Category Archives: Economy

Economy, Fair Tax, IRS, Politics

The Answer For Punitive Tax Code, More Puntitive Tax Code

Charles Schumer (D-NY), No. 3 leader in the Senate’s Democratic majority, is working on a tax provision designed to discourage companies from moving their tax domiciles overseas, where the tax liability is lower than the U.S., that has the highest corporate tax rate in the world.

Which is exactly what is wrong with the current IRS tax code. It is used by politicians as a tax hammer to either reward or punish economic activity. In this case, Schumer is upgrading to a sledge-hammer, by attempting to grab business profits retroactive to 1994. It’s the Democrat’s version of an Occupy Wall Streeter’s wet dream. And would most certainly fire up the wealth-envy part of their party’s base.

The proposal would cut the amount of deductible interest for inverted companies to 25 percent of U.S. taxable income from 50 percent, according to a draft obtained by Bloomberg News.

There is only one tax code that is economically stimulative. Not just for business, but for the middle class and the poor. It’s called the FairTax. And it does not have tax hammers. If fact, the FairTax can not be manipulated by politicians to pick winners or losers. On the contrary, it couldn’t be more open and transparent, or fair. And instead of being an incentive to move out of the country, the FairTax would be the incentive for corporations to being their assets back home and be put to work here. And the only employment problem we would then have is finding enough people to fill the jobs that would be created by the economic recovery that would result in all sectors of the economy.

Link: Schumer Anti-Inversion Tax Plan Could Reach Back to 1994 – Bloomberg.

Economy, Organized Labor, Politics

Big Labor, Minimum Wage, Laid Bare

Here we go again. A labor union advocate riding on the coattails of fifty and a hundred years ago. There’s a reason union membership is declining. They’re no longer needed in most cases. Especially so in the public sector.

Due to Big Labor’s successes in the last century, employers learned from them. They learned how to treat their employees so that there’s no longer a “need” for a union to step in and demand you pay them dues for protecting you from something that you don’t need protecting from or negotiating for. They want you to believe you have no power. You have all the power. It’s called “two feet.” And you can use them to leave an employer that you aren’t comfortable with, for whatever reason you choose. And, you have a voice. Use it yourself. Don’t feel you need a union representative to act or speak on your behalf. If you do, you’ve already surrendered your freedom.

Now it’s Big Labor’s turn to learn something. Be competitive or go out of business. I use the term “business” in an odd way because labor unions produce nothing. They are a leech on business. They are the reason that some businesses have gone out of business, or moved to another state.

Big Labor should put their theory to the test. Let them start a business that produces something (other than marijuana) and sell it on the free market (not to the federal government), and pay their employees two or three times the market value of a comparable private sector job, and see how long they stay in business. Without a government bailout of course. Go for it.

Here’s a fact for those Big Labor acolytes like Aaron Wazlavek who squawk class warfare about those evil 1 percenters. Under Obama’s economy, the top 10 percent, not 1 percent, are doing just fine. It’s the other 90 percent, the so-called working people (as if the top 10 percent don’t work), that have seen their incomes shrink. That median family income has fallen every year since Obama’s “economic recovery” began has nothing to do with labor union membership being low.

Wazlavek proffers . . .

A solid majority of U.S. workers consistently tell pollsters that they would like to join a union if their employer would simply not interfere.

Problem with this propaganda is this. When U.S. workers have a private vote on whether they want to join a union, they vote NO.  That’s not a poll, which can be manipulated to get a desired result. That’s a private vote, and the right to a private vote is not negotiable. “Card Check,” a union scheme to strip U.S. workers of their private vote, is government-sanctioned interference. Boosting labor union membership is not the responsibility of our government. Labor unions can succeed or fail on their own.

MinWagePayneAnother “hot button” of Big Labor is the minimum wage.

Big Labor advocates will say that raising the minimum wage to $15/hr or to what they call a “living wage,” which a starting salary was never intended to be, will cause the economy to grow because people will make more and therefore, be able to spend more. And (here’s the kicker) they’ll also say that it will reduce the deficit by decreasing welfare because, ostensibly, people will be making more money.

Here’s what really happens. Raising the minimum wage automatically gives labor union members, whose contracts are tied to the minimum wage, a raise. You know, the ones already making over $20/hr. The main reason President Obama wants it. His quid pro quo for Big Labor helping him get elected, twice. By arbitrarily raising the cost of labor employers must pay, employers will be forced to do with less of it (if not just go out of business) AND be forced to increase the price of their products, goods, and services to cover it. The result of that is, fewer people working, higher cost of living for everyone, including the long-term unemployed and the ones that just lost their job due to reductions in force, AND an increase in people dependent on government welfare. The second reason Obama wants to increase the minimum wage.

Bottom line, labor union membership is totally dependent on Big Labor learning something from their shrinking influence. Not the federal government and Card Check. And, hiking the minimum wage would have the reverse effect of what the proponents are saying.

Economy, Energy, Politics

World To Obama, Ease U.S. Oil Export Ban

Mmm, lub me some ultra-light, sweet crude.

President Obama is facing growing international pressure to ease the long-standing ban on crude oil and natural gas exports, with South Korea and Mexico joining the European Union in pressing the case for U.S. oil shipments overseas.

10 Most Expensive Avg Gas Prices-7-28
It was $1.84 per gallon in January 2009.

Never ceases to amaze me how the president must be drug screaming and kicking to the oil independence table that will create high-paying jobs (mostly union jobs), lower the cost of fuel, food, and transportation, stimulate the economy, as well as the family incomes that have been falling ever since his “recovery” began.

If the president had any balls at all, he’d be the first one calling for this. More than any sanctions he could muster against Putin’s Russia, having the ability to lower the price of crude worldwide would be the most effective pressure he could put on Putin because Russia’s economy is totally driven by oil and natural gas.

It should be a no-brainer. Americans, Europeans, Asians would all benefit from increased availability and lower energy cost. Then again, we’re dealing with Barack Obama and the greenies.

Link: Exclusive: From Seoul to Mexico City, pressure mounts to ease U.S. oil export ban

Economy, Energy, Media, Politics

Obama By-Passing Congress Again

Refusing to take no for an answer, Obama (not The White House, but Obama) is by-passing the Democrat-controlled Senate on a Useless Nations climate agreement.

King Obama is engineering a UN Climate Accord without Congress. As the media and Democrats in Congress marvel as the lawless Obama administration goes from “deeming” bills passed (ACA) to announcing at a SOTU speech that he’ll go around Congress, and now doing a retroactive re-write of an existing 1992 treaty instead of asking Congress again. Really?

Link: Obama Pursuing Climate Accord in Lieu of Treaty

Economy, Fair Tax, IRS, Whiners

Merck Reports Record 2Q

Time for a little good news from an industry that is continuously under attack from the slip-and-fall lawyer industry.

Merck & Co. (MRK) on Tuesday reported earnings that more than doubled in its second quarter, and topped analysts’ expectations.

  • Earnings, adjusted for one-time gains and costs, were 85 cents per share.
  • Merck shares have increased $7.92, or 16 percent, to $57.97 since the beginning of the year.
  • The stock has climbed $9.63, or 20 percent, in the last 12 months.

What comes next is the attacks from the anti-capitalist Progressives, accusing Merck of evil doings. What they won’t say is that Merck merely followed the IRS tax code.

Link: Merck 2Q profit more than doubles

Economy, Florida, Pensacola, Politics, Race Relations

Kids Shooting Kids In Pensacola

Here is a case where youth violence, youth gun violence specifically, has been a growing concern in the Pensacola area. One way to reach the kids, it was thought, was to give them something to do and try to teach them to behave responsibly.

An altercation early Sunday morning that led to a 16-year-old being shot and a 15-year-old being knocked unconscious occurred right after a Stop the Violence concert, according to an event organizer. A co-organizer of the concert, Bill Marshall, said the concert had been a free event where local music artists performed and spoke to the youths about ending violence in their communities.

So much for that idea. The Pensacola News Journal reporter does not say, but from the address of the place where the free concert was, it seems to be in a predominately Black neighborhood. I could be wrong in assuming that the youths involved were Black, but I doubt it. The reporter could clear this doubt up with just a little more information.

You can’t fix the out-of-control youth issue when you don’t know what the problem is. The problem is that Black youth unemployment is 33.4 percent nationally. That’s almost criminal to have a figure that high. I don’t know if it is better or worse in Pensacola. It is almost twice that of White youth unemployment at 18.9 percent. Which is still way too high. Either way, for all races, youth unemployment is unacceptably high. This makes for trouble the likes of which occurred over the weekend.

The answer obviously is not free concerts. And it isn’t a higher minimum wage. The answer is in a growing economy. Not a contracting economy like we have now. Contrary to what President Obama thinks (and economist he is not), raising the minimum wage (which is where youths always start) will create less opportunities for them. Not more.

Link: Pensacola American Legion shooting occurred after concert.

Economy, Media, Politics

President Obama Doubles Down On Middle Class Rhetoric

Ever since May of his first term, President Obama has been saying that he ‘will not rest‘ until every person that wants a job gets a job. Or health insurance, or this, or that. His SOTU speeches are the same every year. He says we need more “investments” (that means spending) in roads, bridges, infrastructure, education. And after $7 Trillion in new debt for it, you’ll hear it again in his weekly address below. Nothing gets fixed, and the only growth is in the size of government.

Here’s a dose of reality from the BLS.

  • From May of 2013 to May 2014, 2.1 million people have dropped out of the work force. 1.4 million of them were men and 800,000 of them were women.
  • Multiple job holders are up over last year. People who got a second or third job to get by. These are jobs that Obama counts as a new job created.

In his address, the president said . . .

Today, over the past 51 months, our businesses have created 9.4 million new jobs.  By measure after measure, our economy is doing better than it was five years ago.

Actually, Mr. President. GDP contracted by 2.9% in the first quarter of 2014. The shrinking economy is the worst performance for five years. And as usual, the regime is blaming the weather. Never their policies.

  • According to the BLS, the number of unemployed persons was unchanged in May at 9.8 million.
  • Long-term unemployed (over 27 weeks w/o a job) is 3.4 million.
  • Real unemployment rate, the U-6, is 12.2%. Not the 6.3% adjusted figure that the regime touts and the media reports.
  • Labor force participation rate is 62.8%. The lowest since Jimmy Carter.
  • The labor force participation rate for Latinos and Hispanics is 65.6%, which indicates that an open border will not benefit our economy but rather exacerbate the unemployment situation.
  • The Consumer Price Index went up 2.1% over last year. The largest increases coming from Food and Energy. It’s what I call The Poor Tax.

This president hasn’t a clue how to grow the economy, and the numbers bear that out. Not only do the numbers bear that out, but his understanding of how an economy grows puts real-world economics and free-market capitalism on its head. He says . . .

[W]e know from our history that our economy doesn’t grow from the top-down, it grows from the middle-out.

No, we don’t know that. No economist will support that premise. And that’s not our history. But his rhetoric is swallowed hook, line, and sinker by the media and his low information constituents. He says he’s for working people, women, minorities. He says he wants to give everyone a raise. As though it is government that generates wealth. Government only generates power. And the more it has, the less you have. In every piece of bait the president hands out, whether he actually does or not, there’s a hook.

The truth is, Obama’s economic policies are hurting the people who elected him more than any other demographic.

President Obama was re-elected with 51% of the vote. Five demographic groups were crucial to his victory: young voters, single women, those with only a high-school diploma or less, blacks and Hispanics. He cleaned up with 60% of the youth vote, 67% of single women, 93% of blacks, 71% of Hispanics, and 64% of those without a high-school diploma, according to exit polls.

Family income decrease from President Obama’s 5 most dedicated demographics since his “recovery” began.

  • -7% single women households, with or without children
  • -9.6% under age 25
  • -10.9% Black heads of households
  • -4.5% Hispanic heads-of-households
  • -8% incomes of workers with a high-school diploma or less fell by about 8% (-6.9% for those with less than a high-school diploma and -9.3% for those with only a high-school diploma).

To put that into dollar terms, in the four years between the time the Obama recovery began in June 2009 and June of this year, median black household income fell by just over $4,000, Hispanic households lost $2,000 and female-headed households lost $2,300.

The middle class is getting poorer.  While the minimum wage remained steady, the median family income has fallen every year since Obama’s “recovery” began.

With all this in mind, listen how the community organizer blames everyone but himself for his failures, and lies about his successes.

Economy, Media, Politics

AP, Taxes Could Damage Industry

Well this is rich. The AP is reporting that taxing the media (advertising media in this case) “could have damaging consequences” to the industry.

What caught my eye to this article was the headline that begins with “Media watchdog.” Only to find out that the media watchdog they were referring to is watchers of the media, not watchers of government. That dog died with the rise of Obama.

The irony of it all is that only now does the AP report that the notion of taxing a business “could have damaging consequences.” It’s perfectly alright to levy taxes on every other industry or person.

Link: Media watchdog: Hungary should rethink ad tax

Economy, Politics

President Whines For Higher Minimum Wage

Got a note from my bud, the president, today. To help compensate for his lousy economy, he wants to make it even worse by increasing the minimum wage.  Further insuring that the long-term unemployed will stay that way. Because there will be fewer jobs to be had. Most of the jobs his economy has created so far are lower paying jobs in the food service and hospitality industries.

Barack, you have the power to lower the cost of living. So why don’t you? Instead, you want to continue to push costs up. Up in energy. Up in food. Up in transportation. Up in education. Up in public debt. And down in purchasing power. Give up on expecting the shrinking number of people who are still lucky enough to have a job (and yet unborn generations of Americans) to carry your share.

On Jun 10, 2014, at 5:56 PM, Barack Obama wrote:

Ross — (yeah, we’re on a first name basis)Here’s a fact: Right now, someone who works full time making the federal minimum wage earns just $14,500 a year.The minimum wage hasn’t kept up with the rising cost of living.Ross, OFA is collecting signatures on a petition to give Americans a raise.

Hey Barack old buddy. This is the economy you created. There is no one to “give Americans a raise” you idiot. How about you give America the capacity to have a vibrant and robust economy once again? The employers will take care of the rest. Not you, and not the government.