US Presidency
1988

I didn't know they had economists then, but ibn-Khaldun said that at the beginning of the empire the tax rates were low and the revenue was great. At the end of the empire, the rates were great and the revenue was low. So, I came away with the belief that you didn't gain revenue by raising taxes. And in fact, our whole national experience proves it. When Coolidge took to tax reductions, the revenue of the Government increased. And the same thing happened to a certain extent with President Kennedy's tax reduction, which was similar to ours. So, one of my first goals was to unleash the economy of this country and get government off the backs and out of an adversarial relationship with the private sector so that the people of this country could do with their freedom what they were intended to do. That's all we really have done in this administration: We got out of your way. And we have these people that still say that we have a target of 1993 for a balanced budget.