And the US Govt. spurred by general outrage, again does exactly the wrong thing.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/business/20bailout.html?hp
Why would you amend the Tax code to do this? The tax code has nothing to do with this and has to be constantly simplified and not added to. The tax code should be relooked at only to reflect socio-economic changes and not political ones. Its a socio-economic tool and not a political tool.
IF (and its a big one) there are employees at the firm actually doing a good job of clearing up the mess, THEY deserve a bonus,if not now, maybe in the future, and they too will come under this net. And there are a million loopholes to worm out of a "bonus". The ideal way would be to cap payouts and go through tight regulations and approval process for every bonus. As nationalised (lets get real... yeah nationalised) firms, this CAN and SHOULD be done. I'm sure taxpayers would'nt mind paying people at these firms who really deserve it, for these few would be the one who're actually protecting the bailout money. For all my ranting, I still believe in people and I do believe that some that really do a good job do exist.
And American taxpayers shouldn't have to resort to changes in tax code to get the money back. They simply ought to demand 100% of it back without a tax code change. They deserve the money back. The money has been stolen from them and doesn't require a change in law to get it back. A tax code change implies that many other institutions honestly restructuring and have the potential to turn a corner this year or the next will also be affected. It also implies that a government can be a vindictive and petty institution and I thought that was thrown out with Bush and his minions.
For once I agree with the minority Republicans who oppose this
"Led by Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the party leader, several House Republicans assailed the legislation, calling it a diversion by Democrats eager to escape scrutiny for failing to block the bonuses."
The Govt. had an opportunity to block such unfair payouts
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/business/20bonus.html?hp
...and they didn't. Its a Govt. screw up and it is acknowledged that people in the know, knew. Most of the payouts went out last week and the week before and the govt. could very well have blocked it.
As of now, employees of firms with bailouts should be considered public servants. The thieves should be punished and the ones doing the protecting effectively can be rewarded. Changing tax codes takes care of the former but restricts the latter.
Scorn Trails A.I.G. Executives, Even in Their Driveways
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/20/nyregion/20siege.html?ref=business
And this is completely wrong. The executives should be taken as a collective and dealt with in that way. Hounding individuals is simply not the way to go.
Showing posts with label democrat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label democrat. Show all posts
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Monday, October 15, 2007
The Republican Debate - Surprised by Sin!!
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The transcript of the Republican debate at nytimes.com
I expected to be bored. I expected to be disgusted with conservative views on abortion, immigration, the church and other stuff but the first few minutes of the Republican debate were certainly a huge surprise. Irrespective of the fact that most of the republican hopefuls might in themselves be idiots of the first order (with the exception of maybe McCain, Guiliani and Romney), their advisors and speech writers are certainly first-class. That is to be expected from mostly millionaire conservatives but the way each of their opinions were tailored to appeal to middle class americans could blow a huge hole in Democrats' campaigns. Some of the republicans were actually talking protectionism, indirect sales tax as opposed to income tax... The approval ratings say that people look to democrats to managing the economy properly. The republicans have moved from being right-wing both socially and economics-wise to being simply social right-wingers. The current campaigns seem to be directed to get lost ground back.
The republican's problem is not that they are careful about spending, that's just peachy. Its not that they support lower taxation, fills my heart with joy. The point is that they don't mind cutting spending for health insurance for poor children ( the SCHIP expansion veto) and cutting spending on public works for the average American which lead to incidents like the minneapolis bridge crash, the Katrina bungling etc. but don't think twice about spending on ramping up their testosterone in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in relatively peaceful central asia just to spite Russia or expanding patrolling in the malacca straits (for goodness sake!! what the hell does the US want to do there??)
Their lower taxation is first enjoyed by people with incomes >200000$ per annum and later by those with lower incomes. The higher your income the more you benefit i.e. the lesser you earn the lesser you benefit. And no, not in absolute terms; in percentage terms. Middle class americans pay an average of 30% of his/her income as tax while the hedge fund manager probably pays about 2 to 5% of his close-to-billion$ income, the average CEO pays about 15%. The more you earn the less you pay.
Call me cynical but I think Republicans came up with the idea of indirect consumer taxation, which sounds like a leftist dream, because its easier to screw around with this supposed "fair tax" than with income tax. You can tax bread at 2% and Humvees at 20%. Sounds fair enough. But at the end of the day, everyone eats the same amount of bread (oh! organic bread will be taxed lower of course... guess who consumes organic, whole wheat bread fortified with omega oils?) but the middle class doesn't buy humvees. So a larger percentage of middle class income goes to buy the basics which are taxed at the same rate for everyone while the rich have more money to buy playthings with. In a republican regime, the consumption tax WILL be screwed around with to leave the likes of billionaire ranchers with more money in their hands.
Even supposedly level-headed Guiliani goes "You can't possibly cut every tax, as I think Congressman Tancredo pointed out. You need money for police. You need money for military. But I cut, I think, as many taxes as you possibly could in that period of time.".. oh! he will cut every other tax.. cut every other spending but he wouldn't dream of cutting spending for the actual phallic tools of state control.
The transcript of the Republican debate at nytimes.com
I expected to be bored. I expected to be disgusted with conservative views on abortion, immigration, the church and other stuff but the first few minutes of the Republican debate were certainly a huge surprise. Irrespective of the fact that most of the republican hopefuls might in themselves be idiots of the first order (with the exception of maybe McCain, Guiliani and Romney), their advisors and speech writers are certainly first-class. That is to be expected from mostly millionaire conservatives but the way each of their opinions were tailored to appeal to middle class americans could blow a huge hole in Democrats' campaigns. Some of the republicans were actually talking protectionism, indirect sales tax as opposed to income tax... The approval ratings say that people look to democrats to managing the economy properly. The republicans have moved from being right-wing both socially and economics-wise to being simply social right-wingers. The current campaigns seem to be directed to get lost ground back.
The republican's problem is not that they are careful about spending, that's just peachy. Its not that they support lower taxation, fills my heart with joy. The point is that they don't mind cutting spending for health insurance for poor children ( the SCHIP expansion veto) and cutting spending on public works for the average American which lead to incidents like the minneapolis bridge crash, the Katrina bungling etc. but don't think twice about spending on ramping up their testosterone in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in relatively peaceful central asia just to spite Russia or expanding patrolling in the malacca straits (for goodness sake!! what the hell does the US want to do there??)
Their lower taxation is first enjoyed by people with incomes >200000$ per annum and later by those with lower incomes. The higher your income the more you benefit i.e. the lesser you earn the lesser you benefit. And no, not in absolute terms; in percentage terms. Middle class americans pay an average of 30% of his/her income as tax while the hedge fund manager probably pays about 2 to 5% of his close-to-billion$ income, the average CEO pays about 15%. The more you earn the less you pay.
Call me cynical but I think Republicans came up with the idea of indirect consumer taxation, which sounds like a leftist dream, because its easier to screw around with this supposed "fair tax" than with income tax. You can tax bread at 2% and Humvees at 20%. Sounds fair enough. But at the end of the day, everyone eats the same amount of bread (oh! organic bread will be taxed lower of course... guess who consumes organic, whole wheat bread fortified with omega oils?) but the middle class doesn't buy humvees. So a larger percentage of middle class income goes to buy the basics which are taxed at the same rate for everyone while the rich have more money to buy playthings with. In a republican regime, the consumption tax WILL be screwed around with to leave the likes of billionaire ranchers with more money in their hands.
Even supposedly level-headed Guiliani goes "You can't possibly cut every tax, as I think Congressman Tancredo pointed out. You need money for police. You need money for military. But I cut, I think, as many taxes as you possibly could in that period of time.".. oh! he will cut every other tax.. cut every other spending but he wouldn't dream of cutting spending for the actual phallic tools of state control.
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