Cutting taxes for the richest citizens is only a bad thing if you believe it is the government’s job to punish people for being successful.
Those who want to raise taxes on some and lower them for others do so because they believe it’s the government’s job to use the power of the federal government to pick winners and losers – to punish people arbitrarily for what they like and don’t like.
My kids get paid for doing chores. If son 1 does more work more efficiently and earns $4 but son 2 only earns $2, is it my job to forcibly take away money from the one who earned more and give it to the one who earned less?
No. It’s immoral.
On the other hand, those who want to lower taxes do so because they believe that money in the private sector is more productive for the economy and freedom than government confiscation, waste, and redistribution
The private citizen has no vested interest in wasting money. The citizen (and corporations run by citizens) are interested in investing the money to get something of greater value, whether that’s goods or more money. So if the rich keep more of their own money, they invest more in the market – that’s putting money into businesses, who add value to the economy and create jobs.
This pursuit to get more value drives the market and also drives corruption, where someone will want to use their ability to impede the ability of others’ liberty for their own gain. This is where the government steps in, protecting the citizens’ liberty from being infringed on by others.
These two views are diametrically opposed on what the purpose of the government is. The first “liberal” view is that the government’s job is to solve all of society’s problems and through arbitrarily deciding what is “fair,” pick winners and losers by force (like taxing some at different rates than others). In this view, government is the solution to everything and should be always getting bigger and more invasive in citizen’s lives.
The second “conservative” view is that government’s role is ONLY to do things that the market cannot practically do – protect people’s inalienable right to liberty from being invaded by others in or outside of the country, and a few other things that private citizens or corporations can’t do. In this view, government intervention into people’s lives is a problem, and government should be strictly limited with enumerated powers.
The second view is how the founders set up America, and is the view that lead to America’s greatness from the start.
