All right, if you got a big downturn coming,
stocks, the economy, both who do you trust?
You trust the business guy or the anti business guy?
Joining us now to talk about that,
Art Laffer, former Reagan economist Steve Moore,
Committee to unleash prosperity hotline,
more money on WABC radio and Steve Forbes,
media chairman and editor in chief,
Fox News contributor. Anyway, kids,
Art Laffer, I want to start with you.
You're a market guy and a philosopher.
It's why we like you.
You can swing both ways.
Who do you trust if this thing is going to
collapse?
I don't know that's going to collapse.
We're on the front end of a recession and we're
on the front end of what looks like it could
be a bear market.
Who do you want? You want the business person or
do you want the anti business person?
Well, I don't want the person who brought you to
the crash.
That's what I really don't want,
Larry. And these people have brought you to the crash
with bad policies and you know,
it happens to be there.
The anti business people, they weren't any good.
They're no different than Hoover in my mind,
slightly less damaging, but the same type of policies and
that they're no good for the economy.
I'd trust Trump every day of the week and twice
on Sunday for bringing us a good economy.
Steve Force, why is this crack up cracking up?
I think it's a realization 1 Kamala Harris could win.
I think she will, but there's market has to put
that in.
Also Japan is in trouble.
They're way over in debt worse than ours and that
market do you saw 12%
down yesterday realizing and I think that's dragged everything else
down and a realization the rest of the world is
in poor economic shape and where's the growth prospects coming
from? Where are they coming from?
That's to come from the US in terms of those
in power,
I I don't see one thing this just pause on
this one.
The word growth does not enter into the lexicon of
Mr.
Biden or Miss Harris. You never hear that.
Trump at the convention talked endlessly about growth and growth,
tax cuts and tax cuts,
growth and growth. I mean,
he's the only guy on the world stage,
I think, much less the,
you know, the political stage here in the States who
talks the language of growth.
Well, that's true. And also it put in the policies
of growth,
IE, cut taxes. And this is where the danger comes
in.
If Kamala Harris got in,
she doesn't need Congress. She's got the regulatory state behind
her.
And they've demonstrated with college debt and the like,
they'll just go and do what they want.
And the heck with the courts,
what the courts say. So we're going to have an
avalanche of regulation.
We won't be able to get rid of the stuff
that has been put down our throats now that's going
to really bear down in the economy.
So we're in for a real big downturn.
And if we're down, the world is down.
And so we have to lead the world out of
it,
just as we did in the
1980s with Ronald Reagan of pro growth policies.
And also they got to start paying attention to the
Federal Reserve.
Get over this. ID you have to depress the economy
to conquer inflation.
No, just remove regulations, have a stable dollar,
cut taxes by calling. Good things will happen.
Well, cutting interest rates are not not going to be
the solution to anything.
That's just that could reinflate if anything.
But just keep a stable dollar,
stable dollar. Steve Moorer, you're a long time editorial writer
for the Wall Street Journal.
OK, you know it's coming here.
So today I just want to ask you today,
our friends, they're very good friends of ours,
OK? They come out against Trump's idea of,
of reducing the Social Security benefits tax,
which could be indexed to inflation.
It hasn't been in 40 years.
The threshold was
$25,000 with a bump up to
35,000. That has not been changed.
If you did change that,
the new basis for inflation today would be
$80,000, OK, which would be a nice middle class tax
cut and would reduce the overall tax burden
on retirees so they would go out and work and
produce.
Now, how in the Lord's name can that be bad?
Yeah, I like the policy.
And, and I think that when you look at seniors
who are,
let's say, are between the ages of
63 and 70 or even a little bit higher in
age,
you know, half of them are still working or collecting
or investing.
And, you know, we're an aging population.
So we'd we'd like to see people who want to
continue to work,
stay working. That's a good way to stay healthy,
by the way. And the policy today,
I want to make sure your viewers understand this because
I don't think anybody in Washington understands it.
The average tax rate on somebody who continues to work
after the age of 63 or 64,
who's collecting Social Security benefits,
can be 50 or 60 or 70%,
Larry. Those are the highest tax rates of any worker
in the American economy.
We fixed a little bit of the problem under Clinton
when we got rid of some of the earnings test.
But my feeling is this is unfair.
It is unfair to seniors.
I think it would be a great policy
to, you know, for those,
again, for those who want to continue to work,
let's encourage that. Let's not punish them
with these very high taxes.
So I think the Journal got it wrong today.
Be mindful that all of us have already paid the
Social Security tax for the last 40 or 50 years
and we're being asked to double tax it.
I mean, I'm not, I'm not going to mess with
the earnings tax at this point in time.
It's very complicated. But the mere,
the, the simple. Look, Art Laffer,
you written the whole book on this,
the simple idea of indexing of inflation,
indexing a threshold, a tax threshold that hasn't been touched
in 40 years.
How can that be bad?
I mean, the the journalist turned into green eye shades.
They are completely wrong on this.
These things would benefit, I mean,
welfare improved, safe your, your psychic improve.
I mean, like, I don't know
everybody. No, three out of the four of the people
on this segment are,
shall we say, senior citizens.
How's that? I got one,
at least over 80. I got a couple in their
70s and then I got 64.
Now, then I got 1 high school kid who's only
64 years old.
OK. But Arthur, I mean,
I, I, I think that and the bigger point I'm
making is
Trump's the business guy. I think at this point in
time in history,
we need a business person at the helm.
That's really what I'm asking.
Art Laffer
we we do. And I wish they'd I wish he'd
chosen Steve Forbes as his running mate.
To be honest with you,
Steve, I loved your opening comments,
how you're cooking. What we need to do is we
need to index tax rates.
We need to lower tax rates on working output and
employment and continue the Trump agenda of business.
First. You know, what he did on the Tax Cuts
and JOBS Act is second to nothing in history.
I mean, he cut those tax rates from 35 to
21.
He cut the personal income tax.
We need more and more and more of that.
What we need to do is bring people off the
sidelines back into the labor force.
We need to get this country growing and going again.
And in the interim there,
we need to treat seniors,
especially people over 80 years old,
say Moi, we need to treat them really nicely.
You guys be polite and sweet to me all the
time.
Say yes, Sir, no, Sir,
thank you, ma'am, all that stuff.
But we do need to treat seniors correctly.
And Trump knows how to do it.
He's he is a senior,
by the way. And I don't think Kamala Harris is
so there.
80 is the new
608080 is the new 60.
Or at least we can hope about that.
But in many ways, guys,
I'm younger than all of you.
Just for the record, we got one high school kid
on the segment for having sex.
I don't know what to do with them.
Steve Forbes, though. I mean,
I, I, I don't think it's unfair.
Maybe it is, but I said in my opening roof
that Kamala Harris is anti business.
She, I think she hates business.
I think Joe Biden hates business.
Maybe I'm not 100% right,
but I've seen nothing in their policies over the past
3 1/2 years to suggest that they like business or
understand the central role of business in our economy.
Remember our old friend, the late great Jack Kemp used
to say Democrats love employment,
they just don't like the employers who create the job.
That to me is still the the Democratic mantra or
worse.
Yeah. They just take business for granted that somehow everything's
going to be done.
It's like you go to the grocery store,
you just assume everything's there.
You have no idea how it gets there,
who produces and makes it all happen.
They have no appreciation for it.
They just see as a bunch of scoundrels to be
fleece for their own programs.
And one of the things the new Congress has to
do,
hopefully Republican, is get rid of these crazy budget rules
that prevent the Republicans from having real tax cuts and
go through the pretzel exercise you had to go through
to get the 2017 tax cut through 10 years and
eight and all that kind of stuff.
And the scoring that has no real world relevance.
So we get a good clean tax cut.
And you'll see, as we had in the 60s and
the
1980s, America being great again.
And if we're doing great,
the rest of the world will follow our example just
as it did in the
1980s. That's a really important point.
Steve Moore,
why do you think stock market went down so much
the last three days?
You believe it's a recession threat?
The unemployment rate is pointing towards recession.
Recessions breed profits. Profits are the mothers milk of stocks.
I mean, do you buy that?
I'm not going to say recession because all the economists
were wrong.
I said recession threat. Recession threat.
Yeah, so, but I would say this that Trump tweeted
out today or is it say
what's his true social that that this was the camel
crash.
And look, I think there is a bit of truth
to that,
Larry. You know, 10-12 days ago,
Trump had about a 12 point lead and now it's
down to about a one point lead because of this
something I've never seen before in my 30 years of
following politics where they treat Kamala Harris like she's Mother
Teresa in the press.
But I think that, you know,
look, it gets to your point,
Pamela Harris is bad for business.
She's bad for investors, she's bad for the stock market.
So I think there's a little bit of convulsion there
among investors who are getting very nervous about the prospect
that this woman actually could be president.
But I don't think it's going to happen.
And I'm a little younger than
than my friend Arthur Laffer because I don't really remember
the Herbert Hoover
regime. Oh, God,
I got that. But I know,
I know Arthur was there.
They say Nancy Pelosi says Joe Biden should be on
Mount Rushmore.
OK, let's, let's just let's,
let's leave it at that.
Art Laffer, you're a, you've been giving market advice for
a long time in your newsletters and your business.
What advice would you give right now?
Oh, right now that just to really answer the question
about Trump versus Kamala Harris,
Trump has actually written checks that other people have received.
Kamala Harris has only received checks that other people have
written.
She's never been in an entrepreneurial position.
She's never really relied on market.
She's only been on one end of checks and that's
receiving government checks,
not writing checks for employers and employees.
And right now my view is I think Steve's completely
correct.
I think it's the rise of Kamala Harris that has
scared the heck out of people and they're now reassessing
the market prospects because of a possibility of a or
a ticket that I think that is really what you're
seeing.
And Stevens right on that.
All right. Stevens right on that.
We'll we'll end on that note.
Stevens right on that. We found something.
Steve Moore, Thank you. Art Laffer,
Steve Ford. We appreciate it very,
very much.