Do Higher Income Tax Rates Produce Lower Unemployment? History Says They Do!

April 18, 2012

By: D. DiFrancesco

Out of my own curiosity, I decided to look at the relationship between the top income tax rates by year and the annual unemployment rate.  My conclusions are based on the years 1950 through 2011.  I would also like to state that I am neither an accountant nor an economist so the statements I am making are my personal opinion based on what I see in the numbers.

The figures used for my conclusions were derived from two sources, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Tax Policy Center.

In the process of doing this analysis I learned some things which I found pretty fascinating...

• The top tax rate during the 61  years being reviewed  occurred in 1953 with a rate of 92% and ironically, the annual unemployment rate was the lowest of any of the years sampled at 2.93%.

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Rep. Allen West's Ignorant Comments Show Why the Republican Party Is Not The Party of the American People

With all of the negative and horribly unhelpful comments made by representatives of both the Republican and Democratic party's this election season, Rep. Allen West's (R-FL) has to be some of the most inflammatory I have heard.

We have had Republican talking head, Rush Limbaugh's insulting remarks to Sandra Fluke, calling her a slut and a prostitute after her testimony before House Democrats.  And just yesterday, Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen's comment about Ann Romney, who as a stay at home mom, "never worked a day in her life." inciting a Republican backlash and causing everyone from the White House to RNC chairman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to apologize and distance themselves from her comments.

Rep. Allen West (R-FL)

As if these were not enough, now we have Rep. Allen West, who when asked by a constituent at a town hall meeting in Jensen Beach, FL, how many members of Congress are "card-carrying Marxists?"  stated, "I believe there's about 78 to 81 members of the Democratic Party that are members of the Communist Party."  Has the entire Republican Party gone off the deep-end?

West's campaign manager, Tim Edison, in what appears to be an attempt to soften the inflammatory rhetoric spewed by the Representative, says the members in question belong to the Congressional Progressive Caucus.  What does that mean as if it is any less disrespectful.

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Obama Confronts Republicans for Covertly Promoting Social Darwinism on the Backs of the Poor

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis)

During a speech today at an Associated Press luncheon, President Barack Obama finally called the House budget plan supported by Mitt Romney and a vast majority of Republicans exactly what it is, “social darwinism”.

This budget, proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis) and passed by the house on a primarily partisan 228 -191 vote will be disastrous for the middle class, the poor, and the elderly and the Republicans don’t seem to care in the least.

This budget will lower the tax rates by eliminating the six tax brackets in favor of two, one at 10% and the upper level at 25% down from 35% for the wealthiest Americans.  In addition, this budget aims to slow the growth of the federal deficit at the expense of social programs that help the poor and elderly.

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