Will, good to know you are around, and alive and kicking! Part of the problem with some of the data Mike and other GOPers produce is the lack, not only of citations, but of historical trend lines that are persuasive and instructive. Which, of course, is one reason I believe the election was lost for them. However, this said, I personally welcome this kind of debate and I think Mike is doing us a service by permitting multiple perspectives to bloom. I would really like to see a much more positive view of the country, as you have suggested. I travel a lot and, as you probably know, don't miss an opportunity to discuss current affairs. What I find is far more upbeat optimism on the part of most people, as well as a wish for many politicians to stop the drumbeat of complaints and get around to solutions that really help them. One thing about our great country is that optimism and creativity win the the day. Oh, and we face far more than employment problems. There are many other issues they want to see addressed.

Will, I would suggest that you go back and read the first 2 paragraphs of this post. I celebrate the fact that Americans pride themselves in helping others. This is not a put down of America this is a quality to be proud of. After all America was built with individuals joining together to build farms and communities.

All I have done with this post is point out some facts. I am sorry if you don't like the facts but that does not mean that I am putting down the US. On the contrary, until you acknowledge the truth you cannot make informed decisions.

Ron, it is good to see you on the blogs again. I call foul on your blanket statement that Elephants do not produce citations which implies that the Donkeys always do. I thought that we were not supposed to stereo type people. This kind of statement is bait designed to start a flame war which I will not participate in. By the way, in FL where I grew up, I had to check the box "Other" for race so I know a little bit about living in a diverse community.

If you serious about looking at trend lines I would suggest that you investigate the historical tax rates vs. actual dollars collected by the US Treasury over the past 100 years. You will find that raising taxes will do nothing to bring down the debt.

Mike, what truth would you have me acknowledge? That the economy is getting better and has so since the Great Recession ended? It seems that you have a distorted vision of what the economic data revelas because of your apparent irrational hatred for President Obama. To suggest that you even have a clue of what the "Obama Legacy" will be, as your opinion piece alludes to, is an imagined grandiosity of self importance.

Well Mike, I do appreciate your nice words about having me here. I was calling for a far more studied and clearly documented set of data and suggesting that one reason the GOP lost was that it did not do a good job of doing that. I did NOT say the other side was brilliant or even accurate. I thought Romney prevaricated fatally and a heck of a lot more. But he was supposed to bring down the Obama economic house of cards and that failed miserably (...were he CEO of a big corporation he would also be spending time with his wife, family and Cosco). In terms of taxes and debts. I would be happy to understand what I should be reading and what the trend lines look like. I believe that taxes are very low now and debt is very high. I believe that when Bush was 'elected' tax rates were higher and there was far less debt. This suggests to me that there are variables which are easily overlooked (like unpaid for wars, etc.). As for race, which you brought up, you guys blew it (due in part as well to your positions on women) on that big time....in Florida, Massachusetts and most of the country. I was just in California and the GOP is about dead there, in some part because of its position of race and immigration. Want to bring up side subjects? I am disgusted, as a person with a disability, with what your party did in the Senate today in the face of efforts by Bob Dole, Dick Lugar, John McCain, and many disabled vets. Gotta watch out for those black helicopters I guess.....

Thank you, it is nice to know that there are people who appreciate my blogs.

Fair question, some of the numbers have naturally moved a bit since the above was mostly (from 1Q 2012). These numbers are through 2Q 2012.

Corporate-After-Tax-Profits 9.4%
Core Inflation 1.9%
S+P 500 YTD Performance 14.41%
S+P 500 Gains since bottom, roughly 107%.
All other factors mentioned remain virtually unchanged i.e., personal tax rates, tax rates on cap gains/dividends, personal savings rate, household debt, etc.

Except for YTD numbers, data is provided by J.P. Morgan.

Fair point Bob. In fact anytime someone posts data, as Mike has done, they should cite to their source otherwise how do we know they aren't just making it up.

I get my figures from an aggregation of articles throughout the week. I will cite a few examples in my next post.

Linda, the healthcare and biomedical sectors of the economy have been receiving a lot of funding over the past 5 years. Boston has a very strong presence in those areas. Also you look at education industry and you see that the cost of tuition has been rising a lot faster than the inflation rate. This means colleges and universities are not affected by the economic downturn. The State of Massachusetts has a huge education industry. Combine healthcare and education industries and we have been fortunate to have been insulated from the economic woes other parts of the country have suffered.

Nice try on the insult but it fails to have the affect you would like. I have become immune to name calling over the past few years. You can leave the personal insults out the next time you comment and just stick to the points you want to make. You actually had some decent counterpoints that are worthy of discussing and they should not be drowned out in a flame war that personal insults are designed to start.

HAHAHAHA. Linda, this is silly, and misleading.

Other than the sales and service people here in the States at the VW Auto Group's dealerships, where is the gain for the American economy? The VW Group also owns Porsche, so by telling us VW and Porsche are doing well, you were a little redundant.

Again, where are Infinitis, Nissans, Porsches, and VWs made??

And other than sales and services sectors, how is this helping the American economy? Your post paints a very positive picture for Germany, though, so there's that.

I should have read-on for other replies before I researched my answer to this as others had similar replies. Porsche and Volkswagen are German Companies and Nissan is Japan. How would their great sales numbers really help the U.S.A. With quick analysis I found that Volkswagen employs 2000 people in the USA, not too many for all the money we spend on their cars.

It works better if you hit "reply". So it seems that you are another "Party of Inclusion" member who only believes in such nonsense if we agree with YOUR line of thinking. Ironic that your last name is "Worthy", since you see others as unworthy of speaking to you.

I wonder, your ideology mirrors Dave's...your coming to Dave's defense by taking the time to go back into an old article and paraphrase what I said....Are you really Dave?

Again, you're deflecting sweetie. I brought out facts, you fired back with "I don't have to answer that because you were mean to my friend."

Hope and Change, indeed.

Again David, any "drama" between you and I was just that...between you and I. Any "meanness" Linda may or may not experience, she brought upon herself.

But since she jumped to YOUR defense, maybe you can jump to hers....please, tell me where in her post anything positive about the US economy was stated. I seem to have stymied her, and she resorted to calling me a meanie. Is that how it works over there on the Left? We can't have constructive conversation because I was mean one time?

SAM
Jim,
I don't mean to rain on your parade, but the labor department only counts those who have looked for a job within the last 4 weeks as unemployed. They do not count those who have simply dropped out of the labor force due to their unemployment benefits running out. They may have created 146,000 jobs, but when when surveyed households, it came up with 350,000 who had dropped out of the workforce. As usual, the government media likes to put a positive spin on things.

The purpose of raising taxes is to pay for things that we want. Deficts indicate we haven't been generating enough revenue to pay for the things we want. Some wanted a war in Iraq. The war needs to be paid for. Some wanted prescription drug coverage. Needs to be paid for. Some want roads and bridges. Roads/bridges need to be paid for. etc. etc.. etc.

You seem to be advocating for supply side economics or Reaganomics. What the first President Bush referred to as "vodoo economics."

I think you asked 2 questions: 1) "don't tax revenues increase as the economy improves" and 2) "why risk the improving economy AND the improving tax revenues."
The first question implies a belief in supply side economics. I believe Bush was right when he referred to it as vodoo economics. The second question seems to assume that improving tax revenues and improving the economy are mutually exclusive. I don't believe they are.

If you search for revenue versus GDP you will find that the federal government collects approximately 18% of GDP as revenue no matter what the tax rate is. We can infer from this historical data that if we want to balance the budget the government must keep spending to 18% of GDP. Any spending above 18% will result in a deficit. So the real question is can America increase GDP to be 5 times that of current government spending? If it cannot then where does the budget need to be trimmed to match the revenue being received.