This is like when Trump said that foreign countries pay tariffs. Like Byron Donalds in the article you linked, he’s just wrong.

Foreign countries don’t pay tariffs. Domestic producers have always paid the statutory toll, and most of the time the economic incidence too. No textbook has argued argued otherwise, because this is just the standard.

It’s not that Trump is advocating a different policy when he says foreign countries pay tariffs, it’s just that he (like a lot of other MAGA Republicans) so grossly misunderstand economics and their own party positions, that they end up advocating for a different thing. In this case, Byron Donalds is even going as far to advocate the pejorative version of his own side.

Now if you’re saying that trickle-down has become so widespread that even supply-side supporters have become fooled into thinking that it’s their side, I’d happily grant you that. But what I mean when I say that trickle-down has never been “seriously” advocated is that it’s never been in textbooks. There are no policy appropriations made by legislators to support the goals of trickle-down economics.

Similar to how Republicans nowadays accuse Democrats of trying to bring in illegal immigrants to bolster their voter base (a pervasive lie), to try and “debunk” such a policy would be intellectually dishonest, since the Democrats have never advocated such a thing.

Now (1) and (2) as you mentioned, are broadly associated with the economic right in America. The usual narrative is that Republicans want to do (1) and (2) to concentrate more wealth among the rich, their reason for doing this being the trickle-down economics creed. There's two main problems with this narrative I see.

The first, is that (1) and (2) aren't strictly right or left. They can be bipartisan. The left--broadly associated with increased taxes on the rich, labor rights, and a bigger welfare state--despite its reputation, often engages with parts of (1) and (2). This is because (1) and (2) aren't strictly set. You can have parts of (1), or parts of (2), or mix-and-match, but presenting them as definitively joined is unfair.

Take the Inflation Reduction act from the Biden era, passed during a blue Congress. It invested heavily in renewable technologies--typically a left-wing endeavor--but wouldn't things like EV tax credits technically be considered corporate freebies, i.e. a bit of (1)? Or Trump's Working Families Tax Cut (the BBB), which although cut taxes for the rich, did genuinely expand the child tax credit and double the standard deduction--the opposite of (2). The point being that there's nuance in how you execute these policies.

The second problem I see with this narrative, is that policy goals are not the same thing as policy results. If legislation endeavors to solve a problem, but fails, it would be unfair to say that the legislation's purpose was to fail. While one could make the claim that (1) and (2) promote an upward redistributive, I don't think you can make the case that either the left or the right specifically aim for that.

This comes back to my central problem in this thread: trickle-down economics isn't a real policy. If you take purported aim of this caricature policy--taking money from the poor and indiscriminately giving it to the rich--nobody is seriously advocating for that. While you might think that that is what's broadly happening within the economy today, it's unfair to blame amalgamations of (1) and (2) policy and say that advocates of supply-side economics _want_ further inequality.

But my problem is that "take from the poor and indiscriminately give to the rich" is a mischaracterization of supply-side economics.

I figured the syntax was like an either-or thing, but I wasn't sure.

> Saying that trickle down economics is 'an entirely pejorative term created by detractors of supply-side economics' is very much saying that they refer to the same thing...

I don't think it is. What I'm _not_ trying to say is that trickle-down economics is a nickname for supply-side economics. More, trickle-down economics is a strawman. Not the same thing or a different name, but an inaccurate version--a caricature which doesn't even resemble policy. Also I'm not sure what "TFA" stands for.

> This is the most inept attempt at an analogy that I can recall seeing.

It was kind of rough.

Regardless of the incompetence of my arguments though, I promise I am not being intentionally dense. I really do try to act in good faith here on HN, and I'd appreciate it if I could hear more of your perspective and continue this civilly.

In other conversation though, am I curious to know where you got your data. As far as I'm aware the Scandinavian countries do in fact have a robust system of corporate tax incentives. This is part of the reason they boast such high productivity.

I very well might be wrong here though, and the topic is interesting. Would you care to share a source?

"""

I think supply-side economics deserves more nuance than simply thinking we need to make the tax rate arbitrarily low. The Laffer curve isn't the only thing you should look at, since where you tax can be just as important as how much you tax.

Take corporate taxes for example. If one were to advocate to get rid of corporate taxes, you might think that person unabashedly biased. What kind of person would want to give breaks to the richest people (corporations) when everyday people are the most in need of those kind of cuts, right?

But the reality is that when you tax corporations, that is one of the most economically damaging taxes you can do. How about then, rather than taxing corporations, you tax the benefactors of those corporations directly? When you tax Walmart, sure you tax the C-suite, but you also make it so that Walmart can hire less people, and invest less in the economy. Rather than taxing the corporation, what if you just taxed the C-suite directly? Tax the Walton family, or the highest earning employees directly, and you get to have your cake and it too since you get similar amounts of tax revenue without damaging the economy nearly as much.

You'll see this often in the social democracies of Scandinavia, like Sweden or Denmark. These are countries with strong welfare states, and yet, the corporate tax rates are often lower than the U.S., even if you look at the most red states. This is supply side economics at work, and an example of how supply-side economics can be easily misrepresented.

"""

But I hope my pleading is evidence enough anyways. However much this means: I really am being sincere.

How do you compare a criticism, with a policy? Trickle-down economics doesn't have any legislative appropriations. It's not taught in economics classes. Like saying "what's the difference between a boat and a car?" I can tell you that a boat is not a car, but I can't compare the wheels of a car with a boat, nor the keel of a boat with a car. They are different things is all I'm trying to say.

Now as for why I didn't expand with nuance earlier, in my defense I was expanding, but elsewhere in the thread. I foolishly thought this was enough.

You've said you won't respond further, but seeing your passion, I think it would be great if we could have a civil conversation. I genuinely believe that trickle-down and supply-side economics are meaningfully different things, and I think there would be much to gain from hearing your perspective in more detail.

My thesis boils down to the fact that supply-side economics (say for example, something like small business tax credits) often gets conflated with trickle-down economics undeservedly. Trickle-down policy--take money from the poor and give it to the rich indiscriminately--is an objectively horrible idea, but I would say also that nobody is seriously arguing for that sort of thing.

(Also, I'm have no idea what "GP" stands for.)

"""

I think supply-side economics deserves more nuance than simply thinking we need to make the tax rate arbitrarily low. The Laffer curve isn't the only thing you should look at, since where you tax can be just as important as how much you tax.

Take corporate taxes for example. If one were to advocate to get rid of corporate taxes, you might think that person unabashedly biased. What kind of person would want to give tax breaks to the richest people (corporations) when everyday people are the most in need of those kind of cuts, right?

But the reality is that when you tax corporations, that is one of the most economically damaging taxes you can do. How about then, rather than taxing corporations, you tax the benefactors of those corporations directly? When you tax Walmart, sure you tax the C-suite, but you also make it so that Walmart can hire less people, and invest less in the economy. Rather than taxing the corporation, what if you just taxed the C-suite directly? Tax the Walton family, or the highest earning employees directly, and you get to have your cake and it too since you get similar amounts of tax revenue without damaging the economy nearly as much.

You'll see this often in the social democracies of Scandinavia, like Sweden or Denmark. These are countries with strong welfare states, and yet, the corporate tax rates are often lower than the U.S., even if you look at the most red states. This is supply side economics at work, and an example of how supply-side economics can be easily misrepresented.

"""

Take corporate taxes for example. If one were to advocate to get rid of corporate taxes, you might think that person unabashedly biased. What kind of person would want to give breaks to the richest people (corporations) when everyday people are the most in need of those kind of cuts, right?

But the reality is that when you tax corporations, that is one of the most economically damaging taxes you can do. How about then, rather than taxing corporations, you tax the benefactors of those corporations directly? When you tax Walmart, sure you tax the C-suite, but you also make it so that Walmart can hire less people, and invest less in the economy. Rather than taxing the corporation, what if you just taxed the C-suite directly? Tax the Walton family, or the highest earning employees directly, and you get to have your cake and it too since you get similar amounts of tax revenue without damaging the economy nearly as much.

You'll see this often in the social democracies of Scandinavia, like Sweden or Denmark. These are countries with strong welfare states, and yet, the corporate tax rates are often lower than the U.S., even if you look at the most red states. This is supply side economics at work, and an example of how supply-side economics can be easily misrepresented.

I can name you differences, but it's like comparing apples and oranges.

One is a policy and the other is basically the name of a common criticism for that policy.

For example, the Cartesian circle does not refer to any of the many mathematical advancements Rene Descartes discovered. Instead, it's the name of a common criticism for an argument he made. You can think of it like that.

    "the term 'trickle-down economics' was popularized by Democrats in the US to derogate Reaganomics"

    "not to be confused with trickle-down economics"

As for whether supply-side economics actually works, to say it "hasn't panned out" I think, is really oversimplifying. Has capitalism (efficient markets but also environmental decay) worked? Has socialism (universal healthcare but also the military) worked? It depends on who your asking and in what regard. In some ways yes and in other ways no. The category is too broad.

Also, just as important as how much we tax is where we tax. Carbon tax (very good) vs stamp duty tax (very bad). Competent policy often allows you to have your cake (supporting government services) and eat it too (not sacrificing growth).

The policies of supply-side economics, however, are much more defensible, but it seems people would much rather pick on the strawman.

David Hume

I like this quote because it's so blunt. Hume isn't saying we should give in to hedonistic excess, but he isn't shirking the impression either because it deserves to be said strongly.

One (slightly frightening) possibility is that many people write like LLMs even without assistance from LLMs. AI writing may have just become the norm for some. Maybe that's what's happening here.

For what it's worth though--taste, aesthetic, intuition--they really boil down to one thing: feeling. Something you can't reason. Almost emotional.