MARIA BARTIROMO (HOST): This is an incredible story, and, basically, what the Tax Foundation is saying is, people will hide their income with a 70 percent tax rate. Your thoughts?
STEVE FORBES (EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, FORBES): Yes, and this whole emphasis on revenue is ridiculous. What it's really emphasis should be on (sic) is the harm that it's going to do to the economy. It's going to hurt the very people she professes to be a champion of. When you don't have productive investment, you don't get economic growth. Who's hurt the most? And, in terms of what that 70 percent, you hit on it, it's going to lead to a rise of tax shelters, tax exempt bonds, all the things that slow an economy down instead of reinvigorating it. She's hurting the very people she wants to help.
BARTIROMO: Not only that, but it's not enough money to pay for her green initiatives. What do you think Dagen?
FORBES: It always hits the middle class. It always hits the middle class.
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DAGEN MCDOWELL (FOX BUSINESS HOST): What happens is you come in with this giant spending plan, this big green initiative, and then the money doesn't come in to pay for it, and how do you end up funding it? It's going to end up hitting middle class Americans, lower income Americans, which is what you see in Europe. That's what I've said over and over again. It's like, people pay value-added taxes, they pay high fuel taxes in Europe to pay for all this spending.
BARTIROMO: Yeah, right after the tax cut plan, it really did help stimulate last year in terms of economic growth.
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MCDOWELL: They always fall back on the, well, the tippy-top tax rate used to be above 90 percent. Well, you know who cut it? It was John F. Kennedy's idea to cut the top tax rate, and then, ultimately it was L.B.J. that signed it into law.
And one more thing. I just want some honesty, intellectual honesty out of politicians.
BARTIROMO: That's right.
MCDOWELL: If you want people to drive electric cars and you don't want us to use gasoline, then tax gasoline at $5 a gallon. You're sending a message like, OK, we're going to raise all this money from gasoline and then we're going to force you to buy electric vehicles. That would honest, but they won't do it because it's regressive, and it hits the very people who can't afford it.
