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Pro-growth tax-cutter
Rudy Giuliani has proven, both during his tenure as mayor of New York and through his subsequent rhetoric, that he is a pro-growth Republican in the mold of Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp, and Newt Gingrich. As mayor, Giuliani cut city taxes by more than eight billion dollars, reducing the tax burden on New Yorkers by 22%. Giuliani’s low-tax views remain intact. As Race42008.com noted, Rudy’s recent visit to Minnesota included an emphasis on achieving economic growth via low taxes and less regulation on the economy.

Giuliani cut the commercial-rent tax; he cut sales taxes, including taxes on clothing; he cut the marriage penalty on taxpaying couples; he cut taxes on commercial rents everywhere outside of Manhattan’s major business districts; and he cut various taxes on small businesses and self-employed New Yorkers. He cut NYC's hotel tax from 6% to 5%. Consequently, hotel tax revenues increased from $135 million in Fiscal Year 1995 to $239 million in FY 2001.

"The thing that probably disturbs me the most when I read the New York Times editorials, they've kind of turned around the whole idea of cutting taxes, and they make tax increases morally courageous," Giuliani said. "I have no idea what is courageous about raising taxes. I understand it's courageous to run into a fire and take somebody out, but I can't figure out what's courageous about raising taxes. I don't understand why you would think that in an economy that's essentially a private economy, it makes more sense and is more efficient for the government to confiscate more of that money."

Giuliani made these remarks to the Manhattan Institute, an influential think tank well regarded by conservatives and libertarians alike. He credits the organization and its quarterly magazine, City Journal, with inspiring many of his reforms.

Giuliani's tax record matches his rhetoric. He cut or eliminated 23 levies totaling $8 billion. He slashed municipal tax revenues' share of personal income by 18.9 percent and the top local income-tax rate by 21 percent. Asked after September 11 if he would hike taxes, Giuliani was refreshingly blunt, calling that "a dumb, stupid, idiotic, and moronic thing to do…."

Rudy Giuliani characterized his economic philosophy this way: “City government should not and cannot create jobs through government planning. The best it can do, and what it has a responsibility to do, is to deal with its own finances first, to create a solid budgetary foundation that allows businesses to move the economy forward on the strength of their energy and ideas. After all, businesses are and have always been the backbone of New York City.”

Government reformer
Conservatives who liked Newt’s welfare reform and President Bush’s attempt at entitlement reform have an ally in Rudy. Giuliani launched a welfare revolution, removing illegal recipients, cutting the rolls by 20% the first year alone and dropping the welfare rolls by 600,000 over the course of his plan. He launched a work requirement program for the remaining welfare recipients. The New York Times called his program “slavery.”

As mayor, Giuliani reformed welfare in New York with the same tenacity as the class of ‘94 in Congress. A President Giuliani means a conservative reformer who will fight for market-based revisions to our age-old bureaucratic messes in Washington.

Fiscal conservative
As mayor, Rudy Giuliani cut the New York City government payroll by 19%, eliminating unnecessary civil servants from the public dole. Can anyone remember the last time a Republican president was able to send lazy federal workers packing? While hiring 12 percent more police officers and 12.8 percent more teachers, Giuliani sliced municipal manpower elsewhere by 17.2 percent, from 117,494 workers in 1993 to 97,338 in 2001. Inheriting a multi-billion dollar deficit, Rudy turned it into a surplus, delivering eight consecutive balanced budgets.

Giuliani's expenditure growth averaged 2.9 percent annually, while local inflation between January 1994 and December 2001 averaged 3.6 percent. His fiscal 1995 budget decreased outlays by 1.6 percent, while his post-9/11 fiscal 2002 plan lowered appropriations by 2.6 percent.

“[Giuliani] is positively Reaganite on taxes, spending, public order, quality of life, welfare reform, school choice, racial preferences, privatization, shrinking bureaucracy, Americanization of immigrants, fatherhood, moving foster kids into adoptive families, pulverizing Islamo-fascism, and maintaining peace through strength.” – DeRoy Murdock, (“Mean Mr. Giuliani’ Would Bring Toughness to Washington,” HUMAN EVENTS http://www.humaneve nts.com/article. php?id=19495 )

"...When you talk about issues related to fiscal conservatism, which are important to Rudy, I don't know anybody in the public arena who has cut taxes 23 times as Rudy did when he was mayor of New York; who has shrunk the size of government, which he did when he was mayor of New York; reduced the welfare rolls by over 50 percent, which he did when he was mayor of New York. And that's not going into reducing crime by 65% and many other things that he did while mayor in a situation that, before he became mayor, was widely regarded as the second toughest job in American politics, and was widely regarded as an ungovernable situation." -- Bill Simon, GOP candidate for California governor in 2002. (http://www.ocblog. net/ocblog/ 2007/02/i_ watched_rudys. html )

"On every major issue, [Giuliani] is a solidly conservative and extraordinarily adept executive... " -- Michael Reagan ("The GOP Should Dump It's Litmus Test," FRONTPAGE MAGAZINE, Feb. 16, 2007 http://www.frontpag emag.com/ Articles/ ReadArticle. asp?ID=26986 )