Machiavelli vs todays leaders
...red “stingy” and ended up to have good results. With the advice from former president Richard Nixon, Reagan concentrated on economic issues his first six months in office. Reaganomics was the name given to the supply-side economic theory which Reagan based his economic plans. He started reagonomics with the belief that the economy was struggling because of excessive taxation. With more money going to taxes, individuals and corporations were unable to invest capital to stimulate growth. The plan called for massive tax cuts in order to stimulate investments. The economic growth would then “trickle down” to the workers. Supply-side economics also called for budget cuts to counteract the loss of income from the tax cuts. Reagan followed this model by creating his budget plan in 1981. Reagan put together legislation that cut government expenses by $40 billion and created a three-year tax cut plan for individual and corporate income taxes. The tax cut was the largest in history and was expected to jump-start the economy. Reagonomics was an action that ended positively. Therefore, in this situation, Machiavelli’s advice was correct. In Nixon’s Food Stamps act, however, this was not the case. Nixon created the idea of food stamps; this was considered a generous act. Food Stamps are government-issued stamps used in exchange for food. The food stamp system was a system that people could easily cheat. Also, no one feared him, which was considered a very bad thing. The stamps helped the poor population; however, it did not stop people from being poor. Machiavelli believed that if you wanted to pursue a generous action, it must be for a good reason, and must be done correct to work. If his generous action helped, but did not prevent something, then it was not a good decision. The last example relating to chapter 16 is about the Immigration Reform, created by LBJ. The Immigration Reform went both ways, in relationship to Machiavelli. The immigration act of 1965 allowed more people from 3rd world countries to enter US. This act allowed 170,000 immigrants into America, but no more then 20,000 per country. It did have many good things that came with it. However, he was too generous with it, and it lead to problems. Chapter 17 had advice about compassion, how often you should be compassionate, and to what extent. The three presidents/ideas that are relevant to this advice are Nixon – HUD, Clinton - Welfare reform of 1996, and Bush Senior with Contract w/ America. Nixon started HUD (urban and housing development)...