Thursday, June 2, 2011

Smell Something Burning?

That would be Mitt Romney's pants on fire according to fact-check website Politifact.com for his statement that the US is "inches away from ceasing to be a free market economy" as part of his announcement of his Presidential candidacy for 2012.

It’s true that the government’s footprint on spending has grown over the past few years, due in large part to the recession. But while the statistics show that the government continues to have a large influence on the economy, there is little indication that the government’s role has risen dramatically enough over the past few years to threaten the kind of free market that the U.S. has operated under in recent decades. And international comparisons show that the U.S. ranks low in both total tax burden and high in economic freedom -- at least as measured by a prominent conservative think tank. So, as measured by economists from both ends of the spectrum and, most importantly, from the conservative Heritage Foundation, it's ridiculously false to say we are close to losing our free-market economy. We find Romney's statement Pants on Fire.

Click here for more on Romney's speech.

--Ballard Burgher

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