Talk:Trickle-down economics

Two things going on here

I'm a bit confused about whether the article is about

1. the merits and flaws of an actual theory, i.e., "give more to the most fortunate, and somehow the benefits will work their way down to everyone else" or
2. the use of the term "trickle down" as a label for Supply side economics in general or the specific idea that cutting tax rates can sometimes increase tax revenue.

I'm also interested in helping our readers figure out which economists or politicians have advocated trickle down. At least we might start by listing claims (or complaints?) that various politicians have advocated trickle down.

Similar claims, perhaps a bit harder to pin down, might be found in criticisms (veiled or otherwise) that a certain politician's economic policy boiled down to (or smacked of) trickle down. We might say, for example, that

• President T. Rick Eldowne announced in 1953 that cutting tax rates would not just leave the rich with more money to spend or save. He predicted that they would invest this extra money in ways that would create jobs. But S. Narkey Guy called Eldowne's idea "trickle down economics", which won't help the poor because the increased disposable income from a tax cut does not filter into other sections of the economy.

Is anyone interested in helping me distinguish between (1) describing the theory and (2) describing usage of the term? --Uncle Ed (talk) 14:42, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

This is currently under discussion - Thomas Sowell has said that no economist has ever advocated trickle-down economics of the form of giving money to the rich through tax cuts so that they would spend it and the wealth would trickle down. However, many references talk about trickle-down economics (without advocating it themselves). See the discussion above. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 17:33, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

It's going to be hard to describe the source of the term "trickle-down", although I added a reference to Will Rogers.

I would like to figure out whether (A) there is an actual theory here, or (B) people who oppose cutting certain tax rates are branding them as trickle-down. But we have to be careful not to take sides for against any viewpoint, or we will diverge from being neutral.

Investopedia says that people called Laffer's proposal trickle-down, but they didn't say he had such a theory:

• Laffer’s idea that tax cuts could boost growth and tax revenue was quickly labelled “trickle-down.” Between 1980 and 1988, the top marginal tax rate in the United States fell from 70 to 28%. Between 1981 and 1989, total federal receipts increased from $599 to $991 billion. This empirically supported one of the assumptions of the Laffer Curve. However, it neither shows nor proves correlation between a reduction in top tax rates and economic benefits to low- and medium-income earners. [1]

Are they a reliable enough source for inclusion in the article? --Uncle Ed (talk) 13:40, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Quote Farm

Sorry for bifurcating this thread, but I have been looking at various descriptions of 'trickle down' and am wondering which (if any) are relevant to the article. Here is one:

... those who advocate for lower tax rates and less government interference as ways to grow the economy ... clearly do not make their case by seeking

1. a transfer of existing wealth to high-income earners and business owners (i.e. “give more to those who have the most”). Rather, they emphasize
2. the creation of additional wealth and jobs when entrepreneurs are not hampered by heavy regulation and discouraged by steep taxes [2]

I marked it up a little, to emphasize the distinction the author is trying to make. --Uncle Ed (talk) 13:58, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Identity of its proponents

A New York Times article by Robert H. Frank refers repeatedly to "trickle-down theorists" without naming any.

1. Does this simply mean that the author was using trickle-down as a synonym for Supply-side economics? Or,
2. Did he literally mean that there is such a thing as trickle-down theory and that it has adherents?

Thomas Sowell denies the latter, leaving us with the quote from Stockwell. --Uncle Ed (talk) 17:23, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

The article is seriously in error

Trickle-down economics is from people that have money to people that do not. It certainly is much wider then what this article which appears to be a criticism of Reaganomics.

It is used to describe major cash flows in many countries such as Jordan, Lebanon and Moldova which have large cashflows from outside from citizens working in foreign countries.

Hi BernardZ, I haven't seen any sources which describe this cashflow as "trickle-down economics" - could you provide some? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 16:39, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

I did in the stuff you deleted

BernardZ (talk)

Removal of content

Volunteer Marek, you removed some content about Thomas Sowell arguing that no-one had ever advocated trickle-down economics, saying "the same thing is being repeated three damn times". Could you explain a bit more about why you removed this? The content is not duplicated elsewhere in the article that I can see. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 16:36, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Sowell is just mentioned all over the place in this article, so that before my removal, something like half the text was about him. Now, he's notable so it's fine if his views are in here, but they need to be given due weight.Volunteer Marek (talk) 15:20, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

I have restored the content with a fair bit of trimming of unnecessary words, I think is more like its due weight. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 18:26, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

Removal of Sowell content

CFCF, you removed the paragraphs about Sowell saying "UNDUE section, the following section carries critique" - could you explain what exactly you meant here? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 09:54, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Right, it isn't WP:DUE. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 10:00, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

.... and why do you think that? There are several different sources saying that no economist has ever proposed trickle-down economics, why shouldn't that be given a fairly big prominence in the article? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 11:38, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

If you remove a statement from a reliable source, we will be left with only the other side. There is considerable debate over what "trickle-down economics" is, so anything bearing on whether (1) it is a real proposal or (2) it is a nickname to a (slightly?) different proposal for the purpose of blurring any distinctions would be important, not to say crucial.

We are not supposed to resolve controversies, but to present both sides. Supporters of capitalism say that "free market principles" benefit the poor, even if only in an indirect way. Critics of capitalism disagree, arguing that such principles only benefit the rich, and that any benefit to the poor could come only from a (discredited and impossible) trickle-down effect. Maybe this dichotomy of viewpoints needs to be clarified a bit more. --Uncle Ed (talk) 14:05, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

To clarify, it sometimes looks to me like the term trickle-down economics is being used to assert (3) that arguments favoring Capitalism - on the grounds that free market principles increase the standard of living of the poor - amount to nothing more than the notion that helping the rich should result in benefits (somehow) trickling down to the poor and (4) that the trickle-down effect never has happened and can never happen.

Sowell, on the other hand, seems to be arguing (a) that he agrees with #4 (!) but (b) that neither he nor anyone else has actually proposed #3.

[It's kind of like the tussle over The Bell Curve, with Stephen Jay Gould complaining that Charles Murray makes 4 easily falsifiable "assumptions" while Murray denies having made those assumptions. In fact, some contributors recently argued that Murray's denial is not relevant because he's not a secondary source.] --Uncle Ed (talk) 14:16, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, it's a view from a single professor writing in what amounts to some of the most biased sources available. Show that the position is prevalent in the mainstream discourse and not only from one or two professors and you have a case for inclusions. This is a top-level article, that section amounts to minority viewpoints and nitpicky commentary. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 18:27, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

There are three separate economists cited here (Jeram, Horwitz and Sowell). Please try and get consensus on the talk page for your changes as per WP:BRD, rather than just removing the content. Alternatively, feel free to open a WP:RFC. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 18:35, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Yes, do so before reintroducing your statement. There is no indication that anything near-consensus exists to include it. You are giving fringe positions far more weight than the far more authoritative WMF, that is just a textbook example of a WP:DUE-violation. Neither is it especially logical nor does it makes sense to give such weight to semantical opposition of a widely used term. Carl Fredrik 💌 📧 21:33, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

How am I giving it more weight? Maybe you could suggest adding content from the IMF that you think is missing, or rearranging to improve the article? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 21:45, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek: you might be interested in this discussion. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 15:26, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

User:Volunteer Marek, User:Ed Poor and myself are all happy for the content to be included. You are the only editor who wants to remove the content. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 19:37, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

There's an article in FEE by Steven Horwitz, a Professor of Economics at St. Lawrence University, that touches on the issue of whether there is such a thing as "trickle-down economics". [3] --Uncle Ed (talk) 14:44, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, but this is already included in the article (ref 23). Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 16:42, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

strawman argument

"trickle-down economics" is widely used by left leaning critics as a strawman argument. whenever an argument is made that lower taxes would reduce burden on small and medium sized businesses and encourage economic growth, the strawman argument will usually come back with "we already tried trickle down economics, giving money to the rich doesn't work". nobody made the argument that giving money to the rich would grow the economy, but that's what a partisan perceives it as. i think it's very biased to refer to this term like it has any actual credence, especially when this term is used synonymous with supply side economics. which is defined as "macroeconomic theory that argues economic growth can be most effectively created by investing in capital and by lowering barriers on the production of goods and services", and not "economic policies as favoring the wealthy or privileged". A77B (talk) 08:47, 6 May 2017 (UTC)

We work on what reliable sources say - while I agree with you, reliable sources describe trickle-down as it is in the article, so that is how we describe it. There are some other sources (in the "opponents of the term" section) which agree with your view, but if you could add some more then that would be helpful. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 07:41, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

A77B, you might be interested in this: http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/editorials/article186974513.html DOR (HK) (talk) 18:01, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

OR and UNDUE and BLUDGEONING

Perseverence does not excuse you from meeting arguments about putting extreme right-wing commentators on par with the IMF, especially so when their positions are provably false. This edit is extremely problematic: [4], refrain from reinstating such extreme non-NPOV content. Carl Fredrik ^talk 07:58, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

CFCF, you might have missed the discussion above in the section "Removal of Sowell content". I suggest you try to change the consensus there, which currently is for including the content which has three separate sources to back it up. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:02, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, noone is saying that it isn't true: that he said those things.

What however is at issue here is: why it matters that he said those things.

Sowell wrote a post for an extreme right-wing think-tank. This just isn't worth anything compared to the IMF quotes. The above discussions make it very clear that this is undue, and most of your recent editing here has been undue. Carl Fredrik ^talk 08:05, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

• See Talk:Trickle-down_economics#Why was an op-ed used to support the false claim that the term isn't used by professional economists?

As I said in the "Why was an op-ed used to support the false claim that the term isn't used by professional economists?", there is no source which argues that trickle-down economics works. In the "Removal of Sowell content" discussion I showed that there was a consensus for inclusion: myself, Uncle Ed and User:Volunteer Marek have all supported inclusion. Sowell has been quoted in several sources, and has also written similar content for the Spectator. Could you provide evidence that the sources Sowell is quoted in are "extreme right-wing"? I am not saying that the arguments of Sowell, Horwitz and Jeram should be on a par with the IMF, merely that they should not be excluded from the article. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:36, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

The only portion of the entire section that I can agree has any value is the following:

Some supply-side economists consider the term "trickle down" as a political pejorative which does not denote any specific economic theory.

But even that could be sourced much better. There is no need for an entire subsection with two paragraphs of text here, neither does quoting Sowell do anything positive for the article. Carl Fredrik ^talk 08:43, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

References

I still don't understand what your problem is with Sowell, or the sources he is quoted in? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 09:02, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

FEE is a libertarian think-tank, it is WP:FRINGE, and anything that is decidedly far off to one side of the debate has to be balanced according to WP:DUE. There is nothing wrong with quoting Sowell apart from the WP:DUE-consideration. His positions are very far off to one side, and to give him 3x more space than established groups like the IMF is not appropriate. His critique is already present in other parts of the article. Carl Fredrik ^talk 09:10, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Why is an article by Steven Horwitz, who seems fairly distinguished, fringe just because it is a column for a libertarian think-tank? And Sowell is only mentioned once in the article, when he is quoting a criticism of trickle-down economics by a presidential speech writer. Here is another article by Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan saying a similar thing to Sowell and the others.Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 11:54, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

The IMF is also only mentioned once. This is about WP:BALANCE and WP:DUE WEIGHT, not about whether he actually has taken the positions. Why are his positions so remarkable? Carl Fredrik ^talk 07:34, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

I have removed the first mention of Sowell - he is quoting someone else anyway so his name doesn't add anything. Are you now happy to reinstate the content? If there is something that the IMF has said that you think is missing from the article, feel free to suggest it. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:05, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Image in the lead

In the United States prior to the Presidency of Ronald Reagan the majority of average income growth during economic expansions went to the bottom 90% (blue); after 1980, income growth during expansions shifted the top 10% (red). Reaganomics is sometimes used as an example of trickle-down economics.

Not sure about the other stuff, but I don't think the image in the lead is appropriate. The reference is an opinion from a bias source, but when you go to the actual source of the graph, it doesn't seem they make that argument. It looks like WP:SYN - correlation does not imply causation. There were many factors for the economic changes and the trend continues to 2012, probably continues after that. Morphh ^(talk) 00:08, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

I'm fine about moving that image somewhere else, but it is an oft-cited image when it comes to showing Reagonomics. Of course there are disagreements on the whether trickle-down/supply-side caused it. Carl Fredrik ^talk 07:30, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

I will move that image down to the "Criticisms" section as a starting point if that is ok with you guys. I have several problems with the graph - it doesn't make sense to show the "share of income gains" when the income gain can be negative. For example if the bottom 90% had a 0.01% decrease in wages, but the top 10% had a 1% increase, then the overall increase is 0.9%, so the graph would show that the top 10% would have 110% of the income gains which doesn't make sense. It is much clearer to show the absolute percentage increase in income. I am also concerned by the fact that it shows only the periods of expansion - looking at the data then the top 10% lost more during the recessions than the poor so it is unfair to exclude this part. For example, if I include the periods of recession as well as expansion then I get the following graph, which paints a very different picture. (I can't get the x-axis for some reason, but 1980 is the blue line. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:48, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

I just don't get what it's suppose to show about Reagonomics even if you did assume causation. The trend continues with Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2, and Obama, with Obama being the most dramatic shift. The caption makes two true statements which seem to imply without attribution the second statement was the cause of the first. The caption or graph doesn't tie the change to Reagan's tax policy though. It actually shows the opposite, that tax policy had little effect on the trend. If people are oft-citing it for Reagonomics, it's not a great example of whatever they're trying to show. Morphh ^(talk) 11:12, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

It should be noted that Reagan walked into a recession with double digit inflation. Also, the "income inequality" charts never factor in the 30-40% benefits that employees gain out of employer's pockets. This is why most of these "income inequality" charts will deceptively only compare wages and income. A77B (talk) 05:04, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Distribution of growth between the top 10% (left) and bottom 90% (right) in the US between 1917-2010

I'm not sure about the one we have currently, but I think we should have a lead image. How about a cartoon, or Reagan talking about Reagonomics, and cutting taxes increasing growth? LK (talk) 07:50, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

What about this image of Reagan talking about tax reduction? (I've changed the caption from Ronald Reagan article) Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 13:35, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

That image and caption look fine to me, though I may clarify that it was pejoratively characterized as trickle-down. But.. wasn't this article on track to be merged with Reagonomics or Supply-side economics? Seems trickle-down is just a term used by opponents of supply-side for populist messaging. Morphh ^(talk) 13:45, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

Ronald Reagan's economic policies, which were dubbed Reaganomics, included large tax cuts and were characterized as trickle-down economics. In this picture, he is outlining his plan for Tax Reduction Legislation from the Oval Office in a televised address, July 1981

References

My two cents

caveat: I'm an economist.

The trickle-down economic theory, like most economic ideas that get brutalized by politicians, isn’t one that says “just cut taxes and the resulting growth will pay for itself.” Prof. Arthur Laffer himself said it only works when taxes are so high that investment is discouraged. And no, he didn’t specify what that tax rate might be (quite wisely, too: it will vary enormously depending on the conditions).

In the US in the 1980s, trickle-down seemed to work, but only because (a) interest rates were soaring to combat inflation; (b) unemployment soared due to high interest rates choking off demand; and (c) federal spending shot through the roof, generating unprecedented (post-war) deficits and debt.

Throw money at an economy and it will grow. Triple the federal debt between 1981 and 1989 and it can be argued that … whatever happened, worked.

1971-80: debt fell by 1.5 percentage points of GDP.

1981-90: debt rose up by 15.5 points

Here are some interesting sources:

https://www.thebalance.com/trickle-down-economics-theory-effect-does-it-work-3305572

https://www.hks.harvard.edu/news-events/publications/impact-newsletter/archives/autumn-2009/trickle-down-economics-revisited

and, “The IMF Confirms That 'Trickle-Down' Economics Is, Indeed, a Joke”

https://psmag.com/economics/trickle-down-economics-is-indeed-a-joke

One questions seems to be whether anyone ever actually proposed trickle-down as a serious economic policy. If we understand that it is a journalist’s term for supply side economics, then the answer is obviously ‘yes.’ Herbert Stein ( under Nixon), Robert Mundell (Reagan) and Glenn Hubbard (GW Bush) come immediately to mind.DOR (HK) (talk) 12:35, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Good points. Frankly, I'm tempted to merge this article to Supply-side economics. What are your thoughts on that DOR (HK)? Carl Fredrik ^talk 07:31, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Agreed. That's really where it belongs, with a redirect for those who don't know the proper name.DOR (HK) (talk) 17:17, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Just as wage slavery exists alongside the article wage labor, this article also should exist, to document the use of the term, and the arguments it is used in. LK (talk) 06:51, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

I agree with LK; the term "trickle-down theory" has a longer history than the term "supply-side economics", and is not a mere adjunct of that term. The OED shows the first use of "supply side" (but only as a noun) was in 1873; the first use of the term as an adjective to describe a sector of the economy (but not a policy) was in 1957. The earliest use of the term to describe "economic, esp. fiscal, policies designed to promote the supply of goods and services; (also) advocating policies and ideas of this kind, esp. the lowering of taxes and reduction of regulation as a means of increasing revenue and generating growth" was in 1976 when the WSJ used the phrase "Supply-side fiscalism". In 1980 the NYT used the phrase "supply-side policies", and the earliest citation for "supply-side economics" is 1982. On the other hand, Harry Truman said in 1949 "We have abandoned the "trickle-down" concept of national prosperity". Ewulp (talk) 03:55, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

How can that not just be treated in a paragraph "terminology" in a single article? Carl Fredrik ^talk 20:01, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Addition to lead

The following content is in the lead:

"Multiple studies have found a correlation between trickle-down economics and reduced growth, and that higher taxes on the wealthy are linked to economic growth.[4][5][6][7] Trickle-down economics has been widely criticised particularly by left-wing and moderate politicians and economists, but also some right-wing politicians."

This is sourced to one study from the IMF, one collection of graphs showing the income share of the top and bottom parts of the income distribution (which is very misleading, as growth can be negative, as in the above discussion), one column in the New York Times and one article about tax havens that doesn't really mention trickle-down economics. To have a statement like this in the lead, it should really be sourced by several secondary sources (I'm not including columns in that!) Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 20:42, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

This is really just supply side economics

The problem with the article is that as you add references to it, you're really just still talking about supply-side economics; so any reference and text here should be added there as well and vice versa.

But that's a problem. Really the topic is the same; we've duplicated the article.

This is why you're not really supposed to have articles on terms very much, "Wikipedia is not a dictionary" and all that. Perhaps we should merge and add this terminology to the main article?GliderMaven (talk) 22:18, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Merge discussion

I propose that Trickle-down economics be merged into supply side economics. I think that the content in the Trickle-down economics article can easily be explained in the context of supply side economics, and the supply side economics article is of a reasonable size that the merging of Trickle-down economics will not cause any problems as far as article size or undue weight is concerned. GliderMaven (talk) 02:29, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Agreed.DOR (HK) (talk) 15:30, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

IMHO, though I think they could be merged, there is a distinction that is important (although it depends on which source you look at for definitions). See this article or this book.

Although some sources do, in fact, define them the same, many sources draw a sharp distinction defining trickle-down as a type of supply-side economics. Supply-side theory generally states that by lowering taxes overall there is more money in circulation thus encouraging growth overall. Trickle-down more specifically states that by lowering taxes on businesses and the wealthy you encourage the growth of industry which ultimately benefits everybody. The former idea has some mixed support among scholars (not very strong support) whereas the latter is virtually discredited by every serious scholar. I tend to think that distinction is important enough to merit two articles.

-- MC 141.131.2.3 (talk) 15:30, 12 October 2017 (UTC)

P.S. As a point of reference, note that trickle-down theory can be said to be nearly equivalent to the theory of the palace economy whereas supply-side theory covers a much broader idea than the palace theory. --MC 141.131.2.3 (talk) 15:47, 12 October 2017 (UTC)

Trickle-down is the common name. Supply side means something different and is not a widely used name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.127.226.225 (talk • contribs)

• Support Merge - Trickle-down is often used as a pejorative term for support supply side policies. This is mentioned in this article, the supply side article and in Reaganomics. I think it makes sense to have the topic in one place and not break the criticism into its own article - this might be considered a WP:POVFORK. Morphh ^(talk) 03:43, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

• Do Not Merge - Supply-side economics is the broader concept that ties to other concepts like underconsumption, overproduction, and, of course, its counterpart demand-side economics. To address an above comment, supply-side is used in scholarly and practical discussion, supply and demand are too fundamental to economics as concepts to ignore fundamental schools of thought surrounding them. I believe that the mechanics of the Trickle-down effect, which seems to be much of what is discussed both here and within the Trickle-down economics article, absolutely fit within the scope of supply-side economics and would make sense to merge that article instead into this one. Trickle-down economics, however, has an important role as a political concept historically, much of which is discussed in the Reaganomics article, but is not fully within the realm of economics. For instance, important historical criticisms and satire such as William Jennings Bryan's mention in his Cross of Gold speech as well as modern usage and satire of the term, such as the usage of the term pejoratively in the 2016 United States Presidential Debates by Hillary Clinton, deserve an article that observes the topic strictly within politics with the provision of the economic theory given only as context. The term will quite likely prompt more satire in at least the near future that does not hold a place within the topic of supply-side economics. I would, however suggest to consider merging Trickle-down effect into this article, as is indicated in the about hatnote in the first line of the article. I agree with the suggestion that Trickle-down economics appears to be a POV fork, though, and perhaps it is better off being moved into an article about the use of the term and its related phrases historically in politics, with the economic discussion currently in the article reduced only to an amount that provides context for the use of the satirical term. Adequately distinguishing the currently trickle-down economics page as purely a discussion of its usage as a term in political critique or satire would resolve the matter of the POV fork, and the economic theory discussions therein could be migrated to this page or the trickle-down effect page. This mostly seems to occur at the beginning of the article and towards the end with its use of a research paper about the validity of trickle-down as an economic theory, which would be more adequately suited to the economic theory article. In short, too much of the content of the Trickle-down economics page is political and not within the scope of economic discussion or documentation, so the articles should remain separate. Consider merging in Trickle-down effect instead. Penitence (talk) 08:29, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

"higher taxes on the wealthy are linked to economic growth"

This phrase in the lead, with four references after it. I can't however see where the sources say this? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 13:50, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

It's a pretty broad and highly questionable statement as currently phrased. Let's make taxes on the "wealthy" 100% then and be booming and deficit free. I don't doubt there is context, examples, and situations where it's a true statement, but as described here, it's pretty broad and likely unsupportable. We need to be careful of WP:SYN. If the references don't make that broad specific claim, then we should remove it. Morphh ^(talk) 14:48, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

The wording "have found" in that sentence is also a problem for WP:CLAIM. It's a loaded term that indicates "truth", instead of saying the studies said, wrote, or argue their viewpoint. Morphh ^(talk) 14:55, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Describing a finding as a finding is not an example of a WP:CLAIM, as using plain language is always preferable. The existence of this correlation is not contested, only its implications towards causation. The widely-supported, extensively studied existence of a correlation shouldn't be ignored or downplayed without a reliable source explaining the issue. As a summary in the lede, this seems like an appropriate level of detail. Grayfell (talk) 01:01, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Note that Joecite has also argued for removal, saying "these sources are not direct studies that observe the correlation between Trickle-Down economics, and growth rates. Rather they observe correlations between income inequality and growth." Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:42, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

The suggested implication is that there is causation, otherwise it wouldn't be included. Statistical correlation can be used to prove and disprove the point, depending on what measures / timeframes are used. The debated point is over the causation and if other social or economic effects, not the tax policy, were the cause of said statistical correlations. I think to state a truth of correlation (which could also be seen as a viewpoint) without the argument of causation would be misleading to the reader. Morphh ^(talk) 20:14, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Grayfell, I think we should be much more careful, especially in the lead, about what claim we are making here. The studies use "trickle-down economics" in very different contexts. One (the IMF) says that "increasing the income share of the poor and the middle class actually increases growth while a rising income share of the top 20 percent results in lower growth", one (Levy Institute) says that most income gains are going to the wealthiest people, the NYT says that high inequality inhibits growth, while the Guardian finds that lots of money is going offshore. These all mention trickle-down economics, but very different parts of it. I don't think we can make such a broad claim in the lead. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 08:49, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

That is an astonishingly poor argument. The IMF study alone has enough clout to merit inclusion in the lede. That other arguments exist as well only strengthens the argument. The IMF study is very authoritative and conclusively states that only increased income in the bottom and middle sections of the economy creates growth. Distrait cognizance (talk) 09:58, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

What you're quoting is not what the sentence stated. It's a WP:SYN argument: A + B = C. High economic inequality is linked to slower growth + taxes on wealthy reduces economic inequality = taxes on wealthy increases growth. That's a logical fallacy, does not consider D,E,F, applies under the context of X,Y,Z, with the conditions of a bell curve. Unless the source specifically makes that assertion, the sentence is WP:OR and should not be included. Morphh ^(talk) 15:15, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Morphh. Economics isn't just about pure theories that lead to ideal outcomes under perfect conditions. It is mainly about how politicians twist their thin understanding of economics into populist phrases that have little to do with reality, and then use their election victories to reward their friends and punish their enemies. Along the way, economics gets the blame.DOR (HK) (talk) 18:08, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Incredible BIAS in article

There is no SUPPORT whatsoever in this article for trickle down economics. It is simply a labour left wing propaganda article bashing low taxes 101.183.21.131 (talk) 12:41, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Welcome to Widipedia! It might surprise you to learn that we don't advocate one way or the other; that's for politicians. DOR (HK) (talk) 15:15, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Entire article is a tour-de-force of Bad Economics

There is no such thing as "trickle-down theory". There is no such theory. As the article states it was entirely invented by a humorist. This article should be deleted and I'm surprised it even exists. Ergzay (talk) 05:07, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

At Wikipedia that's an irrelevant argument. The only question to be asked is if the subject is notable, as documented in RS. Is it? Obviously. The phrased is very well-known, and, unfortunately, many people actually think it makes sense, even though it doesn't work. Our job is to document the phrase in all its...umm...dubious..."glory".

I suspect you're being facetious. If not, then WP:CIR comes into play. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 05:53, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

This argument has been discussed before on this talk page a few times. There is no record of any economist or politician advocating trickle-down economics (in terms of "if you cut taxes for the rich, they will spend more and that wealth will trickle down"). However, it has been widely covered in media and therefore (unfortunately) is notable. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 07:42, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Well, here's an article written by a senior fellow at the Adam Smith Institute that argues that "trickle-down economics does work, will work, and always has done so .... the argument isn’t that trickle-down economics doesn’t work — even when we use the definition designed as an insult — it’s 'how well does it work?' because we all agree it does." And here's an interview with 2017-2018 White House chief economic advisor Gary Cohn: "When you take a corporate tax rate at 35 percent and move it to 20 percent ... We create wage inflation, which means the workers get paid more; the workers have more disposable income, the workers spend more. And we see the whole trickle-down through the economy, and that's good for the economy." Ewulp (talk) 10:00, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Ok, so I should have written "if you cut taxes for the rich, they will spend more and that wealth will trickle down, which is better than (say) cutting taxes for the poor or cutting the deficit" - the second part is the disputed one. Cohn is (I think) talking about stimulating investment by those companies, rather than just having spare money sitting around and therefore giving it out to workers. Anyway, this is getting slightly off topic, as we both agree that the topic is notable. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 10:21, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Both parts are disputed. If the wealthy invested that extra money in higher wages, starting with the lowest paid (see John Rawls), the increased buying power of the enlarged customer base would help the economy (and business owners), as well as reducing the number who must use welfare benefits to survive. That's classic Social Democracy, and it works great. Experience shows that the wealthy don't usually use that money in that way. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 19:14, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

You think that if taxes are cut, then the rich won't increase their spending *at all*? Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 14:45, 19 September 2018 (UTC)

Every study done shows that a tax savings or rebate to a wealthy person goes mainly to new personal investments; whereas the same money to a poor person goes to spending, and then some. So, the answer is, yes. If the point or goal is demand stimulation, don't give it to the rich.DOR (HK) (talk) 21:19, 19 September 2018 (UTC)

So if it *mainly* goes to investments, what does the rest go to? I agree that giving money to the poor is far more effective at inducing spending, but you were arguing that there would be no new spending generated at all. Absolutelypuremilk (talk) 10:24, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

ConsumptionDOR (HK) (talk) 16:11, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

There is quite a logical jump from "the wealthy don't usually use that money in that way" to "the rich won't increase their spending *at all*". To be even more concise, you turned "usually not" into "not at all". Those are different. You cheated. --Hob Gadling (talk) 11:14, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Investment allocates capital just as spending does, but in any case this whole discussion is off track. The question here is what is trickle-down economics. It's clear that it is simply a pejorative term for Reagonomics or supply side economics, both of which already have pages. Since it has been used in popular media it could have a page, but it should not be referred to as an "economic theory" - it is not and has never been a theory, but rather a label given to certain economic actions or to oversimplify certain economic theories. The page should reflect this much, referring to it as a term. Highest Standards (talk) 16:58, 9 October 2018 (UTC)

This is not a response to what I wrote. --Hob Gadling (talk) 10:13, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

It should be clearly noted that there's no such economic theory called "Trickle-down economics"

While the article itself mentions that this concept was the creation of some humorist, not an economist, the article stills makes it unclear that this is not an actual economic theory that could be found in any economy text book, framework or theory as such. The article heavily relies on political expressions to articulate what "Trickle-down economics" is while making insignificant and superficial references to actual economic theories . It should be noted that this is a political device, not some articulated economic theory or principle. Mentions alone of "Trickle-down economics" elsewhere from reliable sources won't change this fact. The claims made by supply-side economics, an actual theory created by economists, have nothing to do whatsoever with the claims made by the humorist who invented "Trickle-down economics". If Wikipedia incorrectly decides that these two notions are the same, then there's no point in having two separate articles, this should redirected to the supply-side economics article. Alsamuef (talk) 18:51, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia should be shamed of extreme ideological bias especially on economics

GIVE ME THE SOURCE which economists claim "Trickle-down economics"? It does not exist as Thomas sowell mentioned(https://www.daytondailynews.com/news/opinion/thomas-sowell-and-trickle-down-economics/Q7HaS9Sfr4KQtlhsW9sscI/) This shows how left wing leaning Wikipedia is showing propaganda and becomes a demagogue. Even Milton Friedman and Hayek never mentioned about Trickle down Why did you put Reagan on this? Top tax rate was cut initially by Kennedy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEdXrfIMdiU) and this is not something "voodoo" as Liberals arguing There are plenty of research and working papers about Positive effects of cutting tax rates from the high authority journals (" Marginal rate cuts lead to increases in real GDP and declines in unemployment" https://www.nber.org/papers/w19171) Please, Biased Liberals do some work before you argue with your bad emotion. Do some research I can show you tons of proven research about Tax cut effects Sigh....

Read the link a few lines above this, the one in "Well, here's an article written by a senior fellow at the Adam Smith Institute". --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:26, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

Try this: type "Trickle-down economics," with the quotation marks, into Google. Second, read the number ("about 556,000") of hits. Third, reconsider why you are so angry about this article. Finally, get a life. DOR (HK) (talk) 07:05, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

DOR, If somebody calls you "idiot moron", that doesn't mean you become "idiot moron DOR" Lots of liberals tend to call whom disagree "uneducated" when they are the ones who don't know any knowledge or just have biased ideology

I don't know why Wikipedia abstract this as purely negative term when the credible research from top journals (that is what we call real "educated") say lots of positive benefits from cutting marginal income tax and Corporate tax rates And if you guys really wanna describe this you should mention It was KENNEDY who implemented this policy First! When I see the picture of Reagan, I can clearly figure out Wikipedia starts to be a demagogue machine again

Double Standards

Why is the term trickle-down given a page on it's own when it has little if any reason to exist.TheDarkMaster2 (talk) 15:59, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MoVLl_ne2Y&feature=youtu.be

Perhaps the fact that there is a YouTube video (not a valid resource, but still...), and you cared enough to look here means there's actually something worth acknowledging. DOR (HK) (talk) 00:15, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

The term is not an accepted definition of any economic theory, it’s simply a political, pejorative label critics used to insult more libertarian economic ideas about lower taxation leading to economic growth. The article admits it derives from a joke. The question is whether such a term deserves being legitimated by a separate page. The page itself is in the worst tradition of Wikipedia leftist slant by serving as an attack on “supply-side” economics, which is a more serious term. I’ve never seen an economist self-describe as supporting it. I ended up here because I was surprised to see a page on it and wanted to see if it would be as bad as I expected.

It has turned out to be.

Sych (talk) 09:06, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

The term merits an article because it's a common term that people may hear and be curious about. Would you prefer that readers who type "trickle-down economics" into the search box be redirected to Supply-side economics? That would be equating the two; instead the two concepts have separate articles. There's no bias in this; pejorative labels beloved by the right also have Wikipedia articles, e.g. Tax and spend, Social justice warrior, Anchor baby, Gay agenda, Death panels, Liberal elite, Limousine liberal, Snowflake (slang), Gore effect, Moonbat, Loony left, and many more. Ewulp (talk) 22:59, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Usage and support for trickle-down economics

@DOR (HK) I noticed that you reverted my change stating that in recent history, there is little belief among economists that trickle-down economics improves an economy and it is now mainly used to characterise similar policies under the heading of "trickle-down". Could you provide one or two sources of recent economists supporting trickle-down economics? I couldn't seem to find any. I am also curious about the second part of my edit, which was specifically backed up with 3 examples of economic policies being classified as "trickle-down" to discredit them. Iron filings (talk) 23:30, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

This set of policy positions has been so compromised over the years that I have a hard time finding any credible sources willing to stake their professional reputations on it. DOR (HK) (talk) 21:53, 15 April 2021 (UTC)

Opening paragraph

We say, "Whereas general supply-side theory favors lowering taxes overall, trickle-down theory more specifically advocates for a lower tax burden on the upper end of the economic spectrum." Question: does anyone have any hard evidence of any mainstream economist ever advocating a supply-side approach that wholly focuses on lowering taxes on the less well-off? The entire point of supply-side fiscal policy is to generate more capital investment, which suggests that lowering taxes only works for the investor class. If this is the case, then the sentence I quote here should be deleted. DOR (HK) (talk) 17:16, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

Removal of cited information

Revert in question
Discussion over this revert removing this cited information and whether to include this information on the page. Helper201 (talk) 19:01, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Taking this here as asked. The source does not state that it is an editorial. Perhaps it could be moved to criticisms if it is found to be one but much of the information added and included in the article is data from a report, so I think it fits better in this section. Its complete removal I think is unjustified. Helper201 (talk) 15:26, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Much of what was added is simply relaying data from the report and the commentary on the data was placed in quotations. Helper201 (talk) 15:38, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

I'm wary of including this for a couple of reasons. One, it is a lot of text for a relatively marginal report (despite its pomp, WIP isn't really well publicized). Two, we need to be very careful with BI as it sometime syndicates content that is unreliable (per WP:RSP). If we found another source, I think that would be better, but we would need to also significantly trim this entry and be careful for language. Right now, it reads like a hit piece. Squatch347 (talk) 22:09, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

There is really no need to be citing magazines for things of this nature. If Pikety et al have really proved something with regard to supply side, then we should either cite their scholarship or a reliable secondary source that describes, not some business insider op-ed. This is no different than any other science article, the popular press greatly distorts and exaggerates what the actual research says, and should be avoided for that reason. Bonewah (talk) 14:23, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

As I said, I kept it to including data points and some commentary that was specifically put in quotation marks to indicate as such. I don't see any issue with the data from World Inequality Report that it references or any evidence to say its unreliable. Again, the source doesn't not state that it is an editorial or an op-ed. Helper201 (talk) 18:58, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

• Include Business Insider isn't perhaps the best source, but its not garbage either. Its not apparently an editorial, even though it is somewhat strongly worded. I think the only change I would really make to the wording is to just attribute the claim better, noting that those conclusions about the report were drawn by so and so at Business Insider. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 20:39, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and I would move it down to the Criticism section. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 20:41, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

• Exclude. A huge study of 20 years of global wealth demolishes the myth of 'trickle-down' and shows the rich are taking most of the gains for themselves. Yuck. There is a thriving scholarly literature on inequalities and wealth concentration. Cite that. JBchrch talk 20:59, 16 December 2021 (UTC)
• Exclude. The scholarly work of Pikety and others can be cited to peer-reviewed literature. Using this popularized version of a subset of their research furthers this article's confusion between economic theory and political jargon and polemic. SPECIFICO talk 21:06, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

— Let's be clear about one thing: trickle down economics is far more important as a political issue than as an economic one. As such, we should be using citations and crafting the article as if this were about a political issue. It doesn't matter if serious economists believe in it or not: politicians (at least some) do, and media commentators as well. So, from here on in, may I politely request that we stop debating the quality of economic support for this topic, and focus on its political impact? DOR (HK) (talk) 22:34, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

What content would we need to remove to make clear the topic that you correctly identify? I think this bears serious consideration. SPECIFICO talk 23:46, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Well, oppose. This article is about the economic proposition that taxes on businesses and the wealthy in society should be reduced as a means to stimulate business investment in the short term and benefit society at large in the long term. Whether serious economists believe in it or not is a very relevant topic. JBchrch talk 23:50, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

• Exclude, there should be far better sources available about this subject than Business Insider. Use those better, more in-depth, and more serious sources instead of that. The material in question looks like an effort to push "This is bad" with a marginal reference, rather than to demonstrate that in a much less in-your-face way through more serious and in-depth research. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:46, 17 December 2021 (UTC)
• Include, but re-write to be more on-topic Summoned by bot. Seems like proper RS coverage of an on-topic and notable academic's group, but the actual content of this edit needs to be fixed. So first, it seems like it should be included because 1) Piketty et al. are notable on this subject, 2) Insider is WP:RS for this purpose, 3) there's nothing special about this topic to restrict sourcing to peer-reviewed sources, and 4) if there are better sources, add them (Even just [5] linked from this piece). But the edit should be fixed by 1) adding attribution to the Lab and Piketty et al. by name, not just the report name; 2) focusing on the trickle down findings, not just the description of inequality; right now it is the eye candy of x percent now own y percent that goes on way too long -- in fact the data cited muddies the discussion by noting that inequality vastly expanded in the last couple of years, what does that have to do with trickle down? it doesn't say; 3) as part of two, focus on the descriptive/evidence in the report, the normative statements by themselves don't work; 4) expand sourcing, the Insider piece is a bit breathless, would be good to find another secondary source to be sure we're getting it right. Chris vLS (talk) 01:05, 17 December 2021 (UTC)
• Include per Chris vLS_{(summoned by browsing RfC/A)} - I find his argument compelling. I agree that the politics is an important aspect of the topic... both the economists and politicians should be documented here. Fieari (talk) 07:38, 17 December 2021 (UTC)
• Exclude Im not opposed to discussing the political aspects of Trickle-down, but random, sensationalistic garbage from the popular press is not the way to do it, especially as there is no shortage of actual scholarly work on that aspect of the topic. Bonewah (talk) 13:54, 17 December 2021 (UTC)
• Comment I think editors that have an issue with the source should think carefully and seriously in distinguishing between whether that necessarily means the article is not allowed to be cited at all on the page and whether all the information contained within it is completely unusable in its entirety. It’s one thing to have an issue with a source, but another more radical and extreme one to say that issue means it elevates the matter to point where the source cannot be cited at all and that it is completely useless. The source has plenty of data points in it, such as those from the World Inequality Report which could be useful in expanding the page. I'm happy if people want to change the wording in my edit in order to include the source and if people look into compromises. Helper201 (talk) 15:53, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

The actual World Inequality Report only mentions trickle-down in chapter 10, and, although the authors are critical of trickle-down, thier rhetoric is no where close to what the BI article says. This is what my concern is, even setting aside the question of how reliable the World Inequality Report actually is, the popular representation of it is so distorted as to be useless, in my opinion. Bonewah (talk) 16:46, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

• Include I don't actually think BI is a good source, nor do I think it's close to the best one, but it's FAR too easy for editors to say we shouldn't include this source while vaguely waving toward potentially better sources which aren't in the article and if we're being honest aren't on their way to being in the article. So rather than pretend like we're going to keep it out for the sake of encyclopedic neutrality we should be forced to reckon with it. Protonk (talk) 17:16, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

Your Ok including an edit that grossly misrepresents what *its* sources say just because the material might not ever get included otherwise? And what exactly is the important thing that is being excluded? That the author of the BI editorial doesnt like trickle-down. How about we exclude it for being irrelevant and misleading? Bonewah (talk) 18:47, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

And by the way, the notion that this sort of information is currently missing from the article is fiction. About half this article is taken up by its 'criticism' section which is mostly this sort of cherry picking of quotes of questionable relevance or provenance. I disagree with the notion that we should be piling more garbage into this article so that we are "forced to reckon with it" whatever that means. Bonewah (talk) 18:57, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

— JBchrch, This article is about the POLITICAL proposition that taxes on businesses and the wealthy in society should be reduced as a means to stimulate business investment in the short term and benefit society at large in the long term. Serious economists have already made it clear that as an ECONOMIC theory, it is severely lacking . DOR (HK) (talk) 01:41, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

• Exclude – No issues with citing data from the WIP, but there are valid concerns that Business Insider is drawing conclusions in editorializing fashion and not simply stating the report's findings. We need scholarly, academic sources for that kind of analysis, not some quick journalistic reading of the data. The only way it could remain is with proper attribution added, but even then I think stronger analysis is needed here. --GoneIn60 (talk) 18:29, 18 December 2021 (UTC)
• Include but reword - BI is a perfectly reasonable source for this purpose, the problem here is that the content added is not quite about trickle-down economics. But we could fix it to make it work, so we should. Loki (talk) 03:17, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
• Exclude - Per my reasons above. It isn't clear that this article is an actual BI article and per WP:RSP we should be wary of BI's syndicated columns accuracy. This is even more so the case here where a simple perusal of the actual source shows it to be vastly different than the write up we are linking to. I'm also unsure the WIP article itself is notable and, in its current form certainly violates WP:UNDUE. The broader discussion on this article's nature is probably important here. We are getting stuck because the source is treating a strawman as if it were an actual economic theory. The term is a political label used primarily as a pejorative. Squatch347 (talk) 22:51, 19 December 2021 (UTC)
• Exclude - There are much better sources than random op-eds for this topic. Don't quite see what people are getting at with the politics/economics distinction; drawing evidence based conclusions from policy decisions is what economics is about. --RaiderAspect (talk) 06:54, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
• Trim down and include in the Criticism section. It belongs to the criticism section. Alaexis_¿question? 13:23, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
• Exclude: for this topic we generally want academic sources, not newspaper columns. We could cite the report directly, but I'll trust Bonewah's findings that the report only covers trickle-down economics in one chapter, so it's not in-depth enough to justify a place here (there's plenty that has been written entirely on trickle-down economics). — Bilorv (talk) 21:04, 26 December 2021 (UTC)

Image Description.

Good afternoon,

The current image description is "...dubbed "Reaganomics", included large tax cuts and were characterized as trickle-down economics." Leaving this as "characterized" begs the question, by whom to avoid wiki voice.

I made this update earlier which was reverted, so I'm bringing it to the talk page. The revert editor said it was "clearly David Stockman" which could be a fair change since he was one of the earliest advocates of that term. However, the very next sentence is that Reagan's political opponents seized on the term. I think the political opponents language is more apt given that they popularized the characterization. However, if editors would rather it be more limited to Stockman, that would be a good edit as well.

Pending thoughts, Squatch347 (talk) 22:19, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

FEE citation in the lead

Squatch347, regarding this edit, just need to keep in mind that WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY. Great that you are open to having the reference in the body, but it's actually a requirement. Citations should not solely appear in the lead. Perhaps a shorter version of this in the lead would be fine, but I would first work on integrating the citation and specific definition into the body. --GoneIn60 (talk) 18:12, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

But we cannot use a FEE opinion to verify a factual claim in Wiki-voice. Please consider the alternative compromise wording I proposed that Squatch reverted in the edit you link above. SPECIFICO talk 18:40, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

GoneIn60, I think it clearly follows the body. The summary of the history section is, essentially, that this is a pejorative term for a characterization of a political position. We can add links to the body to conform, but without this summary we are using wiki's voice to imply that there is an actual position advocated by actual people called "trickle-down" which seems out of step with the body of the article.

Specifico, I might have missed it, what alternative wording did you propose? The only edit I saw was the clean removal of the language. Squatch347 (talk) 19:05, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Please see the two different prior to yours. SPECIFICO talk 19:21, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

This [6] and this [7]? Squatch347 (talk) 19:26, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Squatch347, while the idea that the term is pejorative is somewhat implied throughout the body, it still feels like the statement "to stimulate business investment in the short term and benefit society at large in the long term" isn't really getting the ample coverage it needs in the body. We get a sense of it, but nothing direct. Perhaps both the term and the statement need to be stated more bluntly in the body, so that when one reads both in the lead, they are able to locate the in-depth discussion later in the article. Just my 2¢.

SPECIFICO, I'm not opposed to calling the term colloquial in the lead. I'll leave that up to others how that's sorted out. I was more focused on the content addition, perhaps trimming and making the body more complete if it were to be kept. --GoneIn60 (talk) 17:58, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

GoneIn60 What do you think of the text I proposed? Trickle-down economics is a colloquial terrm for supply-side economic public policies such as "Reaganomics". Whereas general supply-side theory favors lowering taxes overall, trickle-down theory more specifically advocates for a lower tax burden on the upper end of the economic spectrum. I think we need to get the FEE bit out of there as a first step. SPECIFICO talk 18:15, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

If it were to remain, I would probably shorten it to one sentence without trying to cram in "Reagonmics". That term can be briefly defined/used later in the opening paragraph or relegated to the body altogether. The opening three sentences in the lead, as they are right now, are long-winded and can use some concise copyediting. --GoneIn60 (talk) 20:42, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

Additionally, once resolved, I'd like to add this source to the revised final wording: [8]Squatch347 (talk) 19:26, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

You mean the part where Gary Cohn says how happy he is with trickle-down? Hardly pejoritive. Per my edit cited above, it is colloquial and sometimes facetious but it is not innately pejorative. We go with the sources first, text later. Not text first then google a source. SPECIFICO talk 20:48, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

GoneIn60, ahh I appreciate the clarification. I think it definitely can be cleaned up a bit, but I don't like the replacement with colloquial. That implies that this is just a layman's term for an actual economic proposal, rather than a strawman of actual proposals, a la the body of the article. I'd propose something like; "..., was a term coined by political satirist Will Rogers; it is a pejorative characterization of some supply-side economic policies, such as "Reaganomics"....

Squatch347 (talk) 20:51, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

I think define what it is in the opening sentence without any comparisons, have a nice and simple sentence, and then spend the next 2-3 sentences putting the definition in context (using comparisons and such). But that's just me. --GoneIn60 (talk) 21:37, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

I have implemented this suggestion. I propose we now work on the next several sentences and article text. SPECIFICO talk 21:59, 9 January 2022 (UTC)

I think most of that reduction is fair. I've made a few changes though, again I don't like the word "colloquial" since the term is used almost exclusively in a critical context and is used in both academic literature and in public usage (hence not colloquially). I also re-added the source since there isn't consensus on its removal yet. Especially if we are going to slim down this sentence. I've also added the Wharton source solely relating to its discussion of the term pejoratively. Cohn's inclusion in the source aside, this is a published piece by the Wharton School, so it meets WP:RS Squatch347 (talk) 23:22, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

I just pointed out to you that Trump's top economic advisor endorsed the term enthusiastically in the course of implementing the largest such tax cut in history. There is no consensus for your view, so you need to self-revert and continue to engage in discussion here. Edit warring is never constructive. SPECIFICO talk 23:29, 10 January 2022 (UTC)

Whoa there with the edit warring accusation, we are looking at trying to find a consensus language, and I'll remind you that it was you that simply re-introduced your edits to the mainpage during a discussion. Adding an additional source and proposing some counter language is hardly waring.

As for the source, yes one of Trump's economic advisors is quoted in the article, but the article itself is what I'm referencing, not the quote from that advisor. I don't understand your argument for why his reference in a section of the article irrelevant to its usage here, means it isn't WP:RS. Squatch347 (talk) 14:43, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

Cphn's statement is a counterexamplel that disproves your argument for this content. There's consensus here against the FEE source, so re-inserting it is indeed inappropriate. The Wharton bit is a self-published paper and not RS for the claim you are trying after-the-fact to find a source to fit. SPECIFICO talk 16:00, 11 January 2022 (UTC)

• I don't think there's sufficient sourcing to justify this in the first sentence of the lead, and per WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY we would need to actually have relevant text in the body for the lead to summarize - this new proposed addition to the lead doesn't reflect anything in the body at all. Though, again, I feel that based on the relatively sparse sourcing so far compared to the much longer sourcing of other aspects in the rest of the body, it is probably going to be WP:UNDUE for the first sentence even once added to the body. It isn't just a matter of it being present in the body; we need to figure out how significant this take on its history is in the overall scope of coverage on the topic, and represent that in the body, then reflect it in the lead proportionately to how it is represented in the body. Also, regarding this edit summary, the addition to the lead is relatively new (it was added here) so per WP:ONUS, consensus must be shown to include it, not to remove it. EDIT: Also, FEE is a WP:BIASED source and absolutely cannot be cited without attribution, especially not in the lead. We can say that this is their opinion but cannot present it as fact. Note that we mention that a few people have argued that the term doesn't represent their views and was never used seriously, this is unequivocally (and appropriately) presented as contested opinion in the body - we absolutely cannot present it as fact in the lead without higher-quality neutral sources saying as much. --Aquillion (talk) 20:58, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

Lack of citation

The article claims that Will Rogers created the phrase, but the link at the end of that sentence (#7) leads to an opinion piece from the National Review that has nothing to do with the origin of the term, nor does it offer a reliable definition of "trickle-down" economics. Kaylamolander (talk) 06:40, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@Kaylamolander: I assume you are referring to the sentence in the WP:LEAD (not main body) of the article. In which case, the source you mentioned seems to be cited to support the second part of that sentence, not the first part about Will Rogers. Per MOS:LEADCITE, because the lead of the article is a summary of the main body and will thus contain repeated information, it is not necessary to provide citations for every piece of information in the lead, as long as the same information is already supported by citations in the main body. In this case, the "History and usage" section provides more detail about the Will Rogers origin with a citation. Bennv123 (talk) 09:22, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

Lead sentence and article scope.

We start off by saying "Trickle-down economics is a colloquial term for supply-side economic policies." There's an amazing number of problems in that, for such a short sentence. First, it's entirely unsourced. Whose view is that, or what set of views is it summarising? Second, it's a logical impossibility, as the supposed "colloquial term for" was coined decades earlier than the other. Third, it sets the scene for an ongoing muddle about the scope of the entire article. Are the two indeed supposedly synonymous? Free-marketeers get very huffy that their "supply-side reforms" don't simply amount to trickle-down. (Which indeed sounds unlikely to me, as they invariably amount to unfunded tax cuts for the rich, corporate deregulation, and kneecapping anything resembling workers' rights, but my opinion's not what matters here.) 109.255.211.6 (talk) 23:14, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

I've tried to improve this as best as I can. It was immediately drive-by reverted by a page-patroller, but with no rationale that makes any sense. Please tweak it further if anyone feels it doesn't correctly summarise the article, but not just by restoring the previous terrible version. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 08:00, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Your challenge certinly has merit, but your new sentence replaces an uncited and opinionated sentence with another that is also uncited but less opinionated. Of the two, IMO this one is less POV, So I support keeping it for now. But you really need to find a supporting citation. Of course both statements could be true, certainly the term "trickle-down" has been used derisively of the UK Government's tax-cuts announcement of last week, which its supporters have been praising as "supply-side reforms". When searching for citations, please note that an example of use does not constitute a valid citation; the citation must describe and explain the usage.

@Oopsemoops:, if you disagree, please respond here first. I realise that WP:BRD supports reversion to wp:status quo but I suggest that we are looking at the lesser of two evils here so it is a matter of choosing the least worst. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 09:29, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

I was trying to sum up the body of the article, so my thought was that it didn't need a separate or additional source. If it's not supported thereby, my preference would be to tweak it until it is, rather than add a single source attempting to provide a grand, definitive summary of the scope of the term, or worse, clause-by-clause each part of it which is really what'd be needed if we we sourcing it strictly in isolation. If necessary we could just start off with a dictionary definition: for example, Oxford provides: "the theory that the poorest in society gradually benefit as a result of the increasing wealth of the richest." The previous version I don't think summed up the article at all, per my objections above. Certainly the two are related, in that any time a right-winger suggests a "supply-side reform", a leftist will say "that's more trickle-down economics", and free-marketeers will protest that it's a slur, or that the two are different to some degree or other, or that there's no such thing as a trickle-down, but I don't think we can say one is just a term for the other unqualifiedly. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 11:15, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

With controversial topics such as this, it can be argued that your summing-up is making your own editorial assessment, so it is best to provide a citation from a neutral source. Good luck with finding such! There are many similar cases where it has proven necessary to cite the first sentence, on occasion even every phrase in the first sentence! --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 12:22, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

The 2017 Tax Cuts did NOT favor the rich

In the intro of this article, the 2017 Tax act is listed as an example of a tax break that favored the rich. This is untrue. The article used as a source is giving a misrepresentation of the numbers.

You can see the graph in this article which shows the change in income tax rate per bracket: https://www.thebalancemoney.com/trump-s-tax-plan-how-it-affects-you-4113968

The highest bracket saw the second smallest reduction, after the non change of the second highest bracket. The largest reductions in rate are for the working and middle classes.

Articles disingenuously use the total dollar amounts saved rather than the change in rate, which is a proper way to measure a tax cut. 2601:581:4504:8BF0:E414:3FAC:27C5:5A8F (talk) 20:08, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

That link isn't a WP:RS. Andre🚐 20:57, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

Start with the understanding that poor people don’t pay income taxes. They pay many other taxes, and above a certain threshold, people who are poor do pay taxes. But, below the minimum income level, they don’t. Now, reduce any part of the income tax rate by any amount, leaving all those state and local taxes untouched. Notice that whatever portion of the population gets a tax break, that portion does not include those too poor to qualify for FEDERAL income taxation. Finally, reconsider you statement. DOR (HK) (talk) 15:15, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

October 3 reverts

Hi @Andrevan, why should we include a working paper in this article [9]? 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:FCE7:AC6D:CFC5:3126 (talk) 19:17, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

You're removing piles of sourced material [10] Andre🚐 19:24, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

I'll have it then that you are not objecting to my removal of the FED working paper specifically and will remove it accordingly. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:FCE7:AC6D:CFC5:3126 (talk) 19:27, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Also see Verifiability does not guarantee inclusion. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:FCE7:AC6D:CFC5:3126 (talk) 19:27, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Yeah, it's not NPOV to remove the "criticisms" section, for one thing. Andre🚐 19:29, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

@Andrevan I did not remove the "criticisms" section, but renamed it. While not policy, I (and and others [11]) find WP:CSECTION fairly persuasive. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:FCE7:AC6D:CFC5:3126 (talk) 19:40, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

I think the best bet to move forward is to post each suggested change here for discussion. I agree that working papers do not belong in this topic, but some of the other edits seem less clear cut to me. Squatch347 (talk) 05:43, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Id like to note that "2020 study by economist Anil Kumar" found here does not contain the words "trickle down" by my search of it. It a minimum, we should remove that section due to it being WP:OR. Bonewah (talk) 14:35, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Likewise the 'working' paper] cited in the line A 2020 working paper by London School of Economics and Political Science researchers... No mention of 'trickle down', at least by a 'control-f' search. Bonewah (talk) 14:41, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

And I'm not supporting the working paper specifically and I didn't revert removing it alone, but the other removals were very wholesale. Andre🚐 14:49, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Sure, of course. Squatch347 (talk · contribs) asked above to discuss each change here individually, so the obvious ones seems like a good place to start. Bonewah (talk) 16:44, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

I think there is a consensus to remove both references, so I've done so along with their associated text. Squatch347 (talk)

One small note, I'm not sure a source necessarily needs to have the phrase trickle down since it's noted as colloquial and these are professional papers. Squatch347 (talk) 05:45, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I think that is actually the key issue with this article. If, as we claim, 'trickle-down' is a derisive phrase or colloquialism then we need to strip out all scientific material which claims that 'trickle-down' does or does not work, as trickle-down is not a scientific theory or term that has any meaning to economists in a formal sense. We cant support or debunk a economic theory that isnt actually a theory at all. Essentially this article should be like Tax and spend, covering notable usage of the term itself.

So, for example, the paragraph starting with Overall, there is ample empirical support for and against tax cuts as means of spurring economic growth. should be cut, along with most the material below that, not including the 'politics' section. Again, if trickle-down is a turn of phrase, then empirical evidence is meaningless.

Obviously, this would mean a fairly radical change the the article, so im going to hold off on making any edits until we have discussed it a bit further. Bonewah (talk) 13:29, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I disagree. Trickle down is colloquial but it has a well-defined meaning in reliable sources. Trickle-down does have a meaning and it refers to supply-side economics, ie the theory that tax cuts for big companies and the top tax brackets spur investment and growth. Andre🚐 15:39, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

What reliable sources are you referring to here? Bonewah (talk) 19:22, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

There are many, from news and articles, to books and textbooks, such as Persky, Joseph (2004). Does "trickle down" work? : economic development strategies and job chains in local labor markets. Daniyel Felzenshṭain, Virginia Carlson. Kalamazoo, Mich.: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. ISBN 1-4175-4998-X. OCLC 56820409., it's not synthetic or original research at all, so I strongly oppose your proposal we need to strip out all scientific material which claims that 'trickle-down' does or does not work, as trickle-down is not a scientific theory or term that has any meaning to economists in a formal sense. That's definitely false. Andre🚐 19:27, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Ill have a look at that source. I have a couple of Macro textbooks on order that i will check as well. I would prefer something more obviously reliable than "W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research" which ive never even heard of. Looking at their web page and wiki page, it looks like a non-profit, not an academic source. If this really a term of art in economics, it should be easy to find an scholarly source that undeniably says trickle-down is synonymous with supply side. In which case, we should merge it with supply side. Bonewah (talk) 19:55, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure if it should be merged per se. Yes I do think it is synonymous largely, but we do have many pages that have overlapping definitions that cover them from a slightly different angle. It's worth raising for discussion if you want to propose the merge. Regarding the source I linked, it is indeed a think tank or an economic policy research institute, W. E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, but should be reliable enough to show economists use the term. Here's a recent academic journal article using the term: Burnette-McGrath, Madeleine (2019). "Reagan-Era Economic Theory in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act: Trickle-down Economics through Increased International Mobility of Certain Corporate Income". Florida State University Business Review. 18: 57. [21:40, 5 October 2022 (UTC)] THe more I think about it the more I think they should not be merged. Trickle down is more often used in political science and law, while economists are more likely to call it supply side economics, but we can still have 2 different articles that are fundamentally about the same economic group of concepts. Trickle down is a theory and supply side is a branch of economics that heavily rests on that theory. Andre🚐 21:51, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Honestly, I think Bonewah has a point (though I am against a merge). The term is used rather loosely in a way that generally wouldn't warrant inclusion in WP:PS coverage. It is important to remember that no one is a "trickle down" economist. It is a term used by those who oppose a broad set of approaches, many of them contradictory. It would be generally akin to having a page on here for "tax and spend democrats" and then posting a lot of research related to Keynsian economics. The WP:PS debate should be hosted on the main page of Supply-Side economics (where it is quite robust and well monitored) or whatever policy is being labelled as "trickle-down", not on a sub-branch referring to a nickname used by opponents. I'd entertain removing the criticism/reception section after validating those sources are rescued to the parent articles. Since no one is actually pushing for a policy called "trickle-down" it seems a bit odd to have a criticism section of a proposal labelled as such by an opponent, kind of strawan-y. Squatch347 (talk) 05:27, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I should point out that Madeleine McGrath is a JD law student, not an economist according to the abstract. You generally don't see "trickle-down" used in reputable journals because it isn't a technical term and is seen as unprofessionally derogatory. Squatch347 (talk) 05:36, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

The article does not have to only use sources by economists. There are many examples, though, of notable social scientists using the term. So I oppose your proposal to trim the article. Thomas Sowell has an essay about it: Sowell, Thomas (2012). Trickle down theory and tax cuts for the rich. Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press. ISBN 978-0-8179-1616-9. OCLC 823741840. it's also used by Joseph Stiglitz: Stiglitz, Joseph E. (2019). People, power, and profits : progressive capitalism for an age of discontent (First ed.). New York. ISBN 978-1-324-00422-6. OCLC 1098270456.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) Andre🚐 13:49, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

But both of those pieces are referencing how trickle down isn't an economics policy, but a broad pejorative. That is what I think is causing the lack of focus on the page, the misconstrual that trickle down is an economic policy that can be evaluated by studies. We are applying scientific rigor to evaluating the professional debate on a topic that doesn't exist in professional debate. The term certainly warrants its own page, but the page should be focused on the usage of that term and its etymology rather than trying to cram studies already being discussed on other pages. Squatch347 (talk) 05:36, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree this article should remain separate because trickle-down is not synonymous with supply side. I only sugested that if it turned out that trickle down and supply side are the same thing, which i dont think they are and nothing ive seen has changed my mind, although I have not read the Sowell piece sited above. Im still waiting for delivery of a few more macro textbooks, but the one i do have, Case and Fair (2007 ed) makes no mention of trickle down at all, most notably in the supply side section. Bonewah (talk) 13:09, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree that trickle down isn't a term in economics, as well as law and politics. We should not remove studies that are critical of the impact of trickle-down on this basis. Andre🚐 14:30, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I think if it was an economic term, it would be easy (and necessary) to find references that say so unambiguously. Consider for instance 'supply side economics'. My textbook says its a real economic theory and ill bet the other references im waiting on will say the same thing. That is not the case for trickle-down. The references above never say its an real economic theory, and one of them says specifically that it is not. Bonewah (talk) 15:29, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Again, that's missing the bigger picture. I would say supply-side and trickle down are related and overlapping terms. But it is not necessary for a source to say, "trickle down economics is a real economic term," for it to be one, or for Wikipedia to have an article about the usage of the term and studies about it. Because it has a meaning in the fields of politics and law as well as in economics, which is the theory that tax cuts for the rich will trickle down. Andre🚐 15:42, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

But it is not necessary for a source to say, "trickle down economics is a real economic term," for it to be one, or for Wikipedia to have an article about the usage of the term and studies about it. It is if you want Wikipedia to say it is, or if you want the Wikipedia article to treat it as if it was. Thats the point, we cant site scientific fact for or against an economic theory if it isnt actually an economic theory. And we cant say or act like its an economic theory if we dont have reliable sources that say it is an economic theory. Citing articles where an economist simply uses the term is not sufficient because economists can and do also use the term as a pejorative or in the context of politics or law as you say. Bonewah (talk) 16:44, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I still disagree. There are people who treat it as an economic theory, and there are those who do not. There are many usages of the term, so, I still don't agree. Andre🚐 20:14, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I think you are correct that they don't have to be synonymous in order for wikipedia to have a page on it, but they do need to be synonymous if we are going to use WP:PRIMARY in the article referencing sources that don't actually mention the term referenced in the paper. For us to call them synonymous is WP:SYNTH unless there are reputable economic sources saying they are. Currently, we only have the two you reference, both of which make the exact opposite point. I think it is important to note that in no source on this page is the term "trickle-down" used positively or by someone advocating for said policies. We label is a colloquial usage in the beginning and then treat it as a precise term later in the article. That is clearly inconsistent. So we really have two options. 1) Remove sources that do not reference the article topic in their body after rescuing them to parent articles per WP:PRIMARY or 2) provide a WP:RS that equates the term in primary source documentation. Squatch347 (talk) 06:00, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

On your points, I will locate and demonstrate sources that use the term "trickle down" positively, and neutrally. This is quite doable, but it will require a bit of research, because as you note, many of the proponents of the theory try to re-brand the theory to avoid the negative connotations it has become associated with since, largely, it has been empirically shown to be false. The sources that were positive about its usage as a term do exist and in part, consist of the 80s and 90s era sources that have tried to counter the critical narratives of it. This exists in the present day as well. In the meantime, though, we should not otherwise remove sources from this article or in any other way reduce its scope, since it hasn't been demonstrated that "trickle down" isn't a term used by economists: even if the primary usage of that term as demonstrated by me is negatively, that isn't inherently a pejorative: will respond to your other message below. Andre🚐 18:43, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Ok, well I will be standing by to see those sources, but WP:PRIMARY doesn't let us use sources unless they actually reference the term being covered in the article in wiki-voice. Squatch347 (talk) 10:04, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I did notice a working paper in the body of the text that I've removed related to our discussion here and the consensus that working papers, at least, don't meet WP:PRIMARY standards. Squatch347 (talk) 10:30, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm fine with removing the working papers. But I disagree that we can't use sources about the underlying economics just because the expert economists' view is negative. They still do use the term to describe something. Andre🚐 16:18, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm tracking the dissent on whether or not the source must use the phrase "Trickle-Down." I haven't made any updates on that front until we work through this a bit or until a consensus emerges. I think the next step is for you or someone else to provide a reputable source advocating for trickle-down. I'm a bit concerned that we've simply linked the phrase trickle-down with any tax reduction policy a la its use by critics. Doing so without a NPOV RS would make our current use of primary sources WP:SYNTH. We can't make the connection as editors, we need experts to make that connection per WP:PRIMARY. Policy specifically rules out using journalists (obviously not experts) to link two topics in a highly specialized field. Now, if we can find economic consensus on the definition of "Trickle-Down" policies then we can justify their use pretty easily. Squatch347 (talk) 05:51, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree with your analysis. I'm responding with another source in the below section, so perhaps we should continue discussing there. It is not SYNTH because RS have already tied trickle-down with a series of policies. Andre🚐 14:56, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

WaPo piece

The Washington Post piece [12]at the end of the Economics section is inaccurately described to "find" something. In fact, it summarises research by others. The authors on the linked page [13] are careful to state that their research "has yet to be peer reviewed". Even if we were to include a non-peer reviewed paper without proper attribution ("find" is far too strong), we should at least get the description of that paper right. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:39E9:1410:E537:EE46 (talk) 22:57, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Pinging the above participants Bonewah, Squatch347, Andrevan. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:39E9:1410:E537:EE46 (talk) 22:58, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree with your assessment. The paper is also a working paper. This kind of goes to my point above that the article lacks clarity. The paper doesn't reference trickle down economics as a term because that isn't a professional term. Us having it as part of the economics section here creates an wp:undue impression that economists think of trickle down as a set of policies. At a minimum I think this paragraph should be removed or added to a different section so as to not give the impression of peer review. Squatch347 (talk) 05:36, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

That article further reinforces what we have said above, that 'trickle down' is a pejorative rather than a meaningful economic term. The only 2 places it even says 'trickle down' are 1) in the headline, which, per WP:HEADLINE is not reliable (and they use quotes around trickle-down, suggesting they think of it as an expression rather than a precise term) and once in the body where they say "The tax savings, in other words, would trickle down from the rich to everyone else." The 'in other words' here implies that its the WaPo that is saying it, not someone else. Bonewah (talk) 13:32, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree that this was established above. I understand why you are saying this but just because the term is used negatively, doesn't make it pejorative, and as we've established it is used by economists such as Joseph Stiglitz and Thomas Sowell. It's also not SYNTH/OR to understand that trickle down is being referred to in context. Andre🚐 14:29, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Well, i dont know that we have established the term is a pejorative, but just because its used by economists does not mean that it is an economic term. I mean, one of the economists you mentioned, Thomas Sowell, specifically states that it is not an economic term: The "trickle-down" theory cannot be found in even the most voluminous scholarly studies of economic theories. Bonewah (talk) 15:23, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

That is not saying the topic isn't an economic term, simply that the theory isn't part of Econ 101, and I think we have shown a few examples that it is discussed, and can find more if you would like. I know it is in at least a few textbooks. Regardless, the negative way the term is viewed, doesn't indicate that we shouldn't have those studies discussed in this article. The economists' dispute as to whether it is legitimate or whether the theory is meaningful or accurate should be covered in the article. It's clearly a topic worthy of being discussed by virtue of being discussed by economists. For example, broken windows theory is another theory that is controversial - maybe the article should be moved to trickle-down theory. Andre🚐 15:28, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Again, the mere fact that the term is used or discussed does not make it an economic term. It is a term worthy of a Wikipedia article, just not one that claims or acts as if its an economic theory. Bonewah (talk) 16:51, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Which would be reasonable provided that Supply-side economics is equally categorised as a political ideology masquerading as economics. See Keeping tax low for the rich does not boost economy (London School of Economics, King's College London) --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 17:18, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

When you say 'categorized' do you mean in Wikipedia or by someone else? Bonewah (talk) 17:47, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

"Characterised" might be a better word. I doubt we have a category:political ideology masquerading as economics My essential point is that there should be equality of treatment: each should be taken at face value as good faith economic theories or each (more honestly) as retrospective justifications for an a priori political assertion. What we must not do is regard one as being more valid than the other: if one is valid then so is the other. And conversely. Pick your favourite economist: Paul Krugman takes the "it's codswallop" view: it was codswallop when Regan, Bush, Barber and Maudling touted it and it is rancid codswallop today.

I'm confused now. The point is that the article should cover the concepts in and around trickle-down comprehensively, including all different sorts of sources - economic, political, legal, media, news, books, etc. If there are conflicts in the sourcing we should cover that and attribute it. Andre🚐 20:14, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I think maybe there are two distinct issues here.

1. Are "Supply-side economics" and "trickle-down economics" notable term such as to justify articles. Unarguably yes.
2. Are they genuinely respected among serious economists, with an intellectually rigorous foundation, then the answer is no, probably not. They are ideological positions that some economists such as Laffer and possibly Friedman have given credence to, but other economists consider them bunkum.

So in essence I am saying that yes, we have to have both articles but we must be even-handed in our treatment. It must be clear to readers that they are two equally valid expressions of the same (IMO, flawed) concept. That would be much easier if they were combined into one article but (unless the consensus has changed), that is not realistic. So there will be a great deal of duplication and WP:fork violation. Unfortunately I don't have the time to develop the articles along those lines so it can only be left on the table as a plea for even-handedness and equality of treatment. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 21:42, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I think the problem here is that we are conflating a term used only by opponents of a broad set of policies (again most of them contradictory) as if it were being used by advocates. There is not such thing as trickle down theory. No one advocates for anything of that name, nor has use the term "trickle down" as part of their defense. It is a term, according to the sources on the page, only used in non professional sources by opponents. It should be covered that way in the article.

We don't, for example, have an indepth discussion about the calculation problem with socialist economics on the page about the term pinko. We recognize that it is being used as a pejorative and that it is applied broadly to policies and people who may be socialists or may not be. We maintain the specific technical debate on the parent article. Squatch347 (talk) 06:00, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

It's a false analogy because that's unambiguously an offensive term of name-calling, while "trickle down economics" and "trickle down theory" are serious terms that are used by journalists, academics, and others. Andre🚐 18:44, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

I concur. If there is no such thing as "trickle-down economics" (despite being widely referenced as such) then there is equally (if not more so) no such thing as "Supply-side economics" (but the same notability defence applies). They are two sides of the same coin, two equally valid (or equally invalid) ways of describing the same ideological tenet - retrospectively. As Paul Krugman explains, the idea has no intellectual foundation and has been demonstrated repeatedly to have no measurable effect when tested. Classic pseudoscience. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 19:12, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't think the sourcing supports the idea that it is only used in the pejorative. Most mainstream coverage uses the term in a neutral fashion to summarize the policies in question, to the extent where it can reasonably be called the WP:COMMONNAME. --Aquillion (talk) 20:03, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree. Andre🚐 13:46, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Well, we'll be standing by for reputable sources where someone advocating for such policies has used that term. In the meantime however, there isn't a defense of retaining primary sourced material that doesn't actually use the phrase "trickle-down." Squatch347 (talk) 10:07, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I disagree. And there isn't consensus for your opinion. Reasonably understood economic studies about the economics that don't use the phrase can still be included if there is a consensus to include them. Andre🚐 16:19, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

@John Maynard Friedman: The big difference between trickle-down and supply side is that there are an abundance of reliable sources that refer to supply side as an economic theory, which is not the case with 'trickle down' economics. Whether only a pejorative or not, its not an economic theory. Bonewah (talk) 14:50, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

References

@Andrevan: Economic studies about something that isnt economics should not be included. Economic studies that dont specifically use the phrase trickle-down are almost always going to be WP:OR. Bonewah (talk) 14:53, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I strongly disagree. Here's another source. Simply because the economic theory is often attacked for being inaccurate empirically, does not make it not an economic theory. Basu, Santonu; Mallick, Sushanta (2008). "When does growth trickle down to the poor? The Indian case". Cambridge Journal of Economics. 32 (3): 461–477. ISSN 0309-166X. Andre🚐 14:55, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I dont have direct access to that source, but based on the abstract and intro it does not seem to do what you want it to do. "A theoretical analysis and several econometric tests have been undertaken to examine whether the trickle down effect took place in rural India over a long time period." Trickle down effect is not the same as trickle down theory or trickle down economics. Simply because the economic theory is often attacked for being inaccurate empirically, does not make it not an economic theory. No, what makes it not an economic theory is the lack of reliable sources saying it is an economic theory (not to mention reliable sources explicitly saying it is not an economic theory). Bonewah (talk) 15:20, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

Why isn't trickle down effect the same? Andre🚐 15:22, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

• Here's an RS that uses the phrase explicitly. Watkins, John P. (2014). "Quantitative Easing as a Means of Reducing Unemployment: A New Version of Trickle-Down Economics". Journal of Economic Issues. 48 (2): 431–439. ISSN 0021-3624. [15:23, 10 October 2022 (UTC)]
• Here's another one. Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 and in the Tax Reform Act of 1986. These two acts instituted clas- sic, trickle-down economics , by largely replacing the principle of pro- gressive taxes with the principle of proportional taxes Dugger, William M. (1990). "The Wealth Tax: A Policy Proposal". Journal of Economic Issues. 24 (1): 133–144. ISSN 0021-3624.
• And one more. neoliberal policies such as trickle-down economics , tax breaks for upper-income brackets or the removal of social safety nets Wrenn, Mary V. (2015). "Agency and neoliberalism". Cambridge Journal of Economics. 39 (5): 1231–1243. ISSN 0309-166X.

Andre🚐 15:27, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I have no doubt that economists have used the term, that does not make it an actual theory. Lots of economists have used the term 'voodoo economics' but its not a actual theory. Lots of economists have used the phrase 'tax and spend' but its not an actual theory. Bonewah (talk) 17:44, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I just offered several RS from econ journals that use the exact phrase "trickle-down economics" and discuss its meaning as a (discredited, perhaps) economic theory. So, your argument doesn't hold up in my opinion. It is indeed a real set of economic theories and policy ideas that is referred to by this name, and this is supported by RS. If you do not agree start an RFC. Andre🚐 18:00, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

As i said, i dont have access to those sources. Can you please copy and paste the parts that describe trickle down as an economic theory? Im trying to reconcile the fact that 'trickle-down' theory or 'trickle-down' economics doesnt appear in any econ textbook ive seen and we have sources that explicitly say it is not an economic theory with the claim that it is. Again, not just using the term but defining it as an economic theory. Bonewah (talk)

I agree with Bonewah. Yes it is "a thing", is widely referenced as such so it is definitely notable. But, like so-called "Supply-side economics", it is not accepted as having any credibility in mainstream economics, any more than is, say, Reaganomics. It is a descriptive term for an political movement that is led by ideology rather than by evidence-based analysis. I believe that to be the correct summary of the RSs that you cite. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 18:15, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I just quoted the quotes, if you want access to the full text I recommend going to The Wikipedia Library to get JSTOR access. They clearly refer to the trickle-down theory as a set of economic and policy ideas: the ideas that cutting taxes for upper income will "trickle down" is an economic idea. Just because the idea lacks credibility doesn't make it "not an economic theory." Au contraire, it's a heavily disputed theory even though maybe at this point the mainstream economists understand it lacks credibility, as recent as the Bush tax cuts and the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act it is still brought forth as a theory by conservative economists. Andre🚐 18:23, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I disagree with your assertion that supply side is merely a political movement. I can simply turn to my econ textbook and find the entry that says explicitly that supply side economics is a the theory that ...X. Same book says nothing at all about trickle down. Whether or not supply side is 'discredited' is a different question. Btw, here is another source that explicitly says trickle down is not a real economic theory “Although everyone in the popular press has a somewhat different characterization of what this means, this is not something we have tested or seriously theorized about as economists.” Bonewah (talk) 18:29, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

Here is another one. The problem with this term is that, as far as I know, no economist has ever used that term to describe their own views. Although im not crazy about fee.org as a source, note that these sources are saying explicitly what im saying, that trickle down is not a real economic theory. Bonewah (talk) 18:34, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

And here "It is my object in this paper to suggest that no reputable development economist ever, explicitly or implicitly, entertained any such theory in any of its alleged versions" Dont have access to that one, but again, at least the intro says what ive been saying. Bonewah (talk) 18:42, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

These are all just sources that say trickle-down economics is untrue or debunked or invalid - not that it isn't a valid, notable topic for an economic article. It's not OR or SYNTH to take the many RS that define what trickle-down is, and also attribute those who believe it's not real econ. The article just has to say that and cover the controversy fairly. Andre🚐 18:59, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I concur with both other editors here. Even with your examples, all we have are instances where the term is being used as a pejorative (none of those articles advocate for a policy) or where they put it in quotes indicating they are using a colloquial phrase, not a technical term. I would argue we are pretty close to consensus here. And, honestly this isn't really about consensus,the article is currently a blatant violation of WP:Synth and so WP:Burden is on the user wishing to override policy. Squatch347 (talk) 05:49, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

I continue to disagree with your interpretation of the policy and what a pejorative means. Andre🚐 13:46, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

The term Voodoo economics currently redirects to Reaganomics. Maybe it needs a "request to merge", but a similar arrangement can provide the off-ramp here? Meanwhile, here is another respected economist (Robert Reich) referring to S-SE/T-DE as "gonzo economics" 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 07:47, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

I've started an RFC in the below section. Andre🚐 13:39, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

The voodoo economics redirect seems like far from best practice. The term is mentioned in practice in that article, but also in others. It's neither hatnoted or alt-titled there. As the article is itself mainly about the particular economic history of that administration, rather than other right-wing governments voodooing in the same manner, that's potentially rather unhelpful. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 06:54, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Here's a source from Detroit News that connects them. [14] Andre🚐 19:07, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

The scenario I'm wondering about here is that a reader hears 'Liz Truss's voodoo economics' (or Scott Morrison's, etc, etc), stuffs that into a Wikipedia sear bar, ends up at "Reagonomics" without any clear indication why, and gives up in disgust at that point (or otherwise has a sub-optimal Wikipedia experience). Hence I'm moved to consider if that redirect should have a different target, and/or more helpful landing context in whichever one it does end up pointing to. Which isn't directly relevant to this article, except insofar as this might conceivably be a candidate for the role. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 02:31, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree, VE could redirect to SSE or TDE and that would be a better target. Andre🚐 02:41, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Maybe have it point here, with a hatnote linking to RE? But it should ideally have an alt-title and some context for it too, and if merging this is an imminent prospect... 109.255.211.6 (talk) 19:55, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

That works for me. I don't think the merge is imminent. Andre🚐 20:00, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Done. Likely needs a little more in the body (and a good source), but the longest journey, etc, etc. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 23:14, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

... starts with a wholesale WP:IDONTLIKEIT revert without any addition to the discussion, to complete the Wikipedia version of that saying. Anyone else have any thoughts on this? Can't personally see what was even arguably NPOV about my addition. If one wants an additional source for it, here's the WaPo again: Almost 40 years ago, during the 1980 presidential primary, Bush famously characterized the agenda of then-rival Ronald Reagan as “voodoo economics.” [para] Bush was referring to supply-side policies that claimed tax cuts for the rich would unleash so much growth that they’d generate enough revenue to fund themselves. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 23:44, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

RFC

Is trickle-down an economics theory? Andre🚐 13:39, 11 October 2022 (UTC) Adding a clarification question 1a: should economic sources be usable on this article? Andre🚐 17:53, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

---

This seems to me to be a loaded question, for a number of reasons:

1. it is incomplete: it does not make sense to ask this question about "trickle-down" without at the same time asking about "supply-side economics", which is the other side of the same coin. At present, we have two articles covering essentially the same topic, contrary to WP:FORK
2. an economic theory according to whom? The suffix "economics" is attached to both names but the concept is derided by professional economists as political ideology without evidence base. It is to real economics as pseudoscience is to real science: make an assertion and then search for evidence that supports it and ignore evidence that contradicts it. The London School of Economics paper lists the many cases where it has been shown to have had no appreciable effect. At least homeopathy elicits a placebo effect, this has none.

Can you redraft a more complete and NPOV version? --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 15:01, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

This appears to be getting into the substance of the question. I'm not proposing a merge or a rename or a move, I'm asking whether, per the above discussion, it should be considered an economic theory and therefore we are able to use economic sources in this article discussing it, or whether as @Bonewah has claimed, trickle down is not a real economic theory. Andre🚐 15:53, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

As far as the WP:POVFORK question: I am open to a rename or a merge discussion. However that is not what is being proposed here: I just want to establish that "trickle down economics" is a legitimate WP:COMMONNAME for the group of economic theories closely related to the idea of supply side Andre🚐 18:43, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

• It is unclear what the question is attempting to accomplish here. Trickle-down economics / Trickle-down theory certainly exists as an encyclopedic topic. As I understand it, it is widely considered discredited. I have not examined the sources to evaluate what level of support, if any, it has within the field of professional economics. A more clear question or proposal would be required. I suggest this RFC be withdrawn and, if appropriate, the dispute or proposal be made more clear in a new RFC. Alsee (talk) 15:44, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  Please see the discussion above: multiple users are claiming that it is not an economic theory and therefore we should not include economic sources in the article. I agree that it is discredited, but that does not make it not an economic theory. Andre🚐 15:51, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  You haven't defined "an economic theory". Bonewah asserts that trickle-down is not an economic theory but supply-side is an economic theory. That simply doesn't make sense, since they are alternative names for the same ideological proposition. So neither is an economic theory or both are. I will be intrigued to see a definition of this coin that manages to approve of "heads" while disapproving of "tails". --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 16:12, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  I'm not looking to define anything beyond what already exists today, I'm trying to protect the article from having the current existing content removed with what I consider to be an invalid policy argument. Andre🚐 17:44, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  @Andrevan I was reading the above, attempting to figure out the issue here, while you were replying. Perhaps I went over it too quickly, but I still struggle to understand the intended result here. Your comment about including (or not) economic sources was somewhat helpful. However I still suggest you withdraw this RFC, and if necessary start a new RFC actually specifying the sources you propose to use, and the text you want to include based on them. Actually... I strongly suggest that you identify specific sources and proposed text, and discuss them with editors here before opening a new RFC. That discussion might resolve the issue, and even if it doesn't, it will help define and refine the dispute for a future RFC and people arriving for that RFC. It's really hard to respond to this vague current RFC or the rambling and imprecise wall of text above. Alsee (talk) 16:14, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  I actually don't have a proposal to change the article as it exists today: @Bonewah and @Squatch347 claim that the article should be extensively trimmed to remove economic sources because trickle-down isn't a real economic theory, but just a pejorative term. So I'm not really sure if I can clarify it in the way you are asking for. Andre🚐 17:42, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  Then surely the solution is to merge the articles? (Though of course since Supply-side "economics" is not a real* economic theory either, I guess their objections should continue to apply . Somehow I doubt it, though.) [*"Real", as in taken seriously by notable academic economists.] --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 18:49, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  I am open to merging the articles as a solution to this, but Bonewah and Squatch I believe argued above that they are not synonymous. Andre🚐 18:57, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

• Yes, in that it's a slightly pejorative way to refer to supply-side economics (or one could argue equally that "supply-side economics" is a euphemism for trickle-down economics). From reading the discussion above, I think the dispute here is actually Is trickle-down economics an economic theory, or a political term, or both? I would personally say "both", and frankly I'd support merging the two pages since I don't think there's enough of a distinction to justify the split. Loki (talk) 18:51, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  Thanks, I agree that is a better framing of the question, I will change it to that if everyone agrees that this is an NPOV rephrasing of the question. Andre🚐 18:54, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

  I would also support merging the two pages into supply-side economics, perhaps with a section titled "Trickle-down economics" showing how it is a perjorative term for supply-side economics Bellowhead678 (talk) 09:59, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes, don't really understand the argument against it. Ortizesp (talk) 17:55, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

I would say yes. Trickle-down economics is, for as controversial as it is, a way of thinking. At the very least, it's a widely-recognized component of both Reaganomics and the economic policy of Liz Truss. InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 18:25, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Much of the discussion here could be avoided by a thorough reading of previous posts on this Talk Page. For example, I wrote over five years ago, "One questions seems to be whether anyone ever actually proposed trickle-down as a serious economic policy. If we understand that it is a journalist’s term for supply side economics, then the answer is obviously ‘yes.’ Herbert Stein ( under Nixon), Robert Mundell (Reagan) and Glenn Hubbard (GW Bush) come immediately to mind." DOR (HK) (talk) 19:02, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Are you saying that those advocates used the term Trickle-down interchangeably with Supply-side? Even Tricky-Dick said Trickle-Down? SPECIFICO talk 19:27, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree that the RFC is unclear. My specific concern with this article is that the term 'trickle-down' is a political term, not an economic theory, and should be treated as such. The way i know this is that for any other economic theory, i can easily produce an abundance of reliable academic sources which clearly say "X is an economic theory that holds Y." Monetarism? Yup, no sweat. Keynesian economics yes, again, easily. Even much maligned supply side economics has an entry in my copy of Case and Fair's Macroeconomics. I have yet to see any such thing for trickle-down. Indeed, that same Macro textbook doesnt even have an entry in its index for trickle down. Now, obviously, i have not looked at every possible reliable academic source, notably, i dont have a copy of The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics (which is used as a source for the definition of Monetarism) but i do have several sources which explicitly say T-D is not an economic theory. Thomas Sowell - “Trickle Down” Theory and “Tax Cuts for the Rich” Moreover, the reasons for proposing such tax cuts are often verbally transformed from those of the advocates— namely, changing economic behavior in ways that generate more output, income and resulting higher tax revenues— to a very different theory attributed to the advocates by the opponents, namely “the trickle-down theory.” No such theory has been found in even the most voluminous and learned histories of economic theories. 'Knowledge at Wharton Although everyone in the popular press has a somewhat different characterization of what this means, this is not something we have tested or seriously theorized about as economists. Fee.org The problem with this term is that, as far as I know, no economist has ever used that term to describe their own views. None of these sources are fantastic, but they do say what ive been saying, that Trickle-down is a political term, one used by journalists and politicians, not economists in a scholarly way. Indeed, this article defines it as such in the lede "Trickle-down economics is a term used in criticism of economics policies favoring the higher-income brackets and those with substantial wealth or capital."

So what do i want? Simple, if trickle-down is a political term, this article should cover it as such. @SPECIFICO: You say Nixon used the term? Great! Lets source it and use that here. Sounds like a relevant entry in the history of a political term. @DOR (HK):, Stein, Mundell and Hubbard come to mind? Source it and lets see where it fits in. What we should not do is be citing economic studies (for or against) about tax policy or economic growth or any kind of scientific paper that seeks to debunk or support a theory that isnt actually a theory at all. This would be most of the material under the 'economics' subsection of 'criticisms'. Maybe that material can find a home in the Supply side economics article, but i frankly think its WP:OR here or there.

For my part, i have two more standard issue college Macro textbooks on order, ill see what they say when i get them, and i can try to get to the library and check New Palgraves. I cant really prove a negative, but, in my mind, if multiple academic sources either dont describe it as an economic theory, then it probably isnt. This is Voodoo economics, an important historical term, not a scientific one. Bonewah (talk) 21:04, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for replying. I submit that the RFC is clear enough and this is your opinion/response to it. You believe that it is a political term, and not an economic theory. Andre🚐 21:25, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

There's nothing scientific about either term. "Supply Side" was just as much a lipstick-on-the-pig term as "Trickle-down" was an ironic evocation of the same pig. We have decades of empirical evidence and it does not hold water. And a policy idea, such as Supply Side, is not the same thing as a scientific or well-formed logical "theory" in any case. SPECIFICO talk 01:51, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

• Quick summary of my concern: We are using WP:Primary sources that don't mention the phrase "Trickle-Down" in them based on WP:Synth that it is the same thing as Supply side economics without an authoritative source equating the two.

We do have several sources saying that this is a colloquial usage (including our lede) and that no economist holds a "trickle down" policy prescription. As such, I think this article fits into the broad category of articles we have where we reference colloquial phrases that meet WP:Notability standards, which this one seems to do.

I'm open to a merge under the supply side economics page since this term is generally used against those advocating for supply-ish side policies (though not always). But preferrably, we would limit the scope of the article to its use journalistic and political spheres, which would bring it in line with the more general article structure for colloquial terms.

What we can't do, imo, is use papers that should, properly be on the Supply Side page as if this article were the same thing based solely on our WP:OR. Squatch347 (talk) 08:20, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Is there something about "Herbert Stein ( under Nixon)" that makes people think Nixon -- and not Stein -- used the term? DOR (HK) (talk) 17:37, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Without a source, its impossible to say for sure. Bonewah (talk) 13:28, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

Hence, the comment is on the TALK page, and not in the ARTICLE. See the difference? DOR (HK) (talk) 17:22, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

It's partly gratifying and partly chastening to see my ad-hoc stab at the lead sentence being quoted as authoritative. (See a little up the page, it's quite recent.) I think it's an OK summary of the article, and in line with the dictionary definitions (I should add a couple of cites), but it really doesn't address the fundamental issue: what's the scope of this article? Is it, or can usefully be, different from that of SSE? Is there any area of policy that can consistently be said to be one rather than the other? What we have it present is the usual 'just grew' mishmash, unfortunately. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 17:28, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

I think we have seen the beginning of a consensus form here, but it might be easier if we start to agree on something a bit more basic. I'd like to ask the participating editors to weigh in on the question, is the scope of this page the discussion of a term or the discussion of a policy proposal? Thanks Squatch347 (talk) 07:05, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Term. The article starts with a clear emphasis that this is a term used. All of the history references are about the terms usage. And the article lacks any source defining this as a policy proposal. Squatch347 (talk) 07:05, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Term This RFC is a total hash as the creator picked out a small slice of the overall discussion and asked it without any clear context. This is a term not a scientific theory and should be treated as such. Bonewah (talk) 13:09, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

It's pretty clear there is not a consensus to remove the economic sources. Trickle-down is both an economic and a political term. You do NOT have consensus for your removals Andre🚐 13:21, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Term. My reading of the consensus (Andre aside) is that "Supply-side economics" is discredited pseudo-economics and that "trickle-down economics" is a characterising term to criticise it. I can see no credible justification for deleting WP:RS citations just because they are not peer-reviewed journal papers since no reputable economist is going to make themselves look foolish by taking it seriously (except to produce more evidence debunking it). BTW, if anyone was in any doubt that SSE is discredited hogwash, they just need to look at the bond-market reaction last week to the UK government's plan to try it yet again.--𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 14:38, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Loki and Ortizesp as well as @Aquillion also commented indicating that trickle-down is coherent as an economic theory, as mentioned I am not opposed to a merge with supply-side, but Bonewah and Squatch are. Andre🚐 14:55, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Its not an economic theory unless you can find reliable sources which define it as such. You cant RfC your away around verifiability. Bonewah (talk)

Plentiful sources were provided discussing it in the context of economics. Just because these sources take a negative view of the underlying veracity does not make it not an economic theory, and this is getting into WP:IDHT territory as this has been discussed and there is no consensus for your viewpoint. Andre🚐 16:36, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

That is not true. What you did provide were sources that used the term, not ones that defined it. wp:V is clear "Readers must be able to check that any of the information within Wikipedia articles is not just made up. This means all material must be attributable to reliable, published sources. Additionally, quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be supported by inline citations." Im challenging that Trickle-down is a well defined coherent economic theory. Bonewah (talk) 17:38, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

But we did define it, though it "lacks a universally understood meaning"[15]. Which, again, is not a reason to remove the economic sources that discuss it. The sources clearly describe it as related to the theory of supply side economics. In short, that tax breaks for the wealthy will trickle down, as popularized by Reagan. "Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 and in the Tax Reform Act of 1986. These two acts instituted clas- sic, trickle-down economics , by largely replacing the principle of pro- gressive taxes with the principle of proportional taxes" (Dugger) Andre🚐 18:16, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

If a source (economic or otherwise) discusses TD directly, then sure we can use it. But if a source does not discuss TD directly, then no, we cannot *because* TD "lacks a universally understood meaning". If it lacks a universally understood meaning, then it is not up to us to imagine one into existence. Which is to say that we can not quote research papers on tax cuts or whatever that do not themselves draw some connection with TD. Bonewah (talk) 19:05, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree. Examples of usage without a definition do not constitute a valid citation. And any such definition must state clearly that it is a creditable thesis in economics, distinguishable from SSE. And the source must be credibly NPOV. So not the Cato or the Heritage "institutes". Good luck with that. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 19:31, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Consensus doesn't support your view: it has a meaning but that meaning isn't universally understood, but there is meaning nonetheless as sources use it. So if we have sources that talk about trickle down even if they don't define it, that can be used. Andre🚐 19:34, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Thats fine by me. Its my desire to remove statements where the source cited does not use the term "trickle-down" at all. Note, *can* be used is not the same as *must* be used. If that is agreeable to you, then lets end this RfC and we can get to work doing so. Bonewah (talk) 19:46, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

If terms make sense in context and are tied together with reliable secondary sources, economic sources may be used. You argued that economic sources may not be used. I don't agree. If you agree to stop mass removal of economic sources because trickle down is not an economic theory, we could have an agreement. Otherwise, the RFC should continue. Andre🚐 20:00, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

[edit conflict] Nor yours. You can't infer a definition from an example of use, still less conclude that it categorises it is as a credible theory in economics: to do so is unambiguously OR. I don't wish to prolong this agony: provided we conclude that reliable sources may be used even if they are not peer-reviewed journals, I agree to closing the RFC though I don't envy the closer who has to make any sense of it. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 19:52, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

If there's no consensus for the mass removals of sourced content, the status quo remains. Andre🚐 19:55, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Nor do I agree it's OR to see the many economic sources that discuss trickle-down economics and say it is not a topic in economics. I didn't say it was correct. Andre🚐 20:00, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I suggest you quit while you are ahead. We may differ about how we got here but if we can agree that relevant RSs should not be deleted or precluded, let's just wrap it up here. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 20:06, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree that we need to wrap it up. It is definitely not clear to me that we have clarity or a consensus. RFCs typically may run for up to 30 days. It's only been 6. Andre🚐 20:08, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

We lack clarity because the RfC was unclear. We should have asked if we can use sources which do not explicitly say they are about or in reference to trickle-down as that is the heart of the disagreement. If you wont agree to close the RfC then will you agree to re-word it so users can weigh in on what is actually at issue? Bonewah (talk) 20:45, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I'd propose rewording the RFC as I suggested above per @LokiTheLiar: Is trickle-down economics an economic theory, or a political term, or both? Andre🚐 20:47, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I disagree as 1)If its an economic term, then you need reliable sources which explicitly say it is an economic term and define it. No amount of editor opinion can change remove that requirement. And 2) the core of the disagreement is about sources that we are using that do not mention trickle-down, but some editors think are relevant to trickle down. You even say so yourself If there's no consensus for the mass removals of sourced content. Yes, it is my stated position that we should remove all content that does not explicitly refer to Trickle-down. Not inferred, or implied as decided by what some editor thinks its meaning is.Bonewah (talk) 21:01, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

I submit that I've already offered sources that consider it an economic term, they just say the definition's boundaries are blurry, but they do characterize that. And contrary to your term, consensus will override your opinion on whether the sources are sufficient. Andre🚐 21:03, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Since we still appear to have no consensus on what the consensus is, that is going to be somewhat difficult. Who gets to decide who overrides what? --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 23:22, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

That is the purpose of the RFC: Bonewah and Squatch stated that trickle-down is not an economic theory. Their argument lacks consensus. If we want to all agree that trickle-down has a coherent reference point in terms of economic policy and impact, even though many of the sources do not support the idea that it is good or valid or accurate, then there is no dispute. I contend that it IS an economic term as well as a political one. That is the question in the RFC. Bonewah wants to remove sources because according to him, we don't know it's about trickle down economics unless the term is defined strictly to his satisfaction. Andre🚐 23:26, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Obviously we can let this run a few more days, but we do seem to have a consensus that this article is discussing a term and it's usage rather than a set of policies. I would point out that WP:CONSENSUS does not require unanimous consent if there is broad agreement on something. A lone editor does not get to WP:OWN a page. To that end, I think we need to have a discussion about page structure becaise it reads right now as a discussion of policies. I think the external links are fine, I'm less concerned about peer review if we are treating it as a term since review isn't relevant. The shift back to non-economic sources makes a lot of sense if we are writing this as how the term is used, rather than as a discussion of the academic review of a set of policies. Squatch347 (talk) 06:28, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

We do not at all have a consensus, and someone who represents one POV doesn't get to judge whether there is a consensus. Nor am I a lone editor, as there are at least 3 other editors in the conversation who agreed with my point, meaning the numbers are roughly equal and the arguments are not resolved or unambiguous. There is no consensus to shift away from economic sources. Andre🚐 14:46, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

That wasn't the question I posed to the editors. I asked if the scope of article was about the usage of the term or about evaluation of policies. It was essentially universal (minus you) that the scope of this article was about the usage of the term. My point is not to argue with your assumption about this policy or that policy counting as trickle-down, but to scope the article so that it complies with the stylization and formatting of every other article on Wiki that deals with a colloquial term: cite the parent article for discussion of the topic and focus on how the term has been used over time. For the life of me, I don't get why you feel the need to rehash a debate about economic proposals on a child article about the history of a colloquial term. Squatch347 (talk) 18:31, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

It is not universal minus me, as @Aquillion @LokiTheLiar @Ortizesp also indicated it can be a set of economic policies. Andre🚐 18:41, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

You might want to go back and read their comments. They all agreed it was a colloquial term. The closest you got was that Aquillion thought that it isn't solely a pejorative, but might have crossed over to a Common Name (which is possibly a fair point). None of them, not a single one, has said the article is about a defined set of policies or should be a discussion of those policies.

They all agreed it was a term that has a meaning as to the policy it refers to. There is no consensus here that economic sources should not be discussed. Andre🚐 18:47, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure why we're trying to freight the register of the word with such significance. Is "Reaganomics" not also a rather colloquial term? And why is it axiomatic that "supply-side economics", a '70s coinage, is the "parent" of a much earlier concept? 109.255.211.6 (talk) 19:12, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean, I'm not familiar with the phrase "freight the register," can you elaborate? Reaganomics is an article. To quote that article, refers to the neoliberal economic policies promoted by U.S. President Ronald Reagan during the 1980s. These policies are commonly associated with and characterized as supply-side economics, trickle-down economics, or "voodoo economics" by opponents. Andre🚐 19:15, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

For reference, I do indeed think that "trickle-down economics" refers to the same thing as "supply-side economics", and ideally the two articles should be merged. (Or rather, technically speaking, "supply-side economics" is the particular 1970s/80s instance of a set of policy proposals that goes back to the late 19th century under various names but definitely including "trickle down".) Both names are political terms, because of course they are, there is no neutral name for this.

As is, it seems like this article is for the broader idea and supply-side economics is for the more specific 70s/80s iteration of it. It doesn't seem to me like this article is about a term and that article is about the thing the term refers to. To see what that looks like, compare gay to homosexuality. I don't think the distinction is strong enough in this case to keep two separate articles, though. Loki (talk) 19:18, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to the merge, and maybe the most productive path would to be propose a merge. I believe however Bonewah and Squatch had indicated they do not believe the terms are synonymous and opposed the merge. But at the least, we should note that there is no consensus for Squatch's proposed massive trim of all the economic criticism, cite the parent article for discussion of the topic and focus on how the term has been used over time. Andre🚐 19:25, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I think that is a good distinction. From my read this is also similar to the distinction between gay agenda and LGBTQ Rights. One is a term used indiscriminately and often pejoratively and one is a topic with a robust conversation. Right now, because the article tries to do both it isn't very clear (hence the RFC). I would support restricting the scope to just the term (a la gay, or Gore Effect, or any other political slang) to make the article coherent. Absent that I've supported a merge in the past. This being a sub-heading under Supply side would, by its very nature, constrain it to the discussion of the term as I proposed above. Squatch347 (talk) 19:31, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Im not opposed to a merge, so long as the resulting article doesnt just import all the problems this one currently has. I think we would end up losing the history of the term and its social context which is a shame, and i dont believe that a merge is a good way to solve what is really an OR and verifiability issue. Frankly i would prefer a real RfC that we all agree presents the disagreement as it really is. At least that way we could get some sense of what the broader community thinks. Bonewah (talk) 20:06, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I'd be OK with a merge but not with "restricting the scope" or extensively trimming the economic sources critical of supply-side. I believe we still do not have a consensus to conduct such trimming on this article, and at least earlier today there was still considerable disagreement and a proposal to remove all economic coverage, which I oppose. If this RFC concludes we could start a new one about possibly merging or renaming the articles. Andre🚐 22:02, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

My instinct is that the ultimately best situation is like the one Loki outlines. But that's a potential endpoint, not a means. Either way we need to ensure we have good sources, give them appropriate weight, and structure things logically. And not play the 'excluding material I don't like by scoping games', either. The important part is that if there's two articles, they have clear and sensibly non-redundant scopes, and if there's one, it likewise covers the full range of topics and labels even-handedly. We can't properly have two 'SPOV' articles, as we're very much in danger of having. Equally -- if not moreso! -- we can't have one 'SPOV' one and one 'tightly scoped to just discuss terminology' one. If we have two, it should follow WP:SUMMARYSTYLE, or otherwise make the distinction otherwise clear. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 02:23, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

...trimming the economic sources critical of supply-side Just to be clear, no one is trying to remove critiques of supply side economics from Wiki. I'm asking why they are on this page rather than on, I don't know, the supply side economics page?

I don't understand your rationale for applying critiques to a broad topic to the child page discussion the use of a colloquial term. That isn't how any other colloquial term is referenced on wiki and it doesn't provide obvious value to the reader. If anything, it seems to obscure the usage of this as a term and make the article less readable.

Really there seems to be a pretty good consensus minus yourself and to some extent the IP that we either need to merge this page into the supply-side page as an associated term or conform this page to the general use set a la any of the examples listed above. As it stands now, this page is just a magnet for every POV pusher from any side of a debate to come in and put their particular preferred academic paper, which is disruptive. Squatch347 (talk) 06:36, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I heartedly agree that supply side critiques etc need to be hashed out on the supply side page, not here. What i really object to here and there is the propensity of editors to play amateur economist and ignore wp:OR and WP:SNYTH. Bonewah (talk) 13:00, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Folks, we appear to be going in circles here. At first you say you would support a merge but then you say that we can't use critique of trickle-down, because it's only a colloquial term and that critiques of supply side belong there. My argument is that trickle-down is economically coherent as a characterization of a set of policies and principles, and includes a lot of overlap with supply-side. Andre🚐 14:30, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Exactly. Can't play bait-and-switch where we say "they're the same so we should merge them, but they're different because some of the criticisms use the 'colloquial' term, and SSE is SCIENCE, so critiques that don't play Simon Says using the SSE-advocates' preferred terminology are out of bounds." I don't see how we can avoid it being a contentious (set of) article(s), given the topic. That people can't even agree on the terms, so we're on a constant euphemism/dysphemism treadmill, is really just a symptom of that. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 19:53, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

If TD is an economically coherent as a characterization of a set of policies and principles as you claim, then it should be easy to find multiple reliable sources which clearly define it as such. So far, what ive seen is simply people using the term, sometimes to describe SSE, usually derisively. Which is exactly what you would expect if it were a colloquial term. This is exactly why you see the term in contexts that clearly arent SSE, like the references to innovation 'trickling down' or QE having a 'trickle-down' effect or a 'trickle down' effect from job creation schemes ([url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/56820409 |title=Does "trickle down" work? : economic development strategies and job chains in local labor markets]), because its a generic term typically used to describe a positive effect flowing from one group to another group, usually one that is perceived to be below the first.

You pretty much nailed it below TDE could be used to describe other policies where the trickle-down effect is presumed or theorized or posited that aren't strictly SSE. It can be, and it is. Is it a pretty good description of SSE? Yea, pretty much, which is why its so commonly used in that context. But that is still a colloquial use. Bonewah (talk) 15:17, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

And none of this is a reason why the article can't cover the economic meanings the term is used to refer to. Andre🚐 15:22, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes, it is. The article's title, lead in, and category of articles are all about this as a political term. The format of a political term article (or any article generally discussing a term) is to cover its usage historically. The article is not about a generic policy proposal or economic reactions to that proposal. The vast majority of editors here in the RFC and before have noted that to you. This article is not the appropriate place to collect WP:PRIMARY sources related to supply side economics. Those belong on the Supply side economics page. Please, just take a quick look through some of the other articles on this page's category to see how outtt of sync it is and how it has turned into a WP:FORUM rather than an encyclopedia article. [16]Squatch347 (talk) 06:27, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

The article is about everything and anything "trickle-down economics." Once again you falsely state a majority agrees with you when that is not the case, it's pretty evenly split. This article is the correct place for economic sources and it is not a FORUM and the sources are reputable journal articles that directly discuss trickle-down. There is no consensus for your radical POV pushing. Andre🚐 16:16, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

How did you come to that conclusion? From the article:

This article is about the political term.

Trickle-down economics is a term used in critical references to economic policies

As for consensus, obviously myself and Bonewah sided on the idea of term, but so did FMH, Aquillion, Loki (who said it could be both, but lacked enough evidence as an economic theory to justify the split), Bellowhead678, DOR (HK), SPECIFICO. Opposed are yourself, Ortizesp, and an IP.

But its worse than that because a quick perusal of the talk page shows this exact topic being raised no less than seven times. Two ended in deadlock, five ended with conclusions that this was about the term, not some nebulous, undefined policy. This is far more one sided than you think.

With that said, I hear your concerns and want to address them within the scope of wiki policy. As I see it there are two legitimate routes this article can take.

1) This article is based around the term's usage. We retain most of the current sources, but the text is modified slightly to highlight how they are being used.

2) This article is updated in lead to talk more about this as a set of policies. That will be difficult because we have yet to see a single source actually defining the topic or a single person advocating for the policies. Its probably doable, but will require a lot of work. It also means a lot of the sources go away because in that world we are strictly bound by WP:PRIMARY.

I would suggest course of action 1 as it retains the most information, brings the article into line with its peer category articles, and involves the least contention.

Squatch347 (talk) 05:50, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Loki saying it could be both, is a point in the column for keeping the economic meaning in. Aquillion also comes down in this category although didn't explicitly say anything in the RFC. SPECIFICO presumably as well. Some of the others you mentioned didn't comment in the RFC. It's really just yourself and Bonewah pushing for a trim of the article. Nor do the historical discussions appear to have a clear consensus that I can tell.

That being said I am generally OK with modifying the text slightly, as long as we're clear that we cannot just start trimming out all economic sources as the October 3 reverts referred to. Andre🚐 15:49, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Ok, if I were to put some suggestions in here along those lines, would you be open to them? Specifically, focusing the text on how the term has been used? I'm thinking there should be a political usage and economic usage with the latter being broken down into "related to income" and "applying to externality spillover" (that language could some tweeking). If we did that I'm not sure we would need to remove sources, but we could take it one at a time. Squatch347 (talk) 05:48, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm happy to address the changes to the structure or text Andre🚐 15:49, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Proposal 1

• Section labelled "Criticisms" is relabeled to "Usage." This makes sense given that the structure, even now isn't just criticism. It would also fit more in line with the general structure of the other articles in the category and, hopefully, limit the attractiveness to WP:FORUM the page with random links as we've seen over the last couple of years.

• This section would be broken into two sub-sections (for now): Politics and Economics. With all existing text reordered into those two categories.

• The last part, and we should take this part slow with each change being discussed here, would be to reframe the entries a la we did below, to talk about the general usage of the term by the authors. Looking through the page, I don't see any sources that would be removed in this proposal. We should probably have a discussion on the broader usage of the term when it is being used like in the IMF study. I don't think it should be removed, but should it be lumped into a separate sub-section called "colloquialism" (or something, that word doesn't quite feel right)? I'm on the fence on that one for sure.

Thoughts? Squatch347 (talk) 05:58, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

I am ok with renaming Criticisms to Usage and splitting it up into public policy and economics with the existing text, so if you want to go ahead, I have no objection there. I am also OK with continuing to discuss and reframe the context if needed. I do not think the IMF is "colloquialism," but let's discuss that more in-depth. There seems to be a desire or a tendency to want to discredit or disregard the IMF, which I do not agree with. The IMF may have a foot in economics and another 2 in public policy, but that's the nature of trickle-down. The economic analysis of the ramifications of a public policy favoring tax cuts for the rich is not itself divorced from economics, and the desire to make this split clean is problematic. There are many usages of the concept of trickling down that straddle the line between policy and economics. Nevermind that most serious economists reject the economic veracity of trickle-down policy. Because that isn't the issue we're dealing with here. Please a start a new section to discuss the 3rd bullet point when you are ready to. That being said, I do think the lead could be written better, but I don't want to take a stab at it without a detailed discussion first. Andre🚐 13:48, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Ok, I'll go ahead and make some of those changes then post some individual suggestions here. Just to clarify on the IMF, I thought it might be a colloquialism because they seem to be using it more as an idiom rather than as a specific economic idea. It isn't a dig on the IMF at all, the phrase does seem to have entered common parlance and is often used as a synonym for "spill over" or something of that ilk. We have a few sources in there that are using the term kind of in that manner as I read it. Squatch347 (talk) 05:48, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

(i) Personal income tax (PIT) cuts stimulate growth but the supply side effects are never large enough to offset the revenue loss from lower marginal tax rates; (ii) PIT cuts do 'trickle-down' the income distribution: tax cuts stimulate demand for non-tradable services which raise the wages and employment prospects of low-skilled workers even if the tax cut is not directly incident on them; seems pretty economic and specific to me. Andre🚐 14:06, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

Jumping in late to this conversation. Let me try to unpack things a bit because it seems to me that the conversation has gotten into the weeds and we’ve lost sight of the big picture.

First, I think there’s general agreement that “trickle-down economics” was always first and foremost a critical term used by opponents of certain policies. It’s simply a label like left-wing or liberal or alt-right. All of these are used to discredit opponents and avoid engaging in debating ideas.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson once said:

“The moment when someone attaches you to a philosophy or a movement, then they assign all the baggage and all the rest of the philosophy that goes with it to you. And when you want to have a conversation, they will assert that they already know everything important there is to know about you because of that association. And that's not the way to have a conversation.”

Second, there also appears to be broad agreement that there’s no clear definition of what trickle-down economics is, if it were indeed a theory. In this discussion and elsewhere, some people have argued that it’s just another name for supply-side economics. The David Stockman quote from footnote (9) supports this.

Others have argued it’s only tax cuts for the wealthy. This is what Amadeo argues it is in the article referenced as (2) in the footer. Still others argue that it’s not a theory at all.

Notably, the Wikipedia page on supply-side economics begins: ‘Not to be confused with trickle-down economics.’ In other words, there Wikipedia seems to believe that trickle-down economics is NOT supply-side economics.

I rehearse all of this because while we’re on solid ground defining trickle-down economics as a critical term, we have no basis for defining a theory of trickle-down economics. This is important, because if there’s no accurate definition of a trickle-down economics theory, there’s no way for us to later offer any criticism of something that is undefined and undefinable.

Because economics is a science, as with other sciences, economists propose a theory and then test it. With trickle-down economics, there is no established or agreed upon theory of what this is, so it’s not possible to test it. None of the papers referred to in this Wikipedia page attempts to offer a clearly articulated theory. In fact, most of them use the term “trickle-down” as an adjective, not in the context of a theory, in the same way that one might say the rain trickled down the window. For example, the IMF study in footer 12 and the Bloomberg piece in footer 14.

While Robert Frank’s 2007 New York Times piece (footer 13) does purport to talk about trickle-down theory, it’s an op-ed full of strawmen and anonymous “trickle-down economics” proponents. Similarly, Amadeo’s piece (footer 2) talks about a theory, but the key Wharton reference she attempts to use to back up this claim is filled with quotes from economists dismissing it as a theory.

On the subject of proponents of trickle-down economics, they are so vanishingly rare as to be non-existent. I know of no policy-makers who ever championed or ran on a platform of trickle-down economics or any academics who have put their name behind the theory. Yet it’s easy to come up with vast lists of supply side economists, Keynesian economists etc. If trickle-down proponents existed, we would expect to list them on this Wikipedia page. Yet we don’t, because there are none. The only names we use are those who are using the term as a pejorative, including a disgruntled member of the Reagan administration who is retroactively calling its policies trickle-down economics. They were never called this at the time they were advanced or implemented. In other words, all of this supports our first definition of trickle-down economics as a critical term, not a theory.Kerrni (talk) 02:11, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

This is a bit of a WP:TEXTWALL. I'm not going to respond in depth except to say, the article is about all of the contexts in which trickle-down economics is used. The fact that economic experts argue about what it means proves it's a topic in economics. We don't pick which side we are on. We cover all of the opinions in accordance to their prominence in weight in reliable sources. WP:NPOV WP:BALANCE WP:RS WP:V WP:NOR. You can't pick and choose what sources to throw out because you don't like their logic, or their thinking. If they are notable economists we cover what they think and say. Andre🚐 02:17, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Picking up on a couple of your points. First, I disagree that it's a topic in economics in the sense that most economic topics are thought of. Having studied economics at the undergraduate and post-graduate level in the US and internationally, it was never covered in any lectures or text books. Other economists and commentators have made the same point. If it were really a topic in economics, we'd expect there to be entire books, chapters or courses devoted to the subject in the same way supply-side economics, Keynesian economics, socialism and other subjects are taught and debated. It's notable that there are none, for the same reason that there are no economists or policy-makers who consider themselves proponents of trickle-down economics. If there were truly a theory of trickle-down economics, there would be people debating on each side of it, but you only ever find critics of the so-called theory and no proponents. Second, you acknowledge that there is an argument about what the theory of trickle-down economics is and even that some people argue it is not a theory. In that case, it's important that we acknowledge that in the Wikipedia entry. Instead, in line three we make a blanket statement that "trickle-down theory more specifically advocates for a lower tax burden on the upper end of the economic spectrum". This runs counter to what we all seem to agree -- that there is an argument about what it advocates for and indeed whether there is a generally accepted theory at all. We should acknowledge that and not suggest something that is not grounded in fact. Kerrni (talk) 12:29, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Your own anecdotes on what you have studied isn't how we determine what to write in Wikipedia. If you have some sources for the claim that "trickle down is not a theory," please provide them. Andre🚐 15:33, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I used more than anecdotes to make that point. There are no introductory or other economic textbooks devoted to trickle-down economics or have chapters on trickle-down economics. Paul Krugman's Econ 101 textbook doesn't include it, nor does Alfred Mills or others. The point stands on its own without the anecdote as do the other points I made. Kerrni (talk) 15:57, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

That really is irrelevant, because there's no Wikipedia policy that says you can't talk about an economic topic unless it's in the econ 101 textbook. Andre🚐 15:59, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

It's relevant to your argument that trickle-down economics is a theory because you allege that some economists argue about it. Economists don't argue about it in academia, as I demonstrated above. The sources that are used to try and support this argument do not demonstrate this. Either they don't discuss the theory (e.g. footer (12) and (14)) or they aren't academic rather they're op-eds (e.g. (2) and (13)). Furthermore, as I explained, economic experts aren't arguing about this. An argument requires two sides and there are zero proponents of trickle-down theory, only critics of an undefined theory. Kerrni (talk) 16:22, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Sorry but you seem to be injecting your own opinion and original research. It's not going to fly to just strip out the economic sources already in the article due to your own interpretation. If we want to change the article text but keep the sources and rewrite what the article says, we can do that. Clearly, economists from Stiglitz to Sewell and others mentioned above and in the article do discuss the policy proposal that cutting tax on the rich trickles down to help the overall economy. Just because academics have rejected the empirical veracity doesn't make it not an economic theory and it is POV pushing to come in and put our own spin on this. Andre🚐 16:26, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not offering any opinions or interpretations. I'm just stating facts. For example, it's a fact that the two sources I referenced above do not address trickle-down economics at all, rather they just use the phrase "trickle-down" in the critical sense of the term, not the theory. That's not an opinion. It's just black and white. As for Sowell, the piece you referenced is consistent with everything he's written on the subject that I've read. Quoting directly from the Sowell referenced here (see page 3): "It was an argument that would be made at various times over the years by others— and repeatedly evaded by attacks on a “trickle-down” theory found only in the rhetoric of opponents." In other words, Sowell here makes the very points I have been making--there are no proponents of a trickle-down theory and there are no people arguing for it. The Stiglitz piece reinforces the point that there is no clear definition of what trickle-down economics is. He defines it (page 28) as "...the notion that if the economy grows, everyone will benefit." Again, we're doing users a disservice by providing a definition of a trickle-down economic theory when every source we're discussing seems to have a different definition. We should acknowledge that there is no settled definition of what trickle-down economics is and acknowledge that the very theory's existence is disputed. Kerrni (talk) 16:53, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

It's not a black and white statement, it's reasonable to understand when they talk about "trickle-down" they are talking about this same thing. Sowell may be included as well as Stiglitz. We should summarize what those sources say for the purposes of this article. Nothing you've written says that the "very theory's existence" is in doubt. It exists, but most people just think it's not an empirically accurate one. Andre🚐 17:11, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

It's not at all reasonable to understand they are talking about a theory of trickle-down economics. It's at best ambiguous and it's certainly an interpretation, but other interpretations are equally possible. People have used the term trickle down in countless ways before and since Will Rogers's joke without meaning to imply they are discussing a theory of trickle down economics. In the case of the IMF paper, as I've commented, there is no mention at all about "trickle-down economics", no attempt to define what it would be if they were supposed to be testing a hypothesis and the two mentions of the words "trickle down" over 39 pages are merely descriptive. It sounds like you interpret it as referring to an economic theory. But others couldn't be faulted for thinking the choice of words was incidental and "flow down" or some other description would have meant exactly the same thing. As for your suggestion that the very theory's existence is not in doubt, that's precisely what Sowell is saying when he writes '...a "trickle-down" theory found only in the rhetoric of opponents.' How else could that be interpreted? Kerrni (talk) 17:51, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

No, it's quite obvious that if they're talking about the impact of tax cuts trickling down, that is trickle-down economics. To suggest otherwise is silly. We don't accept Sowell at face value: we balance him with other economists. Andre🚐 18:03, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Not only is that your opinion, which we agree we need to avoid, but you're adopting yet another definition of what trickle down economics is. Recapping the various definitions that have been proposed in all the sources we've been citing (I'm sure we can find more):

Stiglitz: "...the notion that if the economy grows, everyone will benefit."

Amadeo: "Targeted tax cuts...to the wealthy."

Stockman: "Supply-side is 'trickle-down' theory."

Andre: "Tax cuts trickling down."

And of course, we also have these sources (as we've discussed and you requested) from economic experts who dispute it's a theory:

Sowell: "...[a] theory found only in the rhetoric of opponents"

Smetters, faculty director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model, linked to by Amadeo: "It is just a clever negative sound bite." https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/trickle-economics-flood-drip/

Gomes, a finance professor quoted in this paragraph from the same piece Smetters is quoted in:

'Many others have pointed out the folly of using the term — that no real economic model or serious school of thought stands behind what has long been a term of art at the intersection of politics and media. “I have a little bit of a hard time with the terminology and the idea of trickle-down economics,” says Wharton professor of finance Joao F. Gomes. “Although everyone in the popular press has a somewhat different characterization of what this means, this is not something we have tested or seriously theorized about as economists.”'

As I've noted, if we're going to make the case that there is some sort of theory, we need to acknowledge that there are both multiple definitions of what the theory is and that still others dispute that it's a serious theory. Kerrni (talk) 18:27, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm actually not giving my own opinion at all nor are we "making a case," we follow what the sources say, and balance the aspects and different viewpoints in the article. The fact that there are different and conflicting definitions or usages of the term, is NOT a reason to eliminate some usages and claim the term is undefined. We can cover those who believe it is not a real theory, and we will cover those who believe it has a meaning, in proportion to what they say about it. But it's an economic topic, with plentiful sourcing: we cannot exclude sources because they just say "tax cuts trickle down" and don't include the word "economics." That is reasonably implied. WP:SYNTHNOT Andre🚐 18:32, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree that some people might reasonably imply that. But others might equally reasonably imply it isn't. It's ambiguous. We should use sources that don't require an implication. The very reason we're short on sources is because it's a disputed theory that hasn't been tested or seriously theorized. I'm glad we're reaching agreement on some points here. It's been a healthy discussion.

Given the fact that, as you note, there are different and conflicting definitions, we need to edit or remove sentence three: "Whereas general supply-side theory favors lowering taxes overall, trickle-down theory more specifically advocates for a lower tax burden on the upper end of the economic spectrum."

I would suggest something along the lines of: "Trickle-down economics is also considered by some to be a theory. However, it has been variously defined and some economists do not consider it to be a serious theory." We could follow that with some of the definitions as well as some of the economists who dispute it as a theory. And when we cite any criticism we should be careful to note how the source is defining trickle-down economics. Kerrni (talk) 18:52, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Not quite, because we need to avoid WP:WEASEL, so let's be more specific about who formulates trickle-down and what it usually consists of, versus the claims that claim it is incoherent. The way to go about this would be to conduct a more thorough read of the sources in the article and sort them into different buckets. Let's start by looking at the 2 sources on the text you want to change and see what those sources say. One is a magazine article, one is a book about Reaganomics.

I agree this text can be improved. I have no objection to including the economists who believe it is not a serious theory. Also some believe it is basically supply side economics. While others more generally use trickle-down economics to describe any kind of stimulus policy that helps the rich and should then trickle down. I agree that this sentence is an incomplete picture of the entire story, but let's look at what the sources say that are cited there. Andre🚐 19:53, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

The difference here is that there are economists who say they are following a "supply side" approach. There is no one, politician or economist that says they are following a "trickle-down" approach. Or even that benefits will "trickle-down." It is solely a term used in a rhetorical manner by opponents of some policy or other. We don't treat rhetorical flourishes like that as serious terms on wiki. See: Gay Agenda, anchor baby, borking, death panel, limousine liberal, or tar baby option. These are terms used as strawmen of opposing positions and we confine our article to term usage. We need to do so here. Squatch347 (talk) 07:25, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

You're exactly right @Squatch347. A case in point is that former British prime minister Liz Truss never once referred to her proposed across-the-board tax cuts as "trickle-down economics" or that the benefits would "trickle down". The only people that did were those like Frank Langfitt, the NPR London Correspondent, who this week on the 10/24 Morning Edition show, when discussing the newly appointed prime minister, attributed Liz Truss's downfall as being a result of the trickle-down economics policies "she supported". Kerrni (talk) 14:43, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

But in Wikipedia we follow what reliable sources say. If sources call Liz Truss' approach "trickle down," which it UNDOUBTEDLY WAS according to RS, we call it that too. Andre🚐 14:57, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Oh yeah and we have very long articles on all the various kinds of left-wing, liberal, alt-right, etc. Andre🚐 02:18, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

• Ok, made a few organizational changes a la above, but nothing text-wise. My first proposed change is to reword the article related from the Guardian that I moved to the text below. This moves the language out of wiki voice discusses how the term is used:

The political campaign group, Tax Justice Network has used the term referring broadly to wealth inequality in its criticisms of tax havens. Heather Stewart (July 21, 2012). "Wealth doesn't trickle down – it just floods offshore, research reveals". The Guardian. London. Retrieved August 6, 2012.</ref>

Squatch347 (talk) 16:14, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

No objection to that Andre🚐 16:20, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Updated Squatch347 (talk) 16:21, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

• Second change, I recommend striking the below paragraph. The referenced article doesn't include anything about trickle-down specifically or make a direct connection to the article.

Overall, there is ample empirical support for and against tax cuts as means of spurring economic growth. In a 2012 study in the National Tax Journal, Canadian economist Bev Dahlby & Ergete Ferede found that "a higher provincial statutory corporate income tax rate is associated with lower private investment and slower economic growth. Our empirical estimates suggest that a 1 percentage point cut in the corporate tax rate is related to a 0.1–0.2 percentage point increase in the annual growth rate."

Squatch347 (talk) 16:21, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

• Third change is below. More succinct for sure and highlights the IMF's usage. I've definitely come around to Andre's point earlier that this doesn't need to be moved off to another category, it fits here.

The International Monetary Fund has used the term in papers to describe the impacts on GDP growth from income differences.

Squatch347 (talk) 16:25, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

This IMF change seems too extensive and removes their actual conclusion. The important takeaway is what they described not just that they described it. However, I am fine with removing the National Tax Journal. I haven't reviewed that source but I will take your word for it that it doesn't talk about trickle down explicitly, and we have other sources for similar statements that are more explicit. Andre🚐 16:28, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm trying to avoid a WP:PRIMARY war. The point of the article is to highlight the various usages over time and I think summarizing their style of usage is a better reflection of the sources than a long list of random primary sources that may or may not summarize the IMF's thinking on the topic. Especially since our two sources come to differing conclusions. Squatch347 (talk) 16:33, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean exactly. The IMF didn't just "use the term." The current text directly quotes the IMF. I'm happy to summarize what they said instead of quoting them directly. Or find some secondary sources that summarize the IMF's reports and statements. But I think it's too far to go to completely remove their statements and just replace it with "the IMF has used the term to describe the impacts." The important thing is that they did studies that found that the benefits didn't trickle down, so we can't lose that conclusion or we're diluting the IMF's research. Andre🚐 16:39, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Well, the issue is that they've used the term to mean different things, one being the GDP growth impacts from income distribution and the other to be income impacts from tax rate changes. (this sentence might be a better than my initial writeup) I think it is important to summarize how they use the term and what they mean by it; focusing on the their specific findings in (at least in one case) highly specific circumstances makes this more of a WP:FORUM rather than a description of a term's usage in different contexts Squatch347 (talk) 16:50, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

The article can cover all the possible things including contradictions. I don't understand what you mean about FORUM. That doesn't apply to this that I can tell. WP:BALANCE Andre🚐 17:12, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

It could sure, but not all of those things would be relevant. The topic of the article is the usage of the term. That is why the page Gay Agenda doesn't have a lot of random links to journal articles about homosexuality. The page isn't about the broader topic, it is about how that specific term is being used and in what contexts. That is how we keep wiki articles from becoming a cesspool of random journal articles that every person with a POV can add to the page with their two cents on the topic. Squatch347 (talk) 07:17, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't think that's a charitable view of the article as it stands. It is not a cesspool. It's a discussion of a term that is used quite a lot in the discourse to mean a bunch of rather specific economic and policy ideas. Andre🚐 14:58, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Given the types of sources we are using here and their relative impact factors I think cess-pool is a very accurate description. Even if the article were about the state of the discussion within economics, we aren't using reputable journals, we are using the ones with impact (meaning other economists don't read them) factors just above pay for play journals. We have done a good start at removing the working paper nonsense, but it isn't complete.

With that said, we aren't discussing the term like you said, we are discussing the findings of people who have labelled a policy they oppose as something. There really isn't any justification for that from an encyclopedic point of view, which is why we don't do it on any other article here. Squatch347 (talk) 06:14, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

• A 2015 report on policy by economist Pavlina R. Tcherneva described the failings of increasing economic gains of the rich without commensurate participation by the working and middle classes, referring to the problematic policies as "Reagan-style trickle-down economics", and "a trickle-down, financial-sector-driven policy regime". Reference here is not peer-reviewed, nor even published, it is hosted on an internal website. I don't think it is WP:DUE. Squatch347 (talk) 06:58, 2 November 2022 (UTC) Edit: the more I look at the paper and the author, the more it is clear that this is a modern monetary policy paper (which is why it isn't published) which is pretty fringe. Definitely pretty confident now that this source isn't DUE. Squatch347 (talk) 07:13, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

  No, it's from the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, not an "internal website." The author is an assistant professor of economics at Bard College. Not fringe. Just because you don't like or agree with the paper doesn't make it unusable. Andre🚐 15:16, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

Yep, and we don't cite papers solely published on the author's employment page. Per WP:PRIMARY a primary reference must be published in a reputable source, ie not something just put on their website. And, if you look at the page, and her wiki bio, you'll notice it is tagged with modern monetary theory. MMT is fringe economics per its main page. We don't include fringe positions as primary sources. Squatch347 (talk) 13:41, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

• A 2017 IMF paper found that

(i) Personal income tax (PIT) cuts stimulate growth but the supply side effects are never large enough to offset the revenue loss from lower marginal tax rates; (ii) PIT cuts do 'trickle-down' the income distribution: tax cuts stimulate demand for non-tradable services which raise the wages and employment prospects of low-skilled workers even if the tax cut is not directly incident on them; (iii) A revenue neutral tax plan that reduces PIT for middle-income groups, raises the consumption tax, and expands the Earned Income Tax Credit can have modestly positive effects on growth while reducing income polarization; (iv) The growth effects from lower income taxes are concentrated in non-tradable service sectors although the increased demand for tradable goods generate positive spillovers to other countries; (v) Tax cuts targeted to higher income groups have a stronger growth impact than tax cuts for middle income households.

This needs to be trimmed pretty seriously per wp:due we have seven lines of block quote for a single paper and that is far more than is necessary to get the point across. I would suggest The IMF has generally used the term "trickle down" to represent income or wealth effects resulting from tax cuts, including a 2017 paper on personal income taxes.

Squatch347 (talk) 14:03, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Intolerance of any attempt to balance the article now extends to External links

It seems that this thesis is so precious that visitors must not be permitted to see any evidence that falsifies it, demonstrating that it is ideology, not economics. Can anyone provide a rational argument why these links should not be given?

• Zidar, Owen (October 30, 2018). "Tax Cuts for Whom? Heterogeneous Effects of Income Tax Changes on Growth and Employment" (PDF). Journal of Political Economy. 127 (3): 1437–1472. doi:10.1086/701424. ISSN 0022-3808. S2CID 158844554. Archived (PDF) from the original on June 2, 2018. Retrieved December 4, 2019. (working paper)
• Hope, David; Limberg, Julian (December 2020). "The Economic Consequences of Major Tax Cuts for the Rich" (PDF). International Inequalities Institute. London School of Economics and Political Science. Retrieved 8 October 2022. Abstract: This paper uses data from 18 OECD countries over the last five decades to estimate the causal effect of major tax cuts for the rich on income inequality, economic growth, and unemployment. First, we use a new encompassing measure of taxes on the rich to identify instances of major reductions in tax progressivity. Then, we look at the causal effect of these episodes on economic outcomes by applying a nonparametric generalization of the difference-in-differences indicator that implements Mahalanobis matching in panel data analysis.
  We find that major reforms reducing taxes on the rich lead to higher income inequality as measured by the top 1% share of pre-tax national income. The effect remains stable in the medium term. In contrast, such reforms do not have any significant effect on economic growth and unemployment.

The authors of these articles are academics with a professional reputation to protect and consequently have tagged them for now as working papers open to review, so [assuming for sake of progress that the MOS applies to this article] we can't use them as in-body citations, BUT there is nothing in the MOS or other policy that precludes their being included in External Links. There I can only conclude that those editors who seek to cancel them do so because of fear that they will expose the thesis as the evidence-free political ideology that it is and not serious economics. This obstruction is a serious violation of WP:NPOV. 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 23:42, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

I am also frustrated when others undo my contributions, but you could have made the same argument without implying that everyone else is an ideologue "fear[ing]" that their "precious" theory will be "exposed" and nothing of substance would have been lost. If you find that the body of the article portrays the theory in an unduly positive light, make suggestions as to how it should be changed. Don't use the external links section as a dumping ground for low-quality sources that you happen to like. (I hope you will forgive me for making that assumption.) 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:C8C9:FC0E:F73F:ED76 (talk) 23:51, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

You have no basis whatever to describe them as "low quality", these are papers by respected academics. They may not have the highest accolade of full peer-review publication so I acknowledge not top quality but they are nonetheless highly relevant and stand proud against any of the citations in the article. There is something seriously wrong when newspaper columnist are citable but work from the UK's foremost centre for study of economics is not. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 00:07, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

Quality is relative and they are certainly of low quality compared to the sort of sources that we should be using, which are published review pieces as opposed to individual papers or even working papers (but this seems like a debate about semantics rather than substance). I agree that we should largely rid the sections dealing with the actual economic analysis of whatever newspaper columnists write. Perhaps you can start by pointing out sources you object to. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:C8C9:FC0E:F73F:ED76 (talk) 00:21, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

No, I do not accept nor accede to your attempt to reframe the question. You are attempting to impose a test that only applies to the most scholarly or medical topics, and then only to in-body citations. You quoted WP:ELNO in your edit summary: no line of that policy precludes inclusion of these articles, except perhaps 1: the site should not merely repeat information that is already or should be in the article. Yes the information should be in the body and these articles cited in support of it, but for the moment that method does not have consensus. But they certainly belong at least in "Further reading" or "External links" because information they contain is highly relevant to the topic because they show clearly that this concept is not evidence-based and is certainly not good economics. Nothing in any policy says otherwise. So your objection resolves to WP:IDONTLIKEIT. Unless you can produce cogent reasons for their exclusion, they will be reinstated. Also, please post under your regular user-name. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 09:11, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

We will certainly not cite an Irish Times opinion piece for content other than opinion in an article on an academic topic. They do not "show" anything because they are not reliable for academic topics. I don't quite your insistence to add these subpar sources to the article. Surely having reviewed the academic literature makes you confidently express these strong views here, right? So why not just add the high quality sources forming the basis for your views instead of opinion pieces, CNN Money, and a working paper?

I thought we had progressed beyond the thinly-veiled insinuations? It is perfectly possible for IPs to know policy. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:30:F5E0:8F6D:FBD3 (talk) 21:25, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Funny. I just found this [17]. Seems like the LSE paper was actually published; I am not sure why a working paper version was cited. The Socio-Economic Review is perhaps not as mainstream as we would wish, although the authors' choice is likely a result of their political economy focus (at King's, too, not LSE. I am not sure why we kept talking about the LSE). An interesting part I missed in my reading of the working paper: "Given the lack of consensus in existing empirical analyzes and the difficulties of making causal inferences from macro-level panel data analyzes, it remains an open empirical question how cutting taxes on the rich affects economic outcomes" - although we can probably discount that bit of academic rhetoric (why should the editor be interested in "closed" questions...) we certainly should think about how to summarise the sometimes conflicting evidence, particularly without getting close to WP:OR. 2A01:4B00:9D42:6E00:30:F5E0:8F6D:FBD3 (talk) 21:36, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Based on this, the paper could be included once again. The working paper thing was a red herring for this one. Andre🚐 21:47, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Some examples of OR that need to be removed

This article has a problem with WP:OR and WP:SYNTH. Before i get to the specifics, lets review what OR and SYNTH say: Wikipedia does not publish original thought. All material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source. Articles must not contain any new analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not clearly stated by the sources themselves. … This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources. To demonstrate that you are not adding original research, you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and directly support the material being presented.. SYNTH goes further to say Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any source. Similarly, do not combine different parts of one source to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by the source.

So everything in this article must be directly related to 'Trickle-down" and must not reach or imply any conclusions not stated in those sources. For us, that means anything that does not at least say trickle-down cannot be used as we would be implying the text of a reference relates to trickle-down without the citation itself saying so.

This is true irrespective of the outcome of the above RfC. Even if someone produces a reliable source that states "trickle-down" is X,Y and Z" we still cannot go find an example of X and put it here if that example does not explicitly say it is about Trickle-down. Again, we cannot reach or imply a conclusion not clearly stated by the sources themselves.

So let me next detail some examples of OR/SYNTH from this article.

While running against Ronald Reagan for the Presidential nomination in 1980, George H. W. Bush had derided the trickle-down approach as "voodoo economics".

References

The problem? The cited source does not say anything about "the trickle-down approach" as we claim. We are implying that "the trickle-down approach" is what was meant when the source said "George Bush senior famously called Mr Reagan's ideas "voodoo economics" before he became vice-president of the United States. While challenging Mr Reagan in the Republican presidential primaries, he said he did not believe that supply-side reforms like ending regulation would be enough to rejuvenate the economy."

This is OR because we are the ones claiming that Bush was referring to trickle-down.

There are many more examples, and that is what needs to be addressed. Bonewah (talk) 14:38, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

It's a reasonable assumption that "supply-side reforms like ending regulation" are "trickle-down policies." That isn't original research or synth. That's just basic factual background. And we have sources that make the connection. Andre🚐 14:53, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

OR clearly states that the requirement is "you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and directly support the material being presented." It does not say that you can add information based on an editor's "reasonable assumption". Bonewah (talk) 17:42, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

If the article has RSs that explicitly make the connection and assert identity, then the question of OR or SYNTH does arise. Andre, can you identify these sources please? --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 18:27, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I've already offered these sources numerous times above [18] [19] [20] and there are many others. Andre🚐 18:42, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

This is actually a fantastic example of what I argued very early on, that the term is used very colloquially for often mutually exclusive policies. Andre's first link is related to quantative easing, a demand side economic policy. None of the sources make the connection needed to prevent the usages above from being WP:OR Squatch347 (talk) 18:51, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

(EC)Your claiming that those three sources backs up the claim that George H.W. Bush "had derided the trickle-down approach as "voodoo economics"? Because that is what is required. Simply finding something somewhere where someone says Trickle-down economics is not enough. The source must directly back up the claims being made. Bonewah (talk) 18:53, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Hang on, I wasn't offering the sources for the George H.W. Bush statement. I didn't add that statement, and I haven't researched it, and I don't know where it comes from. I was offering sources that substantiate the idea that "trickle-down policies" are defined as a variety of policies, which do not all have to be the same, because Wikipedia can cover different meanings and contexts in one article, that favor stimulus for the wealthy. Obviously, a specific claim of a quote from a Bush will need a source. But if it's clear from the context and the material in the sources given and the basic background knowledge that George H.W. was talking about trickle-down economics when he said voodoo economics, it is not SYNTH/OR. I'd say it's clear from inspection in the BBC News source given, since we have the other sources that describe "trickle-down" as a tax cut for the rich, which is also mentioned in the source. Andre🚐 18:58, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

At any rate here's another source for this from Detroit News. [21] The tax plan’s “trickle-down” approach was popularized in the 1980s during the Reagan administration,....“Voodoo economics” was the derisive term George H.W. Bush applied to it in his failed 1980 bid for the Republican presidential nomination against Ronald Reagan, a supply-side enthusiast. The liberal economist John Kenneth Galbraith in 1982 likened the trickle-down idea to horse manure: “If you feed the horse enough oats, some will pass through to the road for the sparrows.” Andre🚐 19:03, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

The article you linked to does not say that. The ellipses you offer are half the article. And once again, “trickle-down” approach is offered in quotes, just as you would fora colloquial term, not a scientific one. I also note that the article you site mirrors Wikipedia quite a bit, which makes me think they were using this article as a basis for for their article. Bonewah (talk) 19:23, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

The quotes are only used in the first reference to the term. That's why I included the Galbraith part where the quotes are not used. The ellipsis does not change the meaning. It absolutely does support what is written in our article. The article is about trickle-down and it explains that H.W. Bush was using the term against Reagan's supply-side policies commonly known as trickle-down. There's no evidence for the theory that this article was cribbing from Wikipedia. The article is from 2017. Andre🚐 19:27, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

<- As usual, the barest mention of trickle down somewhere is held up as seen as sufficient for User:Andrevan. How about this one:

A 2020 study by economist Anil Kumar of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas found that "The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 is the most extensive overhaul of the U.S. income tax code since the Tax Reform Act of 1986. Existing estimates of TCJA's economic impact are based on economic projections using pre-TCJA estimates of tax effects. Following recent pioneering work of Zidar (2019), I exploit plausibly exogenous state-level variation in tax changes and find that an income tax cut equaling 1 percent of GDP led to a 1 percentage point higher nominal GDP growth and about 0.3 percentage point faster job growth in 2018."

References

Control-f for 'trickle' in the source? 0 results. Bonewah (talk) 20:12, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree about your "barest mention" since the article I shared is pretty much entirely about the concept we're discussing. As to the Kumar article, that one appears to be a working paper, so I assume it could be removed on that basis, rendering the question of its mention of trickle-down essentially moot. Instead we could use this one: [22] Our results therefore provide strong evidence against the influential political–economic idea that tax cuts for the rich ‘trickle down’ to boost the wider economy. Andre🚐 20:56, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Again, I'm unimpressed by claims of things being more or less "scientific" based on whether they're using terms derived from stand-up comedy or cod-Greek. Why would people of the view that it's regressive hogwash be looking for $20 words for it? This is politics and economics, peeps, not particle physics. Nor of the "doesn't count as it's in quotes and half the article away" claims: here's the ellipses-free context for it, lest there being any doubt about what the referent of that "it" is (in an article that 'control-f'-ing, as suggested, produced seven matches, including the title): Laffer occupies a position of prominence in the history of trickle-down economics. In 1974, he famously sketched a diagram on a restaurant napkin to illustrate his belief that the government could cut taxes and, contrary to economic assumptions, end up producing more revenue, not less. Economic growth would accelerate, and income would slosh downhill from corporations and the wealthy to ordinary Americans. [para] Over the years, the concept — also known as supply-side economics — has frequently drawn ridicule. [para] “Voodoo economics” was the derisive term George H.W. Bush applied to it in his failed 1980 bid for the Republican presidential nomination against Ronald Reagan, a supply-side enthusiast. "It" is very clearly TDE, which it's explicitly equating with SSE, and indeed with VE. (For me VE carries the slightly different nuance of "unfunded because it'll pay for itself real soon", whereas TDE/SSE is in principle compatible with old-school "slash public spending" fiscal conservatism, but that's by the by.) 109.255.211.6 (talk) 22:19, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for the comment, and you are correct, on your ellipsis-reference extrapolation, which I appreciate. Without getting into the question of whether economics is a "science," well, it's certainly at least a social science, tho obviously not a hard science in my view. By the way, do you just edit anonymously or are you also someone else in this discussion, just checking? Andre🚐 22:57, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Gratified to have been of some assistance. I'd say more like at most a social science, but sure, all academic fields have their terms of (bachelor of) art. That rarely means that "supply-side" is in practice used with any more definitional precision than "trickle-down" is. And I can confirm that I'm neither sockpuppeting, not have I accidentally forgotten to log in a half-dozen times here. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 03:41, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Got it, thanks! Andre🚐 03:47, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I think there is a fundamental difference in how we go about editing. You guys seem to believe that if a source mentions TD or TDE somewhere in the text it is fit for inclusion here. I dont agree with that, but that disagreement is better hashed out on a case by case basis. What is a much bigger issue is the notion that a source can be used even if it doesnt mention TDE at all, so long as an editor has a "reasonable assumption" that the source has something to do with what that editor believes trickle-down is. If that is what people here believe or how people intend to edit this article, then you are wrong. Full stop. There simply isnt a clearer example of what OR is than that.

So im ok with leaving the GHW Bush quote alone for now so that we can focus on the bigger issue, which is material based on citations that do not reference TD or TDE at all. So ill ask again, what is the basis for including the '2020 study by economist Anil Kumar' above? Bonewah (talk) 14:08, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

That is manifestly not true. The sources for HW Bush do reference trickle-down directly multiple times. And I already removed the 2020 Anil Kumar study. Andre🚐 14:28, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

So do you agree then that at a minimum, a source must at least mention TDE, and that the connection cannot simply be assumed? Bonewah (talk) 14:36, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

It depends on the context, but in general, synonymous terms and reasonable assumptions are certainly valid. Andre🚐 15:39, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

And so this gets to the core of the issue. I dont think SSE and TDE are synonyms nor do i think that its reasonable to assume that if a source is discussing tax cuts it is an appropriate source for this article. If you disagree with that, i would offer that perhaps we should make that the subject of our RfC, or otherwise seek outside advise on how to proceed. Having said that, im also willing to just go through all the examples of things we cite where the source does not explicitly say its about TDE. It might end up that they all get cut anyway without us having to hash out this disagreement. Bonewah (talk) 17:32, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Well, feel free to bring up the other examples of what you are concerned with and we can hash out those specifics as you say. I already removed the Kumar study which was a working paper anyway. Andre🚐 18:53, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

We clearly have many sources asserting that the two are synonymous, or at the very least largely so. And as far as I can see, even SSE zealots essentially concede that: we'd a 'Trussonomics' (if VE = unfunded TDE, than as far as I can see TN = VE when your shamanic reserve-currency towers aren't strong enough) talking head on UK TV news complaining that TDE was a "slur" for SSE. (Their poor delicate feels!) Can't really be a a slur if they don't denote more-or-less the same thing. I'm not even clear what the contrary position is. Which policies are are TDE but not SSE, or SSE but not TDE? More importantly, what's your source for this key distinction? Or are we going to apply a OR criterion as to what's OR? 109.255.211.6 (talk) 19:35, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

To play devil's advocate for them not being synonymous, even though I'd say they are about 85% synonymous in my mind, trickle-down has been used to describe other policies such as quantitative easing, which is a demand-side policy that still favors the wealthy. In the below section there is a discussion of Arthur Okun and William Baumol talking about how innovation trickles down, which is slightly different also from Reaganomics and SSE. TDE could be used to describe other policies where the trickle-down effect is presumed or theorized or posited that aren't strictly SSE. Andre🚐 19:56, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Generally speaking if two terms or topics have a 85% overlap, that's a pretty good sign they should likely end up as one article. Otherwise we're going to have one '15%' article, or a FORK on the 85% that's in constant danger of becoming a POV one. Or wikimuddle being wikimuddle, usually some roiling chaos combo of the two.

How common is it to describe QE as TDE? Don't recall coming across that myself, though certainly I've heard it suggested that it's generally been done in a way where wealthy financial institutions make out like bandits. I'll have to look at the Okun&Baumol material, but surely there's a difference between innovation per se, and 'let's deregulate and taxbreak to the benefit of rights-holders'. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 05:42, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

So I do agree with you that trickle-down is essentially supply-side economics most of the time, and like I said I was playing devil's advocate. But in the parallel thread above Bonewah advanced the very position I was caricaturing. There is at least one source that I shared in a different thread [23], and if you ctrl+F QE there's an unsigned message from someone else referring to what is I think a different one.

Coincidentally I was watching The Problem with Jon Stewart just now and I heard one of the panelists reference the idea that the race to the bottom in globalization trickles down. There are a lot of references to a trickle-down effect so there does seem to have been some generalization of the term into the common parlance, even though I do still think that SSE is the primary referent.

Personally, while I'm open to merging the articles because like I said, I think they are about 85% equivalent, I'm not really looking to have to argue that point, because the 15% to me is enough to have them be separate articles and have this one cover the aspect of the Venn diagram that is outside of SSE as economists describe that term. You have previously argued that SSE is equivalently amorphous to TDE and I'm open to that, but I suspect Squatch and Bonewah do not believe SSE is amorphous. Andre🚐 23:05, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

More OR

Analysis published in 2012 by the Congressional Research Service found that reductions in top tax rates were not correlated with economic growth but were associated with income inequality. The CRS later withdrew the analysis after Senate Republicans objected to its findings and wording.

References

Here are ungated copies of both the WSJ articles used as citations and the CRS report itself. My check reveals no mention of 'Trickle-down'

archive of WSJ Report: Tax Cuts for Wealthy Linked to Income Inequality

copy of CRS report

archive of WSJ Nonpartisan Tax Report Withdrawn After G.O.P. Protest

Bonewah (talk) 18:59, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I have no objection to removing these sentences and both of these sources. Andre🚐 19:10, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

More OR cont.

Although "trickle-down" is commonly mentioned in reference to income, Arthur Okun has used it to refer to the flow of the benefits of innovation, which do not accrue entirely to the "great entrepreneurs and inventors", but trickle down to the masses. More precisely, William Nordhaus, a winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, estimates that innovators can capture only an extremely low 2.2 percent of the total surplus from innovation. Circling back to income "trickle-down", the surplus from innovation can take the form of gains in real wages, which are spread throughout the economy, according to Nobel laureate economist Paul Romer. In particular, economist William Baumol argues that "the bulk of the unprecedented and widespread rise in the developed world's living standards since the Industrial Revolution could not have occurred without the revolution's innovations."

References

I dont have access to all of these sources, but im extremely dubious of any of this. Ill check further as i can. Bonewah (talk) 19:17, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I don't agree to remove this carte blanche (as yet anyway). I haven't read all of this material in depth but I'll need some time to understand what all is being claimed here and how it's sourced. I do think I should have access to all of the sources via The Wikipedia Library which I suggest you sign up for. I do agree that this writing is a little hard to read and probably can be improved. But we'll need to review the sources closely and understand what's going on here first. So it's not at all clear that this is OR on the face of it. Andre🚐 19:24, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

The Okun work does discuss "trickle down" on p. 46 as mentioned, and for the Baumol book it does appear to have "trickle down" and discussion of such concepts around p. 77 so those two at least, seem legit. These at least are not OR by the standard of mentioning trickle-down by name. I didn't finish going through the Nordhaus and Romer sources yet, but if they are suitably related to the concepts from the Okun and Baumol work but use synonymous terminology, that would suffice to include. I'll need some more time to review the sources and the text, but I am leaning toward this not being OR, though it could be rewritten to be clearer for a general audience. Andre🚐 19:52, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

• Section is WP:SYNTH, we are drawing out relationships and connections not made in the sources. This wouldn't meet mustard on any page on wiki.

• I can’t see the Okun reference, what precisely is its usage?

• Nordhaus paper discusses Schumpeterian Profit and technological innovation which is not even the same topic of discussion in the earlier critiques. It is also a working paper. And unless we are transitioning this to a term only page, working papers do not meet WP:Primary requirements.

• Romer paper links to a working paper, but it does look like the DOI references an actual publication, so no issue there. But the paper itself is not about what is being implied or being referenced at large. This is about the trade benefits from a tariff, exactly the opposite of the term's usage earlier.

• Baumol source cites page 80, but that page does not contain the phrase trickle down. The closest is page 77, where he is discussing a model, and says "it is a benefit in the real world." Source does not support text.

Again, if this article was about the term's usage rather than a unwieldy duplicate of the Supply Side Economics critique, these could be used if they were about the term's cross over into other areas where benefits are alleged to leak out to other groups beyond the target group. But that isn't what they are being used for here and so needs to be removed.

Squatch347 (talk) 06:49, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

We can remove the Nordhaus working paper per the working paper thing. Okun and Baumol do both reference trickle down as I mentioned. The page as I mentioned reading it on was p.77. We can change the text to reflect the source more accurately. However, that doesn't make it original research since the source does talk about the topic and the quote appears to be accurate. If it's talking about the concept of trickle down and the context is appropriate, the words trickle down don't need to be on the same page. Original research isn't "drawing out relationships and connections not made in the sources," it's making conclusions and connections. If there are obvious relationships that in this case, ARE present in the sources, that's not OR/SYNTH. It can still be improved sure.

I strenously disagree that the article must be about either supply side, or the term's usage. It's about all of those things. Andre🚐 14:24, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Can you provide the text from Okun? So far this reference isn't verifiable.

I think we still need to remove the Romer paper, the source is explicitly about tariffs and only references trickle-down obliquely. The only use it could have would be in some kind of comment a la "economists sometimes use the term "trickle-down" to refer to the claim that positive eternalities of some policies can accrue to non-target groups." The current writing is completely at odds with that source's usage of the claim.

If we are going to retain Baumol, we have to dramatically re-write this addition since the source references these policies providing real world benefits.

The current writing is WP:OR because our conclusion is not explicitly in the sources. To whit: "This includes any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources. To demonstrate that you are not adding original research, you must be able to cite reliable, published sources that are directly related to the topic of the article, and directly support the material being presented.""

Squatch347 (talk) 06:09, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

@Squatch347, you are completely wrong. The Okun reference is completely verifiable. I don't know why you are unable to verify it, but just because you are unable to, does not mean it is not verifiable. It is a published work and I was able to read it using the link given in the reference. To provide the full text here would be a copyright violation. But more to the point, just as you are fundamentally misunderstanding OR policy, you appear to not understand our core content policy V. Verifiable does not mean verified. At any rate I was able to read the book fine, so try harder I guess. That isn't on me. It clearly talks about trickle-down in the book.

I'm not opposed to rewriting the text but what is the conclusion that you claim we are reaching that is in not in the sources? Because previously you stated that even connecting a source that talks about the same thing is OR. It's not. What is this conclusion or analysis we are making? any analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources Andre🚐 16:14, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

RE:Okun, ok where? What does it say? You said that you had seen the page, so I was asking what you found. The link provided above goes to an outdated archive.org page. I was curious what you had found in the spirit of collaboration. The best I can find is on page 45 where the author states that Benefits do actually trickle down precisely because the big winner.... Is that what you are referrin to? Again, he is referring to the broader use of trickle down in the colloquial sense here referring to accrued benefits arising from technology advancement.

I would support something like the following:

While the term "trickle-down" is commonly used to refer to income benefits, it is sometimes used to refer to the idea of positive externalities arising from technological innovation or increased trade. Arthur Okun, and separately William Baumol, for example, have used the term to refer to the flow of the benefits of innovation, which do not accrue entirely to the "great entrepreneurs and inventors", but trickle down to the masses. And Nobel laureate economist Paul Romer used the term in reference to the impact on wealth from tariff changes.

Squatch347 (talk) 06:08, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

As mentioned I saw the text on p. 77. Since you can read p. 45 I guess you are able to read the source through the archive.org link, I'm not sure what you mean about it being outdated. I don't see any real problem with your proposed text, though. Andre🚐 15:51, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, when I say outdated I mean that the link seems to have expired or not function. Could be me, I'm on a flaky connection right now. I was able to get previews, but not the full context on Google Books. I'm curious if what you had generally matched my impression from above? Squatch347 (talk) 05:55, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Could be you, but when I go to the archive.org page I am able to "borrow" the entire book. At any rate I have no objection to your edit. Andre🚐 15:48, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Third sentence is inconsistent with the rest of the paragraph, is unsupported and should be removed

The page correctly begins by explaining that "trickle-down economics" is simply a critical term used by opponents of certain economic policies. But the third sentence all of a sudden claims that it's an actual (economic) theory. As others have noted on this talk page, it's not at all an actual economic theory. Moreover, while the article that is referenced by the third sentence attempts to claim that it is a theory, to support her claim the article's author in turn links to a Wharton School page (https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/trickle-economics-flood-drip/) in which multiple professors correctly note that it's not a proper theory and it lacks any widely accepted definition. Some quotes from the Wharton piece.

'“I have a little bit of a hard time with the terminology and the idea of trickle-down economics,” says Wharton professor of finance Joao F. Gomes. “Although everyone in the popular press has a somewhat different characterization of what this means, this is not something we have tested or seriously theorized about as economists.”'

'Kent Smetters, Wharton professor of business economics and public policy, says that trickle-down economics is a term created to disparage supply-side economics. “It is just a clever negative sound bite,” says Smetters, faculty director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model (PWBM).'

'Part of the problem is that “trickle down” lacks a universally understood meaning. Smetters says the idea of tax breaks for the rich eventually producing benefits to the poor has never been part of supply-side economics.'

The third sentence should be struck as it contradicts the first two and its premise is not supported. Kerrni (talk) 17:54, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Contradictory sources aren't necessarily a problem, we just need to balance the viewpoints. We can't just come down on the side of one viewpoint. There are many sources in economics journal that evaluate trickle-down, perhaps critically, but this appears to be similar to the discussion in the RFC above. This article is about everything that anyone might have meant or used trickle-down to describe, including economics, news, and other. Andre🚐 18:29, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

@Kermi, take a look at the RFC above. I think your concern is also being referenced there. My proposal was to update this page to match its peers which discuss the term's usage rather than having it being a dumping ground for every single WP:PRIMARY somebody happens to find. If you could review some of that discussion and participate, I think it would address the concerns you mention here. Squatch347 (talk) 05:46, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Do you mean the sentence that begins ome studies suggest a link between trickle-down economics and reduced growth, and some newspapers concluded..? Bonewah (talk) 13:14, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

some studies suggest a link between trickle-down economics and reduced growth, and some newspapers concluded that trickle-down economics does not promote jobs or growth, and that "policy makers shouldn't worry that raising taxes on the rich ... will harm their economies If there's a problem with this set of text, it's that it is wishy-washy, and contains WP:WEASEL. A better way to frame it in my mind would be something like, "Economists and studies have generally been unable to demonstrate the posited growth effects of trickle-down, and some have found that trickle-down policy actually harmed their economies. Newspapers have concluded that trickle-down policy did not lead to a measurable increase in employment or GDP." Andre🚐 13:54, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion @Squatch347. I just jumped in to the RFC. Hope it's a helpful contribution. Kerrni (talk) 02:12, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Change to lead

Let's start a new discussion on a new change to lead per @Kerrni. How about something like this: Economists such as X, Y, and Z have taken the position that there is no coherent economic theory by the name of trickle-down, while others have equated it with the Laffer curve, supply-side economics and tax cuts for the wealthiest. There is conflicting evidence that tax cuts for the rich promote economic growth, with studies such as the A, B, and C showing that tax cuts for the rich may hurt growth or have no effect. Andre🚐 19:57, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose, this article is not about the details of an economic theory. It is about the usage of a term. Why are we adding text to the lead that is off topic? If anything we need to be removing text from the lead that references this as if it were a theory that anyone actually holds rather than a strawman term used by others. Squatch347 (talk) 05:58, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

  It's about both. Andre🚐 14:58, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Kerrni, Bonewah can you please chime in? My take is that you've both been pretty active and this topic involves things you've both opined on in the past. I'd like to get your input here. Squatch347 (talk) 06:19, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

The first proposed sentence should be edited to something like: "Economists such as X, Y, and Z have taken the position that there is no coherent economic theory by the name of trickle-down, while others have equated it with the Laffer curve, supply-side economics and tax cuts for the wealthiest in their arguments criticizing these theories and policies." The second sentence doesn't logically follow from the first, because as @Squatch347 and others have noted, there are no economists or policy makers who have put their names behind any "trickle-down theory" arguing for tax cuts for the rich to promote economic growth. I've seen no one here cite any source where someone is on the record saying, "My policy of trickle-down economics will spur growth through tax cuts for the rich." All the references to trickle-down economics as defined as tax cuts for the rich by the person using the term have been backward looking and as far as I can tell, the policy that they are examining included across-the-board tax cuts covering most wage brackets. In other words, there have been no instances where economists or policy makers argued that a policy of exclusively tax cuts for the rich (that critics call trickle down economics) will spur growth. The policy makers have implemented a broad set of policies, which incidentally include tax cuts for higher income brackets along with others. It makes no logical sense here to discuss evidence about tax cuts for the rich that is critical of a policy that no one is advocating for. Kerrni (talk) 15:42, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes, that's precisely how the "SSE as a euphemism for TDE" rhetoric goes. Are you suggesting that the scope of this page should be entirely about how how anyone that uses the term TDE is just employing (as one Trussian talking-head put it, shortly before these very policies tanked the UK economy) a "slur" on SSE, which article please see for how great that objectively is? I'm not sure what the best solution to the article-scope question, but I think it's very clear that a) it's not that, and b) we're really going to resolve that before we make any actual progress in a way that materially improves the quality of the article. Otherwise it's just going to be indefinite trench warfare over inches of "exclude that material, it disagrees with my POV" ground, result in an equally (or indeed increasingly) bad article, just with a slightly different political slant depending on which set of editors is the more dogged. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 01:43, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree, we aren't really going to resolve this until we resolve the scope, which I've been trying to do for about a month at this point. The question is, do we confine this article to an NPOV discussion of the term's origins and usage or do we make this a POV warfare of primary source documents about any particular economic policy we want? (Fully recognizing that I wrote that in a very biased manner, but that is the kinda no BS view of the alternatives imo). Honestly, keeping this to a narrative of the term's usage short cuts all the nonsensical debates going on because we don't have to weigh in on them, we just report what reputable sources have used the term to mean, and thats it. Squatch347 (talk) 06:56, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

Obviously, as you say, not a fair description. It is not POV to attribute all the usages of the term and its possible meanings to reliable sources. There is WP:NODEADLINE. Presumably the RFC can be closed by an impartial 3rd party since nobody seems to be adding to it, though. Andre🚐 17:19, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

And I don't think I've seen any objection to using all the possible meanings of the term. The objection is us dumping primary sources that any random person finds as if that were an accurate, WP:DUE representation of any particular topic. And to do so without a single source clearly defining what the term means to professional economists. And to do that in contradiction to the format and usage of every single terminology page on Wiki. Analysis of policy and economic proposals belong on the host pages for those policies and proposals. Squatch347 (talk) 06:47, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Let's continue removing sources that don't belong while preserving those that do. Andre🚐 15:13, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

My proposal for the lede is below: The phrase "trickle-down" was originally a term used by politicians and pundits in critical references to economic policies they viewed as favoring upper income brackets, corporations, and individuals with substantial wealth or capital. Over time, the term broadened to be a more general criticism of broad economic policies generally related to supply side economics. It has also expanded in use amongst some economists as a colloquial reference to positive externalities. Squatch347 (talk) 06:33, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Externalities? What? SPECIFICO talk 01:58, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

Lol, yeah probably could use some jargon removal. That is the economic term for what those economists are talking about. Benefits accruing to parties other than those involved in the transaction, and that is how they are referring to them in the linked papers, but maybe something like "spill over economic benefits" with a link to externalities? Squatch347 (talk) 06:54, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

It obfuscates the actual meaning. Andre🚐 17:19, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

What actual meaning? Clearly some (if not most) of the primary sources we are referencing are using this term in a broad colloquial manner, not specifically referring to tax breaks or anything related to that specific policy set. We literally just changed the language on two entries based on that last week. Those uses of the term were about how people who aren't involved are benefited by trade or technological development. Pretending that those are related to the same usage as the political examples isn't faithful to the sources. Squatch347 (talk) 06:32, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm comfortable with the changes and progress we are making on improving the article. But I think that we need to use clearer and more plain language rather than so jargon-heavy. Andre🚐 15:13, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

If we are going to change the lede, id like it to be based on what reliable sources say, not what users here feel is true. On that note, i checked The New Palgrave Economic dictionary and there is no entry for Trickle-down. Bonewah (talk) 18:54, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

That fact is pretty much irrelevant to the discussion. Various RS do define it. Andre🚐 20:34, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Where? Which ones? You keep getting asked this and never actually answer the question. Can you list a single RS that defines "Trickle-Down Economics" in an encyclopedic NPOV manner? Every source you referenced in the RFC said that it was a term used as a pejorative. Squatch347 (talk) 05:50, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

I've already answered this question multiple times. There are many reliable sources that define it. It's defined here [24] and here [25] and here [26], as I've said multiple times, but you keep disregarding WP:SOURCEGOODFAITH and moving the goalposts for reasons why those sources don't apply. It is not pejorative. That is not what a pejorative is: a term that is used for critical analysis. How about this one: [27] or this one [28] Trickle-down economics is the notion that all you need to do is make sure that the economy grows, and if it grows, everybody benefits. Trickle down simply allows the rich to get richer, Andre🚐 15:03, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

You've offered sources, but none of them define trickle down economics, as the responses to you pointed out. The same is true here.

Your first link calls two policy proposals examples, but doesn't define what it is.

Your second is about mental competency requirements within neoliberal economic models. Did you include the right link?

Stiglitz (your only source for the last three) doesn't define it here. He references a couple of examples, but examples aren't a definition. He doesn't say offer a definition in this work.

This is probably the closest to defining trickle-down economics, but fails for two reasons. It doesn't actually provide a definition, it just calls a set of policies "trickle down" not defining what that term actually means. AND, it is in an overtly critical work. It wouldn't be NPOV to only use a single, critical reference as our source material for a definition; especially when it requires us to infer a definition based on examples.

This is just a reference back to your last author, it is another quoting his work, it doesn't count as an independent source.

So, again, you've offered a couple of sources, with no quotes to what text you are referring that all turn out to not offer a definition. What's more notable, every single source (except for the random, unrelated one) only uses the term in a normal, pejorative manner, not in the technical manner you are attempting to use it as on the main page. Unless we have an actual source offering a clear definition of the term as an economic theory, we are just Synthing ourselves into a topic here. Squatch347 (talk) 13:45, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Once again you are incorrect and moving the goalposts, I have quoted the specific text from these sources on multiple occasions. You can read the sources themselves as they do in fact define trickle-down. Once again, the sources being critical is NOT a reason to not use them, nor is a critical description PEJORATIVE. Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 and in the Tax Reform Act of 1986. These two acts instituted clas- sic, trickle-down economics , by largely replacing the principle of pro- gressive taxes with the principle of proportional taxes - Duggar neoliberal policies such as trickle-down economics , tax breaks for upper-income brackets or the removal of social safety nets - Wrenn In the ensuing economic and political debate, this ‘rising tide hypothesis’ evolved into a much more specific idea, according to which regressive economic policies – policies that favour the richer classes – would end up benefiting everyone. Resources given to the rich would inevitably ‘trickle down’ to the rest. It is important to clarify that this version of old-fashioned ‘trickle-down economics’ did not follow from the post-war evidence.[29] -Stiglitz. You are just incorrect. I've met the burden of offering definitions. It does not need to be used in a "technical manner." It is WP:SYNTHNOT. Andre🚐 14:59, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Go back a reread my objection and your quotes. You'll notice that they all take the form of:"trickle down economics as exemplified by policy x." Those quotes would be a great addition to a statement that some economists label policies such as x and y as trickle down economics. None of those are statements of theory. IE "trickle down economics is the theory that..." none of them describe mechanics or systematic relations, the definition of a theory.

Let me as a question (and please take this in good faith, I'm legitimately asking). Do you think there are economists that subscribe to a theory called trickle down? Or do you think that there is a systematic theory some economists hold that is trickle down but maybe they call it something else? Squatch347 (talk) 09:34, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia does not require "mechanics or systematic relations, the definition of a theory." Wikipedia just needs sources that describe things and we write what the sources say. As mentioned, I believe that most economists or policymakers probably call what they subscribe to "supply-side economics" but there are certainly right-wing economists and lawmakers that believe that if they cut taxes on the rich, it will trickle down. It's not relevant because our article simply should cover what the sources say. Andre🚐 17:03, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

While I have noticed this discussion over the last few days, I think it misses the point. The lead is not supposed to define the term and its scope, it is supposed to summarize the key points of the article. Varying definitions and changes in definition over time should be covered in the body of the article. I doubt that anyone should change the lead, before making substantial changes to the article's contents. Dimadick (talk) 09:45, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

That's true, I agree. Andre🚐 15:03, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

The lead is supposed to define the term and make the scope of the article clear: that's the entire point of summary style. Now obviously that's not to say one whimsically writes a lead and the rest of the article slavishly follows in some top-down command-economy manner. But nor do we simply throw random material into the body then summarise them later. Whatever the ramshackle nature of the process, ultimately scoping is an editorial decision, within the constraints of what the balance of the sources supports. And that's especially so when we have articles of obviously overlapping scopes, otherwise we really do risk ending up with a POVFORK, if we simply try to do some crude 'preferred terminology' partition of the sources, even if that's not an explicit editorial intention. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 19:12, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

"Voodoo economics"

I've attempted to raise this several times, but it's been caught up in the usual "revert, don't discuss, ignore anyone else seeking to discuss" cycle. Should the term voodoo economics be discussed here? It's clearly related, whether as a term (or "slur", etc) or as a description of the "theory", but with obvious imprecision, deliberate pejoration, and (dis)similarity-of-scope issues. At present it points to Reaganomics, which I don't think is ideal, especially as it doesn't get either a hatnote or an alt-title there. It merits at least one of those somewhere, and another context to indicate both its specific original usage and its general sense (likely mainly linking one way or the other). Constructive suggestions welcome. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 03:32, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

It is an alternative name for supply side economic theory, or the ‘trickle-down’ journalistic phrase, but quite limited in scope (1979-80 US Presidential campaign, and follow-up references). Perhaps we should “See also” ? DOR (HK) (talk) 09:50, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

It might be slightly different in scope -- if TDE/SSE = 85% similar, as suggested above, perhaps VE = "SSE and we'll borrow until it 'pays for itself'"? -- but closely enough relatedly that I think it needs at least some cross-reference. And obviously the historical context is somewhat specific to GHWB's being against it, until he was for it. However, someone might easily be looking for either that (and hence be confused if they got an WP:ASTONISHing redirect here with no landing ground), or they might have heard the term used in the context of some other country or period entirely (and hence confused by the present state). I'm OK with either, as long as it gets at least a hatnote. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 23:27, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

Agreed that it warrants some inclusion. I like the "see also" idea as it has similar origins and usages as a term. I'd be wary talking about it too much as a theory because, like trickle-down, it is primarily meant as a caricature used in political criticism. Squatch347 (talk) 06:54, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

A somewhat accurate caricature, as is the nature of satire. The suggested policies involved reducing the federal government's revenue, while actually increasing its spending. The advocates of the policy argued (based on the Laffer curve) that the policy would actually maximize the revenue. The predicted maximization never occurred. One of the sources we use on the unsound thinking behind the policy points out something fundamentally wrong about the vision of these advocates: : "[T]he whole California gang had taken [the Laffer curve] literally (and primitively). The way they talked, they seemed to expect that once the supply-side tax cut was in effect, additional revenue would start to fall, manna-like, from the heavens." Basically, they never explained the sources for the expected increased revenue. Dimadick (talk) 09:30, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

I agree. There were indeed advocates of the policy and the theory of trickle-down economics, and there still are people like Grover Norquist or Sam Brownback that advocate cutting tax on the rich to stimulate the economy. Andre🚐 03:22, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Do either of those references call their policies "Trickle-Down Economics" or have they said that effects will "trickle-down?" Because if not, I think you all know this is WP:OR Squatch347 (talk) 13:48, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

It only matters if RS call it that, not if they self-describe it as that. And they do, so it's not OR. Andre🚐 14:55, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Self-descriptions are useless, since we can only use unaffiliated sources. Dimadick (talk) 15:05, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

@Dimadick I don't disagree with your assessment of those specific economic policies or analyses. But I'm not really here to discuss their validity or lack thereof per WP:FORUM. The page is about the term "Trickle-Down Economics" (and probably should be broadened to just trickle-down) and its usage a la all of our other term discussion pages, including parody terms. On those pages we don't go into detail about the policies being parodied and their merits or lack thereof, we simply reference these are the ones that are being referenced. As I noted above, we don't add all the medical journal papers related to homosexual action on the page for the "Gay Agenda" we simply note that is what is being referenced with a wiki link and let the larger discussion happen on the parent article. The question that still hasn't been answered is, why aren't we doing that here? Squatch347 (talk) 13:57, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Because it's a false and bad analogy. Andre🚐 15:00, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

The reference is to Reaganomics in general, and is used to explain why they were mocked as "voodoo economics". The quotation is taken directly from the text on the Laffer curve. The page may be about trickle-down, but this discussion is specifically about the meaning of voodoo economics. Dimadick (talk) 15:03, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

Of course it's not a stand-alone "theory" of its own; it's some fuzzy mashup of TDE/SSE, deficit spending, and the Laffer napkin-hypothesis. Or a fuzzy critique of those, if you prefer. If the thinking is this should be essentially a 'terminology' article, then discussing this as term I think also makes sense, as it's clearly a related one. I'm inclined to have the material here with the cross-ref internally to Reaganomics, as I think it's more awkward to do so the other way around, but either is doable. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 18:48, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

I certainly was astonished to see voodoo economics link to Reaganomics. I would think political smears are typically left in the blockquotes that hold them. They shouldn't be linked to something at all. It implies that they are synonyms. Heavy Chaos (talk) 00:38, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Well, it's not really a smear at this point. Andre🚐 00:53, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

More OR, continued yet again.

The line The political campaign group, Tax Justice Network has used the term referring broadly to wealth inequality in its criticisms of tax havens. is sourced to a guardian article. While the article itself mentions TD twice, once in the title and once in a quote. The research they are citing, the 'tax justice report' does not. Here are archived copies of this report:

tax justice report main

tax justice main report 2

Tax justice main page for report

Bonewah (talk) 14:26, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

That doesn't necessarily matter. If the secondary sources uses TD that is sufficient even if the primary source does not. It's not OR because we're using the secondary source which is reliable. Andre🚐 19:41, 11 November 2022 (UTC)

The OR policy specifically states Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them and Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources. Just to be clear, are you aiming to subtract "More OR", or to add it? The mantra's been bandied around so much on this page, and so wildly incorrectly, that I feel I'm starting to reach semantic satiation. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 18:35, 12 November 2022 (UTC)

Did someone forget that “trickle down” is a journalistic expression, and as such, entirely appropriate in a Guardian article? Please stop debating “trickle down” as if it were some kind of economic theory; it isn’t. DOR (HK) (talk) 14:49, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

But there's no consensus that trickle down shouldn't be considered both an economic and a political term. A Guardian article entitled, "Wealth doesn't trickle down – it just floods offshore, research reveals," actually does belong here. "Inequality is much, much worse than official statistics show, but politicians are still relying on trickle-down to transfer wealth to poorer people. from the article. Super relevant, and shouldn't be removed at all. Andre🚐 17:28, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

So, we agree. DOR (HK) (talk) 08:50, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

"Wealth doesn't trickle down – it just floods offshore, research reveals," They needed research for that? It is standard practice for decades. Dimadick (talk) 10:16, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

So you guys want to keep this material because it contains the phrase 'Trickle-down' twice? Thats the standard for inclusion? Bonewah (talk) 13:57, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

It not only contains the phrase but the concept. I don't understand the argument to remove it. Andre🚐 17:00, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

My argument is the same as it has been throughout. That this article is a middens of material that includes only the most passing of mentioning of TD or articles that are related to TD only by way of what some editor somewhere thinks TD means. Bonewah (talk) 18:04, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Neither of which applies here. Andre🚐 19:45, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Can we please stop obsessing over sources? If this was the “Don’t have a cow, man” talk page, one or two references in a source would be fine. But, some folks seem to think “trickle down” is somehow important enough to require academic-type citations. It isn’t. DOR (HK) (talk) 16:29, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

That would be fine if we didnt act like it was some kind of academic-type subject. Just above Andrevan claims that it is really an economic term. If it is, it needs academic-type sources. Bonewah (talk) 19:11, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

It is both a term in economics, which is written about in economic work, it is a term in politics and public policy in law, and journalism. All of the above. Andre🚐 19:24, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Ok, i will not stop obsessing over sources then. Bonewah (talk) 20:35, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

The misunderstanding seems to be the idea that SYNTH/OR policy somehow prohibits using economic sources in an article about topics that include more than just economics. It does not. Andre🚐 22:19, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

Scientifical Not political

I shall argue later with my proper arguments on essay that the concept is not political but mathematical, scientifical.

The new title is Tricke Everywhere Economics.

Just because we have too many wealthy countries without fiscal policy or TAXING system at all.

Therefore I do argue that the economy (tenders, money, goods) spreads everywhere due to the spontanous interactions in marketplace of ideas.

Resouces are Infinite. Kartasto (talk) 16:59, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

Need better clarity: Real theory or shorthand term?

I'm new to editing WP. I made some typo edits once about 10 years ago, so thank you for your patience if I don't understand the specifics or edit this talk page incorrectly.

I was going to clean up the article a bit and make it more clear that there's apparently disagreement whether this is a legitimate theory, or just a shorthand term frequently used. I was going to make that more clear at the top, with the Thomas Sowell quote (or a different one because he's said it elsewhere). Then I was going to reorganize the existing content to highlight what things have been called "trickle down", and then maybe add any rebuttals that might exist. Then have a section on research, since researches use the term apparently.

But what we need here first is admitting that this challenge hasn't been met: no one has called any economic theory they advocate for "trickle down". It is not a name that anyone self-describes.

Meet this challenge, or leave the edits that point this out and focus the article to this end.

Heavy Chaos (talk) 22:13, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Oppose proposed reorganization. Let's discuss each change one by one and go incrementally and iteratively. In general I oppose your logic and your claim though. Andre🚐 00:54, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

I would support something of this nature. That we treat this as if it were being used as a serious economic theory is beyond ridiculous. As I've mentioned before, this is clearly a short hand term that has a wide variety of conflicting meanings. We should treat it as a term label rather than a group of coherent theories/policy proposals. No one out there is advocating or a subscriber to "trickle-down" economic theory. There are only those who label their opponents as having done so. Squatch347 (talk) 15:32, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. What’s wrong with an article describing a shorthand phrase used by lazy journalists? With all the arguments here, it is clearly needed! DOR (ex-HK) (talk) 15:39, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

Well, I think we should start by removing the last sentence of the first paragraph:

Trickle-down economics is a term used in critical references to economic policies that favor the upper income brackets, corporations, and individuals with substantial wealth or capital. In recent history, the term has been used by critics of supply-side economics. Whereas general supply-side theory favors lowering taxes overall, trickle-down theory more specifically advocates for a lower tax burden on the upper end of the economic spectrum.

"Trickle-down theory" doesn't exist, but the last sentence compares it to an actual espoused theory. The "whereas sentence makes no sense. I was going to delete it now, but I'm not sure how to handle the references. I'm just not sure of the correct editing tools and formats to use at this point. This is a feature heavy platform. I'm overwhelmed. Anyway, I think one of you should do that; or I'm going to eventually give it a go.

Heavy Chaos (talk) 23:17, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

We had a lengthy WP:RFC on this and I don't know if it was ever formally closed but I believe it was roughly split at no consensus - in other words trickle-down economics is both an economic term, and a political one. But I recommend you do not simply delete things per WP:PRESERVE, WP:CONSENSUS, WP:NPOV, WP:RS, etc. Andre🚐 23:19, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

I went ahead with a medium-sized edit. Primarily, I moved a clear example of usage from the lead in to the usage section. I left the "Whereas" sentence alone. If there's a cleaner way to make the edit I've made, I'd appreciate the administrative/style direction. Heavy Chaos (talk) 23:33, 30 January 2023 (UTC)