significantly undermine the United States’ air domain dominance capabilities, but would muddle the missions and blunt the capabilities of the other armed services. It isn’t a matter of seemingly redundant rotary and fixed wing aircraft. Rather, it’s a matter of “doctrine, organization, training, materiel, logistics, personnel and facilities required for a given mission”.
In theory it is infallible. both ends of the scale are inarguable. The only argument it is exact shape of the curve. The curve is simply a fact. There is a point after which increasing taxes decreases revues. Therefore there is also a point where reducing taxes increases revenues
Naval aircraft operate to support the Navy’s mission and operate within its doctrine. The same holds true for the Marine Corps. You might as well ask why both the Army and Marine Corps have infantry, armor, and combat helicopters.