On a foggy morning 30 years ago at his Santa Barbara ranch, Ronald Reagan signed the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981. Talking with reporters afterward, the president reveled in his legislative victory. The law, he said, represented “a turnaround of almost a half a century of a course this country has been on and […]
Joseph Thorndike
Joseph Thorndike is a columnist Bloomberg View. He is the director of the Tax History Project at Tax Analysts and a visiting scholar in history at the University of Virginia.
Posted inPolitics
Nixon’s Great Tax Gimmick and the Politics of Illusion
When President Richard Nixon decided to dismantle the Bretton Woods monetary system, it stunned the world. So did his imposition of wage and price controls. Forty years later, we’re still talking about both. By contrast, the fiscal elements of Nixon’s New Economic Plan have been long forgotten. And for good reason. Most were — as […]
