The Wonk Room

Holtz-Eakin Unsure If ‘Main Street’ Is Hurting, But Certainly ‘Wall Street’ Is ‘In A World Of Hurt’»

Last month, Senator John McCain’s (R-AZ) economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin attempted to promote McCain’s economic plan by explaining that “the Wall Street guys are in a world of hurt,” while “the Main Street guys are hanging in there.”

Today, Holtz-Eakin tried have it both ways. He first justified McCain’s plan to extend the Bush tax cuts by saying that Main Street is “hurting very much.” Minutes later, though, he suggested that on Wall Street “there’s a world of hurt,” while Main Street “has been hanging in there remarkably well.” Watch it:

Holtz-Eakin is wrong about Main Street hanging in there “remarkably well.” He is also citing Main Street’s economic pain as a reason to extend tax cuts that overwhelmingly help the wealthy. In addition to making Bush’s tax cuts permanent, McCain has proposed $300 billion in budget-busting tax cuts for corporations and the ultra-rich.

To ease some of Wall Street’s suffering, McCain has proposed a $175 billion tax cut for corporations. This would give America’s 200 largest corporations $45 billion in tax breaks and send America’s five largest oil companies $4 billion every year.

Just like under George Bush, with McCain’s economic plan Wall Street wins, while American families lose.

Holtz-Eakin on McCain’s Draconian Budget Cuts: ‘The Horrified Folks Better Get Ready’»

At an event at the Tax Policy Center last Wednesday, McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin defended the draconian cuts to spending required to balance McCain’s budget and pay for his tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy by saying:

The reception among the Washington establishment has been one part disbelief — because, oh my god, no one actually does that in Washington (that’s not true they’ve just forgotten) — and one part horror that he might succeed. Well, the horrified folks better get ready.

Listen here:

The “Washington establishment” aren’t the only folks who are horrified by what would need to be a 40% cut in non-defense domestic spending. Here are some others:

–340,000 kids who’d lose Head Start funding

–2.1 million grade-school students who’d be effectively cut from Title 1 school funding

–1.6 million aspiring college students who’d lose access to Pell Grants

–3.4 million families who would lose WIC assistance for low-income women, infants, and children

Better get ready.

Holtz-Eakin On $2.8 Trillion Gap: Just Because McCain ‘Said Things In Town Halls…Doesn’t Mean It’s Official’»

McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin responded yesterday to a recent report by the Tax Policy Center, which found a $2.8 trillion gap between McCain’s public economic proposals and what his advisers had been telling tax experts in private.

Slate reports:

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain’s chief economic adviser, says the numbers he provided to the TPC aren’t secret—they’re the same ones he provides to anyone who asks. He also disputes the way the study takes suggestions McCain has made on the stump out of context. “This is parsing words out of campaign appearances to an unreasonable degree,” Holtz-Eakin said. “He has certainly I’m sure said things in town halls” that don’t jibe perfectly with his written plan. But that doesn’t mean it’s official.

Two problems: the numbers Holtz-Eakin gave to the Tax Policy Center in their initial analysis weren’t available to “anyone who asks,” and pointing out the gaping distinctions between what McCain says on the stump and what his advisers say in private, is far from parsing.

For months, the McCain campaign had not offered specific numbers on his profligate budget proposals. In June, Robert Bixby of the Concord Coalition, a prominent advocacy group for balanced budgets, told Bloomberg news: “I haven’t received anything, and if some of the other groups have then I’ll be really ticked off…If he’s got some more complete budget proposal he can send I’d love to get it.”

Detailed figures did finally appear publicly in the first Tax Policy Center report and later in the Washington Post, but are still not available on the campaign’s web site. And no wonder: there are still serious inconsistencies between what his advisers provide to the wonks at the Tax Policy Center (and the editorial board of the Washington Post) and what appears on McCain’s web site and in his stump speeches.

As Douglas Holtz-Eakin himself has said, only “Senator McCain speaks for Senator McCain.” Silly us, we believed him.

Two examples of McCain’s inconsistencies after the jump. More »

Holtz-Eakin: ‘No Taxes Anywhere For The Wealthy’»

Yesterday, during an event at the Tax Policy Center, Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) senior economic adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin repeated the false claim that McCain’s economic proposal has “no tax cuts anywhere for the wealthy”:

And what Sen. McCain has tried to do is to keep the kinds of taxes that would effect small business where they are…Top rate right now is 35 percent. Under John McCain, 35 percent. Dividends 15 percent, John McCain 15 percent. Capitol gains 15 percent, John McCain 15 percent. No tax cuts anywhere for the wealthy. Instead a tax policy that maintains the ability of small business…to do what they’re doing right now…

Listen:

But the Wonk Room, the Tax Policy Center, and even the National Review argue that McCain’s plan is, in fact, tilted towards the wealthy. The latest Tax Policy analysis concludes:

Senator McCain’s tax cuts would primarily benefit those with very high incomes, almost all of whom would receive large tax cuts that would, on average, raise their after-tax incomes by more than twice the average for all households. Many fewer households at the bottom of the income distribution would get tax cuts and those tax cuts would be small as a share of after-tax income.

Indeed, the report goes on to claim that “McCain’s proposal would make the tax system even more regressive than the system created by the 2001–06 cuts”:

- Households in the top 1 percent of the income distribution would receive average increases in after-tax income of more than 8 percent, in addition to their large benefits under the tax legislation already enacted this decade.

- Households in the middle of the income distribution would receive an additional 1.4 percent increase in after-tax income, on average.

- Those at the bottom would receive tax cuts averaging just 0.6 percent of income.

Thus, if Holtz-Eakin can’t find the tax cuts for the wealthy “anywhere,” he’s not looking hard enough.

New McCain Ad On Gas Prices Contradicts McCain»

Our guest blogger is Adam Jentleson, the Communications and Outreach Director for the Hyde Park Project at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

McCain has a new ad up that claims offshore drilling will lower the price of gas. Referring to McCain, it says, “One man knows we must now drill more in America and rescue our family budgets.”

In response to the ad, Progressive Accountability highlights the 28 lobbyists (plus one) to whom McCain has outsourced his energy policy.

Watch it:

McCain himself has said that offshore drilling would not provide “immediate relief,” and that the benefits to American families struggling to pay for gas would be “psychological“:

I don’t see an immediate relief, but I do see that exploitation of existing reserves that may exist — and in view of many experts that do exist off our coasts — is also a way that we need to provide relief. Even though it may take some years, the fact that we are exploiting those reserves would have a psychological impact that I think is beneficial.

McCain’s chief policy advisor, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, has also said that offshore drilling would have “no immediate effect” on gas prices.

And the government’s official source for energy statistics, the Energy Information Administration, says that new offshore drilling will not have a significant impact on gas prices — not even in twenty years.

So what is the basis for McCain’s claim that offshore drilling will lower gas prices? Short of some new information substantiating that claim, this new ad is tremendously misleading. The only “family budgets” helped by McCain’s plan are those of the superwealthy Big Oil CEOs whose lobbyists are running his campaign.

McCain Advisor Holtz-Eakin: ‘The Main Street Guys Are Hanging In There’»

It seems McCain’s economic concerns extend only as far as Wall Street. Today in the Politico, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain’s senior policy adviser, admitted that “in McCain’s world…the Main Street guys are hanging in there“:

In McCain’s world, Holtz-Eakin said it seems ‘the Main Street guys are hanging in there. The Wall Street guys are in a world of hurt…The concern is how to keep the travails in the financial sector from spilling over and hurting Main Street,’ he concluded.

This is what the McCain campaign must consider “hanging in there.” Since 2000:

–The average family income is down $962, after inflation

–The cost of an average family health plan is up almost $6,000, from $6,300 to $12,100 a year

–Higher gas prices cost families $1000 more a year. The price of a gallon of gas has gone from $1.50 to an all-time high of $4.10.

The American economy has lost 438,000 jobs so far this year alone. Today, there are 1.6 million people who have been unemployed for six months or longer.

Maybe his concern for “the Wall Street Guys” explains McCain’s $175 billion tax cut for corporations in which 59% of the benefits flow to the richest 1% of Americans and $44 billion goes directly to the Fortune 200. After all, they’re in “a world of hurt.”

Holtz-Eakin: Tax Cuts For The Rich Are ‘Not Anywhere’ In McCain’s Plan»

Yesterday, on CNN Late Edition, McCain Senior Economic Adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin claimed that John McCain’s tax plan didn’t include tax cuts for the rich:

BLITZER: But is this true, the suggestion that [Barack Obama] saying you want to give a huge tax break to those Americans making $2.8 million a year and more, that’s true, right?

HOLTZ-EAKIN: No…Mr. Obama is talking about tax cuts for the wealthy. They’re not anywhere. What John McCain would do is reduce the corporate tax rates that’s sending jobs that have pension benefits, health benefits and important security for Americans, he’s cutting rates.

Watch it:

Holtz-Eakin is being wildly misleading. A recent analysis from the non-partisan Tax Policy Center found that McCain’s plan, which includes a dramatic AMT revision, a corporate tax cut, and a doubling of the dependent exemption, “would primarily benefit those with very high incomes, almost all of whom would receive large tax cuts that would, on average, raise their after-tax incomes by more than twice the average for all households.” In other words, it’s a huge tax cut for the rich:

Another beneficiary of McCain’s plan: the McCains themselves. A recent paper by the Center for American Progress Action Fund found that John and Cindy McCain would save $373,429 under McCain’s tax plan.

Senator Obama, on the other hand, “offers much larger tax breaks to low- and middle-income taxpayers and would increase taxes on high-income taxpayers.”

As for the supposed benefits McCain’s rate cut for corporations would have, the Tax Policy Center found that the “larger future deficits [the cut would create] would reduce and could completely offset any positive effect.”

McCain’s reckless tax cuts for corporations and the wealthiest Americans, which he has still not explained how he would pay for, would create the largest deficits in 25 years and the largest debt since World War Two.

As Holtz-Eakin himself said, “you have to pay for that somehow or you’re George Bush III.“

Can McCain Find A Single Economist To Back His Claim That Offshore Drilling Will Lower Gas Prices?»

Our guest blogger is Adam Jentleson, the Communications and Outreach Director for the Hyde Park Project at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

The government’s official source for energy statistics says that offshore drilling will not have a “significant impact” on gas prices until 2030.

McCain’s own campaign admits that offshore drilling will have no short term effect on gas prices:

“Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a senior advisor to McCain’s campaign, acknowledged in a conference call to reporters that new offshore drilling would have no immediate effect on supplies or prices.”

Yet McCain insists on touting offshore drilling as the best way to “assure affordable fuel for America,” as he said in his speech on Tuesday.

This begs the question: can John McCain find a single economist who backs his claim that offshore drilling will lower gas prices in the short term – or even before 2030?

If not, what is the basis for his claim that offshore drilling will lower gas prices?

This is not the first time McCain has had trouble finding economists who would endorse his proposals for lowering gas prices – in fact, just a few weeks ago, McCain failed to find a single economist who would endorse his claim that a temporary suspension of the gas tax would provide significant relief for American families.

The policy was so thoroughly discredited that the only argument McCain and his team could muster was to simply bash economists as a group.

At a campaign stop in New Hampshire, a frustrated McCain told the audience, “If you want to call it [his gas tax proposal] a gimmick, fine. You know the economists? They’re the same ones that didn’t predict this housing crisis we’re in.”

On “This Week” with George Stephanopoulos, Senior Advisor Carly Fiorina, “scoffed at the lack of support from economic analysts. ‘I don’t think it matters,’ she said.”

Even Senior Advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin – a Ph.D. economist himself – got in on the act, saying, “You can stack all the economists end to end and still not find common sense.”

Is this déjà vu all over again? Can McCain find a single economist to back his claim that offshore drilling will lower gas prices, or will his campaign be left with no recourse but to roll out poor Douglas Holtz-Eakin to trash his own profession, yet again?

UPDATE: The Huffington Post takes up the challenge and reports, “the consensus seemed to be that if the presumptive GOP nominee was persuading voters that he could help decrease their gas bill, he was either living in a political fantasy or being disingenuous.”

McCain Adviser Holtz-Eakin Ludicrously Asserts Obama Would Be A Third Bush Term»

Our guest bloggers are Center for American Progress Action Fund fellows James Kvaal and Robert Gordon.

Apparently the McCain campaign is feeling the sting of comparisons to George Bush. McCain describes himself as the strongest support of the war in Iraq. His answer to $4.00 gasoline is to cut oil company taxes by $4 billion a year. And McCain has embraced a Bush proposal to radically change our health care system. (These and other similarities are described in a memorandum released today by the Center for American Progress Action Fund.)

Swimming upstream, McCain policy advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin now argues that it is Senator Obama – not McCain – who wants to continue Bush’s fiscal policies. Obama’s budget “is dedicated to the recent Bush tradition of spending money on everything,” he said.

This is exactly backwards. Consider:

– Like Bush, McCain has proposed massive tax cuts that primarily benefit high-income households. McCain’s $300 billion a year in tax cuts – over and above the cost of extending the Bush tax cuts when they expire in 2010 – would essentially double the size of the Bush tax cuts and make them even more regressive.

– Like Bush, McCain’s massive tax cuts and spending on security leaves little for other priorities. Over the past eight years, other types of discretionary spending have remained essentially unchanged after inflation and population growth. McCain would continue the pattern of putting huge tax cuts and defense spending ahead of other needs, like preschool and renewable energy.

– Like Bush, McCain rails against wasteful spending in the abstract but fails to target any actual programs. His promises to eliminate earmarks and freeze spending could save $30 billion a year or even less. That leaves him short the quite noticeable sum of $270 billion a year. (Holtz-Eakin told Bloomberg that McCain has a secret plan to balance the budget, but he hasn’t shared it with the Concord Coalition — or those of us at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, for that matter.)

– Like Bush, McCain is likely to drive up the national debt by trillions of dollars. Bush took a debt of $3.4 trillion – and headed down – up to $5.4 trillion. McCain’s budget plan would drive the deficit to $12.7 trillion.

Obama also has expensive proposals, such as his health care coverage plan and middle-class tax cuts. But he is clear where the money is coming from: higher taxes on high-income families, ending the war in Iraq, selling the right to emit greenhouse gases, and cutting subsidies to oil and gas companies, health insurers, drug companies, and the student loan industry.

That’s why the Wall Street Journal concluded that Barack Obama’s budget “adds up, probably.” But McCain’s plan, it concluded, “would either cause the federal deficit to explode or would require unprecedented spending cuts.”

Digg It!

McCain And The (Ir)relevant Concord Coalition»

Among other odd comments in his National Review article, Douglas Holtz-Eakin on Wednesday declared that the Concord Coalition, whose director had criticized McCain’s agenda, had “largely lost relevancy.”

Funny that Holtz-Eakin should pick out the Concord Coalition, a national bipartisan organization dedicated to fiscal responsibility. The co-founder and chairman of the Concord Coalition is Pete Peterson, an old friend of Senator McCain, an early supporter of his 2008 run and a member of the McCain campaign economic strategy team. When asked this January, during a GOP presidential debate, how he would make economic policy, McCain responded:

I as president, as every other president, [would] rely primarily on my secretary of the Treasury, on my Council of Economic Advisers, on the head of that. I would rely on the circle that I have developed over many years of people like… Pete Peterson and the Concord group.

Just four years ago, Peterson bestowed upon John McCain the Coalition’s annual Economic Patriot Award at an event sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations. Peterson explained why he had set up the “Concord Coalition devoted to long-term fiscal responsibility and generational equity.” McCain in turn thanked Peterson for his “continued crusade for fiscal sanity and stability on behalf of our children and grandchildren.”

So has the Concord Coalition become largely irrelevant? Or have its principles and goals become largely irrelevant to Senator McCain’s newfound agenda of deficit-financed tax cuts and unbalanced budgets?

The McCain Deficit: Douglas Holtz-Eakin Continues To Debate With Himself»

Our guest blogger is James Kvaal, Domestic Policy Advisor at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

The story so far: Senator John McCain has proposed $300 billion a year in tax cuts, but – as The Economist wrote – “the savings in government spending he promises will not come anywhere close to paying for the tax cuts.”

Yesterday, McCain economic advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin defended his McCain budgeting over at the National Review, arguing that McCain’s proposals will restrain spending and promote economic growth.

But, as Ruth Marcus pointed out, two years ago Holtz-Eakin sounded very different. He said then that, realistically, “government will not be getting any smaller” due to widespread public support for government’s activities. Even a “tremendous effort” by Congress to eliminate wasteful spending totaled less than 0.07 percent of the economy. (McCain’s $300 billion tax cut equals approximately 2 percent of the economy.)

Maybe that is why Holtz-Eakin’s new argument focuses on McCain’s cuts to entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. But McCain has already proposed cutting Social Security and Medicare benefits to restore those programs’ solvency. Does he really want even more cuts — hundreds of billions of dollars more — to pay for his tax cuts, as Angry Bear wonders?

It seems more likely that Holtz-Eakin is changing the subject, preferring to discuss the long-run entitlement problem rather than the short-run deficit problem. But adding hundreds of billions, even trillions, to the debt now will only make our long-run problems worse.

Douglas Holtz-Eakin Vs. Douglas Holtz-Eakin On Corporate Expensing»

Our guest bloggers are Robert Gordon and James Kvaal, fellows at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

John McCain has proposed to let corporations immediately deduct (or “expense”) the full cost of equipment and technology purchases, rather than deducting the costs over time. We analyzed this proposal several weeks ago and concluded that it would cost $745 billion over the next 10 years.

The McCain campaign and its top economic advisor, Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, are now saying that this central provision of his corporate tax cut will cost taxpayers nothing. But the Congressional Budget Office, when led by Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, reached the opposite conclusion.

The McCain campaign is claiming this measure is free because Treasury will lose money at first, then recoup it over time.

On its face, this doesn’t make a lot of sense. We all know $100 today is worth more than $10 a year for 10 years. And McCain is saying his plan will increase investment — how could that be if his plan has no cost to the Treasury?

In the past, Holtz-Eakin has recognized that expensing costs money. He signed a cost estimate for making permanent a provision of the 2002 stimulus package that allowed companies to expense 50% of their costs. The estimate is the last line on page 92 here, reproduced below:

This estimate shows that allowing companies to expense 50 percent of new investments would cost $440 billion over 10 years. And the costs are still very high, nearly $30 billion, 10 years after the provision is made permanent. McCain’s proposal for 100 percent expensing would be even more expensive.

If Holtz-Eakin was right then, how can he be right now?

Earmark Accounting Leaves Two Thirds Of McCain Tax Proposal Unfunded»

Our guest blogger is Scott Lilly, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Alright, so maybe a candidate for President of the United States doesn’t need to know the first thing about the Federal Budget. That’s a job for staff—right? But what if a candidate for President doesn’t know anything about the budget and can’t hire someone who does?

That appears to be the situation that John McCain is in, based on the background provided today by his “Director of Economic Policy” Douglas Holtz-Eakin told reporters recently:

We have $60 billion in discretionary spending that was sourced to earmarks.

Holtz-Eakin says that money could be used to fix the repeal the alternative minimum tax. The problem is that virtually no one can find even a third that much money in the annual spending bills in earmarks.

The most credible effort at earmark accounting in recent years was completed recently by the Taxpayers for Common Sense. They did an exhaustive review of the 2008 spending bills and reported $18.3 billion in earmarks. The White House Office of Management and Budget scrubbed the twelve 2008 appropriation bills and came up with only $16.9 billion. Where does McCain’s other $41.7 billion come from?

There is virtually no explanation. Did Congress spend money in other areas that McCain is counting but neither Taxpayers for Common Sense for the White House counts? That seems to be a hard argument to make. For 2008, the President’s request totals $932.8 billion (not counting the pending supplemental.) The Congressional Budget Office scores the action taken by the Congress on the 2008 appropriation bills at $932.8 billion—exactly the amount requested.

There were some areas that Congress spent more than the President requested and other areas where Congress spent less than the request. But McCain would find it difficult in most instances to object to the judgments made by Congress, for instance the $3.8 billion to improve the quality of health care for returning veterans which was included in the final Military Construction—Veterans bill but not contained in the President’s request.

It is even difficult to imagine that McCain would want to get rid of all of the earmarks. $1.2 billion of which was for better housing and facilities for servicemen and their families at military installations around the world.

The disturbing point here, however, is that even by the loose rules of budget discipline used in Washington in recent years this accounting is completely off the wall. Revenue cuts that are offset by phony spending reductions simply add to the deficit and the nation’s long term debt burden. Senator McCain needs to detail his figures in a manner similar to the materials provided by OMB and Taxpayers for Common Sense.

McCain Still Flip-Flopping On Whether To Rescue Homeowners»

Our guest blogger is James Kvaal, Domestic Policy Advisor at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

It’s hard to know whether McCain supports the Democratic plan to help struggling homeowners by guaranteeing more affordable, refinanced mortgages against default.

Two weeks ago, McCain economic advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin derided the idea as “throwing money at problems” and said it had “the potential to do more harm than good.”

Last week Holtz-Eakin reversed himself, saying that the proposal reflected McCain’s principles and McCain might support it.

But yesterday McCain said he does not support the bill after all, according to Laura Meckler of the Wall Street Journal.

Am I the only one confused?

McCain Does About-Face On Housing Rescue Bill»

Our guest blogger is James Kvaal, Domestic Policy Advisor at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

That was fast.

Only days ago, McCain advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin dismissed Sen. Chris Dodd and Rep. Barney Frank’s mortgage rescue plan – also endorsed by Sens. Clinton and Obama — as “throwing money at problems.” He said it had “the potential to do more harm than good.” Meanwhile, Sen. McCain gave a major housing speech in which he “more or less came out against aid for troubled homeowners” and his hands-off approach drew comparisons to Herbert Hoover.

That’s all changed. Yesterday, the Senate voted 94-1 to move ahead with a housing rescue bill, and now McCain’s for it too. Last night Holtz-Eakin called the Senate action “progress.” And today he said that the Dodd-Frank proposal reflected McCain’s principles and McCain may support it.

For homeowners, it’s a welcome about-face.

Is Holtz-Eakin Backing Away From McCain’s Economic Plan?»

In today’s Washington Post, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, senior policy adviser to Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) presidential campaign, writes 489 words about McCain’s plan for “turning around the economy.” There is not one word about the two massive corporate tax cuts that Sen. McCain billed, barely two months ago, as the top two items in his “economic stimulus plan“:

JOHN MCCAIN UNVEILS ECONOMIC STIMULUS PLAN
For Immediate Release
Thursday, January 17, 2008

ARLINGTON, VA — Today in Columbia, South Carolina, John McCain unveiled his plan to stimulate the American economy. McCain’s plan will lower the corporate tax rate, allow expensing of equipment and technology investments and establish a permanent research and development tax credit. …

Dr. Holtz-Eakin is smart to want to walk away from this absurd Norquist pander, but will the media let Sen. McCain do the same?

Coming soon from Sen. McCain: I was against irresponsible tax cuts before I was for them.

UPDATE: My bad. Although this article didn’t mention expensing, it did mention the corporate rate cuts. Sorry for the error.

Responding to Douglas Holtz-Eakin»

Our guest bloggers are Robert Gordon and James Kvaal, Senior Fellow and Domestic Policy Advisor, respectively, at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

One of Sen. John McCain’s economic advisers, former Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin, has responded to this Center for American Progress Action Fund study of the McCain tax plan:

On the question of tax cuts Gordon and Kvaal had a point, he conceded, though he added voters should wait until the senator fleshes out his tax proposal before passing judgment.

“It will make deficits expand up front, no question,” Holtz-Eakin said, adding that helping corporations ultimately helps workers because it ensures their employer remains internationally competitive. “That place has to be economically viable, otherwise they have a problem.”

Apart from the signal that Senator McCain may change his economic agenda yet again, this candid response raises four questions:

1) Why is it necessary to cut taxes for corporations to make them “economically viable” when the United States already has the fourth-lowest corporate tax revenue as a share of the economy in the industrialized world?

2) Why are deficit-financed corporate tax cuts likely to increase growth when (a) in the short-run, Moody’s Economy.com ranked them the least cost-effective stimulus among 13 options, and (b) in the medium or longer-run, the effect on growth of deficit-financed tax cuts “tends to be small?”

3) How do massive tax cuts for the most fortunate further shared prosperity when income inequality is at its highest level since before the Great Depression (or earlier)?

4) Given the admission that this plan will immediately increase federal budget deficits, how will Senator McCain meet his own goal of balancing the budget by 2012?

UPDATE: Center for American Progress Action Fund Senior Fellow Jeanne Lambrew responds below to Holtz-Eakin’s comments on the criticism of McCain’s health care plan: More »