Norman Ture, my mentor, who was advancing the principles that became supply-side economics when the great Jack Kemp was still throwing footballs for Buffalo, would never agree to either of those extreme positions, and neither do I.

There may be a few instances in which tax cuts “pay for themselves”. Capital gains cuts and the repeal of the death tax may, repeat may, be examples. But supply-side economics does not argue that this will hold in general, even for reductions in marginal income tax rates.

Just because a few of the irrationally exuberant who happen to call themselves supply-siders take these positions does not indict the vast majority of supply-siders who continue in Norman’s tradition,whether they know it or not. Don, and even Bruce, should know that.

And is there not some point at which further disincentivization of consumption becomes worse for the economy, not better? It seems your formulation here is is vulnerable to the same type of open-ended interpretation that seen in the Laffer curve degenerating into “tax cuts increase revenue”.

No doubt the “small death elasticity” observed would, upon closer examination be due to a rather larger elasticity in so-called “heroic measures” to prolong the lives of the elderly and infirm.

Unfortunately, from a public health perspective, it appears that increasing the death tax does little if anything to disincentivize death.

However, from a fiscal policy point of view, this opens up new research horizons; who knows what other tax increases we may find which incur little to no economic disincentives?

Where do I submit a grant application to study the tax elasticity of trophy wives?

FYI, in 2007 I compiled a list of (mostly) conservative economists explicitly rejecting that myth that “tax cuts always/generally (or the W Bush tax cuts in particular) increase revenues”. http://swordscrossed.org/diary/20081017/no-bush-tax-cuts-have-not-generated-higher-revenues I compiled it to show dittoheads who were sure the myth was truth, and I excluded liberal economists since the dittoheads would simply dismiss their views completely and reflexively.

Of course, most simply responded that they didn’t need to listen to economists because they could see for themselves that revenues increased after the Bush (and Reagan and Kennedy) tax cuts. I Explained to them that, even leaving aside Reagan’s tax increases that followed his tax cut, revenues generally rise over the years regardless of tax rates (due to inflation and even in real terms due to the norm of expansion regardless of tax cuts, increases, or neither) and that they can’t even establish legitimate correlation if they cherry pick their data points — ignoring what happens to revenues after a tax increase or no change — and I got through to a few, but most (most were hard-core dittoheads on Redstate.com) basically just covered their ears and screamed defiantly “Yeah, right — I should believe you rather than my own lyin’ eyes! Revenues went up after tax cuts. Case closed.” Pretty tough shells on those coconuts. Hard to penetrate.

But probably a greater obstacle to a responsible fiscal course-correction is the absolute “Don’t feed the beast” argument (1) that if they reject any tax increases long enough, our long-term fiscal imbalance will be solved entirely on the spending side (or darn close to it), and (2) that every dollar of incremental revenue from any tax increases will only lead to an incremental dollar (or more) of spending, leaving us only with higher spending rather than lower deficits, ceteris paribus. See my comment on that Bartlett thread http://capitalgainsandgames.com/blog/bruce-bartlett/1168/supply-side-economics-rip#comment-4199 Both assumptions are apparently invalid, and if so, it is critical that experts with credibility on the right debunk them.

http://www.nber.org/papers/w8158

Dying to Save Taxes: Evidence from Estate Tax Returns on the Death Elasticity
Wojciech Kopczuk, Joel Slemrod
NBER Working Paper No. 8158*
Issued in March 2001

This paper examines data from U.S. federal tax returns to shed light on whether the timing of death is responsive to its tax consequences. We investigate the temporal pattern of deaths around the time of changes in the estate tax system periods when living longer, or dying sooner, could significantly affect estate tax liability. We find some evidence that there is a small death elasticity, although we cannot rule out that what we have uncovered is ex post doctoring of the reported date of death. However, the fact that we find that postponement, rather than acceleration, of death is more likely to occur suggests that this phenomenon is at last partly a real (albeit timing) response to taxation.

Although, to be honest, I had rather hoped my comment might provoke some observation on how, for example, cartoonish right-wing folk theories regarding the effects of taxation on incentives fall apart under even modest probing[*].

Or, perhaps, reflection on how highly-concentrated cheap-money hand-me-downs are toxic to a mass-media-oriented representative polity, our structural fiscal deficit being but one salient example.

Or, best of all, maybe a discussion of the interrelationship of these two points.

But circumstances being what they are, I suppose a retroactive abortion joke will have to do.

([*] I must say, though, that “those notions are nonsense” is a pretty good place to start.)

Not in all cases
In fact, some people seem to be walking arguments for retroactive abortion.

(just goofin’ around; hope no one is offended by the dark humor)