President Obama's Bush I Redux?

We can go over and over this thousands of times and liberals still don't get it. Going after the "rich" just doesn't work to solve the problems that we are in. President Obama's latest foree into class warfare includes corporate jets. That is how he thinks we are going to get out of the financial mess we are in.


Not so fast there buddy. Let's go back to the early 90's when Bush I was president. The combo of Ted Kennedy and George Mitchell included a luxury tax on items such jets, yacht's, and expensive cars. This was going to raise $31 million per year in additional revenue and soak the 'rich' all at the same time. What a deal. The liberal wet dream. More money to waste and hit the rich all in one fell swoop.

Shall we take a look at what happened? I say we do.

The largest yacht manufacturor in the United States at the time closed one plant and laid off all but 260 of it's 1,400 workforce within eight months of the law being signed by President Bush. One third of all U.S. manufacturing companies stopped production and the industry lost 7,600 jobs in the first year.

The tax was in place for close to three years before being repealed. But before the repeal took effect 25,000 yacht builders were out of work, 75,000 more workers who worked in fields related to the building of those yacht's, such as parts and materials needed to build those yacht's, Ocean Yacht's filed for bankruptcy, and instead of the U.S. being the leader in exporting yatch's we become the leader in importing them. Another 1,800 jobs were lost in the jewelery and aircraft industries due to the tax.

The Joint Economic Committee estimated that the job losses in the first six months was a value of $159.6 million that was taken out of our economy. The job losses cost $24.2 million in unemployment benefits and lost income tax revenue. The federal government is said to have lost $7.6 million instead of the $31 million promised to be raised. They were only off by $38 million. A million here, a million there, what is the difference? Just some pesky little details.

Obama wants to try this luxury tax yet again? Does he think it will work better this time? Or this just yet another attempt at the new democratic fall back position of class warfare?

You decide.