tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-43639197911687141182024-03-19T05:41:02.981-07:00The Social Welfare SpotAn electronic resource for information on current issues impacting social welfare, serving as a clearing house for resources to stay current on the politics and economics of social welfare policy in the United States. Understanding and knowledge are the first steps toward change.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.comBlogger108125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-19956804964059950422011-12-30T11:07:00.000-08:002011-12-30T11:08:44.494-08:00A Modern Update on an Old Classic<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:officedocumentsettings> <o:allowpng/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:drawinggridhorizontalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:drawinggridverticalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:displayhorizontaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:displayverticaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:dontautofitconstrainedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal">For those of us who first saw the Wizard of Oz as children, Dorothy, Toto and her imaginary friends will live forever in our memories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Like all classics this story continues to enchant new generations of children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Like so many literary classics it also serves as a morality play illustrating the never-ending battle between good and evil and false leaders projecting themselves as more than they really are.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">In the true sense of a classic the story remains relevant today serving as a metaphor for our moribund political leadership and the continuing fight between two sides each defining themselves as good and the other as evil.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">So, let’s take a trip down the yellow brick road and explore the Wizard of Oz as a contemporary story for the politics of today.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Dorothy as the embodiment of the United States is lost and on a trip that she does not know where it will take her, nor how she got there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When she lands among the munchkins, she finds a people living in fantasy world waiting to be rescued, similar to the American people of today, such as the 52% in a recent Gallup poll that found the widening gap between rich and poor as an “acceptable part of our economic system.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So Dorothy as America is lost without direction, seeking leadership to help her find the way home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Instead she is given roadblocks, a twisting path and setbacks along the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Similarly today, each political party promises us that they will show us the way if we just put our faith in them, but then fail to provide any true leadership to help us find the path home.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">The character of Dorothy as a child is illustrative of how our political leaders treat the American people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We are considered to be children incapable of knowing what is best for us and told that if we would only follow their path blindly we will find our way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Instead we get deeper and deeper into a confusing path with no clear way out and unforeseen dangers at every turn:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>two threatened shutdowns of government, no clear policy on taxes or the recovery, an increasing tax burden on working people while reducing taxes on the wealthiest, all contributing to a growing national debt creating dark clouds on the horizon.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">But still we dance down the yellow brick road. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">First Dorothy finds the scarecrow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He’s a nice sort of fellow, a sack of straw masquerading as a person, but alas he has no brain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Yes, this lovable scarecrow without a brain could only be representative of the Tea Party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>A movement born in anger, with one discernable objective – limit government’s role because big government is bad and it must be starved down to size.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Well, in reality what they are saying is that big government is bad when it is in service to others, but when disaster strikes, just like everybody else they want the government to come in and help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If they only had a brain, they would understand that it is government that maintains the rods they drive on, the bridges they cross and that if it were not for government they would be working seven days a week at below poverty wages.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The world is so easy to understand when you don’t have brain to muck things up with the facts. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">The most recent example of this is Tea Party activist turned mayor of Flint, Michigan who recently turned down an $8.5 million federal grant to build transportation hub, because she believes that <span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 15.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia">“There’s nothing free about government money,” Mayor Janice Daniels said in an interview. “It’s never free, and it’s crippling our way of life.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Placing her ideology before practicality denying the reality of how unemployment cripples people’s way of life by blocking the promise of new jobs as a result of the new transportation hub, Mayor Daniels demonstrates the blind allegiance to ideology over what is good for her constituents.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Facts, oh yes that is another thing that a brain is good for, understanding and making sense out of facts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Our straw-filled, brainless friends deny global climate change in the face of volumes of scientific fact, but challenge a potentially dangerous pipeline because they say here are no scientific facts to support its opposition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But as experience shows us, without a brain, one cannot make sense of facts even once they are presented in logical and irrefutable fashion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Then there is the obsession with no tax increase, and the Tea Party Congress members who have signed a pledge to not raise taxes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Without a brain to take in and interpret information, these folks are willing to sit back and watch municipalities go into bankruptcy and the federal government face the brink of shutdown. That is not leadership, that is blind allegiance to an ideology that does not work, followed only by someone who does not have the brainpower to think critically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Next Dorothy comes across the Tin Man, who lacks heart. If only the wizard could help him gain a heart all will be right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In or modern day morality play the Tin Man, without a heart is representative of the Republican Party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>A party that has become so focused on representing the wealthiest among us that it has lost its heart in the service of its benefactors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Tax cuts for the wealthiest while reducing essential services for everyone else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Critical government benefits such as an extension of unemployment benefits are held hostage to continued tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While insisting that deficit reduction can only be achieved by spending cuts targeted at working and low income Americans, their insistence on rewarding their wealthy benefactors with tax cuts adds to the deficit. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Further indication of an empty place where their hearts should be is that while insisting on a so-called “strict interpretation” of the Constitution, they ignore a phrase in the preamble that clearly states that it is the role of government to “promote the general welfare.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But without a heart, the Republican interpretation of that phrase becomes to promote the welfare of the few at the cost of the many.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Then there is the lion, all he needs is courage; a perfect description of today’s Democratic Party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Today’s Democratic Party<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>has become a collection of men and women without the courage to fight for what they should stand for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This is a group of people that like the lion in Dorothy’s tale, runs from the fight before it even begins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For example take a major part of the party’s 2008 platform – no extension of the Bush-era tax cuts that mostly benefitted the wealthy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Without so much as a whimper, the Democrats agreed to a two-year extension of these cuts and now only have the courage to complain that they exist, but not to do anything about it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The same can be said for giving up universal health care even before the negotiations began and most recently signing approval of a defense spending bill that takes away basic rights of US citizens who can be held without trial indefinitely just for suspicion of terrorist activities.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Like Dorothy we are lost in a strange and foreboding land without anyone to lead us out but yet we manage to pick up baggage along the way without any promise of their ability to help us out or to find the way home.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But wait we have one more friend to find, perhaps he will be the one to help us in our journey –Now we come to the Wizard himself, the guiding philosopher of the tea party – Grover Norquist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This is the man who has expressed his desire to shrink the federal government down to where t is small enough to drown in the bathtub.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The no-tax pledge blindly signed by Tea Party and Republican member of Congress was his brainchild.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While Grover Norquist stands as the guiding light of the Tea Party and it’s anti-government activists, we never get to see what is going on behind the curtain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But pull it away and you will see the dirty little secret of this so-called “grassroots movement.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Norquist and the Tea Party are funded by the billionaire Koch brothers and by Karl Roves latest incarnation Freedom Works.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This is hardly the making of a grassroots movement, rather it is perhaps the biggest corporate lobbying machine fighting any type of government regulation or taxation that might level the playing field and reduce the influence of corporate dollars in the political system.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">With a cast of characters like this, I am afraid that real life can only mimic fantasy for so long, then they must part company.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So, unless the American people rise up and push back there will be no happy ending here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We will not find our way home and the morass that is Congress will only become more dysfunctional, is that is at all possible.</p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-43402861315759365032011-12-06T14:14:00.000-08:002011-12-06T14:15:51.528-08:00Extending the “Payroll” Tax Cut<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:officedocumentsettings> <o:allowpng/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:drawinggridhorizontalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:drawinggridverticalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:displayhorizontaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:displayverticaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:dontautofitconstrainedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">While the Democrats and Republicans in Congress posture over extending the so-called payroll tax cut, the facts about the impact of this policy are lost in all the bombast.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In reality, taxes cut are not nor have they ever proven to be effective stimuli to a sagging economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If the two parties can make headlines with their fight over these tax cuts, it gives the appearance that they are trying to actually do something, and hide the fact that this may well be the most ineffective and unproductive Congress in generations.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Let’s start with some facts that seem to have gotten lost in the shuffle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>First, by calling this a “payroll” tax cut, the administration is camouflaging the fact that it is a <b>Social Security tax cut</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While one side of the aisle tries to deal its deathblow to Social Security by claiming that it is on a collision course with insolvency, the other side of the aisle is hastening that insolvency by reducing its only source of income – the Social Security tax.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The two percent reduction in the Social Security tax essentially <b>robs $265 billion from the Social Security trust fund</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This “incidental” fact has never entered into the arguments on Capitol Hill.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">If it is true that the Social security trust fund is heading toward insolvency, then why deny it more funds?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As usual, the answer is a shortsighted fiscal policy and politicians who cannot see beyond their next election.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Cutting taxes as a stimulus to the economy is a straw dog.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Politicians settle on this because it seems as though they are doing something and voters like to have more money in their pockets. According to the Congressional Budget Office each $1 million in tax cuts creates thirteen new jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>That translates to a cost to the government of <b>$77,000 per job created.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>On the other hand $1 million in unemployment benefit creates 19 new jobs for a cost of <b>$52,000 per job.</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The reason that unemployment benefits creates more jobs is that people collecting benefits need that money to meet daily expenses and will spend it immediately while a social security tax cut goes to people who are employed and many of them will not spend their tax break but will save it instead.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The GOP members of congress are insisting that spending cuts offset any tax cut.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However when they championed the extension of the Bush era tax cuts, there was no such demand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So the GOP platform seems to be that tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans are solid fiscal policy while tax cuts for working families are dangerous fiscal policy that must be offset.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This position becomes clearer when one looks at the offsets being suggested by the Republicans.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">One idea being floated by the GOP is a pay freeze for federal workers and a reduction in the federal workforce by 10%.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Both would further harm the economy, and both place an inordinate burden of reducing the deficit on working families.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>A ten percent reduction in the civilian workforce of 2.15 million would result in 215,000 jobs lost, offsetting the 265,000 jobs that would be created by the payroll tax cut.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The dollar savings would be approximately $1.6 billion to offset a tax cut of $265 billion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Either the GOP leadership cannot do simple math or the real reason behind their plan is to gut Social Security and the work of the federal government.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">However there are ways that can bring more funds into the federal government and maintain the solvency of the Social Security system well into the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The first step would be to eliminate the Social Security tax cap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Currently all employees pay Social security tax on the first $106,800 of salaried income.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Other income such as investment income, business income, etc are not subject to this tax.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As a result of this wage cap, higher income workers pay a substantially reduced Social security tax rate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For example, at the current rate of 4.2%, all workers earning less that $106,800 pays the full tax rate on all of their salaried earnings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, a hypothetical salaried employee earning $213,600 is only paying a rate of 2.1% of salary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Eliminating the cap would not only make Social security a more progressive and fairer tax but it would guarantee solvency well beyond 2075.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Another plan by the GOP, again focuses on some of the most vulnerable people in society - reducing Medicare reimbursements to senior citizens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This plan is in response to the astronomical growth of Medicare costs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, what is being ignored here, is that under the previous administration, the Medicare was prohibited from negotiating drug prices with the pharmaceutical industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In essence this translates into a $29 billion dollar annual subsidy to big pharma.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Unlike other prescription drug suppliers Medicare is the only major insurance company that is barred from negotiating prices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As an example, Medicare currently pays 58% more for prescription drugs than the Veterans Administration that is permitted to negotiate. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">Another step would be to eliminate the Bush era tax cuts, which went overwhelmingly to the wealthiest Americans. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The extension of these cuts were justified as a fiscal necessity in this economic downturn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But if they indeed were needed as a stimulus, they should have softened the economic downturn that began during the prior administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Another example of how tax cuts, do not stimulate the economy and that the cost of extending these cuts - $220-300 billion – is poor fiscal policy.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">One more quick fix that would not only help reduce the deficit and<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>also bring an increased level of fairness and rationality to US tax and fiscal policy are the subsidies aid to the oil companies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While posting record profits and increasing her costs to consumers, big oil enjoys $4 billion a year in tax subsidies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, in this new world of Repubospeak, any attempt to bring an increased level of fairness and equity to tax policy is defined as a tax increase.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">If we were to implement these simple fixes the total saved would be between $234 and $334 billion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>That total is achieved through saving $29 billion in Medicare art D, $200-300 billion in Bush tax cuts and $4 billion in oil subsidies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>These are just three quick fixes that bring fairness and restore some level of responsibility and fairness to federal tax and fiscal policy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>I am confident that here are dozens more such items in the federal budget that can result in billions more in savings. But these will never be implemented because it is not about reducing the deficit, it is about starving government and creating a crisis in Social Security to justify gutting this country’s most successful social program.</p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-68708049171462283962011-11-30T17:39:00.000-08:002011-11-30T17:43:09.633-08:00To Infinity and Beyond<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:officedocumentsettings> <o:allowpng/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:drawinggridhorizontalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:drawinggridverticalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:displayhorizontaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:displayverticaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:dontautofitconstrainedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal">Those are the immortal words of Buzz Lightyear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In reality, we may not be reaching for infinity yet, but something just a little bit closer - that mysterious red planet that has spawned so many science fiction and Armageddon movies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>On Saturday, November 26th, the United States launched he <b>$2.5 billion</b> Curiosity Mars Rover, with the mission of searching for ancient habitable environments to learn if Mars was once home to microbial life.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">On that same day, only two days after Thanksgiving and one month before Christmas, children living in <b>17 million US households</b> went to bed hungry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While hunger and poverty are reaching record levels in the US and the Republican controlled Congress looks for new ways to cut social welfare programs in the name of reducing the federal deficit, our government was able to justify spending $2.5 billion to learn if there was ancient life on Mars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We all should be asking, “what about life on this planet?” </p> <p class="MsoNormal">If we kept our focus on earthly needs and not on the remote possibility of Martian microbes, what could that $2.5 billion have provided?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For starters $2.5 billion dollars could have produced more than <b>6,00 units of affordable housing</b>, providing a decent place for thousands of American families currently without homes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">There are other possibilities for those dollars as well, the same amount of federal dollars could have been used to hire approximately <b>37,000 elementary school teachers</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Replacing many teachers fired due to budget cuts, thereby reducing class size and providing a higher quality education for thousands of children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Or it could have been used to provide more than <b>150,000 college scholarships</b> making college attainable to young people whose families cannot afford the increasing costs of a college education.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If you are more concerned about safety, these funds could have been used to hire <b>40,000 police and firefighters</b>, making u for the thousands who have been laid off due to municipal budget cuts.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-font-family: Arial">In his remarks at the John F. Kennedy Space Center on April 15, 2010 President Obama stated “I am 100 percent committed to the mission of NASA and its future. Because broadening our capabilities in space will continue to serve our society in ways that we can scarcely imagine. Because exploration will once more inspire wonder in a new generation -- sparking passions and launching careers. And because, ultimately, if we fail to press forward in the pursuit of discovery, we are ceding our future and we are ceding that essential element of the American character.</span><span style="font-family:"Times New Roman""><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Now, just nineteen months alter, in the midst of a severe economic downturn, when millions of children are having their dreams denied or deferred these words seem to run hollow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What do we gain by inspiring wonder in a new generation if they are unable to pursue that wonder through a quality education or if they are too hungry to aspire to anything more than wondering where their next meal will come form or when their Mommy or Daddy will get a job or they will have a permanent place to live.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>How do we tell them that as a country we believe that finding microbes on a distant planet is more important than helping them to succeed right here on planet Earth?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal">When we cannot even provide the basic needs for millions of American citizens, and unemployment is approaching record levels, we must make crucial decisions about how our federal tax revenues are spent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Do we focus our attention on improving life here on earth, or do we look out beyond the stars and focus on the possibility of ancient life existing on a distant planet?</p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-11851877313976787672011-10-24T03:49:00.000-07:002011-10-24T03:49:09.422-07:00The Shocking, Graphic Data That Shows Exactly What Motivates the Occupy Movement<br />
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By Les Leopold, AlterNet<br />Posted on October 23, 2011, Printed on October 24, 2011<br />http://www.alternet.org/story/152811/the_shocking%2C_graphic_data_that_shows_exactly_what_motivates_the_occupy_movement</h5>
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What are the Occupy Wall Street protesters angry about? The same things we’re all angry about. The only difference is the protestors turned their anger into public action. Occupy Wall Street lit the embers and the sparks are flying. Whether it turns into a genuine populist prairie fire depends on all of us. </div>
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Now is not the time for wonky policy solutions, as the media meatheads are calling for. Rather, it’s time to air our grievances as loudly as possible, which is precisely what Wall Street and its minions fear the most. Here’s a brief list of why we should be angry and the charts to back it up. </div>
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<b>1. The American Dream is imploding... </b></div>
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-weight: normal;">The productivity/wage chart says it all. From 1947 until the mid-1970s real wages and productivity (economic output per worker hour) danced together. Both climbed year after year as did our real standard of living. If you’re old enough, you will remember seeing your parents doing just a bit better each year, year after year. Then, our nation embarked on a grand economic experiment. Taxes were cut especially on the super-rich. Finance was deregulated and unions were crushed. Lo and behold, the two lines broke apart. Productivity continued to climb, but wages stalled and declined. So where did all that productivity money go? To the rich and to the super-rich, especially to those in finance.<br />
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<b>2. Our wealth is gushing to the top 1 percent...</b><br />
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<b>Actually the top tenth of one percent. Because of financial deregulation and tax cuts for the rich, the income gap is soaring. Here’s one of my favorite indicators that we compiled for <i>The Looting of America. </i>In 1970 the top 100 CEOs earned $45 for every $1 earned by the average worker. By 2006, the ratio climbed to an obscene 1,723 to one. (Not a misprint!)<br />
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<b>3. Family income is declining while the top earners flourish...</b><br />
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<b>As women entered the workforce, family income made up for some of the wage stagnation. But now even family incomes are in trouble. Meanwhile, the incomes of the richest families continue to rise. <br />
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<b>4. The super-rich are paying lower and lower tax rates...</b><br />
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<b>To add financial insult to injury, the richest of the rich pay less and less each year as a percentage of their monstrous incomes. The top 400 taxpayers during the 1950s faced a 90 percent federal tax rate. By 1995 their effective tax rate – what they really paid after all deductions as a percent of all their income – fell to 30 percent. Now it’s barely 16 percent. <br />
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<b>5. Too much money in the hands of the few combined with financial deregulation crashed our economy...</b><br />
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">When the rich become astronomically rich, they gamble with their excess money. And when Wall Street is deregulated, it creates financial casinos for the wealthy. When those casinos inevitably crash, we pay to cover the losses. The 2008 financial crash caused eight million American workers to lose their jobs in a matter of mont<span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; font-weight: normal;"></span></b></span><br />
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hs due to no fault of their own. The last time we had so much money in the hands of so few was 1929! </div>
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<b>6. We’re turning into a billionaire bailout society...</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjobeaqDg1zQNlrHFOy9IoJy0cyEbgrtn9QsRzWFcwZ_YInS300ecy8E-TE97kN0z4tq7rVLTYxN_TypVFI50j0ZhYu238HEFcR4gMkMxt94wpoGXNt4KHLZKsNypQA04dNVCbkLXx5Kmg/s1600/storyimages_6.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="221" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjobeaqDg1zQNlrHFOy9IoJy0cyEbgrtn9QsRzWFcwZ_YInS300ecy8E-TE97kN0z4tq7rVLTYxN_TypVFI50j0ZhYu238HEFcR4gMkMxt94wpoGXNt4KHLZKsNypQA04dNVCbkLXx5Kmg/s320/storyimages_6.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b>We bailed out the big Wall Street banks and protected the billionaires from ruin. Now we are being asked to make good on the debts they caused, while the super-rich get even richer, some making more than $2 million an HOUR! It would take over 47 years for the average family to make as much as the top 10 hedge fund managers make in one hour. <br />
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<b>7. The super-rich still control politics...</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIxWcm_17MN6pY6-cacg7TiK-HqOldrp0QpYPiYKz-3OJMZk7vgMYuPIu7O70db1amTMzQzhDonaokcHgbhaMSnL89rAEASWvcOTuWKXCfnezLp2EwiQlRGUQJtV82dC1B4iLJyv0bzuQ/s1600/storyimages_7.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIxWcm_17MN6pY6-cacg7TiK-HqOldrp0QpYPiYKz-3OJMZk7vgMYuPIu7O70db1amTMzQzhDonaokcHgbhaMSnL89rAEASWvcOTuWKXCfnezLp2EwiQlRGUQJtV82dC1B4iLJyv0bzuQ/s320/storyimages_7.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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Both political parties are occupied by Wall Street. For nearly an entire generation they have competed with each other to gain campaign contributions in exchange for tax breaks and regulatory loopholes for the richest of the rich. Today’s so-called financial reforms are porous, while the money continues to flow to both parties.<br />
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<b>8. Unemployment is a catastrophe...</b><br />
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<b>The reckless gambling on Wall Street tore a hole in the economy sending millions to the unemployment lines. Wall Street caused the enormous spike in unemployment and no one else – not the government, not home buyers, not China.<br />
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<b>9. Our prospects for the future are growing dim...</b><br />
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<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;">It’s bad enough that unemployment is sky-high. But it’s even worse when you can’t find a job for months, even years. Right now the number of unemployed for 26 weeks or more is at record levels. Many of the long-term unemployed will never work again.<br />
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<b>10. The big banks are getting even bigger...</b><br />
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<b>Too big to fail is alive and well. Our nation’s biggest banks are growing larger and larger with no end in sight. Despite what politicians say, the taxpayer will bail out the big banks again. And the big banks know it.<br />
<strong>Stand up and be counted!</strong><br />
Americans are a patient people. Mass movements do not form very often. Most of us hoped that after the crash, the big banks would be broken up, the casinos would be shut down and the gamblers would be punished. At the very least, we expected that the elite financiers would pay for the damage they created – the jobs destroyed, the neighborhoods wrecked, the services cut. It didn’t happen. Finally something clicked. A small number of kids stood up and got noticed. And now it’s growing. We see an outlet for our frustration, our justifiable anger, our disappointment in leaders who sold out.<br />
We don’t know where it’s all going. But this is the time to stand up and be counted – literally. The currency of a populist revolt is numbers in the street. Let’s show our anger where it will be seen. And let us take heart from the words of Franklin Roosevelt who during his first inaugural address in 1933, led the first occupation of Wall Street: <br />
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Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.<br />
True, they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit, they have proposed only the lending of more money.<br />
Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored conditions. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers.<br />
They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.<br />
The money changers have fled their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths.<br />
The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.<br />
Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money, it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.<br />
The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow-men.<br />
Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be values only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit, and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing.</blockquote>
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<i>Les Leopold is the executive director of the Labor Institute and Public Health Institute in New York, and author of <a href="http://www.chelseagreen.com/bookstore/item/the_looting_of_america:paperback">The Looting of America: How Wall Street's Game of Fantasy Finance Destroyed Our Jobs, Pensions, and Prosperity—and What We Can Do About It </a>(Chelsea Green, 2009).</i><br />
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© 2011 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.<br />View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/152811/</h5>
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</b></b></b></span><b><b><b></b></b></b></b></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-28978204049890317762011-09-21T14:56:00.000-07:002011-09-21T14:56:19.472-07:00Elizabeth Warren - Massachusetts Senate Candidate - On Class Warfare<br />Courtesy of Rumproast.com<br />
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I hear all this, you know, “Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever.”—No!<br />
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There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody.<br />
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You built a factory out there—good for you! But I want to be clear. <br />
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You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for.<br />
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You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate.<br />
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You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for.<br />
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You didn’t have to worry that maurauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did. <br />
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Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea—God bless. Keep a big hunk of it.<br />
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But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.<br />
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<a href="http://socialwelfarespot.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><strong><span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS; font-size: large;"></span></strong></a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-70050159779233835082011-09-20T20:25:00.000-07:002011-09-20T20:25:26.005-07:00Class Warfare Index<!--StartFragment-->
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46.2 million<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Number
of people living in poverty in the United States</div>
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15.1<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Americans living in poverty</div>
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6.7<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Americans living in “deep poverty” less than 50% of the poverty level</div>
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0<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Number
of times poverty was mentioned by either candidate in the 2008 Presidential
Debates.</div>
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24<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of total US wealth held by top 1% </div>
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$46,495<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Median
US income in 2009</div>
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7.1%<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Decline
in median US income since 1999</div>
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9.9<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Caucasian Americans living in poverty</div>
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25<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of African Americans living in poverty</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
50 milion Number of people in US without health insurance</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
33<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Hispanic Americans without health insurance</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
11.1<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Americans living in poverty in 1973, after the “War on Poverty” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
15.2<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Americans living in poverty, in 1983, three years into Reaganomics</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$22,050<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Federal
poverty level for a family of four</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$44,100<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Income
needed to provide basic needs for a family of four</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
15 million<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Number
of US children living in poverty</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
21<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of children living in US in poverty</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
36<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of all people living in poverty who are children</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
64<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of total national wealth controlled by top 5%</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
87<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of national wealth controlled by top 20%</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
13<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of national wealth controlled by bottom 80% of population</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
38<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Per
cent of Bush tax cuts that went to top 1%</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
1<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Percent
of Bush tax cuts received by bottom 20% of population</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$520,000<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> A</span>verage
Bush-era tax cut for top .01% of households</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$2.6 trillion <span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> T</span>otal
increase in federal deficit attributed to first ten years of Bush tax cuts</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$5 trillion<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Cost
of extending Bush tax cuts for next decade</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
$400 Billion<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Total
amount spent on interest to finance first ten years of Bush tax cuts</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
-7.4%<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Decrease
in real family income for bottom 20% of families between 1979 and 2009</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
+72.2%<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Increase
in real family income enjoyed by the top 5% of families between 1979 and 2009</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
+116% <span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Increase
in real family income enjoyed by bottom 20% of families between 1947 and1979</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
+86%<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Increase
in real family income enjoyed by top 5% of families between 1947-1979</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
1980<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Year
Reaganomics and trickle down economics began impacting federal tax codes</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
236<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Number
of Congressional Republicans branding Obama’s efforts to fairly tax the wealthiest
Americans as “class warfare”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<br /></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-75787082641450079702011-09-14T04:23:00.000-07:002011-09-14T04:24:00.290-07:00<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">The No (or not so many) Jobs Jobs Bill</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In his speech to the joint session of Congress on September
8, President Obama proposed the American Jobs Act,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>designed to be his answer to the stalled economy and high
unemployment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The $447 billion
bill relies heavily on tax cuts as a way of stimulating the economy by putting
more money in the hands of consumers and encouraging employers to create
jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This, in spite of the fact
that there is no empirical, historical evidence that tax cuts create jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In reality if you follow the arc of tax
cuts starting with Reaganomics and the small government fervor of the 1980’s,
through the Bush-error tax cuts, in reality it would appear that tax cuts have
a negative impact on the economy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The costliest cut proposed is a fifty per cent reduction in
the payroll tax.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By calling this a
payroll tax cut,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the President is
obfuscating the fact that in realty it is a Social Security payroll tax
cut.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The President is proposing
that the 6.2% Social Security payroll tax paid by employers and employees be
halved to 3.1% costing an estimated $240 billion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The idea behind this cut is to put more money into the
economy so that small businesses can hire new workers and current workers will
have more cash to spend, thereby stimulating the economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The average worker will realize a
payroll tax reduction of approximately $1,500.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While this is not an insignificant amount to put into
someone’s pocket, it will do little to change an individual’s economic
circumstances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, $1,500
translates to less than $30 per week or $120 per month.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Most people with an extra $120 per
month will use it towards offsetting the high gasoline costs, paying down their
credit card bills or helping to pay their mortgage or rent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not one of these options contributes to
creating one single new job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Instead it will increase the demand for gasoline thereby helping to
maintain high gas prices or go directly to the banks and help fund even larger
bonuses for executives.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The bigger issue that the President does not address, and
which has been entirely ignored by the media, is that this $240 billion cut
will further strangle the Social Security trust fund.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a Democratic president hammering another nail into
the coffin of Social Security.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even
the Republicans have criticized their leading presidential contender for
suggesting that Social Security would need to be done away with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How can the President justify reducing
the income of Social Security by $240 billion while it is agreed by all
analysts that the trust fund needs to be shored up to provide for the long-term
viability of the program and ensuring benefits for today’s workers?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The system requires additional inputs
of cash, not less.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In 1955 there
were 8.6 workers paying into the system for each retiree receiving benefits,
while in 2010 there were less than three.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As the baby boom generation marches toward retirement, this ratio will
continue to decrease.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Additionally,
as older workers are laid off and are unable to find new jobs, they will file
for Social Security earlier creating more of a drain on the system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
According to the President’s proposal a quarter of a
trillion dollars will be taken from the system at a time when we should be
looking at ways to increase the money going into the Social security trust
fund, not reducing it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While this
cut will have little or no impact on job creation, it will move the crisis of
Social Security up a number of years resulting in cuts to benefits and raising
the retirement age.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While the
President seeks to solve one crisis, he is exacerbating another.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The president has also proposed tax credits to companies
that hire certain unemployed individuals.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Companies hiring a person who has been unemployed for six months or more
can qualify for a $4,000 tax credit and companies hiring an unemployed
veteran<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>can qualify for a $9,600
tax credit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just like tax cuts,
tax credits do not create jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>All these credits will do is determine who gets hired when a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>job is available.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The tax credits will flow to companies
that would be offering jobs anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>These will not necessarily be new jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In order for a company to create a job, there needs to be
work .<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the economy remains
stagnant, and consumer demand remains low, then regardless of tax credits, new
jobs will not be created.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So these
tax credits will not result in any net increase in employment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the President does not address what
happens to those jobs once the tax credit expires.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is he just creating a vicious cycle of short-term
employment?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
By referring to his American Jobs Act as a bi-partisan bill
that includes both Republican and Democratic initiatives, the president has
proposed a bill designed to win Republican support through its heavy reliance
on tax cuts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These tax cuts make
up approximately 59% of the cost of the bill, with only 41% targeting
government spending that will actually impact unemployment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is a simple fact of life,
government spending on big projects, such as those proposed only modestly in
this bill – modernizing up to 35,000 schools and infrastructure investments –
and not tax cuts put people back to work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Employed people spend money and pay taxes, and that is what impacts a
recession.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only institution
large enough and broad enough to help the country spend its way out of this economic
slump is the United States Government. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It does not take Nostradamus to predict the outcome of this
legislative process.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Republican controlled House will support portions of the bill, those that focus
on tax cuts, while defeating the spending portions of the bill including saving
the jobs of teachers, cops and firefighters, extending unemployment and
providing low cost mortgage refinancing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Furthermore, the Republicans in the House will defeat any attempt by the
President to offset the cost of this bill through closing tax loopholes for big
business and raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once again the Republicans will show
that they are the shills of the truly wealthy and of corporate America, and
once again the Democrats will show that they have no backbone as a party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The goal of the Republicans is to stop
the President from a second term in office, and nothing guarantees that more than
a sagging economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-51768830030135130202011-09-01T09:47:00.000-07:002011-09-02T01:55:44.064-07:00Don’t Tax Me But Give Me My Government Services<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none">It seems as though everybody resents paying taxes but yet we all still want the government to provide services when we need or want them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Without taxes our roads would be impassable, bridges would be unsafe, emergency services would be almost nonexistent, there would be no public education, police or fire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In short, we would be living in Somalia, a country without a functioning government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While the United States continues its slide downhill toward a third world economy, the only institution large enough to prevent that from happening is the government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>That is before the vast majority of Republicans in the House and Senate signed a no new tax pledge, binding them to <i><span style="font-family:Garamond;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">oppose any and all efforts to increase the marginal income tax rate for individuals and business; and TWO, oppose any net reduction or elimination of deductions and credits, unless matched dollar for dollar by further </span></span></i><i><span style="font-family:Garamond;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">reducing tax rates. </span></span></i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"><span style="mso-bidi-mso-bidi- mso-bidi-font-weight:bold;font-family:Garamond;font-size:11.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Garamond;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="font-family:Garamond;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">The author of this pledge is Grover Norquist, the head of</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Americans for Tax Reform.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">While tax reform itself is not a bad thing, that is not what Grover Norquist or this pledge is about.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">In his own words, Norquist has very clearly laid out his agenda when he stated: </span></span><i><span style="font-family:Verdana;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.</span></span></i><i><span style="font-family:Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"> </span></span></span></i><span style="font-family:Times;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">It is not about tax fairness or even about tax reform, but it is about reducing government and returning to a strict unregulated, untaxed free market economy that will leave millions of Americans behind.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="mso-bidi-mso-bidi-;font-family:Times;font-size:16.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span>Republicans make a show of shrinking government, while decrying big government, but have no qualms about funneling its largesse to the wealthiest among us with lavish tax cuts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In fact, those that rail the loudest against big government and taxes are the greatest beneficiaries.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>One example is in the imbalance of federal taxes paid by the citizens of the states.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Currently thirty states are represented by Republican governors. Twenty-two of these receive more in federal tax expenditures than they pay in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>On the contrary only nine states represented by a Democratic governor receive more than they pay in federal taxes.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="mso-bidi-mso-bidi-;font-family:Times;font-size:16.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span>One of those states living off the fat of the federal government is Virginia, currently represented in Congress by Eric Cantor, the majority leader of the House.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Not only is Cong. Cantor a signer of the no tax pledge but he has taken the anti-tax mania to newer and more absurd heights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In the wake of Hurricane Irene, Cantor has called for all new spending in federal disaster assistance to be offset by cuts elsewhere in the federal budget.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This at the same time that FEMA is being starved by budget cuts forcing it to reduce assistance to tornado ravaged parts of Missouri, in order to provide disaster assistance to areas ravaged by Irene.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>(it is worth noting here that Missouri is represented by a Democratic Governor)</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none">Back in Virginia however, Mr. Cantor and the entire Virginia Congressional delegation has signed a letter asking for federal emergency assistance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So Mr. Cantor, like so many of his Republican colleagues has no trouble trying to have it both ways.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Fight new taxes, force cutbacks in services that he does not believe in, while enjoying a greater return on federal taxes paid by his state; and, at the same time requesting additional federal funds in the form of disaster relief.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It seems that Cong. Cantor’s plan is to force shrinkage of the federal government in all states but his own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But he is not the only one, in addition to Virginia, Republican governors in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Georgia are also seeking federal disaster assistance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Two of these states, Pennsylvania and Georgia, are on the list of states receiving more in federal funds than they pay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If these Republicans were true to their so-called ideals then they should use the excess funds that they receive from the federal government to pay for their disaster relief. </p><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:12px;"><h1 id="watch-headline-title" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 5px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: transparent; height: 1.1363em; max-height: 1.1363em; line-height: 1.1363em; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); overflow-x: hidden; overflow-y: hidden; "><span id="eow-title" class="long-title" dir="ltr" title="Ludicrous Eric Cantor Wants 'Matching Spending Cuts' on Hurricane Irene Victims Assistance Fund" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background- letter-spacing: -0.5px; color:transparent;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'times new roman';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXqBgRt1CaE&feature=related"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Eric Cantor</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Wants 'Matching</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Spending</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;">Cuts' on</span> Hurricane Irene Victim Assistance Funds</a></span></span></span></span></h1></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none">However, if you are going to be hypocritical, then why not go all out and do it Texas size.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Rick Perry, Governor of Texas and leading Republican presidential candidate, said this about taxes in an interview with James Robinson for Life TV: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">I think we are going through these difficult economic times for a purpose, to bring us back to the biblical principals of you know, you don’t spend all the money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>You work hard for those six years and you put up that seventh year in the warehouse to take you through the hard times and not spending all of our money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Not asking Pharoah to give everything to everybody and to take care of folks because at the end of the day it’s slavery and we become slaves to government. </i><i><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNVwGNrvKnU">Watch it here</a></i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"></i>Perhaps Mr. Perry believes it is only appropriate for others to go back to those “biblical principles” but not for him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In his advocating for the federal government to provide federal disaster aid to his state to cope with the forest fires he stated: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">I think we have had 9,000 separate fires in the state of Texas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The federal government has only helped us with twenty-five of then, that’s inappropriate.</i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"></i><span style="mso-bidi-mso-bidi-;font-family:Times;font-size:16.0pt;">It would seem that what is really inappropriate here is that Governor Perry does not follow his own biblical interpretations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If Mr. Perry had saved in the seventh year to take his state through the hard times, as he preaches, then there would be no need to request federal disaster aid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It would appear that following his preaching on the bible and government is his way of telling others how to live.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Another take on “do as I say, but not as I do.”</span> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none">While I’m talking about Rick Perry and biblical interpretations I just can’t sign off without mentioning Michele Bachman and her evangelical preaching’s.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Instead of seeing the recent natural disasters as one result of global climate change, Ms Bachman sees it as a message from above not to take better care of Mother Earth but as an economic message to the people of the United States when she says <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">I don’t know how much God has to do get the attention of the politicians.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>We’ve had an earthquake, we’ve had a hurricane.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He said “Are you listening to me here?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></i>Curiously, she left out the runaway forest fires and the drought in Texas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It seems that God only gives messages when he disagrees with Democratic politicians.</p> <!--EndFragment--> Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-2429365526013565402011-08-15T13:14:00.000-07:002011-08-15T13:28:29.271-07:00From The Mouth of a Billionaire<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>I'm not one that you would usually find quoting Warren Buffet, but after reading his opinion piece in the August 15th edition of the New York Times, I find that anyone with his wealth and influence, that makes sense in these senseless times, deserves quoting. So for the benefit of readers who do not read or get the New York times I am quoting his piece in its entirety, it is definitely worth the time to read. Of course it is not perfect, he advocates for continuing the so-called "payroll tax cut," when in reality it is a reduction in the Social Security tax. Continuing this will only drive the nail further into the coffin of Social Security as it only serves to starve it of much needed revenues. This "payroll tax" cut was proposed by President Obama as a way of throwing a bone to the middle class while he caved in on tax cuts to the rich. But the naked truth is, tax cuts do not help in a recession they never have. Just look at the Bush error tax cuts that preceded the current recession.<div>
<br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>In addition, Mr Buffet ignores other contributors to the current financial crisis, much as all the Republican presidential candidates do. In the rush to blame the current administration for the crisis, those high-minded Republicans on the campaign trail forget about George Bush's two unfunded wars and his unfunded Medicare prescription program. These two, along with his tax cuts for the rich, formed a perfect economic storm that has brought the country to the brink of default.</div><div>
<br /></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>But with that in mind, Buffet's op-ed piece is a good read, one that our politicians should take note of and act upon if they are sincere about solving the nation's financial crisis.</div><div>
<br /></div><div><!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: 34.0pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:32.0pt;">Stop Coddling the Super-Rich<o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:2.0pt;line-height:16.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;font-size:13.0pt;color:gray;">By WARREN E. BUFFETT<o:p></o:p></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Omaha<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">OUR leaders have asked for “shared sacrifice.” But when they did the asking, they spared me. I checked with my mega-rich friends to learn what pain they were expecting. They, too, were left untouched.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">While the poor and middle class fight for us in Afghanistan, and while most Americans struggle to make ends meet, we mega-rich continue to get our extraordinary tax breaks. Some of us are investment managers who earn billions from our daily labors but are allowed to classify our income as “carried interest,” thereby getting a bargain 15 percent tax rate. Others own stock index futures for 10 minutes and have 60 percent of their gain taxed at 15 percent, as if they’d been long-term investors.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">These and other blessings are showered upon us by legislators in Washington who feel compelled to protect us, much as if we were spotted owls or some other endangered species. It’s nice to have friends in high places.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Last year my federal tax bill — the income tax I paid, as well as payroll taxes paid by me and on my behalf — was $6,938,744. That sounds like a lot of money. But what I paid was only 17.4 percent of my taxable income — and that’s actually a lower percentage than was paid by any of the other 20 people in our office. Their tax burdens ranged from 33 percent to 41 percent and averaged 36 percent.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">If you make money with money, as some of my super-rich friends do, your percentage may be a bit lower than mine. But if you earn money from a job, your percentage will surely exceed mine — most likely by a lot.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">To understand why, you need to examine the sources of government revenue. Last year about 80 percent of these revenues came from personal income taxes and payroll taxes. The mega-rich pay income taxes at a rate of 15 percent on most of their earnings but pay practically nothing in payroll taxes. It’s a different story for the middle class: typically, they fall into the 15 percent and 25 percent income tax brackets, and then are hit with heavy payroll taxes to boot.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Back in the 1980s and 1990s, tax rates for the rich were far higher, and my percentage rate was in the middle of the pack. According to a theory I sometimes hear, I should have thrown a fit and refused to invest because of the elevated tax rates on capital gains and dividends.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">I didn’t refuse, nor did others. I have worked with investors for 60 years and I have yet to see anyone — not even when capital gains rates were 39.9 percent in 1976-77 — shy away from a sensible investment because of the tax rate on the potential gain. People invest to make money, and potential taxes have never scared them off. And to those who argue that higher rates hurt job creation, I would note that a net of nearly 40 million jobs were added between 1980 and 2000. You know what’s happened since then: lower tax rates and far lower job creation.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Since 1992, the I.R.S. has compiled data from the returns of the 400 Americans reporting the largest income. In 1992, the top 400 had aggregate taxable income of $16.9 billion and paid federal taxes of 29.2 percent on that sum. In 2008, the aggregate income of the highest 400 had soared to $90.9 billion — a staggering $227.4 million on average — but the rate paid had fallen to 21.5 percent.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">The taxes I refer to here include only federal income tax, but you can be sure that any payroll tax for the 400 was inconsequential compared to income. In fact, 88 of the 400 in 2008 reported no wages at all, though every one of them reported capital gains. Some of my brethren may shun work but they all like to invest. (I can relate to that.)<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">I know well many of the mega-rich and, by and large, they are very decent people. They love America and appreciate the opportunity this country has given them. Many have joined the Giving Pledge, promising to give most of their wealth to philanthropy. Most wouldn’t mind being told to pay more in taxes as well, particularly when so many of their fellow citizens are truly suffering.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Twelve members of Congress will soon take on the crucial job of rearranging our country’s finances. They’ve been instructed to devise a plan that reduces the 10-year deficit by at least $1.5 trillion. It’s vital, however, that they achieve far more than that. Americans are rapidly losing faith in the ability of Congress to deal with our country’s fiscal problems. Only action that is immediate, real and very substantial will prevent that doubt from morphing into hopelessness. That feeling can create its own reality.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">Job one for the 12 is to pare down some future promises that even a rich America can’t fulfill. Big money must be saved here. The 12 should then turn to the issue of revenues. I would leave rates for 99.7 percent of taxpayers unchanged and continue the current 2-percentage-point reduction in the employee contribution to the payroll tax. This cut helps the poor and the middle class, who need every break they can get.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">But for those making more than $1 million — there were 236,883 such households in 2009 — I would raise rates immediately on taxable income in excess of $1 million, including, of course, dividends and capital gains. And for those who make $10 million or more — there were 8,274 in 2009 — I would suggest an additional increase in rate.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress. It’s time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:16.0pt;line-height:24.0pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia;font-size:16.0pt;">excerpted from the New York Times, August 15, 2011</span></p> <i><span style="font-family:Georgia;mso-fareast-font-family: Cambria;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi- mso-ansi-language:EN-US;mso-fareast-language:EN-USfont-family:Georgia;font-size:15.0pt;">Warren E. Buffett is the chairman and chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway</span></i><!--EndFragment--> </div><div>
<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-62144785381114357052011-08-03T04:58:00.000-07:002011-08-03T05:03:44.943-07:00The New Two Party Political System<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>The United States, unlike parliamentary democracies, has primarily been a two-party political system, the Republicans and Democrats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In post-industrial America the ideological leanings of these two parties have been quite different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The Republican Party has been the champion of free market capitalism with minimal government intervention in the economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In the post-Reagan years it has stood for lower taxes and leaner government, even while Republican administrations were racking up record budget deficits.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>The Democrats’ core belief, on the other hand, was that there are problems and issues that only government is large enough to tackle and that it is the role of government to regulate the economy so corporations do not do irreparable harm in pursuit of profits.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While the Republicans were the party of Ronald Reagan’s philosophy of small government with minimal regulations on corporations and the “trickle down” theory of economics, the Democrats were the party of FDR’s New Deal and Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The core value of the Democratic Party was the belief in the legitimate role of government to provide for the welfare of its citizens, and that government intervention is needed to regulate the economic vagaries that have negative impact on the country and its citizens.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>However, as a result of the recent debate and vote on extending the debt ceiling we have a new two-party configuration – the Republican Party and the Tea Part – with the moribund Democrats as an inconsequential third party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>With only 60 members out of 435 members of the House of Representatives, the Tea Party Caucus, representing only 13.7% of the House, was able to hold the debt ceiling hostage to their demands.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>President Obama conceded to the demands of this small minority party, whose Congressional members represent only 38.8 million people in their congressional districts, or a mere 8% of the US population.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>His capitulation in this debate signaled the end of the Democratic Party as an entity with any real influence.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>In every encounter with the Tea Party and their Republican counterparts, since the 2010 mid-term election, the President has abandoned the core values of the Democratic Party, rendering it to footnote status.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In December the President agreed to an extension of the Bush error tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, adding $32 billion to the deficit annually.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He did this without winning any concessions, while backtracking on a campaign promise to end these destructive tax breaks for the wealthy that needlessly add to the debt without creating significant economic activity.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Now, in his most recent capitulation to this minority party, Obama has agreed to spending cuts without revenue generation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This Democratic President, has come down squarely on the side of those most privileged among us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>To pay for his extension of tax cuts for the wealthy and his inability to close tax loopholes, providing $100 billion annually in tax subsidies to profitable corporations, President Obama has agreed to an immediate $1.4 trillion in cuts, bringing federal spending to its lowest since the Dwight Eisenhower administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Only under a Democratic President could we bring the country back to the same spending level that existed before the civil rights movement and before the War on Poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">Without core values that set it apart form its rivals, a political party ceases to exist. This President has abandoned the core values of the Democratic Party ceding power to the Republicans and the small but now emboldened Tea Party Caucus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While referring to the debt ceiling deal as a compromise, it is evident that the President does not understand the meaning of compromise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For an agreement to be a compromise, both sides must give and get something.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, in this so-called compromise, the Tea Party and their Republican counterparts gave nothing and got everything, while the Democrats gave everything and got nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Hardly a compromise.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>While we continue to shower the wealthiest among us with tax breaks and subsidies and impose cuts on the most vulnerable among us to pay for this largesse heaped on the wealthy, we also mourn the loss of the party of FDR, JFK ad LBJ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Seventy years of social welfare programming, that has lifted millions out of poverty and extended a lifeline to others is now on the chopping block.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>With President Obama leading the retreat, the Democrats have not only turned their backs on their core constituency, but have blocked the hopes and dreams of millions of low income and working Americans <span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>for a better life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The failure of the Democrats and this President to stand up for the American people can only signal the Party's death knell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>President Obama has committed the most egregious political sin, raising the hopes of millions of people and then doing little to help realize those hopes. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>How many of the millions of previously disenfranchised young people and people of color who registered and voted for the first time, just to cast a vote for Mr. Obama, will stay home disillusioned in 2012?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It is too late to win them back, the damage has been done.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-5548912034664950392011-08-01T07:33:00.000-07:002011-08-01T07:36:00.322-07:00Tax-Exempt For-Profits Avoid Paying their Share<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Georgia;font-size:7;color:#173694;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 33px;"><br /></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial; color:#666666"><a href="http://www.nonprofitquarterly.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13736:tax-exempt-for-profits-&catid=149:rick-cohen&Itemid=991">Excerpted from the Nonprofit Quarterly</a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial; color:#666666"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial; color:#666666">JUNE 29, 2011
RICK COHEN</span><span style="font-size:14.0pt; font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Let’s see if we get this right. Nonprofits are leeches on society, they don’t pay taxes, they take our money (your money) and fail to pay their own way, they pay their executives exorbitantly, they spend too much on administrative costs, and, oh yes . . . they don’t pay taxes. This is worth saying twice, since taxes have become the prime mover of politics in recent years. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The argument is so tiresome, so monotonous, and so ill founded. It’s time to correct the record, not in tabulating how much taxes nonprofits actually pay (and they do: as employers paying matching employees’ FICA, as service providers frequently paying registration and licensing fees, as property owners paying user fees for water and sewerage, etc.), but in terms of how many tax-paying entities don’t pay the taxes they are supposed to pay or receive tax rebates.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Nonprofits are hardly the only tax-exempt nongovernmental entities in the U.S. By happenstance, hook, and crook, for-profit corporations frequently don’t pay taxes, get legislative bodies to exempt them from taxes, and they often pay their executives at levels that leave entire nonprofit budgets in the dust.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Compared to the relatively small number of nonprofits with revenues and real estate, the for-profit sector’s multiple navigation strategies to avoid federal, state, and local taxes leads to a basic question – which sector is the real tax-exempt sector? <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">If you know the way, you don’t have to pay—at the federal level</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The crushing burden of federal taxes seems to leave many corporations much less crushed than nonprofits being hit with Unrelated Business Income Taxes (UBITs):<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">. This past March, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) <a href="http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2011/03/ten_giant_us_companies_avoidin.html"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">provided a list of corporate tax evaders</span></a>, several of which are among the nonprofit sector’s most trustworthy corporate philanthropic benefactors:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">1) Exxon Mobil made $19 billion in profits in 2009. Exxon not only paid no federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million rebate from the IRS, according to its SEC filings.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt; font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">2) Bank of America received a $1.9 billion tax refund from the IRS last year, although it made $4.4 billion in profits and received a bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department of nearly $1 trillion.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">3) Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">4) Chevron received a $19 million refund from the IRS last year after it made $10 billion in profits in 2009.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">5) Boeing, which received a $30 billion contract from the Pentagon to build 179 airborne tankers, got a $124 million refund from the IRS last year.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">6) Valero Energy, the 25th largest company in America with $68 billion in sales last year received a $157 million tax refund check from the IRS and, over the past three years, it received a $134 million tax break from the oil and gas manufacturing tax deduction.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">7) Goldman Sachs in 2008 only paid 1.1 percent of its income in taxes even though it earned a profit of $2.3 billion and received an almost $800 billion from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury Department.</span></i><span style="font-size: 14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">8) Citigroup last year made more than $4 billion in profits but paid no federal income taxes. It received a $2.5 trillion bailout from the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">9) ConocoPhillips, the fifth largest oil company in the United States, made $16 billion in profits from 2007 through 2009, but received $451 million in tax breaks through the oil and gas manufacturing deduction.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">10) Over the past five years, Carnival Cruise Lines made more than $11 billion in profits, but its federal income tax rate during those years was just 1.1 percent.</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family: Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Business Insider</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family: Arial">magazine <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/16-more-profitable-companies-that-pay-almost-nothing-in-taxes-2011-3#1-range-resource-corporation-rrc-16"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">added additional big corporations</span></a>, not necessarily those with the name recognition of those on the Sanders list, that are paying next to no federal taxes:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· <i>NextEra Energy: Pretax profits of $8.572 billion, effective tax rate of 1.74 percent</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· <i>Xcel Energy: Pretax profits of $4.334 billion, tax rate of 1.78 percent</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· <i>Amazon: Pretax profits of $3.512 billion, tax rate of 4.33 percent</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· <i>Host Hotels and Resorts: Profits of $1.116 billion, tax rate 3.05 percent</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· <i>TECO Energy: Profits of $1.62 billion, tax rate of 2.31 percent</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Note that several of these corporations actually received tax rebates, putting their effective tax rates into the realm of negative percentages. In several cases, such as Exxon Mobil and Bank of America, their zero tax rates in 2009 were simply an extension of the lack of taxes they paid the previous year. In fact, many corporations over the years have managed to make their profits immune to taxation. A 2008 Government Accountability Office study found that more than half of U.S. companies doing business in the U.S. had paid no income taxes for at least one year between 1998 and 2005 and 42 percent had not paid taxes for at least two years. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">If you don’t want to pay, ask permission not to play—corporations working the states</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The appearance of Amazon on the list of mega-corporations that pay little or nothing is worth noting. Remember that many of these corporations that pay next to nothing to the federal government sometimes find themselves paying taxes to state governments – and they often don’t like it. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Some time ago, Amazon got huffy with the state of Texas – where corporations pay almost nothing even when they’re paying full taxes – because the state tried to hit Amazon with a sales tax bill. Amazon’s position was that the state had no right to tax e-commerce. Texas argued that Amazon’s big distribution center in Irving gave Amazon a physical presence in the state and thus triggered its eligibility to pay the sales tax. (Note that putative presidential candidate Rick Perry seemed to side with Amazon against the state comptroller, Susan Combs.) The law is clear: Retailers with a brick-and-mortar physical presence in the state have to collect sales taxes on sales to customers there, but no physical presence, no sales tax. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">After initially threatening to shut down its Irving plant, Amazon cooked up a deal for the state. It would make a capital investment of $300 million in “five or six warehouse and distribution centers” in Texas in return for not having to charge customers sales tax for the following four-and-a-half years. <a href="http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/politics/entries/2011/06/20/amazon_negoitiating_for_salest.html"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">The plan would generate 5,000 or 6,000 jobs</span></a>. The numbers reported suggest that Amazon will save more in sales tax payments than it will invest in the facilities – and the centers are of course to be owned by Amazon, they aren’t gifts to the state. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">This deal wasn’t just cooked up by Governor Perry and the Texas legislature. Amazon has negotiated these sales tax exemptions with other states as well. In South Carolina, Amazon has pledged to invest $125 million and create 2,000 jobs by 2013 in return for being exempted from collecting and paying sales taxes from customers. <a href="http://austinist.com/2011/06/23/amazon_seeking_deal_on_state_sales.php"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">Amazon has a similar deal with Tennessee</span></a>. It isn’t like Amazon is trying to balance off the sales tax against the high corporate tax rate in Texas. Texas doesn’t have a corporate tax at all. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">In revenue-starved Michigan, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two of the nation’s most profitable companies – until they led the Wall Street decline into recession – have never had to pay real estate transfer taxes on properties they have sold in the state. Though governmentally supported, the two mortgage behemoths are private for-profit corporations, though they invoke an ersatz nonprofit status on occasion as in Michigan. The treasurer of Oakland County, Mich., has hit the two GSEs with <a href="http://www.housingwire.com/2011/06/24/suits-allege-fannie-freddie-owe-millions-in-real-estate-transfer-taxes-in-michigan"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">a bill for $12 million in real estate transfer fees</span></a>, explaining, “Fannie and Freddie you quack like a duck (or a private corporate entity), so you better pay up.”<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">It is no surprise to most readers that states frequently offer corporations tax bargains or no tax bills at all if they will relocate their facilities. For example, just this month, Florida Governor Rick Scott wrote a letter to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange offering a neat tax package if the Exchange would move to the Sunshine State. Scott <a href="http://www.sunshinestatenews.com/blog/gov-scott-looks-lure-chicago-mercantile-exchange-florida"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">made the pitch</span></a> after reading in the <i>Wall Street Journal</i>about the Exchange’s frustration with the 8.9 percent rate in Illinois. Scott isn’t necessarily being partial to the Mercantile Exchange. He actually has proposed the elimination of all state corporate taxes, though the Florida legislature has yet to agree with the notion.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">It would be hard to imagine that Fannie and Freddie needed a free pass from Michigan for their real estate transfers, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange a cut rate bargain on corporate taxes in Illinois, or Amazon a sales tax collection break in Texas. But that’s the way the game is played. If a corporation can find a loophole for sidestepping a potential tax bill, they’ll jump at the chance. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">If you don’t pay property taxes, you might be a for-profit corporation—abatements for businesses and developers</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">This isn’t new stuff, to be sure. For what seems like eons, states and localities have been giving away the store to big corporations that have somewhat more robust tax-paying power than nonprofits. In most cases, governments prefer giving corporations tax subsidies as opposed to direct subsidies, because in the arcana of state and local budgets, property tax abatements and exemptions don’t show up as a negative. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The diminutive payments corporations make pursuant to abatements show up as net positives – money accreting to tax coffers that in theory wouldn’t have otherwise been show up as a positive, even though they are less than what the corporations would have paid had they paid normal property taxes – like your and I do.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Ostensibly the quid pro quo, like Amazon’s offer to Texas and South Carolina, is job creation, but the abatements rarely achieve the results. The truly famous example is Pennsylvania’s offer of $70 million in subsidies to a European auto manufacturer to create a manufacturing plant in the southwestern part of the state to create 10,000 jobs; its highest employment ever was 6,000 and the plant closed within a decade. A couple of decades later, Alabama gave another European auto manufacturer $253 million in subsidies to create 1,500 jobs, a cost per job of roughly $169,000 (<a href="http://www.mea.org/tef/pdf/protecting_public_ed.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>).<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">There are often multiple kinds of tax abatements offered to business – straight tax abatement deals, abatements tied to enterprise zones, redevelopment project incentives, etc. Few states even know the cumulative value of what they offer or what they’ve given away. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· A report on tax abatements awarded by governments in Tennessee confessed that it couldn’t even identify all of the entities pitching abatements, but based on admittedly incomplete data, it concluded that governments had given away $105.2 million in 2001 and $104.3 million in 2002 in tax abatements to private entities leasing public property for commercial purposes (<a href="http://www.tn.gov/tacir/PDF_FILES/Taxes/prop_tax_abate.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>). No cost-benefit analysis was available to determine what was achieved through these economic development agreements, much less whether the cost was worth the benefit. A 2010 study by the New Jersey State Comptroller on tax abatements there didn’t even bother to attempt a calculation of the total property tax giveaway to entities that were supposed to be paying property taxes (<a href="http://www.nj.gov/comptroller/news/docs/tax_abatement_report.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>).<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· Do you think Goldman Sachs is going to pack up and leave the New York metropolitan area? New York and New Jersey must believe it and have offered the immensely profitable firm lots of abatements for its office towers in Manhattan and Jersey City. New York City gave Goldman $200 million in tax breaks for is 43-floor office tower in Lower Manhattan and then somehow tossed the firm another $140 million in property tax breaks. Across the Hudson River, Goldman built a 42-story complex with the incentive of $160 million in tax incentives and has <a href="http://blog.nj.com/njv_linda_stamato/2010/08/stop_high_cost_tax_abatements.html"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">negotiated new abatements for a second yet-to-be-built office building</span></a>. Is Goldman hard up for cash? Not with <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/01/21/banks-compensation-idUSN2122918020100121"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">profits per employee of $1.4 million in 2009</span></a>, twice the 2008 level, not with net earnings (profit) of $8.35 billion for calendar year 2010 (<a href="http://www2.goldmansachs.com/our-firm/press/press-releases/current/pdfs/2010-q4-earnings.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>), a little <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/21/AR2010012101044.html"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">down from 2009’s $13.39 billion</span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· A 2004 study by Good Jobs First examined the public subsidies (not just tax abatements, but also free or significantly discounted land, corporate tax credits, and more) supporting 84 of 91 Wal-Mart centers and stores, with an estimated governmental giveaway to the retail behemoth of $624 million (<a href="http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/sites/default/files/docs/pdf/wmtstudy.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>). <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· Boeing has been a mainstay of Seattle’s corporate landscape forever, but in 2001, the corporation announced it was moving its corporate headquarters out of Seattle and induced a property tax cutting competition among Chicago, Denver, and Dallas/Fort Worth. The local and state government generosity was noteworthy, with Chicago’s package offering the most to the company, a package of $56 million in subsidies for only 500 jobs. That shook up Seattle officials, so that when Boeing announced its plans to find a new location for manufacturing its 7E7 “Dreamliner” passenger jet, the state put together a $3.2 billion/20 year subsidy package, <a href="http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/corporate-subsidy-watch/boeing"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">basically freeing Boeing of most local taxes</span></a>. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· A 2009 study by the state of Nevada yielded some information on the sales and use tax exemptions granted the Nevada Commission on Economic Development (almost doubling from $18.9 million in fiscal year 2007 to $34.8 million in fiscal year 2008 – for 22 businesses (<a href="http://www.leg.state.nv.us/Division/Research/Library/HotTopics/FiscalAffairs/TaxAbatementsExemptionsIncentives.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>)). <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The reality about corporate tax breaks at the state and local level is troubling from a public policy perspective:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· State governments and localities don’t even know how much they’re giving away. There is no accounting available to even the officials who are supposed to monitor what they’re giving corporations.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· The abatements and exemptions offered to corporations are by choice, not by law. Legislatures and city councils are choosing to give specific corporations specific tax breaks. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· The purported quid pro quos offered by businesses for their abatements are hard if not in most cases impossible to enforce, clawback provisions or otherwise. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· For many corporations, the expectation of abatements is automatic. It isn’t that they will bolt from Manhattan to Omaha if they don’t get abatements. Both local governments and corporations know this, but the abatements are almost automatic anyhow. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· Businesses actually employ consultants—lobbyists—who are sometimes paid a percentage of the tax savings. Securing tax abatements for businesses is now an industry.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· Local government officials who know that the corporations can well afford to pay their tax bills are whipsawed between demanding corporations on one side and skittish legislatures on the other. For many officials, it isn’t a matter of agreeing to or rejecting an abatement application, but trying to negotiate the best possible payment from the corporation possible.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">· Corporations sometimes come back for additional, layered abatements, even when projects fail, so that the projected subsidy cost of a project at the front end is hardly the true total subsidy cost at project completion.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">It is difficult to imagine that the public, no matter what taxpayers think of what nonprofits do or do not pay as property taxes (in the form of payments in lieu of taxes or user fees), thinks that museums, hospitals, universities, and other nonprofit facilities are positive contributions to their communities. In contrast, read the conclusion of a 2007 report on corporate tax credits and tax abatements in Connecticut: <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-top:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom: 14.0pt;margin-left:48.0pt;mso-add-space:auto;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align: none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">“<i>We were unable to determine the aggregate jobs associated with firms that claimed tax credits and/or abatements during the study period…DECD’s analysis concludes that several Connecticut tax credit, property tax abatement and exemption programs have negative or very limited positive impacts. Other programs have had little or no participation. (<a href="http://www.ct.gov/ecd/lib/ecd/decd_sb_501_sec_27_report_12-30-2010_final.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>)”</i><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">A critical report (<a href="http://speaknj.com/njpp_tax_abatement_report.pdf"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">PDF</span></a>) on Jersey City’s tax abatements for developers and corporations concluded that “all that glitters is not gold.” The glitter is in the coffers of the corporations that are raking in tax abatements and other incentives without much impact on job creation or other concrete, measurable economic development activities. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Corporate executives earning more than entire nonprofits</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">The total revenues of most nonprofits are lower than the compensation packages for corporate executives. According to the AFL-CIO’s <a href="http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/"><span style="color:#173694; text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">2011 Executive Paywatch</span></a>, the average annual compensation for CEOs of S&P 500 companies in 2010 was $11,358,445, with a base salary of over $1 million, a bonus of more than $250,000, stock awards of $3.8 million, and option awards of $2.4 million. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Compare those executive salaries to the entire annual revenues of public charities. Nine out of ten registered public charities (all 501(c)(3) nonprofits except for private foundations) and nine out of ten public charities filing 990s reported revenues of less than $1 million, <a href="http://nccsdataweb.urban.org/NCCS/V1Pub/index.php"><span style="color:#173694;text-decoration:none;text-underline:none">according to the latest statistics compiled by the Urban Institute’s National Center for Charitable Statistics</span></a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Overpaid nonprofit CEOs? It’s clear that the majority of nonprofits, not to mention their executive directors, are hardly raking in much money, even as state legislatures and city councils aim at nonprofits for tax-like revenues. The executives of the <i>tax-exempt</i>for-profit corporations make more money than the bulk of entire nonprofit organizations generate as revenues to support their tax-exempt programs:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Exxon Mobil</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family: Arial">: In 2010, R. W. Tillerson’s total compensation as CEO was $28,952,558<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Bank of America</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Brian T. Moynihan’s 2010 compensation was </span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">$1,940,069<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">General Electric</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Jeffrey R. Immelt’s total compensation in 2010 was </span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family: Arial">$21,428,765<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Chevron</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: J.S. Watson’s total compensation was </span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt; font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">$16,260,528<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Boeing</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: In 2010, W. James McNerney Jr. received $19,740,023</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Valero Energy</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: William R. Klesse’s total compensation was $11,103,385</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Goldman Sachs</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Lloyd Blankfein’s compensation was $14,116,423</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Citigroup</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Vikram Pandit earned $1 million</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt; font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">ConocoPhillips</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: James J. Mulva took in </span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">$17,932,895<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Carnival Cruise Lines</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Micky Arison’s total compensation was $7,097,709</span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial; mso-bidi-font-family:Arial"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Amazon</span></i></b><i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: CEO Jeffrey Bezos’s total compensation in 2010 was </span></i><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">$1,681,840<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">NextEra</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: In 2010, Lewis Hay III received $13,560,217<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Xcel</span></b><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">: Richard C. Kelly’s total compensation was $9,956,433<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:14.0pt;mso-add-space:auto; mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial">Maybe it’s obvious, but we’ll say it: The big corporate tax scofflaws, headed by CEOs with multi-million dollar compensation packages, are increasingly paying little or no taxes despite billions of dollars in profits. Why aren’t members of Congress, state legislatures, and municipal councils looking to the for-profit tax exempts to pay their fair share instead of trying to eke nickels and dimes out of the organizations that due to their 501(c)(3) status are truly supposed to be tax exempt? Something is awry with public policy decision-makers’ understanding of what the “nonprofit” actually means and it’s tiresome and monotonous. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <table class="MsoNormalTable" border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="border-collapse:collapse;mso-table-layout-alt:fixed;border:none; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt"> <tbody><tr style="mso-yfti-irow:0;mso-yfti-firstrow:yes;mso-yfti-lastrow:yes"> <td width="437" style="width:437.4pt;border:none;padding:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt"> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-add-space:auto;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace: none"><span style="font-size:14.0pt;font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family: Arial"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-32410163825210573322011-07-25T19:10:00.000-07:002011-07-25T19:16:22.018-07:00A Pivotal Moment in American History<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align: none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;mso-bidi-font-family:Tahoma;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 5px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 5px; font-family:Tahoma, Geneva, sans-serif;font-size:12px;"></span></span></p><h1 style="text-align: center; ">Senator Bernie Sanders on the Debt Limit Debate</h1><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align: none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family:Tahoma;mso-bidi-font-family:Tahoma;">With one week to go before an Aug. 2 deadline for raising the nation's debt limit, the stakes are enormous. Some in Congress continue to press for steep cuts in programs for working families. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid remain in jeopardy. Funds for education, child care, nutrition, affordable housing, environmental protection and energy independence also are at stake. When Republican leaders talk about $3 trillion or $4 trillion in spending cuts over the next 10 years, with no new taxes on the wealthy and large corporations, please understand what they mean. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <table class="MsoNormalTable" border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="border-collapse:collapse;mso-table-layout-alt:fixed;border:none; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt"> <tbody><tr style="mso-yfti-irow:0;mso-yfti-firstrow:yes;mso-yfti-lastrow:yes"> <td width="1" valign="top" style="width:1.0pt;border:none;padding:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt"> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> </td> <td width="390" valign="top" style="width:390.0pt;border:none;padding:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt"> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">SOCIAL SECURITY </span></b><span style="font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">— The average Social Security recipient who retires at age 65 would get $560 less a year at age 75, under a proposal to change the formula which determines cost-of-living adjustments. The same retiree would get $1,000 less a year at age 85 than under current law. Another provision pushed by House Republicans would require that Social Security always be solvent for 75 years, an avenue to even larger cuts in benefits. All of this would take place despite the fact that Social Security has not contributed one penny to the deficit and has a $2.6 trillion surplus.
<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><b><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">MEDICARE </span></b><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">— Raising the eligibility age from 65 to 67 is one proposal. Another would cut benefits by as much as $500 billion over 10 years. How are 66-year-old Americans with modest means going to afford health insurance with a private company especially if they have medical problems? It's not going to happen. They are going to suffer. Some will unnecessarily die.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">
<b>MEDICAID</b> — At a time when 50 million Americans already have no health insurance, Republicans and some Democrats are proposing to cut hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicaid. That means that many men, women and children will lose the health insurance they have. According to a Harvard University study, some 45,000 Americans die each year because they don't get to a doctor when they should. How many more will die if Medicaid is slashed? How many children will be thrown off the Children's Health Insurance Program?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">
<b>EDUCATION </b>— Childcare and college education already are unaffordable for millions of working families. Head Start has long waiting-lists. If Republicans and some Democrats get their way, Pell grants and other educational programs will be deeply slashed. Affordable childcare and a college education will no longer be possible for many families in our country.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">
<b>ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY</b> — Forget about the government having the ability to protect the people from corporations who want to evade Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act regulations. With massive cuts in the EPA, the resources will not be there. Forget about this country having the investment capability to transform our energy system to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. Forget about creating millions of jobs rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and improving our public transportation system.
<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none; mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Arial;mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;">
<b>We don't have to make these cuts. Adopting a fair budget plan which ends tax breaks for the wealthy and large corporations and makes real cuts in military spending is the kind of shared sacrifice that the American people want<o:p></o:p></b></span></p> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-61658865057422988342011-07-23T19:25:00.000-07:002011-07-23T19:36:22.494-07:00The Debate Over the National Debt ad Deficit Reduction is a Smokescreen to Distract the Country from the Real Issues.<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>While the new class of conservative Republicans, spurred on by the Tea Party, hold fast to their pledge not to raise taxes, the government is picking up steam in its charge to the economic disaster of a default.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>If the issue were really about the deficit and the debt, then there would have been an agreement on the debt ceiling and a default would be avoided at all costs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But the ongoing debate is only the side story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It would seem that the real story behind the breakdown in negotiations has a dual plot, first to make the economy so bad under an Obama administration that it will ensure a Republican victory in 2012 and secondly to dismantle the social welfare programs that serve low and moderate income people and the elderly.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>In the right-wing, conservative view of the world, social security and Medicaid are tantamount to Socialism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>These two programs, that are mandatory for all workers to pay into, are perhaps the most successful social welfare programs created as part of the New Deal and the War on Poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Prior to these two programs, older Americans represented the highest number of people living in poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>That number has been reversed as millions of older Americans were moved out of poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As a result of the success of these two programs, there have been numerous attempts by Republicans to destabilize both.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Most famously was George Bush’s failed attempt at privatizing social security, which would have transferred millions if not billions of dollars out of the pockets of retirees and into Wall Street traders and speculators. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">Less known but much more devastating was the unfunded prescription drug program passed into law by George Bush.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When a conservative Republican proposes a new social welfare benefit, we should be afraid, we should be very afraid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Not only has this new benefit been paid with borrowed monies, but in reality it was designed to be a subsidy for the enormously profitable pharmaceutical industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>A little known piece of the authorizing legislation denied Medicare the ability to negotiate drug prices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So, as the largest purchaser of prescription drugs, Medicare is the only health insurer that pays list price for prescription drugs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This one proviso costs the government billions of dollars every year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So masquerading as a benefit to seniors, this was little more than a nail in the coffin of Medicare and a drain on the federal budget.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">It appears that it is only when there is a Democrat in the White House, that Republicans begin to care about the debt and the deficit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>George Bush’s greatest legacy to the American people were two unfunded wars, an unfunded tax break for the wealthiest Americans and the unfunded prescription drug benefit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>All of these paid for with borrowed dollars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Where were John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and Eric Cantor when their party was running up the debt at record levels? </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">The author of the “no-tax” pledge that has captivated Congressional Republicans is Grover Norquist, an influential conservative activist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In his own words, Norquist provides the true rationale for the current deadlock: ”I don’t want to abolish government, I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bath tub.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In his world the deficit is not the issue, it is government itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>By keeping the focus on the debt ceiling and away from the real ideology informing the debate, we never get to the real issues that are faced by everyday working Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The issues that only government is big enough to tackle.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">Oh, before I forget, these same Congress members who want to take away social welfare benefits from working Americans, have one of the best welfare packages offered to any workers anywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Congress members receive an annual salary of $174,000, more than three times the average household income in the country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Additionally they get almost 75% of their health insurance costs paid by the government, and they can receive as much as $36,000 a year in pension benefits after serving only five years at age 62.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>That is two and half times greater than the average social security benefit<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>of $14,00, received by American retires, most of whom have no pension and minimal savings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Not bad for what is essentially a part-time job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">So lets’ take a look at some of those real issues that are being masked by the phony debate about the federal debt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As long as the focus is on the debt ceiling and not on these real issues, more and more Americans will find themselves facing real economic emergencies, not the type manufactured by a desperate Republican Party. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;text-indent: 0.5in; "><b>The Real Issues Index</b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>173,000</b> <span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of jobs lost in June 2011</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>14.1 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of individuals unemployed in June 2011</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>6.3 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of US workers unemployed for more than six months</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>8.6 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of involuntary part-time workers</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>2.7 million</b> <span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of discouraged workers not counted as part of the labor force</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>9.2 %</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Official government unemployment rate</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>16.6%</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>True unemployment rate</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>2.6 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of households earning less than $25,000 per year</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>40 million </b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of people living in poverty in US</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>15.5 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of children under age 18 living in poverty</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>$22,350</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Official poverty threshold for a family of four</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>58.5</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> Per cent of</span> people in the US who will spend at least one year in poverty during their lives</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>1.7 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of foreclosure filings in first six months of 2011</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>222,740</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of foreclosed properties in June 2011</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>2.3 to 3.5 million</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Number of people who are homeless in US</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b>23</b><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Per cent of homeless families who have children</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>When John Boehner walked out on the negotiations he walked out on the American people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When he called tax increases “job killers,” he lied to the American people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>It was the Bush tax cuts, bank deregulation, corporate tax giveaways, two unfunded wars, tax advantages to corporations who move jobs offshore, bailing out the banks and union busting policies – all supported by Mr. Boehner and his followers – that have caused this problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Until our so-called representatives are willing to address these, the real issues, the debt crisis will never go away, and our economy will continue its slide to third world depths.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in"><o:p> </o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-41036354932943335752011-07-18T07:31:00.000-07:002011-07-18T07:32:31.615-07:00Debt Reduction, Supply Side Economics and the Great Recession<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>While the new mantra of the current crop of Republicans in Congress is debt reduction and tax relief to get the economy going again, they should look at the role of their own party’s policies in creating the mess of an economy that we are all experiencing.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Let’s begin by taking a look at the Republican insistence on debt reduction as a pre-requisite to any budget deal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In the last three decades, supply-side Republican presidents have added more to the national debt that any previous Democratic president.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When Ronald Reagan entered office with a promise to cut government and reduce the budget, the national debt stood at $1.9 trillion, when the champion of trickle down economics left office the national debt stood at $3.75 trillion, a staggering 97% increase.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In just eight years, President Reagan increased the annual deficit from $99 billion to $252 billion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Most of this growing annual deficit and the huge increase in the national debt was a result of a bloated military budget and tax cuts targeted to corporations and the wealthiest Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While the US debt was growing so was the average household debt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In eight years, under Reagan’s trickle down economics, average household debt increased from 60% of income to 119%, making the average American household more vulnerable to the vagaries of the marketplace.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">In spite of this growth in the debt, “Reaganomics” would continue to influence Republicans claiming that businesses and wealthy Americans needed to become unfettered by onerous taxes and regulations so that they could create jobs and lift the economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Under Reagan, this march toward deregulation of the financial marketplace began with gutting the federal regulations on mortgage lending, put in place as a result of the first foreclosure crisis during the Great Depression.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This first step toward financial deregulation demonstrated once again how we as a society are ahistorical (not a real word but it seems to work here).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>These mortgage lending regulations, and indeed the whole host of regulations governing the practices of the financial industry were put into place because they were needed to protect Americans against the veracious appetite of the banking industry. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in">Next, the administration and Congress focused on freeing the Savings and Loans from “onerous” federal regulations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This included steps such as lifting regulations on the types of investments they could make, allowing for riskier investments; changing the way S & L’s recorded assets and liabilities artificially inflating their bottom line, allowing them to take on more risk with less of a cushion to fall back on; and delaying the closure of insolvent S & L’s allowing them to take on more debt without sufficient reserves.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Inheriting the trickle down theory of supply side economics, which he once referred to as “voodoo economics,”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>and a national debt of $3.75 trillion, George Bush the First went about increasing the national debt by 59% in just four years to $4.98 trillion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Halfway into his presidency the bill began to come due from the Reagan administration’s deregulation of the Savings and Loan industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As their risky and often ethically and financially questionable investments began to fail, what has been called the “greatest collapse of financial institutions since the Depression,” was under way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As in the current financial industry meltdown, the administration rode in on its white horse, committing taxpayer dollars to bail out wealthy bankers and investors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Once again demonstrating how our so-called free market system is in reality a hybrid economic system – socialism for the rich and capitalism for everybody else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>By the time the dust settled on the S & L bailout, the government had spent $123.8 billion in taxpayer dollars, while the industry only put up $29.1 billion of its own.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>But President Bush had a personal incentive to spend taxpayer dollars on the bailout.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Two Bush sons, Jeb and Neil, were deeply involved in financial dealings in the S & L industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>At the ripe old age of 30, Neil Bush was made a director of the Silverado Savings & Loan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>A mere three years later, Silverado closed costing taxpayers $1.66 billion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While a director, the younger Bush brother approved loans to businesses in which he had an interest and received a $100,000 loan, with no obligation to pay it back, from an individual doing business with the bank.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>At the same time, brother Jeb was defaulting on a $4.6 million loan from another S & L.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Bill Clinton entered the White House with an inherited national debt of $4.98 trillion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In his eight-year tenure, Clinton increased the debt by 13% to $5.64 trillion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>While this increase may not be cause for celebration it was lest than one-quarter of the debt increase amassed by the previous administration in only four years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, Clinton proved to us that free market deregulation and supply side economics are not solely the property of Republicans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As President, Clinton signed into law the most sweeping deregulation of the banking industry, sweeping away the fail-safe protections put in place after the Great Depression, lifting almost all of the restraints on the giant monopolies dominating the financial industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 repealed the Glass-Steigall Act of 1932, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>which mandated the separation of investment banking from commercial banking, rules put into place as a result of the banking meltdown that caused the Great Depression.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This paved the way for a spate of bank mergers and takeovers that created the myth of “too big to fail.” </p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Clinton and the Republican controlled Congress paved the way for the coming bank meltdown and George Bush, his successor in the White House, added into the mix<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>his brand of supply side economics, clinching the sprint towards economic catastrophe. As President, George Bush quickly turned the Clinton budget surplus into record budget deficits and increased the national debt by 46% up to $8.2 trillion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>He first began whittling the surplus down by sending out tax refund checks to American taxpayers, telling the public that they surplus was theirs to do with as they chose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Then we were gifted with the now famous Bush Tax Cuts that were targeted overwhelmingly to the wealthiest Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>These were justified by the fantasy that if wealthy individuals paid less in taxes they would have more money to invest and create jobs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Although this has been proven wrong over time, and it is fact that the Bush tax cuts did not stimulate the economy nor prevent the coming meltdown, the Republican mantra still remains that taxes are job killers and that tax breaks will help to stimulate the economy.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>So today we find ourselves in the middle of the Great Recession, with record unemployment, record numbers of children living in poverty and more than 50 million people without health insurance and we are still told that taxes and the debt are the real culprits.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>When in fact the only institution large enough to help us out from under is the federal government, and its only source of revenues are taxes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However, defying reality, the conversation has focused solely on cutting the debt. Not on creating jobs, supporting education, infrastructure improvements or clean energy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As long as the debate is on how to reduce the debt, the real problems facing everyday Americans will continue to be ignored.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In the ongoing debate, government is the problem not the solution and all government programs that do not subsidize business or fund defense are on the chopping block.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This means that the social welfare programs that prevent economic catastrophe for millions of American families and individuals have become expendable, seen as luxuries and not the legitimate role of a government that is responsible for the welfare of its citizens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As President Obama has so eloquently stated,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>the debate in Congress is “less about reducing the deficit than about changing the basic social compact in America.”</p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-25700516275083642172011-07-10T14:21:00.000-07:002011-07-10T14:41:04.578-07:00The Corporate Tax Index (or not sharing the tax burden while enjoying all the benefits of government services)<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">115 - The number of S&P 500 companies that pay less than 20% in taxes<span style="mso-tab-count:2"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">35% - The official corporate tax rate<span style="mso-tab-count: 7"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">37 - The number of companies receiving more in tax credits than they paid<span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$17.587 billion - Boeing Corporation’s pretax income for 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:3"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">-0.1% Per cent Boeing Corporation paid in US taxes in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:2"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$3 million - Tax rebate earned by Boeing in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 5"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$3.512 billion - Amazon’s pretax income for 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">4.33% - Per cent Amazon paid in US taxes in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:6"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span> </span>$14.2 billion - General Electric’s earnings in 2010 <span style="mso-tab-count: 5"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$0 - Federal taxes paid by General Electric in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span> </span>$3.2 billion - Tax subsidy earned by General Electric in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span> </span>-64.0% General electric’s effective 2010 US tax rate<span style="mso-tab-count:4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$10.8 billion - Google’s 2010 earnings<span style="mso-tab-count:7"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$0 - Federal taxes paid by Google in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 6"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$19.7 billion - IBM’s earnings for 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:7"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$0 - Federal taxes paid by IBM in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 7"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$190 million - Tax subsidy earned by IBM in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 2"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count:3"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$9.4 billion - Pfizer’s 2010 earnings<span style="mso-tab-count:7"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span> </span>$0 - Federal taxes paid by Pfizer in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 6"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$29.8 billion - Federal tax credits for R & D, mostly to pharmaceuticals<span style="mso-tab-count:3"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$7.419 billion - Exxon Mobil US profit in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count: 6"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span> </span>$0 - Federal taxes paid by ExxonMobil in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:6"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$992 million - Federal tax subsidies earned by ExxonMobil in 2010<span style="mso-tab-count:3"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$26.5 billion - Federal subsidies to oil companies over last ten years<span style="mso-tab-count:3"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$952 billion - Big five oil company profits over last ten years<span style="mso-tab-count:4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$ 6 billion - Federal subsidy for ethanol from corn<span style="mso-tab-count: 5"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span> </span>24% - Per cent of US corn crop devoted to ethanol<span style="mso-tab-count:5"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span></span>128% - Increase in price of bushel of corn in last year<span style="mso-tab-count:4"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$102 billion - Annual cost to federal government for corporate tax breaks<span style="mso-tab-count:2"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">$100 billion - Proposed cut to federal Medicaid program <span style="mso-tab-count:2"> <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-2332034496991274082011-07-08T11:28:00.001-07:002011-07-08T19:38:48.833-07:00The Hiatus is OverHello Everybody.<div><br /></div><div>I want to begin by thanking you for your patience in my absence. This is my first post since May 2011. I am shocked that the year went by so quickly, but glad to be back.</div><div><br /></div><div>During my sabbatical from the blog I was involved in setting up a new Masters degree program and a new academic department.</div><div><br /></div><div>I am happy to report that I am now the Chair of the Department of Leadership and Policy at Wheelock College, and that we have graduated our first class of Masters Students in Organizational Leadership.</div><div><br /></div><div>Starting with today's post, I will be back posting regularly - hopefully at least once a week, addressing the policy issues that affect us all.</div><div><br /></div><div>I hope you will join me once again and that I can provide information that will be helpful to you while I try to make sense out of very complex issues.</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-14490075349462235192011-07-08T11:25:00.000-07:002011-07-08T19:44:32.152-07:00Cutting the Budget is Not the Answer<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><br /></p> <p class="MsoNormal">While President Obama and Congressional Republicans try to find common ground on how to reduce the deficit, the issue that does not get attention is the fact that in a recession such as we are experiencing, cutting the federal budget will not help create jobs or stimulate the economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Congressional Republicans have demanded $2.4 trillion in budget cuts, and the Obama Administration is projecting cuts of $4 trillion over the next decade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>To end the recession and create jobs, spending must increase.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Budget cuts and deficit reduction measures only add to job loss and decreased spending thereby exacerbating an already serious economic situation.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">There are two sides to any budget – income and expenses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Any serious effort to reduce the deficit should look at both sides of the federal budget.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However the Congressional Republicans have signed a “no tax pledge” forbidding their members form considering any new taxes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Since the federal government gets its income solely from taxes, this pledge has taken the income side of the budget off the negotiating table.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>So the conversations between the Republican leadership and the White House are focusing on budget cuts to reduce the deficit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>But it is current tax policy, formulated since the Reagan era that has reduced taxes on the wealthy while increasing the federal budget deficit.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">In1980, the top 1% of the wealthiest Americans earned 10% of total income, today that number has increased to 20% of total income, during this same period they enjoyed a reduction in their tax rate from 70% to 35%.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>However since most of their income is not from wages but from investments, they pay a mere 15% capital gains rate on the bulk of their income, resulting in an effective tax rate of a approximately 17%.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">However, the Republican mantra of cutting the deficit while not allowing any new revenue sources appears to be a smokescreen for gutting the already tattered social safety net.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Take the recent extension of the Bush-era tax cuts for example.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Fully fifty-five per cent of the benefits went to the top 10% of highest income households.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The top 1% of income households received 38% of the benefits, and if that is not enough, the top .01% received an average of $520,000 in tax benefits as a result.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Congressional Republicans held fast to their beliefs that letting these tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire would hurt he economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This in spite of the fact that these tax cuts were awarded to wealthy Americans before the economic meltdown and did nothing to prevent it and may have been a factor contributing to the meltdown.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Candidate Obama pledged to let these onerous tax cuts for the wealthy expire when their authorization ran out in 2011, but President Obama caved into Republican demands and signed legislation extending the cuts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This is spite of the fact that in their first seven years during the Bush administration, these tax cuts contributed $1.7 trillion to the deficit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Just this one item alone, could account for almost half of the proposed budget cuts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In addition to these tax cuts favoring the wealthiest Americans, there are a host of tax loopholes and subsidies for corporations and wealthy Americans, that the Republicans are refusing to close while looking at the social safety net, supports for the most vulnerable among us, to make up the shortfall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>In <b><i>Republospeak</i></b>, closing a tax loophole or ending a needless and wasteful corporate subsidy is the same as raising taxes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Preserve this tax largesse to the wealthiest among us while demonizing the poor and elderly so that they can be targeted for devastating cuts.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">Take Medicaid for an example.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The $100 billion proposed cut to Medicaid, the health insurance program for families living under the federal poverty level, will reduce the quality and availability of medical care for millions of low income families, placing a greater burden on states to maintain minimal levels of care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>According to Families USA, in just one state, - California – the proposed Medicaid cuts will result in the loss of 187,610 jobs and more than $24 billion in state business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This does not include the increased cost of emergency room care when Medicaid recipients do not have proper preventive health care available.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The New York Times has reported that children on Medicaid are more likely to be denied service by medical specialists, and when they are seen they must wait longer for appointments than those with other types of health insurance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>As bad as this situation is, it will only get worse when the cuts are implemented.</p> <p class="MsoNormal">In a display of political irony and callousness, Governor Walker of Wisconsin has proposed cutting Medicaid which serves 20% of the state’s population by $500 million, while at the same time proposing to increase payments to cover the cost of “burying Wisconsinites who die destitute.”</p> <p class="MsoNormal">The current negotiations between the White House and the Republican leaders of Congress was never about the deficit, it is a poorly camouflaged attempt to roll back and gut services for low income and elderly citizens while ensuring increasing profits for the wealthiest Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>And oh, by the way, while the Republicans scream about raising the debt ceiling and play a game of brinkmanship, it would be good to remember, that while President Bush was racking up the largest deficit spending in history the Republicans voted to raise the debt ceiling four times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Perhaps the real tragedy here is that President Obama has partially bought into their line of thinking.</p> <!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-66162379689292688062010-05-11T17:17:00.000-07:002010-05-11T17:26:53.479-07:00Health Care Reform Index<span style="font-weight:bold;">46.3 million</span> - Number of Americans without health insurance<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">45,000</span> - Number of Americans, without health insurance, who die each year due to preventable causes, according to a study by Harvard Medical School<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">32 million</span> - Number of uninsured Americans who will be able to get health insurance under the new law<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">45.2 million</span> - Number of older Americans enrolled in Medicare<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">160.6 million</span> - Number of Americans who get their health insurance through their employer<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">112.2 million</span> - Number of low and moderate income Americans who will receive subsidies to purchase health insurance<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">$5,761</span> - Per capita health care spending in the US, the highest in the world<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">15</span> - Per cent of total US GDP spent on health care, the highest in the developed world<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">6.8</span> - Infant mortality rate per 1,000 live births, highest in the developed world<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">77</span> - Life expectancy in the US, ranking fifth in the world<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">2.3 trillion</span> -Amount spent by Americans on health care in 2007, the last year that statistics are available<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">390 billion</span> - Amount of savings to be realized by Medicare in the next decade while protecting basic benefits<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">26</span> -The age until which children will be able to remain under their parents insurance coverage<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">143 billion</span> - Amount of deficit reduction in next ten years attributed to health care reform<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">0</span> - Number of undocumented immigrants who will be able to purchase health insurance, even with their own money, from the state health care exchanges<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">0.9</span> - Per cent increase in Medicare taxes for individuals earning more than $200,000 or couples earning more than $250,000 per year <br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">3.8</span> - Per cent tax on unearned income for those same high-income earners<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">100</span> - Per cent of members of Congress who will be required to purchase health insurance through the state run health exchanges beginning in 2014<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">1</span> - Number of western, industrialized countries without universal health care – the United States<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">0</span> - Number of Republicans in Congress who voted for health care reform<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">0</span> - Distance that health care reform moves the country closer to socialismAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-37922685282453563062010-05-04T13:49:00.000-07:002010-05-04T13:56:14.852-07:00Tea Party Index41 - Per cent of Tea Party members who believe President Obama was NOT born in the United States<br /><br />52 - Per cent of Tea Party members who believe “too much has been made of the problems facing black people”<br /><br />31 - Per cent of Americans who approve of the Tea party movement<br /><br />89 - Per cent of tea Party members who are white<br /><br />40 - Per cent of Tea Party members who are 45 years old or older<br /><br />61 - Per cent of Tea Party members who are male<br /><br />44 - Per cent of Tea Party members who identify as “born again”<br /><br />$285,000 - Amount contributed to Scott Brown’s campaign by the Tea Party<br /><br />$12 million - Amount Sarah Palin has earned in speaking fees since losing her bid for Vice-President<br /><br />2.3 million - Number of copies of Sarah Palin’s autobiography sold to date<br /><br />$1 million - Amount of three-year contract Fox News gave Sarah Palin to serve as a contributor to the news<br /> <br />$250,00 - Amount Sarah Palin is paid per episode for her Learning Channel reality show about Alaska<br /><br />$100,00 - Amount the Tea Party paid Sarah Palin for her keynote address at their first national convention<br /><br />91 - Per cent of Tea Party members who support smaller government with fewer services<br /><br />95 - Per cent of all American households that received a tax cut in 2009<br /><br />10 - Per cent increase in the average IRS tax refund over last year<br /><br />2 - Per cent of Tea Party members that think taxes were cut last year<br /><br />44 - Per cent of Tea Party members who believe taxes were increased last year<br /><br />86 - Per cent of Tea Party members believe that taxes are too high<br /><br />57 - Per cent of Americans who believe taxes are too high<br /><br />1 - Per cent of richest families that earn 24% of all income in the country<br /><br />400 -Number of richest taxpayers who saw their income double in 2009 and their taxes reduced by 50%<br /><br />65 - Per cent of Tea Party members who believe Social security is a form of Socialism<br /><br />92 - Per cent of Tea Party members who believe the US is moving more towards Socialism than CapitalismAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-27550119553409642832010-05-03T12:46:00.000-07:002010-05-03T12:47:30.927-07:00Bernie Sanders on Wall Street ReformSanders Op-Ed: Real Wall Street Reform<br />By Sen. Bernie Sanders <br /><br />April 23, 2010<br /><br />Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman and one of the architects of financial deregulation, recently testified to the effect that no one could have predicted the Wall Street collapse of 2008. Really?<br /><br />As a member of the House Financial Services Committee, this is what I said on the floor of the House in 1999 as I voted against the Gramm-Leach-Bliley bank deregulation bill: “I believe this legislation, in its current form, will do more harm than good. It will lead to fewer banks and financial service providers; increased charges and fees for individual consumers and small businesses; diminished credit for rural America; and taxpayer exposure to potential loses should a financial conglomerate fail. It will lead to more mega-mergers; a small number of corporations dominating the financial service industry; and further concentration of economic power in our country.”<br /><br />Frankly, it didn’t take a PhD in finance to come to this conclusion. If you lock a heroin addict in a room with heroin, you shouldn’t be shocked if he overdoses. If you give unlimited license to Wall Street speculators, whose only function is to make as much money as possible, you shouldn’t be surprised when the result is greed on steroids, reckless behavior and a disaster for ordinary people.<br /><br />Today, as a result of that uncontrollable greed, millions of Americans have lost their jobs, health care and homes and our country continues to struggle through a disastrous recession. Disgust at Wall Street is profound. The American people want change as to how Wall Street functions, real change. Congress must deliver. <br /><br />We must be clear that real and meaningful financial reform will not come easy. When Wall Street and the financial sector successfully fought for deregulation they poured some $5 billion into lobbying and campaign contributions over a 10-year period. Now, as Congress begins to address financial reform, they’re at it again. In 2009, the major financial interests spent $300 million in lobbying and the money continues to flow like water. <br /><br />In my view, the real and transformational financial reform we need must include the following elements:<br /><br />Break Up Huge Banks The four major U.S. banks – Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase and Well-Fargo – issue two-thirds of the credit cards in this country, write half the mortgages and collectively hold $7.4 trillion in assets, about 52 percent of the nation’s estimated total output last year. Incredibly, despite all of them being bailed out during the Wall Street meltdown because they were “too big to fail,” three of them (Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo) are now bigger than before the bailout. But this is an issue which goes beyond the danger of “too big to fail” and future taxpayer liability. We must break up these behemoths because of the incredible economic power they exert on the economy through their concentration of ownership and enormous competitive advantages. <br /><br />Financial Institutions Must be Integrated Into the Real Economy At a time when we are in the midst of a major recession, it is insane that our largest financial institutions continue to trade trillions in esoteric financial instruments which makes Wall Street the largest gambling casino in the world. We need to create a financial system which invests in the real economy, and helps create millions of new jobs by providing small and medium businesses with the credit they desperately need. We also need investments to rebuild our manufacturing sector, transform our energy system and create modern transportation and infrastructure systems. We don’t need banks pushing home mortgages on people who can’t afford them. We don’t need huge amounts being “bet” on whether housing securities go up or down or what the price of oil will be six months from now. <br /><br />National Usury Legislation Major financial institutions have, in many ways, become nothing less than loan-sharking operations. Today, millions of Americans who pay their bills on time are now forced to pay 25 or 30 percent interest rates. That is not only obscene but, according to every major religion, immoral. Banks cannot be allowed to engage in usury and charge outrageous interest rates. We must cap interest rates for private banks at the same level as we do for credit unions – 15 percent except under exceptional circumstances.<br /><br />Transparency at the Federal Reserve The Federal Reserve cannot continue to operate in almost total secrecy. During the bailout, large financial institutions received trillions of dollars in zero or near-zero interest loans. Who received those loans and under what terms? The Fed isn’t telling. Did some of them turn around and, in a mammoth welfare scam, invest that Fed money in government treasury bonds at 3 percent or 4 percent interest rates? The Fed refuses to say. It’s time we had transparency at the Fed so that the American people know what our central bank is doing.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-35021475324036187032010-05-01T08:30:00.000-07:002010-05-01T08:32:30.975-07:00Bill Moyers on the New American PlutonomyBILL MOYERS April 30, 2010<br /><br />You've no doubt figured out my bias by now. I've hardly kept it a secret. In this regard, I take my cue from the late Edward R. Murrow, the Moses of broadcast news. <br /><br />Ed Murrow told his generation of journalists bias is okay as long as you don't try to hide it. So here, one more time, is mine: plutocracy and democracy don't mix. Plutocracy, the rule of the rich, political power controlled by the wealthy. <br /><br />Plutocracy is not an American word but it's become an American phenomenon. Back in the fall of 2005, the Wall Street giant Citigroup even coined a variation on it, plutonomy, an economic system where the privileged few make sure the rich get richer with government on their side. By the next spring, Citigroup decided the time had come to publicly "bang the drum on plutonomy." <br /><br />And bang they did, with an "equity strategy" for their investors, entitled, "Revisiting Plutonomy: The Rich Getting Richer." Here are some excerpts: <br /><br />"Asset booms, a rising profit share and favorable treatment by market-friendly governments have allowed the rich to prosper...[and] take an increasing share of income and wealth over the last 20 years..." <br /><br />"...the top 10%, particularly the top 1% of the US-- the plutonomists in our parlance-- have benefited disproportionately from the recent productivity surge in the US...[and] from globalization and the productivity boom, at the relative expense of labor." <br /><br />"...[and they] are likely to get even wealthier in the coming years. [Because] the dynamics of plutonomy are still intact." <br /><br />And so they were, before the great collapse of 2008. And so they are, today, after the fall. While millions of people have lost their jobs, their homes, and their savings, the plutonomists are doing just fine. In some cases, even better, thanks to our bailout of the big banks which meant record profits and record bonuses for Wall Street. <br /><br />Now why is this? Because over the past 30 years the plutocrats, or plutonomists — choose your poison — have used their vastly increased wealth to capture the flag and assure the government does their bidding. Remember that Citigroup reference to "market-friendly governments" on their side? It hasn't mattered which party has been in power — government has done Wall Street's bidding. <br /><br />Don't blame the lobbyists, by the way; they are simply the mules of politics, delivering the drug of choice to a political class addicted to cash — what polite circles call "campaign contributions" and Tony Soprano would call "protection." <br /><br />This marriage of money and politics has produced an America of gross inequality at the top and low social mobility at the bottom, with little but anxiety and dread in between, as middle class Americans feel the ground falling out from under their feet. According to a study from the Pew Research Center last month, nine out of ten Americans give our national economy a negative rating. Eight out of ten report difficulty finding jobs in their communities, and seven out of ten say they experienced job-related or financial problems over the past year. <br /><br />So it is that like those populists of that earlier era, millions of Americans have awakened to a sobering reality: they live in a plutocracy, where they are disposable. Then, the remedy was a popular insurgency that ignited the spark of democracy. <br /><br />Now we have come to another parting of the ways, and once again the fate and character of our country are up for grabs. <br /><br />So along with Jim Hightower and Iowa's concerned citizens, and many of you, I am biased: democracy only works when we claim it as our own. <br />.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-85365045094679553602010-04-23T13:36:00.000-07:002010-04-23T13:41:20.583-07:00Earth Day Index<span style="font-weight:bold;">4.39</span> the number of pounds of trash thrown away each day by the average American<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">10%</span> amount of solid waste in US that gets recycled<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">18 billion</span> the number of disposable diapers thrown away each year<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">2.5 millio</span>n plastic bottles are thrown away every hour in America<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">4 million</span> the number of tons of junk mail delivered in America every year<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">650</span> the average number of pounds of paper used by each American in one year<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">43,000</span> the number of tons of food thrown out in the US every day<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">270 million</span> the number of tires thrown away annually in the US<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">2</span> the number of manmade structures seen from space, the Great Wall of China and the Fresh Kills Landfill in NYC<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">900 million</span> the number of trees cut down annually for US paper and pulp mills<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">5%</span> the percentage of the world’s population that lives in the US<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">33%</span> the percentage of the earth’s timber and paper consumed by Americans<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">96%</span> the amount of energy saved using a recycled aluminum can rather than making a can from ore<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">95%</span> the amount of reduction in air pollution manufacturing an aluminum can from recycled materials rather than ore<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">97%</span> the amount of reduction in water pollution manufacturing an aluminum can from recycled materials rather than ore<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">1 million</span> the number of gallons of water that can be contaminated from improperly disposing of one quart of engine oil<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">4 million</span> the number of tons of wrapping paper and shopping bags thrown away during the holiday season in the US<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">9 cubic yards</span> the amount of landfill space saved by recycling one ton of cardboard<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">60</span> <span style="font-weight:bold;">pounds</span> the amount of air pollutants avoided by producing one ton of recycled paperAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-70068118724631916772010-04-19T05:30:00.000-07:002010-04-19T05:43:57.914-07:00U.S. Inequality Index• <span style="font-weight:bold;">81%</span> increase in net worth enjoyed by top 5% of wealthiest US households between 1979-2005<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">1.1%</span> decrease in net worth experienced by lowest 20% of income households during the same period<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">50%</span> the amount that US worker productivity has increased since 1970 while average wages declined<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">$20.3 billion</span> the amount paid out in Wall Street bonuses in 2009<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">38%</span> amount of total US income growth that went to the top .1% of Americans between 1978-2008<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">400 </span> number of American families whose income quintupled from $16 million to $87 million from 1992-2007<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">13%</span> the average income loss experienced by American families during that same period<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">99</span> the increase in new American billionaires between 2001-2007 bringing the total to 400<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">18.6%</span> the number of American families with zero net worth<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">17 million</span> number of US households that experienced food insecurity in 2008<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">200,000</span> number of US veterans who are homeless on any given night<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">1.35 million</span> number of US children who experience homelessness in a twelve month period<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">25%</span> reduction in public housing vouchers between 1999-2006<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">$114 billion</span> reduction in federal funding for affordable housing between 2004-2007<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">13.2</span> per centage of US citizens living below the official poverty level<br /><br />• <span style="font-weight:bold;">14.4 million</span> number of US children living below poverty levelAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-76455194003428346372010-04-18T06:55:00.000-07:002010-04-18T06:57:16.539-07:00What Do We Get For Our US Tax Dollars?We like to think of Europeans as poor overtaxed serfs but the benefits they receive show the shortcomings of the US system<br /><br />By Steven Hill <br /><br />April 16, 2010 "The Guardian" -- Most Americans seem to regard 15 April – the day income tax returns are due to the Internal Revenue Service – as a recurring tragedy on the order of a biblical plague. Particularly this year, with US government deficits soaring, everyone from the Teabaggers to Senate Republicans are reviving a scary Friday the 13th scenario from the 1990s about a return to Big Government. Recently Rudy Giuliani even stated that President Obama was moving us towards – heaven forbid – European social democracy.<br /><br />Europe frequently plays the punching bag role during these moments because there is a perception that the poor Europeans are overtaxed serfs. But a closer look reveals that this is a myth that prevents Americans from understanding the vast shortcomings of our own system.<br /><br />A few years ago, an American acquaintance of mine who lives in Sweden told me that, quite by chance, he and his Swedish wife were in New York City and ended up sharing a limousine to the theatre district with a southern US senator and his wife. This senator, a conservative, anti-tax Democrat, asked my acquaintance about Sweden and swaggeringly commented about "all those taxes the Swedes pay". To which this American replied, "The problem with Americans and their taxes is that we get nothing for them." He then went on to tell the senator about the comprehensive level of services and benefits that Swedes receive.<br /><br />"If Americans knew what Swedes receive for their taxes, we would probably riot," he told the senator. The rest of the ride to the theatre district was unsurprisingly quiet.<br /><br />The fact is, in return for their taxes, Europeans are receiving a generous support system for families and individuals for which Americans must pay exorbitantly, out-of-pocket, if we are to receive it at all. That includes quality healthcare for every single person, the average cost of which is about half of what Americans pay, even as various studies show that Europeans achieve healthier results.<br /><br />But that's not all. In return for their taxes, Europeans also are receiving affordable childcare, a decent retirement pension, free or inexpensive university education, job retraining, paid sick leave, paid parental leave, ample vacations, affordable housing, senior care, efficient mass transportation and more. In order to receive the same level of benefits as Europeans, most Americans fork out a ton of money in out-of-pocket payments, in addition to our taxes.<br /><br />For example, while 47 million Americans don't have any health insurance at all, many who do are paying escalating premiums and deductibles. Indeed, Anthem Blue Cross announced that its premiums will increase by up to 40%.<br /><br />But Europeans receive healthcare in return for a modest amount deducted from their paychecks.<br />Friends have told me they are saving nearly a hundred thousand dollars for their children's college education, and most young Americans graduate with tens of thousands of dollars of debt. But many European children attend for free or nearly so (depending on the country).<br /><br />Childcare in the US costs over $12,000 annually for a family with two children, but in Europe it cost about one-sixth that amount, and the quality is far superior. Millions of Americans are stuffing as much as possible into their IRAs and 401(k)s because social security provides only about half the retirement income needed. But the more generous European retirement system provides about 75-85% (depending on the country) of retirement income. Either way, you pay.<br /><br />Americans' private spending on old-age care is nearly three times higher per capita than in Europe because Americans must self-finance a significant share of their own senior care. Sixty million American workers have no paid sick leave, millions more have no paid parental leave following a birth, and so must self-finance their own time off. But Europeans receive all this in exchange for their taxes.<br /><br />Americans also tend to pay more in local and state taxes, as well as in property taxes. Americans also pay hidden taxes, such as $300bn annually in federal tax breaks to businesses that provide health benefits to their employees. When you sum up the total balance sheet, it turns out that Americans pay out just as much as Europeans – but we receive a lot less for our money.<br /><br />Unfortunately these sorts of complexities are not calculated into simplistic analyses like Forbes' annual Tax Misery Index, a "study" which shows European nations as the most miserable and the low-tax United States as happy as a clam – right next to Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.<br /><br />But Forbes only adds up income tax, social security, sales tax or VAT and a few other minor fees. A thorough analysis would need to create a ledger in which all the supports and services Europeans receive are listed on one side and the amount of taxes and any additional fees they pay are listed on the other; and then do a similar analysis for Americans, listing what Americans pay in taxes as well as out-of-pocket expenses for those same services.<br /><br />In this economically competitive age, increasingly these kinds of services are necessary to ensure healthy, happy and productive families and workers.<br /><br />Europeans have these supports, but most Americans do not unless you pay a ton out of pocket. Or unless you are a member of Congress, which of course provide European-level support for its members and their families.<br /><br />That's something to keep in mind on 15 April. Happy Tax Day.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4363919791168714118.post-4708912359180187132010-04-06T15:47:00.000-07:002010-04-06T15:50:00.269-07:00The Dangerous Drift Back Towards Segregated Schoolsby Marian Wright Edelman<br /><br />Marian Wright Edelman, President of the Children's Defense Fund, is part of Change.org's Changemakers network, comprised of leading voices for social change.<br /><br />Two recent decisions by school boards in North Carolina are local signs of a troubling national trend towards resegregation in public schools. In New Hanover County, which includes Wilmington, parents and advocates spent much of last year debating a new middle school redistricting plan that would focus on "neighborhood schools," essentially resegregating the schools by race and economic class because our neighborhoods look that way.<br /><br />School board member Elizabeth Redenbaugh was the only White and only Republican member to join two Black Democratic colleagues in opposing the new plan. In a letter sent to parents and fellow board members last fall, Redenbaugh described some of what she was seeing: "I have literally had parents...approach me and state, ‘The bottom line is this: I do not want my children in school with black children.' I have had parents ask me why we do anything at all for the black children in our county. They look me in the eye and say, ‘we have spent so much money on black children . . . Nothing helps. I don't know why we even try anymore'...Such statements literally grieve my heart and beg the question: Who is my neighbor?" But despite the concerns Redenbaugh and her colleagues shared, they were ultimately overruled by the other members early this year in a 4-3 vote.<br /><br />Meanwhile, in Wake County, North Carolina, which includes Raleigh, schools may be moving backwards in a similar direction. Wake County has been lauded for its student assignment policy to balance schools using socioeconomic status augmented by a comprehensive program of magnet schools. But on March 24, the Wake County School Board voted to begin studying a new districting plan that would change the current busing system and reassign students based on "neighborhood attendance zones"-a return to potentially more segregated schools because of the neighborhood demographics. Advocates for Wake County's current socially and economically integrated school system are fighting to prevent this change. But these significant decisions represent a very disturbing trend across the country. The sad truth is that the dream Dr. King rightly considered one of the greatest victories of the Civil Rights Movement-the desegregation of our nation's schools-is unraveling before our eyes.<br /><br />Desegregated schools grew in the years directly following the Civil Rights Movement, but since 1988, racial resegregation in public schools has been rising slowly and systematically. In June 2007, both the spirit and intent of the historic Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision were assaulted when the Supreme Court acknowledged in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 and Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education the benefits of racially diverse schools for all students who attend them, but ruled that desegregation plans that assign students to schools on the basis of race are unconstitutional. At a time when the number of poor and minority children in America is growing and the number of White middle-class children is decreasing, our schools are once again becoming isolated by race and class. Plans like the diversity policy and magnet school program that have been in place in Wake County, which focused primarily on socioeconomic status instead of race, helped produce integrated schools with broad appeal and academic achievement gains; this two-pronged approach was lauded as another method of achieving diversity without concentrating children in racially isolated, high-poverty schools. But as the recent school board decision there shows, even those successful measures are now under attack.<br /><br />The problem, as leading expert Gary Orfield of the Civil Rights Project at the University of California, Los Angeles and others have argued, is that segregated schools are not good for any of our children. We already know they are disastrous for poor and minority students, for whom there is a strong connection between school segregation, failing schools, and high dropout rates. Almost half of America's Black students and nearly two-fifths of Latino students attend high schools that have been labeled "dropout factories" by Johns Hopkins University researchers and the U.S. Department of Education, where less than 60 percent of the freshman class will graduate in four years. But studies of the outcomes of inter-district transfer programs also show that while programs designed to improve integration significantly improve the life chances of children who are transferred in, they do not have a negative effect on the academic progress of students in the receiving district-one of the apparent fears of many parents. In fact, as Orfield and others note, integration has been shown to benefit children on both sides.<br /><br />As our society becomes more and more diverse, it is critically important that children from all backgrounds learn to interact with one another productively. When parents are allowed to hold on to the outdated beliefs that sending their children to a "diverse" school means sending them to an inferior school, it does their own children a disservice. In a rapidly globalizing world, returning to segregated schools would be another missed opportunity for all of America's children. We have so far left to go. We can't afford to take any more steps backwards.<br /><br /><br />Marian Wright Edelman is President of the Children's Defense Fund and in 2000, she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian awardAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17994878896250653439noreply@blogger.com0