Am I surprised that the Wallstreet Journal would have a complaint-piece about potential higher taxes though?
Nope.
One choice quote: "The only way to cover the cost of burgeoning debt without growth-crushing taxes is to encourage faster economic growth."
Am I the only one who feels uneasy about our society's obsession with ever-increasing growth? Can that model possibly be sustainable on a finite globe?
Many people point to the 70% tax rate as the ideal because that's what we had in the "good old days" in the 1950s. That's not a good reason to choose that figure either. There were other factors contributing to the 1950s being the "good old days."
That's why finding an "ideal" tax rate is a challenging problem.