Should There Be A Tax On Wealth?
Warren Buffett says we need a significantly higher income tax for the super-rich. But could that argument be a red herring? Partial Objects writes that the real conversation we need to be having is about taxing wealth – i.e., Buffett’s $45 billion fortune, not the paltry millions he made in 2010:
Warren Buffett wants us to stop coddling the super-rich. He argues for superlatively higher taxes on those with incomes greater than $1 million a year.
Let’s say we take Buffett’s advice, and we raise taxes so that those highest 400 income earners pay an additional 20% more in income taxes (i.e. 41.5 instead of 21.5). That would mean an additional $18 billion in revenue. Nice, right?
The US doesn’t tax wealth, but other countries do. If we did, at a modest 10%, it would mean an additional $140 billion in revenue every year. But we never talk about taxing wealth, only income. The class…
Dooming Ourselves Deeper Into Debt
Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:
The showdown over the budget and the debt ceiling continues to drag on and Congress is still attempting to cut spending down to nothing but defense, tax breaks for the wealthy and their own salaries. While politicians continue to rail against taxes and spending and the media hypes the “gang of six”, it seems that we’re quietly moving past an interesting historical marker. Ten years ago, former President George W. Bush signed the first round of tax cuts and the Treasury Department began to borrow billions in order to pay for them.
Think Progress reports that on August 1, 2001, the AP ran a story on the Treasury announcing its intent to borrow $51 billion to cover the tax rebate checks handed out by the Bush Administration. In addition, the article highlighted the Democratic argument against the Bush tax cuts: “Democrats argued that President Bush’s $1.35 trillion…
Senator Orrin Hatch To Poor: Do More For The Rich
Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:
According to Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), the poor and middle class aren’t doing enough to share the economic burden in America. In a speech on the Senate floor, the 77 year old Republican, whose net worth is estimated from $2 to $5 million and takes in a $174,000 per year salary from the Senate, said that the poor “need to share some of the responsibility” of the deficit, and that he preferred the Republican approach of “shared prosperity.”
Hatch went on to say that “51 percent of wage earners, of all households, do not pay income taxes.” He attempted to clarify a few sentences later, saying that payroll taxes were the same thing as social security taxes.
Senator Hatch appears deeply out of touch with exactly what “poor” people endure and where most of the federal budget goes. The richest Americans Hatch felt the need to so quickly defend…
Ever Want to Yell at 300 Billionaires Who Helped Wreck the Economy? (Video)
At Bank of America’s first Investor Conference in three years (3/8/11), organizers from US Uncut crashed the event to protest corporate tax dodgers and public service cuts. The room was packed with 300 hedge fund managers, institutional investors, & asset managers.
What US Uncut said:
When corporations like Bank of America don’t pay their fair share of taxes, we have to ‘cut’ teachers, firefighters, and public servants. Do you pay your taxes? So do we. Why don’t corporations pay their fair share, just like everyone else? Bank of America is Bad for America. Bank of America pockets Billions in profits and bailouts, but $0 in American taxes — that’s immoral and un-American.
$1.2 Trillion: The Real Cost of U.S. National Security
Christopher Hellman writes on TomDispatch.com:
So the big week is here as the federal budget heads for the Washington operating table. The question in the media will be: to shut or not to shut the government down — and whether that shutdown is likely to happen now, two weeks from now, or in the spring when raising the debt ceiling comes up for debate. In the meantime, the new Republican majority in the House of Representatives is intent on taking out fuel subsidies for the poor, federal funding for Planned Parenthood, money for National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System, and the Maternal and Child Health Block Grant that “supports state-based prenatal care programs and services for children with special needs,” among many other programs, but not (as New York Times columnist Gail Collins pointed out recently) the millions of dollars the U.S. Army sinks into its “relationship” with NASCAR. The House voted down a proposal to eliminate that program…
U.S. Taxpayers Paid $450,000 For Navy Jets To Fly Over A Closed Stadium Roof Before the Super Bowl
Photo: Bigcats lair (CC)
No biggie for the attendees, since this stadium has the largest HDTV screen in the world. Sally Jenkins writes in the Washington Post:
Everything you need to know about the future of the NFL could be seen in the gloriously decadent stadium that hosted this Super Bowl. As NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell pointed out, “Quite frankly, that’s our stage.” It was the cleanest, safest, nicest stadium anyone has ever visited. It was also the most extravagant and economically stratified. It cost double what Jerry Jones said it would, and taxpayers financed about a quarter of it, yet its innermost marble interiors are totally inaccessible to the average fan.
A tipping point was reached with this Super Bowl, for me. It was the screwed-over anger of those 1,250 people without seats that did it. Those travel-weary, cash-whipped fans paid small fortunes to go to the game, only to discover their…
Still Think Financial Markets = Financial Investment?
For those STILL too gullible to believe that we will never recover until we stop the irresponsible hoarding and gambling behaviours of Wall Street through a property tax on large securities holdings, I present the following:
Our economy doesn’t need to print more money. The economy must have had about $1.5 TRILLION more money at the end of 2010 than it started with. What we need to do is make the banksters and uber-rich pay their fair share and stop glomming off old age pensioners.
Details available upon request. Or check it out for yourself here.
If you liked this, or better yet, if you hated this, check out my ‘Policy Directions‘ page at Dystopia Diaries.
My Holiday Gifts for President Obama
What follows is an open letter to the President of the United States, extending my holiday greetings and providing a brief explanation of some perhaps ‘idiosyncratic’ gifts sent to Pennsylvania Avenue via U.P.S. this past week.
Okay, okay, I realize this may seem rather belated, but let’s be realistic: there was no way you were going to get around to opening my Xmas gifts to you until now. Indeed, they probably still remain unopened in some storage room, if they haven’t already been nicked by the staff you’ve assigned to opening packages. Or the security detail hasn’t mistakenly drawn a sinister interpretation of their contents and ruined them by soaking them in some watery defusion contrivance.
Which would be a great shame. Not because my personal feelings would be injured by the gifts’ destruction, but because recent events have shown me that you sorely in need these items. So much so that…
Wealth: When Will The 98% Tell The 2%, Enough Is Enough?
Gilbert Mercier writes on News Junkie Post:
Congress has passed, a two year renewal of the Bush tax cuts. The bill is a nice extra Christmas bonus for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans, and it will only amplify the monumental US budget deficit.
The logic behind the bill goes against, not only common sense but also against the global trend, notably in Europe, to cut spending and increase taxation in order to address a spreading budget crisis.
The governments of countries such as Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain are pushing for unpopular austerity measures, and richer countries such as the UK and France are trying to implement the same type of economic policies often by cutting social benefits and programs.
If austerity is the trend in Europe, it is certainly not the case in the United States. The US political and financial ruling class, which can be credited for starting the global financial…
Danny Schechter on The Secret Wall Street Bailout
The U.S. doled out $12.3 trillion dollars to finance bailouts, a figure far higher than what was previously stated. Danny Schechter writes in Al Jazeera:
Go, Wall Street, Go!
Never mind the rise in unemployment and foreclosures. Never mind the folks waiting to know if they will get the benefits they need before they are cut off. Never mind the growing gap between rich and poor, and the rapid spread of poverty. (Did you know that inequality in the US is at the highest level of any industrialised country?)
Does any of this matter?
The idea of equality as a social goal is apparently passé. Christmas has a special meaning on Wall Street: It’s bonus time.
Just five too big to fail bankster companies have stashed $90 billion for payouts to prized employees. They know that the beat on The Street is fading, so it seems to be take the money and run time. Incidentally, that…
Senator Bernie Sanders Defends Regular Americans
Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT).
The Estate Tax (which was given an Orwellian rename by the Republicans as the “Death Tax”) does and will not hurt you — unless it is abolished.
The Estate Tax affects only 3/10 of 1% of the richest Americans. We’re not even talking about the wealthy here, we’re talking about the OBSCENELY wealthy here.
To put this in context, if the Republicans get what they want, it would mean $30 BILLION in tax cuts for the Walton family (who own Walmart) alone.
So they barely pay their workers a living wage and abuse them in a hundred other ways, drive multiple small businesses out of the marketplace which are major drivers of economic growth in the country, and the Republicans in the Senate and an all-too compliant President Obama, want to rewards them for all that by giving them a tax cut that is more than the gross national product…
The Return of Doctor Weird and the “Laugher Curve”
Laffer Curve drawn by Vanessaezekowitz (CC).
With millionaire dilettante Ron Johnson confirmed as Wisconsin’s senator elect to the government his own Tea Party professes to disdain, it’s a sure bet we’re gonna be bombarded with a lot of blather about how tax cuts for corporations and the uber-rich are supposed to magically improve employment and erase deficits. Which is utter batshit lunacy. But don’t take my word for it — run the numbers yourself. All within the linked workbook “Laffer Curve Analysis v1″.
Midterms are over; here begineth the real shitstorm: the struggle against Right Wing corporatists and faux populists trying to complete their destruction of the United States.
No, that’s not just the Wild Turkey talking. Haven’t touched the stuff for the better part of a week now. And though the night terror visions of President Palin’s Interior Secretary Don Blankenship leasing the floor of the House to BP for fracking natural gas and Treasury Secretary Richard…
A Modest Proposal to Republicans on How to Trim the Budget
Originally posted by D. J. Pangburn on death + taxes:
Dear Republicans,
Without a doubt, you will hold up Reagan as a symbol of fiscal responsibility. Bush 41 lost on the economy and tax increases, Clinton balanced the budget by working with Republicans, and it’s common knowledge that Bush 43 grew the national budget to epic proportions in his time in office — most of it on Defense spending. And he did nothing to balance the budget — which, of course, you already know, as evidenced by your new House Budget Committee Chairmen’s comment on how the 2006 elections were a “repudiation of Republicans who strayed from their principles and got soft on spending and government.”
A closer look at Reagan’s economic maneuvers reveals the budget deficit in 1980 (his first year in office) was $1 trillion and in 1988 it was $3 trillion. Why? Tax cuts and increased spending. Defense spending. W. followed…
1 in 34 Americans Made Absolutely No Money in 2009
David Cay Johnston writes on Tax.com:
Now for some really scary breaking news, from the latest payroll tax data. Every 34th wage earner in America in 2008 went all of 2009 without earning a single dollar, new data from the Social Security Administration show. Total wages, median wages, and average wages all declined, but at the very top, salaries grew more than fivefold.
Not a single news organization reported this data when it was released October 15, searches of Google and the Nexis databases show. Nor did any blog, so the citizen journalists and professional economists did no better than the newsroom pros in reporting this basic information about our economy.
The new data hold important lessons for economic growth and tax policy and take on added meaning when examined in light of tax return data back to 1950. The story the numbers tell is one of a strengthening economic base with income…
Tea Party Candidate: Abolish All Public Schools
Thought Americans were dumb enough as is? Apparently you’re just not ambitious enough; this from David Knowles at AOL’s Newsdesk:
School’s out … forever?
Tea Party candidate David Harmer, who is running as a Republican for the U.S. House of Representatives in California’s 11th District, thinks the nation’s public education system should more closely resemble the way it looked in 1825. In other words, Harmer would abolish public schools altogether.
In an op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle in 2000, Harmer wrote the following:
To attain quantum leaps in educational quality and opportunity, however, we need to separate school and state entirely. Government should exit the business of running and funding schools.
This is no utopian ideal; it’s the way things worked through the first century of American nationhood, when literacy levels among all classes, at least outside the South, matched or exceeded those prevailing now, and when public discourse and even tabloid content was pitched…
No Pay, No Spray: Firefighters Let Tennessee Home Burn Because Homeowner ‘Forgot’ to Pay $75 Fee
Photo courtesy of punkpatriot on Etsy
I saw the man in question, Gene Cranick, interviewed on Countdown with Keith Olbermann earlier in the week. Seems a bit insane to not just collect the fee (plus some penalty) after putting out the fire. Via MSNBC:
Firefighters in rural Tennessee let a home burn to the ground last week because the homeowner hadn’t paid a $75 fee. Gene Cranick of Obion County and his family lost all of their possessions in the Sept. 29 fire, along with three dogs and a cat.
“They could have been saved if they had put water on it, but they didn’t do it,” Cranick told MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann. The fire started when the Cranicks’ grandson was burning trash near the family home. As it grew out of control, the Cranicks called 911, but the fire department from the nearby city of South Fulton would not respond.
“We wasn’t on their list,” he…
Watch What a Legal Pot Economy Looks Like (Video)
Haik Hoisington writes on Alternet:
This fall Californians will go the polls with a chance to make history. They will be able to cast a vote to tax and regulate marijuana like alcohol or cigarettes. California’s Proposition 19 is one of many similar initiatives cropping up on state ballots across the country.
Whether it’s calls for decriminalization or medical marijuana the end of cannabis prohibition has never seemed closer. In this short animated parable, “The Flower,” award winning artist Haik Hoisington contrasts a legal marijuana economy with an illegal one, to show how everyone stands to benefit from ending the war on weed.
The U.S. Government Stops Paying Dead People
The U.S. government sees dead people. Explains a lot. Mark S. Smith writes on the AP via Yahoo News:
Here’s an idea, Uncle Sam: Stop writing checks to dead people.
The government sent benefit checks to 20,000 departed Americans over three years, totaling more than $180 million — a remarkable number that provoked the Obama administration to create a government-wide “do not pay” list as part of its brainstorming for ways to save taxpayer money.
Once the database is up and running, agencies will have to search it before sending out payments. A pre-check check, so to speak.
“We’re making sure that payments no longer go to the deceased — it sounds ridiculous even to say it,” acknowledged Vice President Joe Biden in describing the database.
Also planned for inclusion: contractors who’ve fallen behind in their payments or, even worse, landed in jail, and companies that have been suspended or otherwise deemed ineligible for government…
Soaring Costs Force Canada to Reassess Healthcare Model
Claire Sibonney writes in Reuters via Yahoo News:
Pressured by an aging population and the need to rein in budget deficits, Canada’s provinces are taking tough measures to curb healthcare costs, a trend that could erode the principles of the popular state-funded system.
Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, kicked off a fierce battle with drug companies and pharmacies when it said earlier this year it would halve generic drug prices and eliminate “incentive fees” to generic drug manufacturers.
British Columbia is replacing block grants to hospitals with fee-for-procedure payments and Quebec has a new flat health tax and a proposal for payments on each medical visit — an idea that critics say is an illegal user fee.
And a few provinces are also experimenting with private funding for procedures such as hip, knee and cataract surgery. It’s likely just a start as the provinces, responsible for delivering healthcare, cope with the demands of a…
