Walker pushes Tax Cut = Higher Revenues Myth, the reason for Budget Shortfall.

Here's what I consider the most logical and factually accurate coverage of the tax cut myth:

Tax Increase in Green and Balance

Correlating Tax Increases and Decreases with Revenue: By conveniently pointing to places where tax cuts were enacted at or around the time of a recovery or boom, tax cut advocates argue that tax cuts increase revenue. The problem with this is that the revenue increases following the Bush and Reagan tax cuts are dwarfed by the revenue increase following Bill Clinton’s tax increase on the wealthiest Americans.  

In fact, as a percentage of GDP, post-Reagan & Bush tax cut revenue falls below the 1965-2005 average. In other words, revenue increased because the economy was recovering/growing, and the tax cuts have little (probably nothing) to do with growth in GDP ... if anything, these tax cuts actually lowered revenue increased from what they would have been otherwise.  So the real question to ask is this: how much revenue did these tax cuts cost us?  See Historical Tax Rates.

Here's one of my favorite graphs, highlighting what my wife has been telling me for years about her own business. It's funny no one ever mentions it:

These lack of correlation between lower taxes and increased economic growth flies in the face of the assumptions of many. But upon a closer look, it’s easy to understand why higher taxes can actually encourage more investment in the economy.

Tax revenues happen for a number of reasons, reasons a graph in the Wall Street Journal purposefully avoided. I didn't picture it here for space and because I have better graphs that take into consideration many other factors, like these:

Reagan Tax Cuts: The Facts: Many Reagan apologists claim that these tax cuts created the robust economy that followed. However this ignores ignores the effects of the Federal Reserve’s lowering of interest rates. Reagan also increased military spending and ran up the federal deficit (the combined effect of tax cuts and increased spending). In other words, Reagan did exactly what Republican pundits who praise him are currently criticizing Obama for. Reagan advocates claim his tax cuts bolstered the economy while ignoring the lowered interest rates and increased deficit spending (kind of like an ongoing stimulus package).

Walker predictions wrong, get him reelected, but never materialize thanks to Supply Side Economics.

Remember this golden oldies from the last state of the state?

The governor touted a memo from the Legislative Fiscal Bureau issued a few days before last year's speech that said the state would have $911 million more than expected as an ending balance by June 2015, creating a total surplus of just more than $1 billion.

That didn't happen. Thanks to WISC's Jessica Arp, we have this Fact Check update:

Because of the tax cuts and many other factors, by the time the Legislature adjourned in March, the surplus was down to just $165 million. Then, in November, a memo issued by the administration said it is now $132 million in the red. 

Here's Arp's report:

And without the governors leadership and focus, educational maneuvers are not working out like we were told. In fact, we're spending money without getting a return on the investment:

News 3 found $28 million awarded to all 16 tech colleges in July to open nearly 5,000 new spots. So far, 1,526 students are enrolled statewide in those spots, and 252 of them have completed training.

Don't hold your breath waiting for adjustments. But the governors favorite forward thinking occupation, welding (?), is taking off:

Madison College officials said so far, they've added spots for 425 students and have eliminated one waiting list in welding.

Walker is barely paying attention to anything now, letting things slide...:

On the high school training programs, News 3 found a grant application wasn't posted until last month, so that $3 million has not been spent.

Republican Governors Tax Cuts Flop, don't create jobs.

Scott Walker is dead last in the Midwest for job growth, and that’s after tax cuts and draconian cuts to spending.

Like Walker, Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback made even bigger cuts, and now it’s all falling apart:

WaPo: Gov. Sam Brownback … tout the success of his economic program, particularly several rounds of income tax cuts amounting to the largest in the state's history … job growth hasn't exactly materialized … job growth in Kansas has actually lagged behind the U.S. average, especially in the years following the first round of Brownback tax cuts in 2012.

Niraj Chokshi reported on a Center and Budget Policy Priorities study of Kansas' cuts. In an unusually frank assessment from the nonpartisan think tank, the study's authors concluded that "Kansas is a cautionary tale, not a model. As other states recover from the recent recession and turn toward the future, Kansas’ huge tax cuts have left that state’s schools and other public services stuck in the recession, and declining further — a serious threat to the state’s long-term economic vitality. 

Meanwhile, promises of immediate economic improvement have utterly failed to materialize." Every month brings fresh economic news that further validates these findings

Here's Scott Walker's private sector jobs chart, see any similarities? Republican supply side economics is a failure, and needs to be stopped:

After posting this story, I noticed Uppity Wisconsin also covered this incredible similarity, and wondered why the media isn't going after Scott Walker like they are with Sam Brownback. A good question.

Supply Side Jesus, from the vault.

Al Franken put this together before he became a senator, and I thought it kinda fit with the supply side standstill instituted by our Republican Congress.