technology stocks. almost no matter what, that's where you will find growth. >> all right. no debate. you guys are the best. get it? cut taxes for corporations and for individuals you're going to make things move. >> a flat tax for everybody. >> corporations by the thousands are thinking of leaving our country. they are leaving because of taxes. >> we need to make the government run smarter and better and reform the corporate tax system. >> let's not have the most expensive business tax rate in the world. >> a simple flat tax. 10% for individuals and 16% business flat tax. >> you heard it, folks. the one thing gop candidates agreed upon this week at the debate, tax reform and tax cuts are the best way to get jobs and the economy back. are they right or wrong? hi, everybody. welcome to "forbes on fox."

let's go in focus oh find out with steve forbes, mike ozanian, is a bree that schafer, bruce japsen. steve, a couple bought in hook, line and sinker. >> even after 20 years they can learn. i'm glad they are going for the tax rate. more than one tax rate is putting rabbits together. they multiply. we should have learned it in the '8 09s. now it's about 10,000 rates. the simplicity is good. i wish they would say we need a stable dollar like you have a watch that tells time. on the tax thing, a huge benefit to the economy, not only for america and the world. if we do it, other countries will follow. we'll finally get the world economy and our economy moving forward. >> something i'm sure bruce agrees with 100%. right? >> i could almost not breathe after hearing some of the stuff we're talking about last night. the tax -- nobody likes to pay

high taxes. i don't know if we can afford the tax cuts with the defense build-up marco rubio was talking about. romney said with tax cuts he would get unemployment down to 6%. we event had tax cuts for the rich and unemployment is down to 5%. it seems things are headed in a positive direction. >> the idea, of course, bruce, is that the economy would be stirred up by the tax cutting and revenues might increase. rich, let's be specific and look at plans. they are all talking about cutting rates, some more than others. the really big rate cutter on personal income tax is ted cruz. 10% flat rate. then ben carson. 14.9% for personal and corporate. donald trump, jeb bush. marco rubio is not so hot. 35% ain't much different from what we've got now. >> i think they're all great. ted cruz, you can debate whether a 16% corporate rate is a

value-added tax or not. 16% is the average tax rate the general electric paid in 2015. everybody should have rates like that. >> that's a good point. we have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. there are so many special deals that the average corporations pay is much less than the top rate. >> you have to have armies of lawyers and accountants to get it down. for the average small business owner they don't have that. it's completely unfair. >> that's the bottom line with a flat tax. bruce should endorse it fully because it's fair. it doesn't give special deals to the insiders that they get special deductions. >> bruce should endorse the flat tax and marginal tax rate for more government revenue. i want to make the point that

lowering tax rates has a positive impact when you also reduce government spending. reagan reduced the growth rate in government spending along with tax cuts and we had a booming economy. bill clinton toward the end of the presidency in the late 90s cut the capital gains tax and reduced government spending. bush only cut taxes and spending went crazy. >> i agree with you 99% of the time. there is 1% disagreement on this. is sabrina, martin freeman said tax cuts starve the beast. you starve -- they spend money they don't have. it does cut the money the government has. >> it goes without saying you have to cut spending. you want to starve the beast and one of the reasons you want to cut taxes is because it gives individuals more freedom. that's what we all care about.

the thing i liked that i was hearing was the image of republicans is they only want to cut taxes for the wealthy or for corporations. they wanted broad based tax reform to help the middle class. that would alleviate a lot of tax burden for the working class. that was a good image to leave the debate with. >> the old saw where reagan said cut all tax rates. unless they are all cut together we won't have serious growth here. do you agree? >> you don't want the government picking the winners and losers. one thing to celebrate is 40 years ago if you talked about tax re form you were looked at as weird. republicans and democrats thought it would cause an inflationary breakout. it's a really big deal that they are talking about it. my problem is the grandiosity that our ideas will bring america back again. america is amazing already. tax reform makes what'ses

amazing more spectacular. let's focus on the positive. >> looks spectacular. by the way, you were in los angeles which is congratulations on los angeles getting another football team. what about carson's plan? we heard about the money that went overseas because of the high corporate tax rates. he would have a one-year tax holiday for corporations to bring the $2 trillion back home and invest here. what do you think? >> that's a good idea. also a good idea would be to end the idea that america can tax profits you make overseas. most countries don't do that. you make money in the u.s., you don't pay tax if you are an irish company in ireland as well. that's double taxation. flat tax end s that. this is a profoundly moral issue. if you add up the tens of billions of hours in the last generation we have spent come plying with the tax code and the trillions we spent complying with it, money out of people's pocket and imagine if that had gone for new products, services,

med call devices, new medical cures how much better the world would be today. >> bruce, it's a terrible waste of time and human energy. >> i agree. there could be tax reform. one thing people talk about is fairness. there is bipartisan agreement. i think even trump agrees they should get rid of the special tax breaks for the hedge fund and private equity guys that pay only 15% on income. i think there could be bipartisan agreement. the inversion issue -- >> the money that's overseas. bruce, what about the fairness issue. we have such a complex tax code. the only people that do well are the people with the lawyers and accountants and lob yis inside washington to get special deals. >> certainly. simplification would be good. when people say, i pay 15% on my

gain and everybody knows that's how they make income, you should make it simple. you could do an across the board asle well. >> you are in washington today. you know the city well. when you have people like bruce and steve agreeing that the tax code is too complicated, maybe even agreeing that the corporate rate should come down and get rid of special deals, why can't jerks inside the beltway get something done on this? >> this is where mike is correct. we have a big spend ing problem. so people are talking. of course it's easy to talk about reforming the tax code. we have obamacare fully coming into effect over the next couple of years. i don't know if republicans want to acknowledge that we have this major spending problem. they have to talk to democrats about reigning in programs, entitlements, obamacare and the like. that's where the work comes in. >> mike? >> that's how politicians buy votes, david. both the main stream republicans over the last several years and

the main stream democrats have used the tax code and taxes to buy votes to get elected. the flat tax is the way to go. >> that leads into the next block. thank you very much. coming up next, president obama and nikki haley warning both parties to stop the in-fighting and get things done in d.c. and get things done in d.c. someyou owned your car for four years, you named it brad. you loved brad. and then you totaled him. you two had been through everything together. two boyfriends, three jobs... you're like nothing can replace brad. then liberty mutual calls, and you break into your happy dance. if you sign up for better car replacement™, we'll pay for a car that's a model year newer with 15,000 fewer miles than your old one. see car insurance in a whole new light. liberty mutual insurance.

one of the few regrets of my presidency that the rancor and suspicion between the parties is worse instead of better. >> it's important to look in the mirror. republicans need to understand they, too, are responsible for the status of where we are in theory. >> president obama telling both parties to stop the political gridlock in d.c. in his state of the union address this week and south carolina governor nikki haley echoing the message in her response. john, you say it is better for taxpayers when the parties don't

get along. that's a forbes flipside. explain. >> well, suspicious between the parties is the best aspect of obama's presidency by far. governments have no resources so when they are working in concert either redirecting resources in ways that are important for freedom and prosperity. we want gridlock. we love it when they cut spending but this is the second best choice. >> normally i agree with john and i do basically on this issue. but you have a situation of bill clinton who was willing to talk to the opposition. in fact, deficits went way down under clinton after a republican congress came in and he began to deal with the republican congress. pretty good when republicans controlled the whole ball of wax under president bush, things didn't look so good. >> yeah. that's for sure. fwridlock led to government

shutdown. that's not what we want. in an area where we could have bipartisan agreement, having gridlock isn't repairing our infrastructure and our friend maria bartiromo brought up in south carolina a billion dollars in auto repairs because of the bad roads and bridges. we have to get together on this stuff. >> steve, on the other hand, divided governments generally do well. the markets like divided governments. again under president clinton the market was flat when democrats controlled everything. when the republicans came in, you had the division. they agreed on less and the markets took off. >> actually clinton is a good cater to of public opinion or a reader of public opinion. they came to bipartisan agreement like cutting the capital gains tax, welfare reform and the like. so they got positive things done. just to say we need bipartisanship, for what? more spend ing? no. cutting the military? bad. raising taxes, bad.

cutting taxes, good. what's it about? that's the key. >> if it's about compromising for a good cause like welfare reform, for example, under president clinton it's okay. if you're trying to compromise with the socialists, if bernie is in power the best he can get with a compromise is maybe a welfare state. >> yeah. but, look, we have so much dysfunction in the united states right now that we've got to come together on key issues. we talked about tax simplification and tax reform on the previous segment. it was democrat bill bradley and republican jack kemp who led the bipartisan initiative to simplify and lower taxes in the 1980s. it led to a huge boom. you talked about newt gingrich and bill clinton. i think there can be good things done when you have people coming together. >> on the other hand, mike, newt gingrich knew about a government shutdown every now and again. we have had 11 government shutdowns in the past few years. generally the markets do well in

the government shutdowns. it doesn't do all the damage to our economy that people claim it will do. >> david, first of all, only about 15% of the government is shut down, but you're right. newt gingrich forced clinton to the middle by shutting down the government. >> by the way, point of order here it was clinton who shut down the government. newt gingrich said you have to do it or shut down the government. clinton pulled the trigger. >> then in the late 90s we saw the deficits go away. we went into a surplus and the economy took off. more importantly, take-home pay took off. it's been flat since 1999. newt gingrich was successful at bringing clinton to the table where clinton said the era of big government is over. bush brought it back and obama doubled down. >> maybe it is good when you have the clash of the titans. the republicans and democrats not talking to each other . >> i absolutely think it is.

we have to remember there has never been an era of political civility. perhaps the era of good feelings for fife years. this is a country founded on debate. we should be more concerned when that debate stops. even if it's a side that i agree with. it's much more important to continue to have these conversations about health care, energy, tax re form. rather than allel falling in lockstep. that's the way the president has behaved until he started talking recently about political rancor. he's about assuming we should all get along. >> he's one to talk. the "cashin' in" gang ready to roll at the bottom of the hour. what do you got? >> donald versus the president over the costly syrian refugee program. the president wants more to come here. but trump says no way. whos's right and why? plus, spending tax dollars to destroy homes in run down neighborhoods. a good investment or a waste of money? we debate that and you decide.

see you at 11:30. >> eric, thank you. up here first a push to ease sentencing guidelines for criminals. some ofxx

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because we should fit into your life. not the other way around. eric bolling [ speaking in a foreign language ] unbelievable video out this week. mexican drug lord's el chapo's rea arresarrest after his esca prison. meanwhile call to help his

clients by overhauling our criminal justice system to lower sentences for certain drug offenders and give judges more say in dolling out sentences for less serious crimes. could this put our lives property and businesses at risk? the problem with these reforms is it become as numbers game where you want to reduce the number of people in prison. many people are in for seemingly mild drug crimes have plea bargained down from more violent crimes. you have to go on a case-by-case basis. for violent crimes they should be in prison. even nonviolent crimes, bernie madoff ripped off many people, stole billions. it's on a case-by-case basis, not the sweeping reforms that make politicians feel good. >> like obamacare. one size doesn't fit all. >> it definitely doesn't. it is a shame that there are so many people incarcerated not because they brought harm to others but because they sold or

used a substance that politicians have deemed bad for us. we've got to get government out of the personal choices in life and reduce the number of people in prison by extension. >> this stuff is bad for us. with all the soft drug laws in california and colorado and a president who doesn't want to enforce drug laws in states look what happened. heroin use in the united states is up dramatically, about doubled. this is what's shocking. heroin overdose. look at the number of deaths in the united states from 2004 to 2014. from 1800 to over 10,000. >> well, yeah. it's true some of the easier drugs are gateway drugs into serious drugs. i think it speaks to broader cult rath ral reforms we need. we need ale culture that provides alternatives to drugs, that es compassionate if you have an addiction. new hampshire, it's been a big issue with chris christie talking about it. it should be innocent until

proven guilty. that's what they are trying to do here. >> i don't think it's coincidence. you have the softer drug laws and an increase in heroin use and overdose that's staggering. >> it seems causal, but i suspect this is self-selection. we are dealing with a situation where we don't have a strong economy, where people don't have the educational opportunities. we have families in decline so we can't separate those things out entirely. we are in a vicious cycle where people can't get back on their feet. >> quickly, mike. >> this is the one case where i'm glad democrats and republicans are working together. there isn't one easy solution. >> rich? >> we have to be tougher on violent criminals and more lenient with nonviolent criminals. >> the manhattan institute looked at this. if you're a violent criminal you

are less likely to be rehabilitated back into society. a violent criminal is much more likely to re incarceraincarcera >> steve is nodding yes. >> absolutely true. it has to be case-by-case. again, plea bargain disguises the nature of criminals. >> all right. coming up, with markets getting hammered our

breaking news, who are the week's. after this week you'll want to watch on monday. we have the market rebound picks. >> i love this team. they signed a new deal. >> manchester united. what do you think? >> mike is the world's expert on valuation. i would agree with him. >> you like apple. why? >> because it's down 28% from the peak. p.e. ratio of ten.

$200 billion in cash. >> mike, like it? >> i'm nervous. this company lost its mojo when steve jobs passed away. >> that's it for "forbes on f " fox." have a great weekend. here's eric bolling. the donald doubling down on his syrian refugee stance at the fox business debate. trump going on a tirade after president obama suggested he's putting a face of fear and terror on all refugees. >> it's not fear and terror. it's reality. look at indonesia, bombings all over. you look at california. look, frankly, at paris. that could be the great trojan horse. it could be people going to do great destruction. we can't let these people come into our country and break our borders. we can't do it. >> who's right -- trump or the president? hi, everyone. i'm eric bolling. welcome to "cashin' in." our crew this week, jonathan