James,
But the point is that this is NOT “taken in isolation,” but ONLY as part and parcel of eliminating the corporate income tax entirely. And who said anything about us saying that the earnings are “excessive.” Did I say that? I don’t think so. Here’s how I described it, more concisely, in a letter to a reader:
The main goal isn’t to keep executive compensation lower; the main goal is to use just a tiny bit of the windfall from eliminating corporate income taxes for the purposes of answering the lefty complaints that we don’t cover the “transition costs” in our proposals for personal accounts in Social Security.
In short, I am using a tiny bit of the proceeds from one conservative proposal to bolster the case for another conservative proposal, while providing a bit of populist “cover” for political purposes.
You will also note that I did not write a word about “income inequality.” I don’t give a flying **** about income inequality. I don’t think that is the government’s business. But I do think it makes sense to tap a windfall for other, better purposes.
