Discuss the US Presidential Election & the Economy 2369
A number of folks have been submitting topics that indicate that they want to have a serious discussion on the issues surrounding this election. Since we're under a week now, I've decided to run a series of discussion stories to give you guys a place to discuss the issue. So here's the first one: The Economy. It's the biggest topic these days, eclipsing even war as the most important issue to most Americans. But how will that affect your choice next week? And why?
... and I feel fine. (Score:5, Informative)
Lots of money moving around. If you're quick you can catch some of it - or lose everything.
Me, I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing - go to work and pay my bills and tough it out.
The election? I'll be glad when it's over and everybody can shut up about it. Whoever wins is in for a lot of stress.
There are more than two candidates running (Score:1, Informative)
The media will have us believe that we can only choose between Coke and Pepsi. What BS!!!!
Please consider voting for an Independent. Take a serious look at the issues and while you'll no difference between the Corporate democrats and Corporate Republicans, you might just find what you're looking for in the alternative candidates.
No matter what you do though - make sure you get out there and vote!!!
Re:Ridiculous (Score:5, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget [wikipedia.org]
The President writes & submits the budget, Congress votes on it, amends it, votes some more, etc., then sends it back. Then the President signs it into law.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:4, Informative)
If you look at the graphs and the comments, you should it *is* adjusted for inflation.
Unfortunately, they want to try to fix it.. (Score:2, Informative)
Both of the major party candidates have the problem that they view the problems of the economy as something that can be fixed by spending money they don't have. The more the government intervenes, the worse for the economy in the long term. Both candidates supported the bailout boondoggle. McCain's main virtue as a candidate is that he's a different party than the one that will control congress, so that he's less likely to actually spend his money- but that didn't stop the Democrats & Bush from getting together to ram the bailout plan down our throats so it only goes so far. Obama's main virtue is that maybe if we get a few years of unified government it will be so clear to everybody that his fiscal policies suck that we'll get an actual fiscal conservative (whether it be Republican, Libertarian, or other) electing in four years. It was putting forward a fiscal "moderate" like Bush instead of someone who actually cared about spending and then presenting him as conservative that helped us reach the insane spending we have today- we haven't had a good choice on fiscal matters in a long time. Sane fiscal policy isn't cutting taxes and raising spending, it's cutting spending to the point that things are at least balanced, then trading off more cuts with the economic benefits of paying down the debt or cutting taxes.
Simple (Score:4, Informative)
I don't trust the Dems not to raise taxes on everyone. Obama already said Social Security was going up, that's a tax increase on all working people. Every time the Dems have said they were going to raise taxes on the "rich" in the last 36 years (my working life), my taxes have gone up. I have yet to make $50K in a year. The last thing this country needs is having the top 3 spots in the hands of Obama, Reed, and Pelosi, I have trouble imagining anything worse.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:1, Informative)
That's not entirely true. The POTUS proposes the budget and congress passes it or not. One of the reasons we had such a fiscally conservative government in the 90's is because Clinton couldn't get past congress a liberal budget, they forced him to balance it.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:3, Informative)
Clinton also presided over the internet revolution. The country went through a huge upswing in growth and productivity. This also included a huge bubble that finished popping while Bush was in control. Did Clinton actually do anything to make the internet revolution happen or was he lucky to be in the right place at the right time (the same way Bush was unlucky to be in charge when the internet bubble really collapsed and 9/11 happened)?
Re:The real issue: voter suppression (Score:4, Informative)
groups that are polling strongly pro-Obama (e.g., active duty military...
http://www.militarytimes.com/static/projects/pages/081003_ep_2pp.pdf [militarytimes.com]
You'll notice only one mostly blue pie-chart out of the 15 on the page, then you can look at the heading for the obvious reason behind the result.
Re:One-party system (Score:5, Informative)
Additionally, it was mainly Democrats in the late 90s who pushed for banks to give more risky loans, which is one of the major causes of the economic turmoil today (it's certainly not the only cause).
I'm not sure precisely what you're referring to here, but the claim that the Community Reinvestment Act caused this mess has been thoroughly debunked, largely because most of the subprime mortgages were made by relatively unregulated mortgage brokers not regulated by the CRA, rather than banks. Also, the rate of subprime lending for loans made to satisfy the CRA was comparable to the rate for loans in other locations.
If you are instead referring to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, that was created and pushed through Congress by Republicans, and signed by Bill Clinton, so both parties would be guilty there.
Re:Small Government (Score:5, Informative)
Aside from President Bush's actions, the Republican party generally favors far less government than the Democrats. I think your philosophical reservation against Democrats is still pretty much intact.
Re:Oh, Is there an election going on? (Score:3, Informative)
Not in the UK. The biggest story here right now isn't the US election, the wars or the economy.
It's that a couple of radio presenters left a rude message on Manuel's answering machine! http://www.guardian.co.uk/media [guardian.co.uk]
Serious news fatigue I guess. After weeks of relentless doom and gloom (and coverage of the US election), something silly seems to appeal to the press.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:2, Informative)
Incorrect.
Congress approves the budget. They also make some changes on the way through, but the bulk of the budget is created by the Executive branch. Specifically Office of Management and the Budget. I used to use it as a foot stool while I was working there. The sucker is a foot and a half thick.
Re:any evidence (Score:5, Informative)
Re:National Debt!!! (Score:2, Informative)
Also to note reducing spending during a recession is one of the major factors that turns it into a Depression.
Re:any evidence (Score:4, Informative)
...acting as a mouthpiece for a socialist agenda
You don't even know what Socialism is. *Barak Obama* is to the right of most right-wing parties in the rest of the world. Only in the US would a center-right candidate get called 'Socialist'.
History has shown that when one party has control of the entire legislative and executive branches of our government, the economy suffers.
What, like at the moment. Oh, wait...
Re:Small Government (Score:4, Informative)
That's crap. Government has only grown since Clinton, and it grew during Clinton, and during Bush I, and Reagan as well.
You want to argue public choice economics, fine, but don't play like it's one parties fault. And since the Republicans have been in charge for 22 of the last 30 years, they have a clear responsibility for the current size of the government.
Re:The real issue: voter suppression (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Ridiculous (Score:5, Informative)
"Under President Clinton the growth in debt ceased, but note the radical change in direction since George W. Bush entered office"
I notice that the radical change in direction started while Clinton was still in office.
Should we also mention that Congress, not the President, makes the budget.
From TFA: "In 1993 President Clinton inherited the deficit spending problem and did more than just talk about it; he fixed it. In his first two years, with a cooperative Democratic Congress, he set the course for the best economy this country has ever experienced. Then he worked with what could be characterized as the most hostile Congress in history, led by Republicans for the last six years of his administration. Yet, under constant personal attacks from the right, he still managed to get the growth of the debt down to 0.32% (one third of one percent) his last year in office. Had his policies been followed for one more year the debt would have been reduced for the first time since the Kennedy administration. Contrary to the myth fostered by our right-wing friends, under a Democrat, revenue increased and spending decreased."
Re:Short answer (Score:5, Informative)
Nope. One says "we'll just give people money, that'll fix it!" and the other says "we'll just cut taxes on businesses, that'll fix it!"
If you go to their websites you can download more detailed policy proposals.
For an independent comparison of their plans for the economy in general, and more specifically taxes and spending, you might want to try this article [nytimes.com] and this article [nytimes.com].
Re:any evidence (Score:3, Informative)
No one understands how the economy really works. Economists call that the Efficient Market Hypothesis [wikipedia.org].
There is a difference between knowing how the economy works and accurately predicting what the economy will do.
Re:any evidence (Score:2, Informative)
For both major party candidates, it's Keynesians. I like the Austrian economists, so I really have no one to support on this issue. e.g. They both would have done the bailout or some variant. What's the difference? It's which companies are the favorites.
3 Candidates? (Score:3, Informative)
Where are you voting? My ballot had 13 candidates for president on it (with matching VP candidates all, so I didn't miscount).
And I am as pleased as can be that my next door neighbor has indicated that he is going to throw his vote to one of the 11 "also rans" instead of to Obama.
Socialism (Score:0, Informative)
Re:Short answer (Score:1, Informative)
As far as swinging to the extreme of the parties go, though, we have one candidate who panders to the extreme of his party during elections, and another who steps to the middle when he needs votes. As far as avoiding the extremes its a pretty easy choice.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
It's probably more-efficient to let the IRS handle the rebates, rather than to have a separate Welfare department.
You are correct. The "earned-income tax credit" (or socialist, welfare, communism as it is known on the far right) is a "tax rebate" for lower income people who pay most of their "taxes" as Social Security and Welfare contributions rather than as income tax. Dating back to 1975 and updated by Reagan, Bush I, and Clinton, it is widely acknowledged as one of the most effective anti-poverty programs ever established (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_Income_Tax_Credit#Impact)
But, I'd like to respond to what will, I'm sure, become flood of libertarian posts by people who managed to pick themselves up by their parent's bootstraps. Government hands out billions of dollars of welfare a year and most of it does NOT go to struggling citizens. Most of it is wrapped up in corporate tax credits or in under-valued water, mining, forestry, radio-frequency, grazing and other leases that convert public property into private profits. I'll take the libertarian "The government is not your daddy" position seriously when the libertarians start talking about the real welfare system.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
Why can't they just cut wasteful, federal spending....and let ALL tax payers keep more of their own money?
It's tough to believe but there just isn't enough waste to cut, at least not the easy kind. The federal deficit is projected to be $438 billion this year, and that was before the government started the massive bank bailouts. Combine that with deferred infrastructure maintenance and the baby boom starting to draw on Social Security and Medicare and things are not good.
Even if all pork were cut from House bills, it's still not enough to balance the budget. It's fun to talk about cutting a bridge to nowhere, but these kinds of numbers are going to require both serious spending cuts and higher taxes.
Higher taxes, cuts to major spending areas (military and civilian) as well as cuts to entitlement programs are going to happen, regardless of who gets in office.
Re:Why not just have a forum section? (Score:3, Informative)
Legislative seats (either state or federal) are certainly NOT "soft targets". The great majority of them are carefully gerrymandered [fraudfactor.com] to maximize reelection of the incumbent party [redistrictinggame.com]. The only elected positions even close to level playing fields are city or county-wide offices like mayor (e.g. Gayle McLaughlin in Richmond).
Re:Socalist (Score:3, Informative)
Also can anyone actually explain why we should be bailing out these banks in the first place?
Sure. Note I'm not necessarily advocating this, but I've had this well explained to me - and I like sharing it, because its horrifying.
Instead of looking at the banking system, first lets look at the insurance system. Its a bit easier to understand. There are a handful of big insurance companies, and hundreds of little insurance companies. Because of the risk involved in everything, they insure each other. So lets say there is a major catastrophe somewhere that requires hundreds of millions of dollars in payouts. Now, the small insurance company out there can't absorb that hit without going under. So by insuring themselves with OTHER insurance companies, they build a web of disbursed risk.
Therefor, when a major event happens, the whole system generally absorbs the shock. This allows the entire insurance industry to exist - otherwise the risk involved insuring someones house for half a million dollars for a measly $50 a month becomes much more risky. If you spread that risk over a huge number of houses - and companies - it makes sense. Economies of scale - insuring one house makes no sense.
This means the failure of a major insurance company is very unlikely. But it also means that if one of the major insurance companies folds because of payouts, they ALL fold. The entire system collapses.
The banking system is exactly like this. If one of the major banks were to actually, really, truly fail the entire financial system would collapse. The banks are too interdependent. All the money in your chequeing account, your investments, mutual funds offered by your bank, all of it would disappear along with your bank. You could probably get some FDIC insurance coverage, but that would be about it.
The choice is being made, actively, to devalue currency in order to eliminate the debt we've built up. There are only two options we have in the current situation: deal with long, severe depression and financial system collapse or large amounts of inflation.
Why this isn't being reflected in the market currently is quite confusing actually. You can't dump two trillion dollars into an economy and see the value of the dollar go -up-. Someone is screwing with the system right now, and I would bet we'll see a heavy reset in the next 12 months.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
At the bottom of this first page of the report is a graph showing what "most" actually is, 70%. So only 30% of US corporations generally pay ANY tax in a given year according to the GAO.
So again, why shouldn't we be clamouring for rich people and corporations to be paying up like the rest of us?
Re: Republicans (Score:3, Informative)
If you are going to condemn Palin for lack of experience, than you should be voting for McCain because the Democratic nominee has NO executive leadership experience.
If that is your sole criteria, McCain has no "executive leadership" experience either.
I would also point out that Obama has run a national campaign that unseated the Clinton political machine, and managed it very intelligently. If the way he has run his campaign is any indication of how he would govern, I would say he has clearly demonstrated his executive leadership capability.
Palin/McCain, not so much.....
Re:Historical graphs [Re:any evidence] (Score:5, Informative)
Minus the last 8 years, spending has always gone up when Democrats were in Congress, and down when Republicans were. Congress spends the money, not the President.
That said, however, it is true that the Republicans since 2000 have totally failed to live up to almost everything they have purportedly stood for in the past 50 years. The Democrats have done a good job of standing up for their ideas, or at least the stupid ones.
Kerry "declared" Winner in 2004? Patently FALSE (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.pollingreport2.com/wh2004a.htm [pollingreport2.com]
In reality, most polls in 2004 showed BUSH to be ahead of Kerry.
I'm still puzzled on how this myth even started, but it's rather clear that for the most part the Polls in 2004 were CORRECT.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
And it's set too low.
They set it back when $20,000 was a living wage. Now $40,000 is a living wage and $20,000 is massive poverty.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
The $5k credit vs. deductibility is roughly revenue neutral, but has a high likelihood of lowering health care costs. There is STILL a reason for employer run plans, because under McCain's plan, it is exempt from payroll taxes, which at 15% combined employer/employee, is pretty substantial.
If you carry a "normal" plan, $12k/year, at the 28% tax bracket, results in a new tax liability of $3,360... so when you fill our your return, you own an extra $3,360 on your extra $12k in taxable earnings, but get a credit of $5000, so you save $1,640 per year.
The way this is "revenue neutral" is that people with expensive plans and higher tax rates would actually lose out (but they do better in other parts of McCain's plan). If you are a low income worked, right now, with a crappy health plan and 15% tax rate, you'd do great with McCain. $6k plan, means $900 in tax liability, less a $5000 credit means a decreased tax liability of $4100, and I believe that the health insurance credit is refundable (because it goes directly to the insurance company as a payment mechanism).
If you are a rich guy with a super-premium plan that covers everything, you have a $24000 plan at the 35% tax rate you owe $8400 in taxes, get a $5000 credit, and owe an extra $3400. The theory is that the rich guy who was paying $24k for an overpriced plan because he did it inside his company to avoid taxes (it cost him less than $16k pre-tax because of his rate), is likely to switch to a $12k plan now, paying more "out of pocket" since there is no longer an incentive to pay everything in premiums.
The McCain effort is poorly explained, probably not understood by the Senator, but focused on controlling medical costs by removing the incentive to over insure.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:2, Informative)
I'll take the libertarian "The government is not your daddy" position seriously when the libertarians start talking about the real welfare system.
I've never known a libertarian or real conservative republican that didn't think corporate bailouts were good. Most of them just think that tax breaks should go evenly as a percentage paid instead of going evenly as a dollar value, ie instead of everyone getting $2000 back they get 10% of what they paid. Unfortunately, this is political suicide since that means 90% of the tax break goes to the richest 10% of the nation. They leave out the fact that the 10% also paid 90% of the taxes.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:5, Informative)
Adjust it for inflation and see what it looks like.
It is adjusted for inflation. Also check this graph with a lot more variables blah [slate.com]
Re:any evidence (Score:3, Informative)
John Maynard Keynes was an economist who used his understanding of economics to make himself wealthy. He spent a couple of hours a day on his investments, leaving himself the rest of the day to amuse himself. He lost most of his money in the 1929 crash, but quickly recouped his losses. I'd say that the fact that Keynes found making a fortune fairly easy by putting is economic ideas into practice (as opposed to making a fortune by selling the ideas) probably counts as reasonable evidence that he understood how the economy of his day worked. Naturally, nobody can predict everything; there is a degree of randomness and chaos.
I think the key is that the randomness and chaos is most powerful over the short term. Over the long term, various economic parameters like stock market indices tend to be fractal: the closer you look, the more detail there is to see. This means nobody is ever fully the master of their economic fate. However, by investing in a way that offsets the variability in various indices, you can "understand" the economy quite well. David Swenson, who manages Yale's endowment, has a very simple system: you just keep rebalancing your portfolio regularly. When stocks are up and bonds are down, you take money out of stocks and put it into bonds and vice versa. What this means is that you are continually buying low and selling high.
Does this confer on him the ability to predict something like the credit crisis that plays bloody hell with everything? No. But that certainly wasn't beyond human reason. What it was, was beyond human emotion to accept. Consider this timeline of articles:
2002, September: Housing Bubble Lurks Among the Levered [thestreet.com]:"The people who say that the housing market can't be seeing a bubble argue that it's more heterogeneous, whereas the equity market is more homogeneous, in terms of money flowing back between different securities. ... It is true that real estate is more of a regional market, but it can still turn into a bubble."
Could this be that this is the classic glass half empty/half full dichotomy? I don't think so; the glass half full people are saying that empty space cannot exist in the glass, which doesn't seem right...
2002 October Housing boom breeds new mortgage deals [usatoday.com]:"Jennifer Scutti, a mortgage industry analyst at CIBC World Markets, wonders about the impact on delinquencies when some of the back-loaded costs of the new flexible mortgage deals hit home."
Looks like Ms. Scutti was right. Just how right? She goes on to say there might be problems in "three to five years"...
2002 October Where the Risk Went [businessweek.com]: With respect to credit default swaps, "[The banks] have shifted the risks to institutions that are less-equipped to handle them--from insurers to highly leveraged hedge funds. And because disclosure is limited, it's not always clear just who is exposed. ... Who's bearing the risk that has been redistributed by all of those securitizations and derivatives? Surprisingly, some of it has stayed in the banking system. ... The danger is that if the financial system's health is impaired, consumers and businesses will be starved of credit, and the economy will slump."
OK, so mortgage practices are getting dangerous... at the same time the banking system is overextending itself by insuring securities, risking a complete collapse. What does that mean with respect to mortgage backed securities?
2003, January: How TCW Galileo Gets Stellar Returns [businessweek.com]: how? "In general, mortgage-backed securities funds are much less volatile than other types of bond funds because they're less sensitive to changes in interest rates." Hmm. Just thr
Re:any evidence (Score:3, Informative)
Who forced who into what? No one had to give these loans. The deregulation that allowed this was a measure to stave off this occurrence.
Re:Short answer (Score:5, Informative)
The polls are so variable it's hard to know which are accurate. Some show Obama up by 14. Others show him up by just 1. The difference lies in differing assumptions about who is likely to turn out to vote on Election Day. See for example, this explanation [realclearpolitics.com].
If turnout is demographically similar to previous elections, polls show it will be a very close election. If as some pollsters expect, we have larger-than-usual turnout among blacks and the young, then Obama will probably have a large margin of victory.
I agree that the media can often be morons. But it's not stupid to question the accuracy of the polls, given how hugely dependent they are upon what are little more than guesses about voter turnout.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:1, Informative)
With a few exception, you do NOT own the mineral right, the water rights or, for that matter, the radio frequency and airspace rights to your own land.
For example, my tenuous understandings is that all the water rights for the entire Colorado river and it's tributaries where sold by the 1800s. If your property was parceled out as part of a development at any time in the last 100 years the water and mineral rights were probably severed from the surface rights.
YMMV, of course. You may have done the due diligence to verify that you've retained mineral and water rights to your property, but most people don't.
Re:any evidence (Score:3, Informative)
An Obama presidency with a rubberstamp Congress, or a Democratic Congress with a rubberstamp Obama presidency, either way you want to look at it, will be disastrous.
Statements like these are really starting to annoy me. "If X gets elected then we are all doomed!" Give me a fucking break, unless you are some psychic you really don't know whats going to happen in the future regardless of who gets elected. Historically, this country has had single party rule for so many terms, that we should totally be wiped out by now under your logic.
Also, people calling Obama a socialist (I find it sad that people think this is such a bad thing. Do people not want healthcare, ambulances, fire departments,etc??) are pretty silly. If you actually look at the details of Obama's tax plan, there will be an overall reduction (albeit small) of federal income tax compared to the current tax code. In other words, if we are going to throw the word socialist around, Obama is less socialist than Bush! In reality, he is just slightly changing the tax brackets to make it slightly more progressive. Last time I checked, I don't think any country has fallen due to a slightly progressive change to their tax codes.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:5, Informative)
I must revise my statistics. According to the IRS, for 2006 (latest year available online) the numbers look about like this:
AGI %returns %income %taxes
1MM and up 0.3 15.1 26.7
500k-1MM 0.4 5.0 9.2
200-500k 2.2 11.1 17.3
100-200k 8.8 20.0 20.4
50-100k 21.6 26.4 18.0
$1 to 50k 66.7 22.4 8.4
So the top 2.9% of returns by AGI earned over $200k, totaling about 31.2% of all wages, and paid 53.2% of all income taxes.
(BTW, man I hate Slashdot's lack of support for the table tag!!!!)
Re:any evidence (Score:3, Informative)
From 2003:''These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis,'' said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ''The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.'' [nytimes.com]
Re:One-party system (Score:3, Informative)
It amazes me how little most U.S. citizens know... (Score:5, Informative)
Rolling Stone magazine has an article about vote stealing in 2008: Block the Vote: Will the GOP's campaign to deter new voters and discard Democratic ballots determine the next president? [rollingstone.com] That article is also available as a PDF file [gregpalast.com].
The Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law has another article: Voter Suppression Incidents 2008 [brennancenter.org]. A PDF [brennancenter.org] is available.
Neither of those articles discuss how votes are stolen using computer fraud. Slashdot has run 17 stories in 2007 and 2008 about computer vote fraud and electronic voting, listed here in reverse order by date:
West Virginia Voters Say Machines Are Switching Votes [slashdot.org].
Black Box Voting 2008 Election Protection Toolkit [slashdot.org]
How To Spot E-Vote Tampering? [slashdot.org]
Hard Evidence of Voting Machine Addition Errors [slashdot.org]
New Jersey E-Voting Problems Worse Than Originally Suspected [slashdot.org]
The Cost of Electronic Voting [slashdot.org]
Sequoia Vote Machine Can't Do Simple Arithmetic? [slashdot.org]
Ohio Investigating Possible Vote Machine Tampering Last Year [slashdot.org]
Diebold Voter Fraud Rumors in New Hampshire Primaries [slashdot.org]
Ohio's Alternative to Diebold Machines May Be Equally Bad [slashdot.org]
All Fifty States May Face Voting Machine Lawsuit [slashdot.org]
Judge Voids Un-Auditable California Election [slashdot.org]
Re-Vote Likely After E-Vote Data Mishandling [slashdot.org]
A Flawed US Election Reform Bill [slashdot.org]
House To Vote On Paper Trail and OSS Voting Bill [slashdot.org]
U.S. To Certify Labs For Testing E-Voting Machines [slashdot.org]
U.S. Bars Lab From Testing E-Voting Machines [slashdot.org]
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:3, Informative)
I would not be so sure of this. As usual, The Simpsons got it right:
I didn't get rich by writing a lot of checks!
Often people become wealthy due to both earning more and spending less. A lot of people I know who are just barely scraping by still buy nicer food and eat out quite a bit more than I do.
Now, I'm not making anywhere near $250,000/year, and maybe it changes a bit when you reach that level. Certainly it would be a rational choice to consider that spending twice as much money on food will make their lives better while having an almost ignorable impact on cash flow. But a lot of moderately rich people are also very frugal, so they may simply keep being cheap.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:2, Informative)
More taxes for under 100K ? (Score:5, Informative)
Really? Did you use Obama's own calculator [barackobama.com]?
Re:My thoughts... (Score:3, Informative)
This is a conservative talking point that's long been refuted.
Attempts at "redistribution" do not address the mythical lazy guy on the street. Those people exist, sure, but they're a relative minority. The endemic problem is much larger in scale - namely the fact that certain people start behind, whether due to their upbringing in a lower class neighborhood/family or lack of education or simple lack of job opportunities in their area. It's the same thing with affirmative action - it's not as if people are running around rejecting African-Americans from higher education willy-nilly, it's an attempt to cushion the overall trend and provide a more level playing field. Conservatives love to point to individuals, both those who haven't done well due to some perceived laziness or something, as well as those who "have the American dream", but it does not address the overall trend.
Obama does not take this on directly because doing so would be an implicit admission that "redistribution of wealth" is a good thing, which the Cold War mentality has taught us Is Inherently Bad despite the fact that associating this scheme with socialism is pretty out-there and equating communism with socialism is about the same.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:2, Informative)
"They leave out the fact that the 10% also paid 90% of the taxes."
And got 90% of the money.
Yes, Greenspan is a libertarian. (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, yes. Greenspan is well-known to have been a lifelong libertarian. The man was a close personal friend of Ayn Rand, for gods sake. Wikipedia: [wikipedia.org]
During the 1950s, Greenspan was one of the members of Ayn Rand's inner circle, the Ayn Rand Collective, who read Atlas Shrugged while it was being written. Rand nicknamed Greenspan "the undertaker" because of his penchant for dark clothing and reserved demeanor. Although Greenspan continues to advocate laissez-faire capitalism, some Objectivists find his support for a gold standard somewhat incongruous or dubious, given the Federal Reserve's role in America's fiat money system and endogenous inflation.
This is why it was shocking to many when Greenspan made the concession before Congress last week that his ideological model of how the markets worked was flawed. [pbs.org]
Where your $15K went (Score:5, Informative)
Where Do Our Federal Tax Dollars Go? [cbpp.org]
42% of the budget goes to Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid, but presumably most of that money came from direct contributions not income tax.
Dividing your tax among the remainder:
Re:It amazes me how little most U.S. citizens know (Score:3, Informative)
That's registration fraud, not voter fraud.
Re:It amazes me how little most U.S. citizens know (Score:5, Informative)
Of course, they are required by law to turn in all registrations they receive. They are only allowed to flag registrations that they have reason to believe are fraudulent.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:2, Informative)
(okay it's a lot more, it jumps from 20% to 40% on all earnings over £35k)
You've been suckered by the thatcherite "low taxes" idea.
It "jumps" from 31% to 41%. If you include employers NI as well it goes from 38.8% to 47.7%
The sooner someone courageous in government merges employees National Insurance into standard income tax the better. They can keep the employers contribution but pretending that NI is anything other than an income tax is a fraud.
It's even more of a fraud because it's calculated on weekly earnings, so if a student earns 3000 in three months summer vacation but doesn't work any other time they will pay around 190GBP in NI and no opportunity to claim it back. If they earn that 3000 in one week (rather unlikely) then they will pay around 95GBP NI and if they earn it over 29 or more weeks (never earning more than 105GBP in a week) then they will pay nothing.
The rich get all sorts of extra tax allowances that the man on the Clapham omnibus, earning 25K/year has little or chance to take advantage of.
Capital Gains tax allowance (9K), Residential lettings relief (up to 40K), lower rates of income tax on dividends (32.5%). There's bound to be a lot more, these are the ones I know about.
There's also moving assets between husband and wife (the allowances above are doubled). People who are not married can't just transfer assets backwards and forwards without incurring potential CGT liabilities but they can transfer enough to soak up the 9K allowance each year. It's relatively easy to transfer unearned income from one person to another and take advantage of lower tax bands. If your only income is PAYE then it's impossible to take advantage of a partners tax allowances if they aren't earning.
The richer you are the easier it is to take advantage of all of these tax breaks. That is, of course, quite deliberate.
Tim.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Short answer (Score:2, Informative)
538 [fivethirtyeight.com] had a nice mention of what seems to be an already high turnout of black voters.
Re:Ok..how about taxes? (Score:2, Informative)
Yes, welfare and income redistribution is doing horrible things in 3rd world countries like Denmark,Norway,Sweden,France,Germany,Belgium etc...
Denmark has a very high income tax rate and a moderate corporate tax rate. The top income tax rate is 59 percent, and the top corporate tax rate was cut to 25 percent from 28 percent in 2007. Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and an excise tax. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 50.4 percent.
Norway has a high income tax rate and a moderate corporate tax rate. The top income tax rate is 47.8 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 28 percent. Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and a tax on net wealth. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 43.6 percent.
Sweden has a very burdensome income tax rate and a moderate corporate tax rate. The top income tax rate is 60 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 28 percent. Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and a capital gains tax. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 51.1 percent.
France: the top personal income tax rate is 40 percent, down from 48.1 percent. The top corporate tax rate is 33.8 percent (33.3 percent plus a 1.5 percent surcharge). Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and a business tax. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 44 percent.
Germany has a high income tax rate and a burdensome corporate income tax rate. The top income tax rate is 47.5 percent (45 percent plus a 5.5 percent solidarity surcharge). The federal corporate tax rate is 25 percent (raised to 26.4 percent by a 5.5 percent solidarity tax), but the effective rate can be almost 39 percent. Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT) and a trade tax that varies from 13 percent to 20 percent. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 34.7 percent.
Belgium's income tax rate is one of the world's highest, and its corporate tax rate is also high. The top income tax rate is 50 percent, and the top corporate tax rate is 34 percent (a 33 percent tax rate and 3 percent surcharge). Other taxes include a value-added tax (VAT), a transport tax, and a property tax. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 44.9 percent.
vs.
USA Current tax
U.S. tax rates are burdensome. Both the top income tax rate and the top corporate tax rate are 35 percent. Other taxes include a property tax, an estate tax, and excise taxes. In the most recent year, overall tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 26.8 percent.
It wasn't the traders. (Score:3, Informative)
or the CEOs of most of the companies out there. It was the fundamental nature of our monetary system and banking itself. It is built into the fabric of our society. Has been for centuries.
e.g.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/frb.html [lewrockwell.com]
and/or:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-905047436258345 [google.com]
But hey look. There's an election coming! Maybe something will change. LOL.
Re:Regulatory Changes Due (Score:2, Informative)
and both suffer from the delusion (common in managers) that if they don't know much about it, it nevertheless can't be too complicated.
[Citation needed]
Obama has a history of calling up knowledgeable people and asking them for advice, like when he called up SEC chair Bill Donaldson over a year [bloomberg.com] before the financial markets collapsed:
Re:platforms are irrellevent at this point (Score:3, Informative)
That's only half the story.
The Myth that Laissez Faire Is Responsible for Our Present Crisis [mises.org]
For the first time in a long time, the Fed Funds Rate was lower then inflation. That is to say, the Real Fed Funds Rate [mises.org] was negative. You couldn't afford to not get a loan! Naturally, this increased the money supply (by definition), and combined with new types of loans that we had never seen before (AIG was the biggest victim of this) because of certain deregulation (another thing we saw during the great depression as you pointed out), it caused borrowing, more money was invested in things you might use a loan for, say, houses, and prices went up. The new money filters out through the economy, rich down, turning good decisions at the time to bad ones (and causing accusations of greed), then when energy and costs of living go up, people couldn't afford to continue payments, and all of a sudden, prices pop.
The last time the Fed Funds Rate was this low was the 1970s. The time before that, the 1920s. Perhaps there is a connection?
The Housing Bubble in 4 Easy Steps [mises.org]