It’s not often that you can learn about the Laffer Curve from Art Laffer himself. While relatively controversial, Art Laffer popularized, but did not create, the notion that tax revenues could increase by lowering taxes. In this clip, he does a good job distinguishing between the two sections of the curve and focusing on the pedagogical side of the curve.
Christian Finnegan — Fat Tax
Christian Finnegan knows he isn’t in the best shape so he’s decided to join a gym. He figures that at least if he never goes to the gym then he can consider the gym membership a form of fat tax. This framing adjustment could still have the same impact as working out since he now has to internalize his decision to eat unhealthy foods.
Going Places (1948)
From YouTube:
Cold War cartoon defending the profit motive against anti-capitalist critics. The second of seven smart-looking animated shorts in the “fun and facts about American business” series. Its subject is “the profit motive,” and it stars “Freddie Fudsie,” a lazy soap maker who just wants to go fishing. He invents bar soap, makes some money, and is about to retire in peace and quiet when a sexy lady (the Profit Motive) walks by and Freddie — who suddenly needs more money to win her affection — never sees a fishing hole again. But that’s okay, because “the profit motive has been the driving force behind the growth of American industry” and “will make a better life for the children of tomorrow.”
Quartz — Robots Should Pay Taxes
Bill Gates, in an article with Quartz, argues that if a robot which take workers’ jobs should be required to pay taxes. Those tax funds should be redistributed to pay for re-training programs.
New Girl – Douchebag Jar
Schmidt has a tendency to be a bit eccentric and bother his roommates with a variety of sayings/outfits. These outburst tend to annoy his roommates so they collectively agree to regular his behavior and force him to pay a tax to a “douchebag jar” when he does things the group considers unfavorable.
Ted: Jonas Eliasson: How to solve traffic jams
Traffic jams are often provided as an example of a market failure. Drivers are focused on their own driving and don’t consider how it may impact others. As a result, too many people use road systems and congestion occurs. This Ted Talk highlights how Pigouvian taxes could be used to correct the market failure by instituting congestion taxes. While it’s not presented by an economist, he uses a lot of economics concepts throughout the talk.
Parks and Rec — Ron Swanson on Government Intervention
Ron demonstrates how government taxes interrupt the actions of free markets.