Trickle-down economics?_其他_趣味英语-查字典英语网

Trickle-down economics?

Anyways, the trickle down theory is pro-capital, pro-invest and pro-elite and is criticized, often correctly, as the culprit for the growing income gap between rich and poor.

This income gap is no small matter, of course, as inequality is root of many social evils, leading to, say, the current refugee crisis of Europe and, at worst, revolutions in the past.

Anyway, that is that and now let me use media examples to further drive the point home:

1. Helping to clinch his eventual victory, Barack Obama declared in a 2008 presidential campaign ad, “The old trickle-down theory has failed us”[source: YouTube]. This statement and Obama's victory resound like a death knell to an economic mentality that some say served to line the pockets of the rich. However, the trickle-down theory to which he refers remains a highly controversial topic. That Obama seeks to end trickle-down policy is certain, but what the theory really suggests and whether it has succeeded have been less clear.

To understand trickle-down theory, we have to iterate some economic basics. First off, all capitalistic economies undergo natural ups and downs. In times of prosperity, economic activity is high, and jobs are easy to find. In times of recession, a country's economy produces less, and people have trouble finding jobs. Government steps in to try to help smooth out these fluctuations and dull the pain of sharp economic downturns.

Adjusting the tax policy is one way to affect the economy, and the U.S. government has been using tax policy this way almost since the inception of the national income tax in 1913. Although economists agree that changing how a government taxes its citizens can have some dramatic effects on an economy, they disagree on which policy is best.