I know it because I've read about them for years. Keep up on public affairs; it's sometimes almost impossible to show up at the last minute and be informed.
Well that's the thing; I do keep pretty well up with public affairs, and from what I can tell, most of these ideas come from academia, but without much rigor or data to support these new taxation plans, and the legislators who support them do so for largely un-scientific reasons (e.g. has a good hook for a title).
So when I say this all seems slapdash, I mean that I'm thoroughly unimpressed with the way by which these taxation plans are coming out of the woodwork. Feels like an episode of West Wing, the one with the Cartographers for Social Equity.
If you want to keep up on it, a great source is The Economist. They have a strong free market bias (it is the solution to all things) but they provide serious analysis, including serious economics, accessibly and succinctly. Paul Krugman is good too, when he writes an article on economics - he clearly distinguishes his political preferences from the economics, and presents all serious sides of economic debates (and he has a Nobel Prize in economics).
> from what I can tell, most of these ideas come from academia, but without much rigor or data to support these new taxation plans, and the legislators who support them do so for largely un-scientific reasons (e.g. has a good hook for a title)
Can you give some examples? I think it's too easy to deride everything and everyone; some are good and some are bad ideas.
I agree that policy inevitably goes through the filter of politics, though I think that's essential: The economists who designed the policy cannot know the needs of people in District 9 of North Carolina, and human nature is to designate inconvenient needs of others as nice-to-have, but unnecessary category. (That's how, IMHO, so many policies benefit the wealthy but not working class or poor: It's wealthy people making the policies.)
Of course, that can go too far. We won't get perfect laws.
Nice! I read The Economist weekly (the old fashioned way, from the mail), as well as WSJ, WaPo, NYT, Newsweek, probably ~40 articles a day from Memeorandum, whatever dreck gets put on Twitter, here, and Reddit. I've also got a handful of daily newsletters I subscribe to that I usually get through most of, as well. I'm a bit of a news junky. :)
I don't really have time today to compile a list of proposed tax legislation and their sources (or what I think of those plans), but reading through just the Wyden proposal [0], I can already see more of the "this guy agrees with me politically" crowd coming out than any real example of what Wyden bases this plan on. You've got the bill text, a summary of each section, and a summary of the bill, but no "and here's why we think this". Just the usual "WORKING AMERICANS NEED THIS" filler text that every bill has.
My point is that the "filter of politics" is exhausting and not necessary (to this degree). I do not think it's okay to propose legislation without explaining why it will do what you say, rather than some other thing. We're needlessly rushing the process
Sorry, I misunderstood you about what you read. Now I'd like to know how you have time! If you have any highly efficient curated news aggregation (high value information, generally non-partisan), I'd love to know.
> My point is that the "filter of politics" is exhausting and not necessary (to this degree). I do not think it's okay to propose legislation without explaining why it will do what you say, rather than some other thing. We're needlessly rushing the process
I agree with all that, other than rushing the process. These bills have been discussed for a long time, the tax debates are old (even if not appropriately explained), and the impact of delay is substantial, including reducing the chance of getting anything at all done. The alternative may be 'nothing'.
> If you have any highly efficient curated news aggregation (high value information, generally non-partisan), I'd love to know.
Hah! Literally exactly the thing I'd like to build (productize my process, attach relevant metadata for filtering/sorting, imagine being able to "dial in" your partisan feed to get a sense of what each wing is saying) when I somehow do find some time. I've been spewing ideas at my wife about it for over a year now, but life circumstances threw me in a different direction temporarily.
