Tag Archives: Economy

Where Rules Of The Road Are Not

An article in today’s Pensacola News Journal piqued my interest because of a matter that was brought to the attention of the Pensacola City Police, three times.

The article is about a growing trend started by a local entrepreneur that builds and sells battery-powered golf cards that are legal to drive on public roadways and are subject to the same traffic and motor vehicle laws that apply to cars.

A commenter there, Paul Utter said “if they are on the street, they need a tag and insurance..if not get off the road.”

After reading that, I had to reply . . .

There’s one caveat to that Paul. The Pensacola City Police apparently have one exception to the law. You see, if you’re a hard working guy, or gal, in the landscaping business, of course your vehicle and the trailer you tow both have to be registered and street-legal. But if you work for a big company like, or say, UPS, you’re allowed to drive on the roadways in your unregistered vehicle AND unregistered trailer. No problem.

Of course, Paul is correct. All vehicles driven on the public roadways must be legally registered and tagged, including any trailers being towed.

But there seems to be a double-standard within the Pensacola City limits. I’ve personally never seen landscapers driving around in an unregistered vehicle towing an unregistered trailer. Or any other occupation for that matter. Only reason I use landscapers as an example is because there are so many of them around. (A testament, perhaps, to the need to make a living in a lousy economy. But that’s another subject.)

Maybe you have seen a UPS driver delivering packages in your neighborhood? Maybe he was doing it legally? Clearly, this one was not.

ups-atvAnd clearly, the city police were ineffective in enforcing the law. Because repeated calls about the same offense on different days resulted in no effective action. And calls to Police Chief Chip Simmons went unanswered and unreturned.

This writer has no problem in UPS finding more economical ways to conduct their business. But I want to believe that the City Police would agree that the rules of the road actually do apply to everyone on the road.

Link: Pensacola Beach residents ditch cars for golf carts

Chambliss, Woodall Advance FairTax Legislation

This is good news. A small step forward. But it is a step forward. It brings the FairTax to a place in the legislative process that it has never been before. Many thanks sponsors Chambliss and Woodall and to the thousands of FairTax advocates throughout the country. Our work is finally beginning to pay off. Emphasis on beginning.

For Immediate Release:

Chambliss, Woodall Call for FairTax Consideration

Send letter to Joint Committee on Taxation

 

WASHINGTON- Today, U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., and U.S. Rep. Rob Woodall, R-Ga-7, asked the Joint Committee on Taxation to produce a revenue estimate of H.R. 25 and S. 13, the FairTax bill. This estimate will allow the FairTax to be considered during congressional negotiations for tax reform.

Chambliss and Woodall have long urged Congress to support the FairTax legislation, which would implement a simpler, less-cumbersome tax code. Chambliss and Woodall have sponsored legislation in both the House and the Senate.

“The current tax code has become too burdensome and complex, and is filled with provisions that benefit only a few Americans at the expense of everyone else. That’s simply not right,” said Chambliss. “Now is the time to enact the FairTax, which would create a fairer, simpler tax code that allows every American the freedom to determine his or her own priorities and opportunities.”

“No matter what they do, honest, hardworking Americans are punished under our current tax code. Pass the FairTax, and we can unshackle America’s job creators and jump start this economy. Pass the FairTax, and we can reward all Americans who contribute to our economy—not just those who can afford the best tax lawyers and accountants,” Woodall said. “We, as a nation, can do better than relying on a tax code that picks winners and losers. Let’s level the playing field with the FairTax and restore more freedom to our economy, not more government.”

The FairTax would shift the federal government’s method of revenue collection from income to personal consumption. It would repeal all federal personal income taxes, corporate income taxes, payroll taxes, self-employment taxes, capital gains taxes and gift and estate taxes, and would replace those with a revenue-neutral, personal consumption tax on all retail sales of new goods and services.

Text of the letter is below: Continue reading Chambliss, Woodall Advance FairTax Legislation

The Tipping Point Of Welfare Spending

Here’s some stats that will blow your mind. It should answer the question to whether the ‘war on poverty’ is lost. Or, raise the question whether it was ever intended to be ‘won’ in the first place.

welfare_spending

According to the Republican side of the Senate Budget Committee, welfare spending per day per household in poverty is $168, which is higher than the $137 median income per day. When broken down per hour, welfare spending per hour per household in poverty is $30.60, which is higher than the $25.03 median income per hour.

The universe of means-tested welfare spending refers to programs that provide low-income assistance in the form of direct or indirect financial support—such as food stamps, free housing, child care, etc.—and which the recipient does not pay into (in contrast to Medicare or Social Security). For fiscal year 2011, CRS identified roughly 80 overlapping federal means-tested welfare programs that together represented the single largest budget item in 2011—more than the nation spends on Social Security, Medicare, or national defense. The total amount spent on these federal programs, when taken together with approximately $280 billion in state contributions, amounted to roughly $1 trillion. Nearly 95 percent of these costs come from four categories of spending: medical assistance, cash assistance, food assistance, and social / housing assistance. Under the President’s FY13 budget proposal, means-tested spending would increase an additional 30 percent over the next four years.

This so-called war is never-ending, with the purpose of creating as many voters dependent on government as possible. And look how successful it has become under the current Commander-in-Chief. Will Americans vote themselves a decrease in benefits after they’ve already voted for keeping them, and soaking the rich to ostensibly sustain them?

Link:‘Welfare Spending Equates to $168 Per Day for Every Household in Poverty’

Food Stamps And The Dependent Society

The administration is having great success in their ad campaign to spread the wealth around.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been running radio ads for the past four months encouraging those eligible to enroll. The campaign is targeted at the elderly, working poor, the unemployed and Hispanics.

Hispanics here and in Mexico.

The most recent data on SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) participation were released Friday, and showed that 47,710,324 people were enrolled in the program in September, an increase of 607,559 from the 47,102,765 enrolled in August.

The increase is just as much a matter of policy as it is the poor economy. Obama’s poor economy. In The White House, they call it ‘street money.’ Well, they won’t really say that. But that’s what it is. Creating a dependent society, fundamental change in America, is moving right along.

Action Alert, Time For Bold Tax Reform

Tax reform is, like it was last election season, and the one before that etc., once again on the minds of politicians in Washington. But for very different reasons than why it is on our mind.

We see the current IRS code as an impediment to starting or building a business and/or providing for our family. They see it as a means to get re-elected.  I’m on the side of the people, not the government.

There is a way to fund the government that simultaneously promotes our personal and national economy. And not just for one class, but for every class. It’s called the FairTax as represented in legislation H.R. 25 in the House and S.13 in the Senate.

There are 80 Representatives and Senators that are on the side of the people. But that’s not near enough to bring the FairTax to fruition. The time is now, more than ever, to speak up. Let your Senators and Representative know that you want bold tax reform. Not more tax deform. You want the FairTax.

Contact Link

Links: FairTax.org | FairTax FAQ  | Senate Bill S. 13  |  House Bill H.R. 25

Fiscal Cliff Political Snake Oil

It’s not as though our journey to the so-called fiscal cliff was a surprise or accident. This journey was planned, voted and approved by a congress that can’t say NO. And it didn’t start with the Obama administration. It started with the Johnson administration fifty years ago by raiding Social Security to fund new so-called entitlement programs he called The Great Society. It was that short-sightedness and the continued expansion of government overhead since then that has brought us to where we are today.

The fix is simple. Any head of household knows what it is. You don’t spend more than you have. You budget what you do have to last until your next paycheck, or in this case, the next April 15th. Like the game of golf the concept is simple. Hit the ball into the hole. The hard part is gaining the skill to do it.

The administration today champions higher taxes. They like the tax rates under the Clinton administration. They conveniently forget the part where Clinton’s spending didn’t exceed the revenue and how that came to be.

Again, the fix is simple but it requires decisions that are not politically easy to make. Make and pass a budget, something the Obama administration has so-far neglected to do. And make it a revenue-priority budget, not a spending-priority budget. To support a sustainable economy and society, it means when your money runs out on paper, you’ve spent enough. As opposed to borrowing to keep up with your spending and entitlement programs. Or to put it another way, making promises you can’t keep.

Above all else, you don’t grow government. What the politicos in Washington fail to understand is that growing government is increasing our (taxpayers’) overhead. And when you’re going out of business, you don’t increase your overhead. Any politician that suggests anything to the contrary is pushing snake oil.

[polldaddy poll=6722354]

President Obama Gets His Wish For Input On Taxes

The administration’s position on taxes is clear. Higher taxes are more important than higher revenue. The mixing of ‘fairness’ to economic principles is counter-productive. The President rejects out-of-hand ‘dynamic scoring’ despite evidence that from a purely economic standpoint, it is what happens in real life.

Whenever the President has his political back against the wall, he talks a good game. He says how open he is to advice on taxes from all areas, all industries, and all citizens. Two weeks before the election, on the campaign trail and with NBC’s Brian Williams, President Obama said “You know me, I say what I mean, and I mean what I say.”  This is his chance to prove that his word is his bond.

This challenge is made by Mr. Kerry Bowers,  a man I know to be an expert on not only how the FairTax works and how much better it is for the economy, working people, and business than the current IRS code, but he can explain it in a way understandable to the economically savvy and economically challenged among us, including President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and House Speaker John Boehner.

Please distribute this video to your federal representatives, news media, politically connected groups and people, and suggest to them that this meeting take place.

The FairTax will fuel economic recovery and economic stability like no other proposal out there. And it will do it without increasing the debt. It will eliminate the FUD factor, the anchor dragging the economy and killing jobs along the way. It will effectively un-tax the poor and increase economic upward mobility from poor to middle, and middle to upper class. It will put in to action what the President says he wants. Which is, to restore the American Dream.

Links: FairTax.org | FairTax FAQ

Pensacola News Journal Endorses Romney

Considering that our local newspaper, the Pensacola News Journal, endorsed Barack Obama in ’08, their endorsement of Mitt Romney today was a surprise. Whether it is a sign of buyers remorse or their own economic situation, the basis for their endorsement is the economy, and the likelihood that Romney can turn things around for the better.

Obama failed to adequately address the rising national debt that will cripple future generations. He has not pushed the approval submitted two years ago by the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, also known as the Simpson-Bowles plan, that called for higher taxes to bring the debt under control. Congress also has failed to take the debt seriously, instead passing the buck, or in this case, $16 trillion of them.

Clearly, President Obama is disconnected from reality with this statement.

If the economy and our economic situation in NW Florida is as important to them as they say, the Romney endorsement seems to be inconsistent with their ‘NO’ recommendation for all of Florida’s 11 amendments. Early voting started yesterday in Florida. But don’t hold your breath waiting to see them reverse themselves on those too.

Links: WE RECOMMEND: Mitt Romney for presidentVote ‘No’ on amendments

Obamacare Fines Start For Hospitals That Readmit Sick Patients

Oh Yeah. Government controlled health care just spells the end to health care as we know it, and what’s left is managed by the rationing of it.

Besides, Obama himself should be calling for the repeal of Obamacare.

Here’s what President Obama said about his ‘Affordable Health Care Act.’ when selling it to a joint session of Congress (and the American people) in September 2009.

And here’s what you need to know. First, I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits — either now or in the future. (Applause.) I will not sign it if it adds one dime to the deficit, now or in the future, period. And to prove that I’m serious, there will be a provision in this plan that requires us to come forward with more spending cuts if the savings we promised don’t materialize. {emphasis added}

Link: Obamacare Fines Start For Hospitals That Readmit Sick Patients.

Economic Policy Specifics

Obama inherited a huge debt of $10 trillion in 2008. Under his watch, it has grown to $16 trillion. Between wails from the Obama campaign about Romney’s tax returns, they also want some policy specifics. Let’s look at the specifics of deficits and the debt.

Since so many people are educated in government schools, a definition of terms is needed so you’ll know the difference between a deficit and the debt. You’ll also be able to tell when you are being lied to where the debt and deficit is concerned.

A ‘deficit’ is the shortfall created when the government spends more in a given year than it collects in taxes and fees. Candidate Obama said that he would cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term.

The debt, or national debt, is the sum of all the deficits.

Bush’s last year produced a deficit of over $500 billion dollars. Bringing the national debt up to $10 trillion.  To keep his promise, Obama’s deficit this year should be about $250 billion. So much for Obama’s “promise” to reduce the deficit by half, by the end of his first term.

Since Obama has been in office, he has had record deficits with each year being over $1 trillion. Between those annual deficits and legislation like Obamacare, the debt has risen from $10 trillion to $16 trillion during his first term.

No surprise that the Obama campaign and their ‘low information’ supporters believe the President when he says he has a plan to solve the nation’s huge debt problem. He doesn’t, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says so.

In a random act of journalism, AP’s Tom Raum hits the specifics of how both candidates plan to solve the debt crisis.

President Barack Obama has proposed bringing deficits down by slowing spending gradually, to avoid suddenly tipping the economy back into recession.

Translation, they don’t plan on ever spending less than we take in. The ‘slowing spending’ means increasing the debt slower rather than faster. The end result is still increasing the debt. Not reducing it.

Republican candidate Mitt Romney would lower deficits mostly through deep spending cuts, including some of the reductions proposed by his conservative running mate Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, chairman of the House Budget Committee.

Republican’s plan reduces deficits by (wait for it) reducing spending on a schedule that eventually arrives at a balanced budget. Which is the starting point to actually paying down the national debt.

Today’s quiz: Who has a plan for reducing the deficit and debt? Romney or Obama?

Link: WHY IT MATTERS: Debt