HEADLINE: Why Republicans Struggle to Cut Spending GUEST NAME: Adam Michel SUMMARY: John Batchelor speaks with Adam Michel arguing Republicans excel at selling tax cuts but fail to sell spending cuts, which are mathematically necessary to sustain tax cuts

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John Batchelor

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🗓️ 9 October 2025

⏱️ 3 minutes

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Summary

HEADLINE: Why Republicans Struggle to Cut Spending GUEST NAME: Adam Michel SUMMARY: John Batchelor speaks with Adam Michel arguing Republicans excel at selling tax cuts but fail to sell spending cuts, which are mathematically necessary to sustain tax cuts. Both taxes and spending distort incentives. Michel contends that spending cuts are not austerity but reforms that improve lives, referencing how 1990s welfare reforms helped people exit poverty.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is John Batchshaw. Conversation with Adam Michelle of the Cato Institute, the director of tax policy.
0:07.9	I learned that Republicans really like to talk about tax cuts. However, tax cuts without cutting spending,
0:16.7	well, Adam explains here. Not only that, cutting spending has advantages in all directions,
0:23.0	including improving the lives of the least among us.
0:26.5	Adam Michel, Cato Institute, cutting spending. Not cutting spending is the same as raising taxes.
0:35.6	Republican Party, not cutting spending is the same as raising taxes. You're good at
0:41.3	that part. What about the cutting spending? More of this tonight. Adamichelle.
0:50.5	That's a good question. There's, I think Republicans are very good at talking about the importance of tax cuts.
0:58.0	That tax cut, lowering taxes let you keep more of your hard-earned money, that they're a supply-side reform that unleashes businesses and lets the American consumer sit in the driver's seat.
1:15.1	The problem is they're not as good at selling spending cuts, which are a necessary component of tax cuts. If we don't keep spending down,
1:21.2	taxes have to go up by sort of by mathematical certainty. If we keep spending more than we take in, something has to
1:29.5	break. And so the, in my view, the way out is to learn to talk about spending cuts in the way
1:37.9	that we talk about tax cuts. Both taxes and spending distort incentives to work and save. They crowd out family and community
1:47.1	institutions. They mess with entrepreneurship, which puts America at the head of every other
1:54.8	country around the world. And it's not just taxes that impact all of those things, but spending
2:00.0	does as well.
2:01.7	If you look at the one big, beautiful bill that Republicans recently passed,
2:06.0	some of the reforms they made adding work requirements to some welfare programs.
2:11.1	There's a long pedigree of reforms like that that reduce spending,
2:15.1	but also help people get out of poverty. After the 1990 welfare
2:20.6	reforms, we see the people that were impacted by those reforms doing better. They have less
2:26.8	food insecurity. The children that grew up in those households are doing better a generation
	...

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