19 July 2007

more on that crazy Laffer curve

A few days ago I posted about some particularly egregious curve-fitting in the Wall Street Journal, in which corporate tax rates versus tax revenue in different countries was plotted, and a curve was fit to the data to make it look like we were on the right side of the Laffer curve. (Incidentally, people on the right economically believe we are on the right side of the Laffer curve, and therefore taxes should be cut; people on the left economically believe we are on the left side of the Laffer curve and therefore taxes should be raised.)

Someone else called this Best Curve-Fitting Ever (sarcastically, of course, if you take a look at the actual pictures); the comments are rather interesting, and do a better job of explaining the economic issues underlying this than I could.

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