Concept

Fiscal conservatism

Overview

In American political theory, fiscal conservatism or economic conservatism is a political and economic philosophy regarding fiscal policy and fiscal responsibility with an ideological basis in capitalism, individualism, limited government, and laissez-faire economics. Fiscal conservatives advocate tax cuts, reduced government spending, free markets, deregulation, privatization, free trade, and minimal government debt. Fiscal conservatism follows the same philosophical outlook as classical liberalism.

The term has its origins in the era of the American New Deal during the 1930s as a result of the policies initiated by modern liberals, when many classical liberals started calling themselves conservatives as they did not wish to be identified with what was being called liberalism in the United States. In the United States, the term liberalism has become associated with the welfare state and expanded regulatory policies created as a result of the New Deal and its offshoots from the 1930s onwards.

Fiscal conservatives formed one of the three legs of the traditional American conservative movement that had emerged during the 1950s, together with social conservatism and national defense conservatism. Many Americans who are classical liberals also tend to identify as libertarian, holding more culturally liberal views and advocating a non-interventionist foreign policy while supporting lower taxes and less government spending. As of 2020, 39% of Americans polled considered themselves "economically conservative".

Because of its proximity to the United States, the term has entered the lexicon in Canada. In many other countries, economic liberalism or simply liberalism is used to describe what Americans call fiscal conservatism.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

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1. The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities; that is, in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state. The expense of government to the individuals of a great nation, is like the expense of management to the joint tenants of a great estate, who are all obliged…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
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The balance of produce and consumption may be constantly in favour of a nation, though what is called the balance of trade be generally against it. A nation may import to a greater value than it exports for half a century, perhaps, together; the gold and silver which comes into it during all this time, may be all immediately sent out of it; its circulating coin…
Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
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In what is termed politics, democratic social organization makes provision for this direct participation in control: in the economic region, control remains external and autocratic. Hence the split between inner mental action and outer physical action of which the traditional distinction between the liberal and the utilitarian is the reflex.
John Dewey, Democracy and Education
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Related ideas

Opposing perspectives

Social liberalism

Place in the tradition

Part of Conservatism.

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