Every time we think we can’t hear anything more absurd out of the logic-free zone of Washington, we’re proven wrong.

Here is the conclusion of a new looney-tunes study from the Congressional Research Service, the policy analysis arm of the House and Senate:

Simple theoretical insights indicate that a revenue-maximizing corporate tax rate is much higher than either the current 21% rate or the 35% rate before the 2017 rate cut. Such a rate is probably no less than 70%, a finding consistent with most of the results of the alternative approach of estimating the elasticity of the tax base with respect to the tax rate.

You don’t have to be an apostle of the Laffer-Kemp-Kudlow-Reagan theory of taxation to realize this is a new peak of supreme stupidity.

You just look at recent history. As we reported in yesterday’s HOTLINE, corporate tax revenues are up nearly 50% total since the Trump corporate rate cut from 35% to 21% (federal), and 12.5% after adjusting for inflation.  So if CUTTING the rate to 21% raised revenue, how could RAISING the rate to 70% also increase revenues?

As our friend and member of our UP economic policy council Jim Carter points out in ripping this “study” to shreds, why would the Europeans and Asians lower their corporate rates on average from 50% in the 1970s to 25% today if it were going to COST their treasuries money?

Oh, and for those invested in the stock market: if you want to see the biggest sell off in stocks in American history – a stock market meltdown that would make 1929 look like a picnic – lower the after-tax rate of return on equities capital from 79% to 30%.