• "Well written, well researched, and the thesis put forth is well argued.... Woods has opened up an area of historical analysis that should invite further study."
    -Journal of American History

  • "During these times that challenge our freedoms there is no one more qualified to make U.S. history relevant to the fight against big government than Thomas Woods."
    -Barry Goldwater Jr.
    Former Member of Congress

  • "I strongly recommend Woods's work."
    -The Honorable Ron Paul,
    U.S. House of Representatives

  • "Written with great clarity and fluency, making the complex philosophical and theological concepts approachable."
    -Journal of American Studies

  • "A must-read."
    -Barron's

  • "An excellent reading source for anyone interested in financial markets, and much more so for anyone interested in learning about capitalism without all the misinterpretations being thrown about in the financial media."
    -Asia Times

  • "Provocative, well-written, and deserves to be read."
    -Catholic Historical Review

  • "An engaging and important contribution to scholarship on the history of American Catholicism."
    -Journal of the Historical Society

  • "Woods and [co-author Kevin] Gutzman appeal to both left and right in this constitutionalist jeremiad…. The authors' exegeses of the Constitution and court decisions, heavy on original intent arguments, are lucid and telling."
    -Publishers Weekly

  • "A marvelous read. Every chapter taught me something new and unexpected."
    -Tom Bethell, senior editor,
    The American Spectator

  • "The hottest book today is Meltdown, by my friend Tom Woods."
    -Judge Andrew Napolitano, senior judicial analyst,
    FOX News Channel

  • "Should be required reading."
    -Economic Affairs (London)

  • "Woods, one of the best classical liberal [libertarian] scholars of his generation, has once more placed us in his debt with this lucid and tightly argued book."
    -David Gordon, The Mises Review

  • "Tom Woods is one of my dearest allies in the struggle against wrong-headed and dangerous economic policy."
    -Peter Schiff

Schiff on the 91% Tax Rate Propaganda

You may have figured out that this issue drives me up a wall; here’s my own take on the subject. Now here’s Peter Schiff in the Wall Street Journal smacking down the increasingly conventional claim that “the rich” paid 91% marginal income tax rates in the past, and we had a super economy.

Unlearn the Propaganda!

  • michael Fleischer

    the thing with this topic is this…liberals wont be satisfied until they are shown real actull tax returns. Much of what austrians and free market types like us say is dismissed until we can produce hard date. my favorite myth busting activity for instance is hearing someone say something about the “clinton surplus” and then point them to the US treasury’s actuall website to show them that the total indebtedness actually increased during every year of clintons two terms.
    So it is with this issue. People out there still assert that the so called 1-2% highest wage earners had an EFFECTIVE tax rate in the 60 percent range. This might have been true for some fabulously wealthy people at the time who actually had some income subject to the 91 percent rate but for most better off people their effective rate was 20-30 percent. A perfect example is to look up the details of the finances of George Romney…yes Mitt Romneys father who ran for president and released all his tax returns. He was quite a well off man and have a lot to charity but his total effective tax rate was 20-25 percent most years despite falling into the 60 percent bracket.
    Anyway I, trying to find who has done the best work on this and really published actuall tax returns and hard IRS data showing how much the gov actually collected in each of these brackets in the 1955-1963 period before JFK lowered taxes. Also missing from ,most liberals understanding is the fact that all kinds of things were deductible and there was a whole tax shelter industry…
    anyway I glad that the austrian community is taking this up because this is another one of those liberal bugaboos that the left harps on so much “oh if only we would go back to the glory days of the 1950′s when the rich paid so much more ” …They have no idea what they are talking about. Krugman as usually least of all.