'Adoption of the Populist Party's ideals would/is beneficial for the United States of America."

Thanks for the debate, Lannan. ==My case== FrameworkCompletely dropped throughout the entire debate and therefore conceded. Weigh the round on a cost-benefit analysis. My opponent hasn't offered any way to weigh his impacts on this scale, so presume a negative vote. I. TaxationA. Corporate taxPro has dropped throughout the entire debate the card from the National Bureau of Economic Research showing why corporate taxes are a really, really bad idea. I don't really know what else to say here. Pro's only response is that the government provides services with the tax money but: a) he's dropped the warrant from the Forbes card and the sheer common sense of the matter that the private sector is more efficient, b) he's failed to impact *any* of this. Why is the welfare state good? And c) he dropped my counter that even if you buy the need for lots of government revenue we still don't need the corporate tax because the income tax exists and the removal of the corporate tax increases the taxable base vastly. Keep in mind how vastly the corporate tax harms incentive, to the point of destroying what would've been an extra 5% of our GDP. Along with the obvious societal benefits of a huge increase in wealth, this would create a larger national income for the government to draw from. Obviously my position has been against the income tax, but to tax personal income and then corporate income is just redundant and harms the economy vastly. B. Income tax Pro drops in his final round my counter proposal--even if we need an income tax, a flat tax is preferable. Keep in mind that Pro has never justified why we need an income tax other than vague references to services the government provides that he presumes to be good. However even if you buy the need for an income tax, I gain his advocacy because the card from the National Center for Policy Analysis has gone completely dropped throughout the entire debate and shows us that a flat tax, not the progressive tax the populists wanted, would let the economy grow more. This allows for the government to increase revenues as well because of a larger taxable base. Literally the only advantage of a progressive tax Pro cites is income inequality but he's failed to establish: a) Why inequality is bad, b) how this outweighs literally hundreds of billions of dollars and c) if a progressive tax actually helps inequality in a noticeable way. Pro has also dropped the logical warrant on why increasing taxation as wealth increases harms incentive. From my economic impacts alone I outweigh everything Pro has brought up. Vote Con. II. Government control of industry A. RailroadsPro makes no response whatsoever to state run railroads being a terrible idea economically. You can extend that through every round, even in his rebuttal Lannan prefaced it with me focusing on efficiency over some other ideals, which is an implicit concession. It's pretty obvious that handing over such a vital part of the economy, then and now, to the government would've been a terrible idea. Lannans only impacts come from the Railroads practicing sleazy business tactics that were only possible due to government regulation (stock watering), a populist ideal if there ever was one. Pro argues that the ICC was good but he dropped my argument on how his own source said it was useless, and my turn on how it helped set the framework for the regulatory state that's killing the economy today. Pro tries to argue that the ICC was good because it "delayed" the panic of 1893, but not only does he provide no warrant at all for how this happened or why these two things are linked, the panic of 1893 happening anyway should be good enough evidence that any impact Pro manages to have at this point is irrelevant. B. CommunicationThis is the most confused point of the round (partly my fault). My point was that the populists wanted a state run telegraph service. The telegraph was soon obsolete due to the telephone. I compared what this service would've been like to the postal service in the US today that loses $25 million per day because its outdated and inefficient, and compared this with companies that used to offer telegraphs that have moved on to show why the private sector is better. Lannan's response was just that the US has the best postal system, but if "best" means "loses only $25 million per day" than this shows only the sorry state of postal services abroad. A state telegraph service would've been even worse. Vote Con here. ==Opponents case== I. MoneyPro drops that the federal reserve isn't a good system and that the previous system would've been superior with less government regulations that rendered the banks helpless. Pro also drops that the value of the Dollar has dropped exponentially, losing 96% of its value in 100 years. Pro argues that this will help the poor because it erases the debt of the farmer. First, he doesn't quantify this, secondly while it's true that inflation helps farmers and other debtors in the short term, in the long term it harms us all by destroying the value of our savings. Recall also that the Federal Reserve system witnessed and failed to alleviate the worst economic depression in United States history. Maybe a few farmers got to keep their farms, but a lot more lost theirs during the depression. The Federal Reserve was at least just as bad, but more likely worse than the previous system. Another populist economic suggestion that's led to disaster. II. Transportation and regulation Pro admits that the ICC was a failed act, his only impact coming from it "attacking" the railroad industry--the sole link allowing for meaningful commerce and travel between many parts of the country in the populists day. Lannan attributes the bills failure to an uncommitted legislature, and whatever the reason this shows how Populist demands and expectations were inconsistent with political and economic reality. My opponent argues against the laissez faire economy by saying companies were corrupt and bringing up a few new arguments. First don't let him get away with this in the last round, but his arguments are pretty poorly impacted. Never mind the fact that I wasn't advocating a totally free market (just less stifling red tape--remember compliance costs alone are around $1.76 trillion), he fails to explain why these arguments, things like OSHA and anti-trust legislation should supersede my impacts. As for companies being corrupt, corporations are not the only entities that can be corrupt, but more importantly since the only major legislative achievement he cites, the ICC, was a complete failure this means that we have no government action to look to that solved the corruption. His impact simply doesn't exist. III. Direct legislation Pro drops that populist demands led to sloppily written legislation. We're still paying for the civil war, not metaphorically or figuratively, but literally. Pro attributes the adulteration of the Senate to the Americans people's "greatness" declining. This is an argument against democracy and direct elections. Honestly there just isn't much argument here. He never showed any difference in policy actions based upon the method of selection of Senators, nor has he explained how this small increase in democracy outweigh every other bad thing the populists did. Pro says that populists would've supported term limits. Fine, even if we grant this he doesn't explain why this is good. Term limits are a huge debate by themselves. There is just a lack of positive tangible results coming off of Pro's case.