Discretionary spending 1980-276 bil 1989-488 bil
Mandatory spending 1980-262 bil 1989- 486 bil Taxation became regressive, payroll taxes burden as a share of GDP went up, Cooperate taxes went down, payroll taxes went down for all, but with greater decreases for big earners. This is often cited as a reason the economy did well during the Reagan years, but if you are looking for similar historical comparisons of times when the economy grew for averages of more then 5% a year for more than 5 years the factor that is found in every example since WWI is higher government spending. This might be the single example where regressive taxes increased growth for an extended period of time, but I suspect government spending was the thing that did it. I think Reagan was all for this spending, and give him a large share of the credit for the recovery in the 80's. You might not, and what that would mean to me is that it wasn't Reagan, but congress that caused significant growth in the 80's.