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Will, with all due respect, you were 4 years old at the time - I remember the thing; I lived through it. The so-called "Reagan recession" was caused by Paul Volcker raising interest rates almost to 20% in order to wring out from the system the stagflation that was caused by the cumulative damage done by Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter. It was deep and it was painful but it had precisely zero to do with Reagan; it was totally driven by monetary policy and moreover, the "malaise" started before the 1980 election. IIRC that recession was over by mid '82. By the time the tax cuts kicked in and worked their way through the economy, it was months later. What you're forgetting is that the tax cuts were enacted in '81 - and when that happened, the resulting wave of investment and risk started to show up in '82. You can look it up. That then accelerated when the tax code was rationalized in '86 and most tax shelters were killed off, which meant money was redirected to productive uses. The 80s also benefitted from Volcker having killed off inflation in '79-'81; it wasn't just the tax cuts, though the tax cuts were a huge part of it becaue they got rid of the economically distortionary decisionmaking that the tax code was causing.
Really, Will, you're just cherry picking stuff from history books (which I understand because you're not old enough to actually remember what was happening). What do you think caused the boom of the 90s - (i) a tiny adjustment of marginal rates or (ii) a combination of the peace dividend (resulting from Reagan pushing the USSR over the economic cliff) and a huge increase in productivity driven by technology, coupled with low energy prices?
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