We asked students what they thought about President Bush’s
new economic growth package with $674 billion worth of tax cuts.
Here’s what they had to say: Anthony Salazar
Fourth-year, MCD bio
I believe he cut the dividend tax so he could stimulate spending
but it’s going to benefit the rich because they have more resources
and more money invested, so they’ll be compounding more interest.
The poor don’t have those resources and because there’s more of the
poor and less of the rich, it’s going to be difficult to stimulate
the economy that way because you need the masses to participate. We
need new investors to stimulate the economy. The rich already have
their money invested. We need to get new investors by stimulating
the poor or the middle class to spend and invest. I don’t know if
Bush’s policy will do that. Ravi Menghani
Fourth-year, biochemistry
Basically it’s going to benefit the wealthy. The bottom 50
percent of wage earners are only going to get about 5 percent of
what is given back by the cuts. I think Bush is trying to please
wealthy constituents but he’s also trying to stimulate the economy
with trickle-down economics. On CNN they were comparing him to
Reagan. I think what Bush should do is redistribute taxes with poor
people getting more back … Giving more money to rich people is
not going to jump-start the economy because the rich won’t spend
any more money. Tina Cydzik
Second-year, materials engineering
I’m fearful of President Bush’s tax plan because I think the way
the economy is working right now, it will be dangerous because some
people will just want to save the money the tax break is giving
them. I don’t think increasing disposable income is actually going
to allow people to spend more. People are concerned about the state
of the economy and war, and they’re going to save their money.
I think it’s a good idea to give money to states and publicly
funded programs. There’s so much deficit spending right now. That
would help balance the cuts that are going on in education. Maybe
increasing health benefits would help, because there’s still people
in need. There isn’t enough money circulating to those who need
assistance.