Ryssdal: Without getting into a “he said, he said” argument over the economics of this, because you would win, there are studies that show the opposite of what you say. And let me just give you the anecdotal question here: I’ve talked to some CEOs in the last 10 days and they say ‘Yeah no, I mean, we’re not going to give people a $4,000 raise, what is that?”
Hassett: First, I disagree that there are people that show the opposite of what I say, in the sense that that — you know, as a practical matter that means that you would take my answer and multiply it by negative one, right?
Ryssdal: Well—
Hassett: What’s really happening is that there’s a continuum of results between “workers bear none of the corporate tax” to workers bear, actually there’s some papers that say more than 100 percent.
Ryssdal: Right. Right. But let’s—
Hassett: I’m kind of in the middle there, but there are some people that are below me.
Ryssdal: Without getting into a “he said, he said” argument over the economics of this, because you would win, there are studies that show the opposite of what you say. And let me just give you the anecdotal question here: I’ve talked to some CEOs in the last 10 days and they say ‘Yeah no, I mean, we’re not going to give people a $4,000 raise, what is that?”
Hassett: First, I disagree that there are people that show the opposite of what I say, in the sense that that — you know, as a practical matter that means that you would take my answer and multiply it by negative one, right?
Ryssdal: Well—
Hassett: What’s really happening is that there’s a continuum of results between “workers bear none of the corporate tax” to workers bear, actually there’s some papers that say more than 100 percent.
Ryssdal: Right. Right. But let’s—
Hassett: I’m kind of in the middle there, but there are some people that are below me.
Ryssdal: Let’s take the question in the spirit with which it’s intended, right? I mean there are people who disagree with you, but anecdotally I’m telling you…
Hassett: No, but I’m just characterizing — Can I respond please?
Ryssdal: Of course.
Hassett: I’m characterizing the disagreement, though, as being different from the opposite of what I say. So the people who believe the low end of the literature say that folks will get about $1,000, a $900 pay hike because of this bill. I think that a conservative estimate is $4,000. There are other papers of literature that say it’s a lot more than that. But the range is all positive, and $1,000 is a heck of a lot of money to ordinary people. So even if you take the low end, then I think that you should vote for this bill.
Let’s take the question in the spirit with which it’s intended, right? I mean there are people who disagree with you, but anecdotally I’m telling you…
Hassett: No, but I’m just characterizing — Can I respond please?
Ryssdal: Of course.
Hassett: I’m characterizing the disagreement, though, as being different from the opposite of what I say. So the people who believe the low end of the literature say that folks will get about $1,000, a $900 pay hike because of this bill. I think that a conservative estimate is $4,000. There are other papers of literature that say it’s a lot more than that. But the range is all positive, and $1,000 is a heck of a lot of money to ordinary people. So even if you take the low end, then I think that you should vote for this bill.
Ryssdal: Even though there are corporate CEOs out there who are telling me “Yeah, no, we’re gonna — we have other things we need to do with that money.”
Hassett: Well, what’s going to happen to the CEO who thinks that nothing is going to happen is that a plant is going to locate here that was about to locate in Ireland, and that competitor is going to try to hire a bunch of workers, and then the employer that’s not doing anything is going to have to pay his workers more or lose them to the competition. You know the best way to get a pay raise is to get an outside offer, and this tax policy will give us a whole bunch of new outside offers. That’s where the wage effect’s coming from.