OPINION – by Prof. Dr. Bruno COLMANT, Member of the Royal Academy of Belgium
Neoliberalism opposes the social redistribution that characterizes the United States with the trickle-down theory, which asserts that the income of the wealthiest individuals is reinjected into the economy, contributing directly or indirectly to general economic activity and employment in the rest of society. The wealthy must, therefore, be freed from excessive taxation.
This theory was expressed, without naming it, by William Jennings Bryan (1860-1925), Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924), President of the United States from 1913 to 1921, but first put forward in 1932 by an American humorist, Will Rogers, who mocked the tax-cutting program of...
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