Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?

I noticed you started with 81 - but we can back for even more!



The Social Security Bill had more Republican Votes than Dems

The Civil Rights Bill had more Republican Votes than Dems



But the main difference - it had both parties voting for the bill - not just one!Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?The Bush tax cuts were for the wealthy and the Welfare was for the poor. Try again guys.



"Since 2001 President Bush and congressional leaders have promised that enacting each of a series of tax cuts would strengthen the economy by bringing faster growth, more jobs, and greater investment. With Congress again debating whether to extend past tax cuts and enact new ones, it’s time to review how much the last four years of tax cuts have affected the U.S. economy and budget outlook. Unfortunately for most Americans, the tax cuts since 2001 have not made today’s economy stronger. Over the last five fiscal years, the tax cuts have had a direct cost of $860 billion and (with interest costs) a total effect on the deficit of $929 billion. By creating excessive permanent deficits, they have lowered our future standard of living."

http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/bp…Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?
The small businesses that create huge numbers of jobs were greatly helped by the Bush tax cuts, which enabled the hiring of more out-of-work people, and which (the opposite of what many expected), brought in unexpectedly large amounts of tax money to the U.S. Treasury. (Tax increases would have put some of them out of business and certainly prevented hirings by them.)Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?Here’s where things stood in 1980, Carter’s last year in office, and in subsequent periods:



****Carter: Interest rate, 21%. Inflation, 13.5%. Unemployment, 7%. The so-called “Misery Index,” which Carter used to great effect in his 1976 campaign to win election, 20.5%.



****Reagan’s last year: Interest rate, 9%. Inflation, 4.1%. Unemployment, 5.5%. Misery Index, 9.6%.



Bush today 2007 : Interest rate, 8%. Inflation, 2.6%. Unemployment, 4.5%. Misery Index, 7.1%.



It’s not even close. The only question is: Why did things get so bad under Carter? And that’s a long story. The fundamental reason, however, is he made mistake after mistake, blinded by the leftist rhetoric his party adopted after the infamous ’72 Democratic Convention, when the so-called New Left seized control.

In office, Carter adopted the Keynesian economics ( just like Obama ) of the time, buying into the theory that there was a reverse “trade-off” between inflation and unemployment — an idea that proved spectacularly wrong. The U.S. became mired in “stagflation,” with both inflation and unemployment rising sharply.



As things grew worse, Carter sharply boosted government spending. When that didn’t work, he blamed the American people. “I think it’s inevitable that there will be a lower standard of living than what everybody had always anticipated,” he told advisers in 1979. “The only trend is downward. But it’s impossible to get people to face up to this.”

Those remarks were followed by his now-famous “malaise” speech in which he unveiled six proposals — including import quotas, windfall profits taxes and increased spending on alternative fuels — to combat higher oil prices charged by OPEC. Nothing about tax cuts. Nothing about finding more energy. In short, he told Americans to consume less, but pay more.



“We have learned that ‘more’ is not necessarily ‘better,’ and that even our great nation has its recognized limits,” Carter said, borrowing heavily from the “limits to growth” movement that swept liberal intellectual circles in the ’70s.

With public anger growing and his own polls lagging, Carter started wearing sweaters and encouraging us to turn down the thermostat. But his big spending didn’t work. The resulting budget deficit, 12 times bigger than the one President Nixon left, gave him a serious public relations problem.

On this score, Carter might have escaped his own malaise if he had cut taxes to get the economy going again. But even with marginal income tax rates at a hefty 70%, he accepted the common wisdom that a tax cut would boost inflation and lower government revenue. He was dead wrong.

As noted in “The Commanding Heights,” a leading economic history of the last century, “Carter’s attempts to follow Keynes’ formula and spend his way out of trouble were going nowhere.”

Eventually (but grudgingly), Carter did agree to slash the tax rate on capital gains to 28% from 40%. But that didn’t kick in until 1979. By then it was too late to help him politically.



Two other moves have garnered Carter praise: setting deregulation in motion and naming Paul Volcker as Fed chairman in 1979. Carter did begin deregulation, for which he deserves credit. And to be sure, Volcker clamped down on the growth in money supply, bringing on a deep recession but also killing the inflationary spiral.

Inflation, however, was already easing when Carter entered office. It was only after he named a political supporter, the late G. William Miller, as Fed chairman that prices really took off. Miller, who served only a year, is now viewed as the worst Fed chief ever.

Volcker? He wasn’t Carter’s choice. He was nominated only after a contingent of Wall Street power brokers, alarmed at the economy’s decline, went to the White House and demanded the appointment of the well-respected president of the New York Fed.



In his last years in office, Carter spoke of an “erosion of our confidence in the future.” But his failure to support the Shah of Iran led to a takeover of that oil-rich republic by fundamentalist Muslims, and a second Mideast oil shock hammered the economy and pushed inflation to new highs.
Well, I don't normally remember every bill passed since 1981, but that doesn't mean there aren't any. On the other hand, I can't name ANY legislation, passed by the Democrats, from ANY time that helped the Middle class either.Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?Nope. And I can't name any Democratic Party legislation either. They're both looking out for the corporate interests.Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?
..... i agree with what ever it was that "micheala" posted..... and i'm a liberal democrat.....but i am very open minded.....(is all of that OK to do ?).....
Bush tax cuts stimulated the economy and we had the tech bubble under the Republican congress.Can you name one specific piece of Republican legislation since 1981 that helped the middle class?
The Reagan and Bush tax cuts lead to some of the highest deficits in this nation's history.
Welfare Reform Bill of the 1990s.



Since Clinton liked it enough to sign off on it, I assume you agree?
The Bush and Reagan tax cuts
Obama is a defiling plague on this nation!