The only thing that could delight me more than this promise is if Mankiw announced that he was joining the Carmelites or becoming an anchorite.

I seem to remember the cream of British rock music, back in the day, groaning over high taxes in England. But instead of hanging up their rock and roll shoes, they simply sucked it up (Beatles) or relocated to places outside the district (Stones? Elton?) and kept on keepin’ on. You do what you gotta do, Greg.

I looked for a comments link, like most opinion pieces on NYT online have. I was going to encourage him to go compltely Galt, and maybe save the country altogether, but there wasn’t one.

What a complete idiot. To think he had/has influence on policy!

I was thinking that, too. Baseball players, great scienetists, singers, creative people of all kinds and workaholics, they do what they do because they can’t not do it.

Obviously, the fact that this doesn’t apply to Mankiw makes it clear that he is far from being a great or creative mind. Or even a clear mind, come to that.

Next week: Economist writes another essay. We’re all going to live forever!

Mankiw, that’s just the feminine name version of Mancow, right?

I thought it was funny when he had himself waterboarded.

Imagine: less of him.

Sounds OK to me.

Let me get this straight…if the high taxes keep him from taking that extra gig worth $1k, he gets $0 and his kids get $0. But if he takes the extra work, his issue get to pad their trust funds, just not as much as if the tax cut remains in place. What a selfish prick.

I thought “lower taxes for the rich = job creation” was the mantra.

For comment links you have to pay them directly now. Like the fire department.

If we’re really lucky he’ll start charging by the word for the articles themselves, which will then vanish from starvation.

“As a leading conservative thinker, it is my considered opinion that….. Okay sorry, If you want more, then pay up. Go ahead. I’m waiting. Come on. Hello? Is this thing on…?”

Cream of the crop, indeed…what Strange Brew were they drinking? Oh, maybe liquid platinum.. Now that is the rock upon which economic progress is made.

One of Shrub’s economic advisers might give fewer speeches if he’s expected to pay higher taxes, an expectation that the beginning of his screed seems to acknowledge would be perfectly reasonable?

If we raise the top marginal tax rate to 70% will he promise to “go Galt” completely?

I will forgo all earnings until the top marginal tax rate returns to 35%, because 38% is offensively high! This 3% increase in the top marginal tax rate CAN NOT STAND!!

[pulls out Laffer curve]

Oh wait, no, 38% is fine. As you were.

Oh, I see what you did there, Mr. Mankiw.

And I call bullshit. Talk about comparing apples to orangutans! An honest Republican (but I contradict myself) editorialist would compare the value of $1,000 earned under the current tax rates and the expected rates if the Bush tax cuts expire. But, no, you compared it no taxes at all.

You pretend that your only interest in earning additional money is what you can pass on to your heirs (so you can add in the effect of the estate tax). And you name yourself as upper middle class, but you pretend that your hypothetical estate would be subject to an estate tax that doesn’t kick in till at least $1 million and you pretend (i.e., lie) that the entire amount would be subject to the maximum rate, as well as take the worst-case scenario with regard to exemptions.

Why, one would think that you’re just a lying hack, doing the bidding of the superstar actors and hedge fund managers (and Waltons and Kochs and…), just to earn a few more dollars in an selfish effort to keep yourself outside of the blast zone of the nuked middle class.

I have been thinking — narcissistically, to be sure —

And herein lies the problem.

And please note the vast hordes of innovators, entrepreneurs, and creative types who went Galt during the Eisenhower administration when the top marginal rate was 90%.

Oh, man, say it’s not so! I was just one day from retirement! My wife and I were going to sail around the world on my yacht — look, here’s a picture of it. It’s called “GONNA LIVE FOREVER.”

Oh, the irony!

At long last, World O’ Crap makes its return to the blogroll. (Note: For all I know, the link has been there for months. I just vaguely remember being annoyed it wasn’t there a long time ago.)

Here in gunsbeforebutter-land (where my redneck friends buy lots of ammo and their skinny little kids don’t have good shoes) we think when “30 years from now, when I pass on, my children would inherit about $10,000″ those kids will be fuckin’ stoked and blow all that hard earned cash on WasillaWhiteMonsterMadnessMeth because pappy douche is gone.

You beat me to it. After that epic line, I had a hard time focusing on Greg’s pricey words because of the uncontrollable laughter…

Seriously, this idiot is allowed to teach at Harvard? And kids pay extremely good money to “learn” this kind of “Imagine for a moment that the earth was flat…” bullshit? I mean, we know that most economists compensate for their ignorance with conjecture and assumptions, but his “hey, if only I didn’t have to pay my part of all your taxes, my kids would love me more” cop-out is beyond the pale.

We watched The Book of Eli last night. I bet it’ll be just like that! (I’ll watch Denzel in anything.)

I said this over at Kevin’s place, but it bears repeating. I hang out with a lot of writers, many of them with long publication lists, and they’ll be happy to step up and take any assignments left hanging due to Libertarians Going Galt. The business is cutthroat at the moment, and jobs are scarce. Plenty more where he came from.

Awww, poor Gregowy, he’s soooo sad that he can’t help out, but it just don’t pay. Narcissistic doesn’t adequately describe the GOP .

“It was horrible, I tells ya, horrible!” We need a better class of jerkoff, really. These guys are fucking dweebs.

Ahh, the sound of lightsabers as TBogg and those commenting cut quickly, cleanly to the bone leaving no flesh behind…

At the risk of repeating a joke I and others have made before, I think Libertarians withholding the fruits of their cultural efforts from the world and imagining that anyone actually cares, let alone collapses in devastation, really is a perfect description of the passengers on the “B” Ark, if there ever was one.

“Now, there was a reason we were all going to get on this ship and not produce anything and just roam around until it crashed on some deserted planet….”

“You’re a load of useless, bloody loonies!!”

“Ah yes, that was it! That was the reason that it was. Ha. Pass me the loofah will you?”

The thing that’s so annoying about this “the producers will withhold their creative genius if we tax them more” bullshit is that there are so many poor morons who buy into it. Any of whom, if approached and told “we’re going to raise your salary from $35K to $300K per year; the only hitch is that instead of paying $17,500 in taxes on the amount over $250K, you’re going to have to pay $19,000 on the amount over $250K – do we have a deal?” would trample their own grandmother to the pavement in the mad rush to sign up. What, he’s going to refuse the deal because he’ll ONLY be making $176K more than he was making before, rather than $177.5K?

NO ONE thinks that way, not even people who are at that $250K level already. Mr. Mankiw would forego making an additional $31K per year because it’s not $32.5K? Economist, PLEASE.

Among all the conservatarian economic gibberish, this is about the most irritating, simply for the reason that any thinking person knows good and damn well that people pretty much ALWAYS elect to make as much money as they can; if the tax rate means they make a little less than they would have otherwise, they’re still going to make as much as they can.

Mankiw is just a goddamned liar, as much as I wish he WOULD pick up all his toys and go home.

Just one more essay. Please.

Another attempt to mislead with regard to marginal tax rates.

disease and famine will rule the land, and zombies will walk amongst us.

Seriously. We’re fucked.

Chargers/Raiders post-game review……

I think the answer may be to give this clown a $400 tax credit to write an essay supporting a tax hike.

Greg’s a pussy

If I pay a bit more in taxes, can Obama build those FEMA camps a little faster? kthxbai.

What scratch said at 30.

By the way Greg, I live in Boston too. What the fuck do you think they are using to repair the monster potholes on 495 so you can get to the Cape? Monopoly money?

Remember the 1990′s, when the top marginal rate was 3% higher than it is now and no new technologies were developed or grown and all our Galtian internet supermen moved to the tax-free haven of Somalia?

Yeah, fuck this guy. And the New York Times. Why hasn’t that thing died already?

Mankiw should be happy his employers haven’t figured out they could outsource the job of copying and pasting Republican talking points for a hell of a lot less than they are paying him.

In addition to the fact that Mankiw is contrasting the effect of zero taxes versus 38% marginal tax, which is already outrageously dishonest, he’s also making an implicit argument against retaining tax cuts for the rich.

See, he says that if he gets an additional $200 or $1000 or whatever, he’s going to sock it away in a (presumably) safe investment for his spawn. We have a huge demand shortage. The last thing we need is more rich assholes squirreling away their cash in the proverbial sock under the mattress.

It looks to me like Mankiw is admitting that he’ll sit on any additional cash the government gives him, and that there would be more stimulative effect from giving that money to the poors or spending it on public works. Thanks, Greggers, it’s been fucking noted.

Delong and Drum also skewer this one. Boy, there’s quite a slew of rich assholes deceptively whining about having their disposable income reduced by less than 4%.

Many good points made already. But as someone who would be approaching the $250K cutoff (if it applied to gross income, which it doesn’t), allow me to say that if I’m taxed more at the margin, I will work more, not less, to keep up with my expenses, college savings, 401K, etc. The only type of rich person I can imagine working less is the one who doesn’t need the fucking money! That’s why people worked hard when the marginal rate was 90%. They wanted the dough to get that Zenith 16″ black and white console TV with the built in stereo turntable and the Rambler Ambassador station wagon (allof course made in the USA by American unionized labor).

To paraphrase Mary McCarthy on Lillian Hellman, everything the man says is a lie, including “and” and “the”. Not to mention the math, which was apparently ghost-written by Megan McArdle.

Shorter All Galtards: “You’ll be sorry when I’m gone to the Gulch… soon… really, I can leave any time!”

Infantile.

It would appear that Mr. Mankiw has Peter Principled himself to the same level of expertise in the economics world as Orly Taitz holds in the legal profession.