Grasping Reality on TypePad, by Brad DeLong

The new July jobs report released Friday is an utter disaster for Kansans and embattled Gov. Sam Brownback.... Over the last year, Kansas has actually shed 4,500 jobs... minus 0.3 percent — 5th worst in the nation. Only Wyoming, North Dakota, Louisiana and Oklahoma were behind Kansas.... The governor has stated for more than four years that the income tax cuts he signed in 2012 would lead to an explosion of jobs. That has not happened.... Meanwhile, across the state line in Missouri, that state added 2,100 jobs in July. And over the last year, the Show-Me State has gained 21,500 in employment, or a growth rate of 0.8 percent. That’s 14th worst in the nation, so nothing to be ecstatic about. Then again, at least Missouri is not Kansas.

The most convincing explanation I have heard came from a senior state-level Republican policymaker: "When your state Republican Party is seriously listening to Arthur Laffer and Steve Moore and following them over the cliff into unsustainable policies, the business climate is bad--you know there will be a big backlash someday, but you don't know what form it will take, and that is not a source of risk that you want to add on to what you are currently facing."

And yet the voters of Kansas reelected the clown...

Sam Brownback (2014): The Under the Radar Conservative You Need to Hear From:

We are attempting to be the best place in America to do two things: raise a family and grow a small business.... We’re dominated by small business, and 75 percent of Kansans work for themselves, or for somebody with 10 or fewer employees. And I think overall we’ve done a pretty good job of it because we’ve taken all income taxes off of small business, off of LLCs.... [With] some of the countries that came out of the Soviet Union, dropping their tax rates and upping the revenue that they received... was an interesting model.... They dropped their rates down to much more reasonable levels, they saw their revenues go up, and they saw growth happening....

The one that yells at you is Texas versus California, because you’ve got one with no income taxes and the other with, I think, the highest state income tax in America. Or one of the highest, anyway. And one’s got out-migration, and the other one’s got large in-migration. I think those models are pretty instructive about the role, particularly of income taxes, on growth. Not so much about the issues of property taxes or sales taxes but income taxes and their impact on growth...

And:

Sam Brownback (2014): A Midwest Renaissance Rooted in the Reagan Formula:

Fifty years ago, in 1964, Ronald Reagan gave a famous speech widely broadcast on radio and television called "A Time for Choosing," in which he described the contrast between two potential paths forward for our nation. One path was the continuation of the big-government policies of higher taxes, higher spending, soaring debt, more centralization of power in Washington, more regulation of the economy, more dependence on government programs... and less freedom. The other path... would bring to our nation lower taxes, less spending, reduced deficits, less government dependence, less centralization of power... and more freedom.... Today some call that a choice between a "red state" or "blue state" model. I say it is a choice between dependence and self-reliance, between intrusion and freedom.

While President Obama continues to implement his big-government vision for the nation, Kansas and its neighbors in Missouri and Oklahoma are charting a course based on a vision of lower taxes and leaner governments leading to a more prosperous citizenry. Together our states are implementing taxes and regulatory policies that are building a Midwest renaissance. Last year, my administration implemented income-tax cuts that made Kansas highly attractive to working families and small businesses. The Kansas tax cuts... reduced the top income-tax rate ... supported small business by taking away all income taxes on small businesses... Sub S chapters... LLCs... and sole proprietorships. Those businesses went from a tax rate of 6.45% to zero....

In our region, we hear much about the "border war," a competition for business growth and location between Missouri and Kansas. In truth we are at our strongest when we offer economic opportunity to residents on both sides of State Line Road. Our ultimate goal is the success of our region, bringing businesses from across the nation to the Midwest. When we thrive as a region, we retain and attract the best and brightest.... The American Midwest is fulfilling the dream of a Midwest renaissance in America....

In Kansas the early results are impressive. In the past year, a record number of small businesses—more than 15,000—were formed.... Kansas has the fourth-highest rate of growth in the construction industry in the nation, according to the Associated General Contractors of America. While most of the country struggles to recover from a recession that ended five years ago, Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri are charting a course for a prosperous future—a Midwest renaissance based on bedrock American principles that Ronald Reagan laid out back in 1964.

That "fourth-highest rate of growth in the construction industry in the nation" is a deceptive statistic. You don't see construction cranes in Kansas--save for some rebuilding interstate highway interchanges and some expanding urban hospitals.

And from that hotbed of liberalism, National Review:

Kevin Williamson: Kansas Tax Cuts Won’t Starve the Government Beast:

When Governor Brownback first started talking about large tax cuts, the story for public consumption was naïve supply-side: A more business-friendly Kansas would boom, and new jobs and investment would offset the projected revenue losses. That didn’t happen, and it’s not entirely clear that anybody really expected it to....

Representative Owen Donohoe, for example, said that the new fiscal dispensation was “the greatest thing that’s ever happened to Kansas,” and that it would — here’s the delusional part — “force us to be more efficient.” That’s a nice story, as he told it: “If we become more efficient, that means we provide the same if not better services to the people, and we do it at a lesser cost and save money.” But that isn’t what happened. It never is....

Kansas just passed a new budget... that imposes general cuts (3 percent for most state agencies), large cuts to highway spending, significant cuts to the state universities, and--this part is indefensible--it delays state payments to the fund that sustains its government-employee pensions.... Worse, all that doesn’t even balance the budget, as required by Kansas law.... Unserious men promise to Starve the Beast and balance budgets by eliminating “waste, fraud, and abuse,” the formulation relied upon by, among others, Donald Trump, 2016’s poster-boy for terminal unseriousness. Delusional politicians insist that significant tax cuts can be offset by simple gains in efficiency — but if it were that simple, then why not implement those cost-saving measures first and the tax cuts afterward?...

Most of what state and local governments spend their money on is public schools, state universities, police, roads, and ordinary municipal services.... Kansas is not going to bring its spending down to match a lower revenue line without touching education and the roads. It isn’t going to happen. Yes, conservatives believe in smaller government, but conservatives also believe in prudence--and that our political calculations must in the end take account of reality. And here’s the reality that every politician eventually discovers: You can promise to Starve the Beast, but in the end, the Beast is Us.