Tag: Moral Hazard

ECONOMICS: 15$ minimum wage

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.tpnn.com/2014/09/08/did-the-fast-food-minimum-wage-strike-just-backfire/

 

Did the Fast Food Minimum Wage Strike Just Backfire?
September 8, 2014
By Matthew Burke

*** begin quote ***

TPNN radio host Tim Constantine of The Capitol Hill Show reports that the fast-food strikers have just shot themselves in the foot…big time.

“This company called Momentum Machines, has built a robot that could change the fast food industry forever,” announced Constantine. “The robot can slice toppings like tomatoes and pickles immediately before it places that slice onto your burger, so you get the freshest burger possible.” he reported following the Astroturf strikes organized by big labor unions and not necessarily even the workers of businesses like Burger King and McDonald’s.

“The robot is more consistent, more sanitary, and complains less, than your average worker,” Constantine explained.

“Here’s the kicker,” revealed Constantine: “The robot can produce 360 hamburgers per hour,” which equates to approximately one burger every ten seconds, much faster and efficiently than any human could.

*** end quote ***

From an economic point of view, it’s a no brainer. 

Robot Burgger Makers are cheaper than “Human Resources”.

I’ve told the tale of AT&T and the Elevator Operators. http://wp.me/pg9z-2Eb

Those ladies were casualties of the Federal Minimum Wage diktat. I know one who never had the skills to get another job. Wonder who else that happened to?

Cui Bono?

So let’s look behind the scene as to why this ASTROTURF group is campaigning.

Clearly, the minimum wage burger flippers will be out of a job faster than you can say: “You want fries with that?”

Big Labor knows that a rise in the minimum wage will directly escalate the Union wage scale. And bureaucrats know that the Gooferment pay scales will all rise to “compete”. Big Unions knows bigger paychecks means bigger Union dues.

So once again, we find the roots of the “minimum wage problem”.

Now dare I say this is a racial or “Social Justice” issue. Not for it, but against it. What is the Black Youth Unemployment rate? Will increasing the minimum wage decrease that? Not likely! And, how is it justice to put people on the dole. 

Talk about “moral hazard”? It’s not even close. 

Argh!

# – # – # – # – #   

MONEY: Default is unavoildable

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://lewrockwell.com/north/north1264.html

—  begin quote —

Will the federal government default? Yes. Will investors learn their lesson? Not for long. But for a time, yes.

Here is the lesson: Do not trust a politician who says America cannot, must not, and will not default.

Here is the rule: “Never believe a rumor until it is officially denied by the government.”

Obama has officially denied it.

It’s coming.

— end quote —

Regardless of how you define “default”, what the FED is doing in buying debt with more paper, is de facto default.

So what the individual to do?

Buy assets that are not dollar denominated.

Bullion coins are my favorite. Nickles too.

Diversify. Pay off debt. And “get small in your hole”. (Any vet knows what that means!)

–30–

 

MONEY: Financial planning with old memes

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-coming-retiree-crisis-2012-10

Take Action Now To Prepare For The Great Retiree Crisis

Jeff Voudrie, See It Market | Oct. 10, 2012, 8:30 AM

***** begin quote *****

The financial planning community has largely relied on assumptions regarding equity, debt and inflation percentages that have been experienced over the last 30 years.

There are 3 problems with these assumptions:

Equity returns the last 30 years have been extraordinarily high as a result of the longest and greatest Bull market in the history of U.S. stock markets. Accordingly, many financial plans used projections that assumed equity returns of 8-10% a year.

Debt returns over the same period are equally skewed. Remember the double-digit interest rates of the 1980’s? In 1989, as a young broker, I was selling 30-year TVA bonds yielding 10%! Financial plans the last 5-10 years have used interest rate assumptions around 5-6% a year.

The scenarios that led to the historic markets the last 30 years are very unlikely to EVER be repeated in today’s retiree’s lifetime. And those who are taking distributions based on these outdated assumptions may soon run out of money.

For instance, let’s assume that someone retired 5 years ago at age 60 with a $500,000 investment portfolio. Based on financial plans popular at that time, the retiree is taking $2500 a month in distributions—money they need to maintain their current standard of living. Since the plan anticipated the ability to average a 7% return on a portfolio with close to 50% in equities, the retiree expects to be able to take those distributions and never run out of money.

Adjusting those assumptions based on what many believe resembles more reasonable assumptions going forward requires decreasing the rate of return assumption for a similar-risk portfolio to around 4% and increasing the inflation assumption from 1-2% a year to 3-4% a year (which may still be too conservative). Suddenly, the portfolio that should last forever is now projected to be exhausted in only 16.8 years! That means that the entire nest egg and what it earns cannot sustain the current withdrawal rate. Since the retiree started the withdrawals five years ago, now they are down to 11.8 years—running out of money around age 76!

***** end quote *****

Clearly, the political class has screwed up the American economy.

Pity the poor, the elderly, the middle class, those on fixed income.

Inflation is grossly understated by the “official” stats.

Are we headed to be like Europe or pre-WW2 Germany?

Clearly, everyone needs to update their financial plans.

I’ve recommended to my turkeys that they adjust their “money reserve requirements”.

Everyone better plan to work for a longer time.

— 30 —

POLITICAL: Politicians only show the “good”; never the “harm” they do

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://cafehayek.com/2012/10/threadbare-economics.html

Threadbare Economics

by DON BOUDREAUX on OCTOBER 11, 2012

in POLITICS, SEEN AND UNSEEN, TRADE

*** begin quote ***

This administration policy will win votes for the President from some textile workers in the Carolinas. And Mr. Sanchez and his big boss can now bask self-righteously in their imagined humanity.

But will Mr. Sanchez pose for pictures with poor families whose living standards fall because clothing is now made more costly? Will the administration stage press events to highlight the jobs lost because American consumers, obliged to spend more on clothing, will have less to spend on restaurant meals, evenings at the movies, and other goods and services? Will the President post photos on his website of Americans whose jobs are destroyed because foreigners will now have fewer dollars to spend and invest in the U.S.? Will Mr. Obama boast that his re-election strategy includes a policy that, by dulling the creative forces of competition, diminishes America’s economic dynamism and, hence, reduces its economic growth?

*** end quote ***

It’s our old friend Bastiat and those unseen unintended consequences!

Nasty old “rule”.  “Every time a politician says or does something, look for what’s behind the curtain.”

It’s like when the increased minimum wage law induced AT&T to automate the elevator operators out of their jobs. Some were capable of other work, but many were just let go. My cousin never worked again in her life. True she wasn’t the sharpest blade in the draw, but she was the unseen side of that increase in the minimum wage law.

So don’t tell me that real people are not hurt when the politicians run amok!

–30–

RANT: “Big Church”, another failed concept

Published on by reinkefj1 Comment

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/diocese-of-orange-raises-bid-for-crystal-cathedral/

Diocese of Orange raises bid for Crystal Cathedral
By Marianne Medlin

*** begin quote ***

Garden Grove, Calif., Aug 11, 2011 / 05:59 am (CNA).- The Diocese of Orange upped its previous bid and signaled openness to new negotiations for the Crystal Cathedral after board members recently announced that the building is no longer for sale.

*** and ***

The liturgist for the Orange diocese, Monsignor Arthur Holquin, said July 26 that several changes would need to take place in order for the Crystal Cathedral to become a Catholic worship space.

Along with a central altar, a tabernacle and a baptismal font, the building would need a “cathedra” or bishop’s chair. While renovations are needed to the building, “not much deconstruction would be required and the iconic personality of the original architecture and design would, for the most part, be retained,” he said.

Purchasing the Crystal Cathedral is an attractive option for the diocese because it provides an instant solution to its building needs and would cost roughly half the $100 million price tag for the planned Santa Ana cathedral.

Though the diocese made an official $50 million bid for the Crystal Cathedral on July 22, the church’s board later voted against selling it and decided to appeal to church members and viewers to donate the funds instead.

*** end quote ***

Guess I just don’t understand.

Couldn’t God be worshiped in an appropriately decorated warehouse?

As far as the “bishop’s chair”, I have a old folding chair to donate. Won’t that hold a butt.

$100M$?

Reminds me of the French’s Maginot Line and Patton’s famous apocryphal remark “fixed fortifications are monuments to man’s stupidity”.

Maybe a cathedral is marketing? Of an idea who’s time has past. “Big Church” must join the dustbin of failed concepts like: Big Gooferment, Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Labor, Big Biz, “Too Big To Fail” (2B2F), Social Security “Insurance”, the misnamed Federal Reserve Bank, Wall Street, Fiat Paper aka “monopoly money”, and all such stupidity?

It’s always sad when the illusions and delusions die. And all we are left with is the wreckage.

Is it too late to rebuild from the pieces?

# # # # #

POLITICAL: Why do I suspect that the taxpayer will be paying

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.impactlab.net/2011/08/01/banks-turning-to-bulldozing-foreclosed-homes/

August 1st, 2011 at 12:23 pm
Banks turn to bulldozing foreclosed homes
in: Business, Economy, Latest Trend

*** begin quote ***

Increasingly, it appears banks are turning to demolition teams instead of realtors to rid them of their least valuable repossessed homes. Last month, Bank of America announced plans to demolish 100 foreclosed homes in the Cleveland area. The land is then going to be donated back to the local government authorities. BofA says the recent donations in Cleveland are part of a larger plan to rid itself of its least saleable properties, many of which, according to a company spokesperson, are worth less than $10,000. BofA has already donated 100 homes in Detroit and 150 in Chicago, and may add as many as nine more cities by the end of the year.

*** end quote ***

Wow, what an interesting concept!

They get a write off for the donation. And, they don’t have to pay property taxes.

Argh!

Ouch!

What a waste of capital housing stock.

# # # # #

POLITICAL: Too big to fail?

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://lewrockwell.com/margolis/margolis249.html

Banks Should Die for Their Countries, Not Countries for Their Banks
by Eric Margolis

*** begin quote ***

Greece is using the same scare-tactics that the supposedly too-big-to-fail insolvent US banks employed in 2008: “if I go down, I’ll take everyone with me.”

In this case, it’s Europe’s big banks. Three big French banks, BNP, Crédit Agricole, Société Général, hold large chunks of Greece’s debt. If Greece defaults, goes the hue and cry, French, German, Swiss, and Belgian banks may crash.

Here we go again. Politicians have allowed the banking industry not only to grow larger than manufacturing, notably in the United States where the top five banks control 40% of all deposits, but to become so powerful, over-extended, and risky they are a danger to itself and the public.

Bankers who invested in Greek debt or US subprime mortgages were greedy fools and should be fired, not rescued.

*** end quote ***

Seems logical to me “2big2fail” is “2big2be”.

Only politicians and bureaucrats don’t seem to see the concept.

Nature only allows an efficient size.

“We, The Sheeple” need to update our paradigms and memes.

# – # – # – # – # 2011-Jul-12 @ 07:54

INTERESTING: Moral Hazard

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://cafehayek.com/2010/08/successful-bailout.html

Successful Bailout? by Don Boudreaux on August 2, 2010

*** begin quote ***

Second – and more importantly – the chief economic case against the bailout was not that huge infusions of taxpayer funds and special exemptions from bankruptcy rules could not make G.M. and Chrysler profitable. Of course they could. Instead, the heart of the case against the bailout is that it saps the life-blood of entrepreneurial capitalism. The bailout reinforces the debilitating precedent of protecting firms deemed ‘too big to fail.’ Capital and other resources are thus kept glued by politics to familiar lines of production, thus impeding entrepreneurial initiative that would have otherwise redeployed these resources into newer, more-dynamic, and more productive industries.

*** end quote ***

“The broken window fallacy”
— Frédéric Bastiat Ce qu’on voit et ce qu’on ne voit pas (That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Unseen) 1850

I know for certain that the 5k$ that Obama robbed from my wife’s IRA could have been used to do something she wanted to do. Even if the bankruptcy only gave her a dollar, it was still HER dollar; not his!

Seizure by the Gooferment. Worked for FDR; worked for Obama. I won’t forget it either.

# # # # #

RANT: Bailouts are welfare and theft is just theft

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://irisheagle.blogspot.com/2010/07/mortgage-bail-out-recipients-should-be.html

Saturday, July 10, 2010
Mortgage bail-out recipients should be publicly named

*** begin quote ***

I also have sympathy for those who find themselves out of work and can’t afford their mortgage, but again I would like any help that we taxpayers are to provide …

*** end quote ***

Welfare is welfare. Theft is theft. And, there’s a “moral hazard” in this.

When the Gooferment takes over, “We, The Taxpayers” don’t get to decide who gets our charity and who doesn’t. Who’s worthwhile and who’s a bum! And, from thence all sorts of bad things come.

It’s welfare. Just more welfare. That enables bad behavior. Bad behavior on the part of the recipient, every one who knows about it, the politicians, and the bureaucrats. The recipient is not “encouraged” to make better decisions. Every one, who knows about it, takes on more risks “knowing” that “We, The Taxpayer” will chip in to our hard luck story. The politicians get to claim that they “care” — easy to care sending OPM Other People’s Money — while having favors, contracts, and jobs to dispense. And, last but not least, the bureaucrats can have high paying jobs with pensions while doing “good for the downtrodden”. Argh!

It’s welfare. It’s theft. And, it encourages future bad behaviors that we can only imagine.

To misquote the iconic Nike commercial, and to quote the stupid anti–drug one, “Just Say No”.

No Taxpayer-funded bailouts of any kind. Ever. No matter how sad the tale.

If the politicians want to pass the collection basket after putting in a few quid of their own, I’m happy to contribute. Just don’t rob me and expect me to be happy that the thief is doing good with my few scarce pennies.

Argh!

# # # # #

GOVEROTRAGEOUS: The Gooferment doesn’t learn from history

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://opinion.financialpost.com/2010/06/25/lawrence-solomon-avertible-catastrophe/#ixzz0s9jeLCy7

Avertible catastrophe
Lawrence Solomon
June 25, 2010 – 9:06 pm
The BP oil-rig explosion. The U.S. turned down an offer of Dutch technology that might have reduced the spill’s impact.
How U.S. labour and ­environmental rules blocked Dutch spill-cleanup technology

*** begin quote ***

Then again, perhaps he should not be all that perplexed at the American tolerance for turning an accident into a catastrophe. When the Exxon Valdez oil tanker accident occurred off the coast of Alaska in 1989, a Dutch team with clean-up equipment flew in to Anchorage airport to offer their help. To their amazement, they were rebuffed and told to go home with their equipment. The Exxon Valdez became the biggest oil spill disaster in U.S. history — until the BP Gulf spill.

*** end quote ***

It just proves that the Gooferment is stupid!

And, we are just a dumb for believing their illusions and promises.

# # # # #

INTERESTING: Time to nuke Freddy and Fannie!

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703513604575310383542102668.html?mod=WSJ_hps_sections_realestate

http://goo.gl/O4AQ

CAPITALJUNE 17, 2010
Rethinking Part of the American Dream
By DAVID WESSEL

*** begin quote ***

In hard-hit Las Vegas, nearly 59% of households own their homes, but only 15% to 19% of households own a home in which they have any equity left.

For many, the American dream of home ownership turned into a nightmare of debt and foreclosure. Some people should rent.

As late as the 1930s, a U.S. mortgage was generally a loan for three to five years, at which time the borrower had to pay it off. Then the government fostered the 15-year fixed-rate mortgage—and eventually the 30—and the concept that the homeowner would pay off principal in monthly installments.

*** end quote ***

Argh!

Several thoughts occur to me here:

① 15 to 20% of homes left with the owners having equity? All those senior citizens who bought retirement homes? That’s astounding.

② Talk about malinvestment. (That’s Austrian economics term. See below.) Detroit, Flint, and Gary are destroying houses to avoid providing gooferment services. We as a society have our wealth destroyed by such action. Are there no homeles there?

③ It would seem that the FTC and the TREASURY / FED / SEC could stop this disaster anytime they want to. Regulations of minimum down payment like stock margins. Rules about honest disclosure. Limits on what banks can resell as “securities”. AND, the biggest rule, the originator get stuck with defaults! No more package it and forget it. (But then we’d see just how crappy the economy is. And, how many banks would be insolvent. It’s in the Gooferment’s interest to keep putting lipstick on the is pig. Pucker up! Guess who’s going ot have to kiss it?

④ I remember reading that Freddy and Fannie make the economy more uncompetitive and more “rigid” in that owning a home meant the workforce could not adapt to new opportunities in new locations. A high percentage of folks renting means they can move more quickly. Didn’t the Mayans force migrations by burning the village and forcing them to move hundreds of miles? Is this our modern equvalent?

⑤ Speaking of Freddy and Fannie, I see where bailing them out is going to be the “mother of all bailouts”. Shouldn’t we put them out of their, and our, misery? Time for a Constitutional Amendment banning all GSEs! (Gooferment Sponsored Entities)

⑥ Why don’t we bring back the 30 year Treasury Bond as a method of financing the deficit and easing the pain we are facing? Or is the GOoferment afraid of what that 30 year rate will be?

⑦ On HGTV, there are a lot of home buyers, some first timers, who are buying big ticket homes with nearly nothing down. Several hundred thousand dollar mortgages and they need “mortgage assistance”, seller paid closing costs, and even the tax credits to make the numbers work at all. And, in the cases of two income “families” (i.e., DINKs), one paycheck is completely going to the mortgage. Isn’t that a recipe for default in a job loss scenario?

⑧ Perhaps, it’s time for multi-generational households (i.e., grandma and grandpa buy with their retirement money; mom, dad, and the grandkids bunk in)? Wasn’t that the model before Social Security allowed Grandparents to escape to Florida? Makes the Grandparent able to dodge the nursing home.

⑨ Interesting that the Wall Street Journal paywall isn’t very encompassing.

# – # – #

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malinvestment

“Panics do not destroy capital; they merely reveal the extent to which it has been destroyed by its betrayal into hopelessly unproductive works.”

— John Mills, December 11, 1867, on Credit Cycles and the Origin of Commercial Panics

# # # # #

RANT: ‘Beach House Bailout’

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=165701

OBAMA WATCH CENTRAL
Is insurance industry next takeover target?
Proposal in Congress puts feds in middle of catastrophe claims
Posted: June 12, 2010 9:10 pm Eastern
By Bob Unruh

*** begin quote ***

“The ‘Homeowners’ Defense Act,’ H.R. 2555, dubbed the ‘Beach House Bailout,’ requires taxpayers across the country, and in your district, to subsidize insurance for wealthy homeowners along the Florida coastline,” the letter to members of Congress said. “The bill is structured to assist the state of Florida (and to a much smaller extent, California) through federal assistance.”

*** end quote ***

Never mind take over, who wants to subsidize rich people on the Florida coast in mansions?

Let Donald, Rush, and whomever fund their own risks!

As a matter of fact, why is the gooferment involved in “insuring” floods any way?

Can you spell ‘moral hazard’?

# # # # #

POLITICS: The attempt to have welfare and warfare destroys us; just like LBJ did

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/obama-missile-defense-2572467-nuclear-iran

Friday, September 18, 2009
Mark Steyn: Obama helping Putin restitch Iron Curtain
Scrapping of U.S. missile defense plans hands big victory to Russia’s new czar.
Mark Steyn
Syndicated columnist

*** begin quote ***

In a sense, the health care debate and the foreign policy debacle are two sides of the same coin: For Britain and other great powers, the decision to build a hugely expensive welfare state at home entailed inevitably a long retreat from responsibilities abroad, with a thousand small betrayals of peripheral allies along the way. A few years ago, the great scholar Bernard Lewis warned, during the debate on withdrawal from Iraq, that America risked being seen as “harmless as an enemy and treacherous as a friend.” In Moscow and Tehran, on the one hand, and Warsaw and Prague, on the other, they’re drawing their own conclusions.

*** end quote ***

Don’t you wonder how this one action is going to hurt our ability to be safe in the future?

If I was a foreign country, I wouldn’t trust us.

Would you?

We are clearly untrustworthy. And, we, the dollar, and the world will suffer from our failure.

# # # # #

POLITICAL: It’s the gooferment!

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.lewrockwell.com/kwiatkowski/kwiatkowski236.html

Health Care Through Central Planning: A Helpful Analogy
by Karen Kwiatkowski

*** begin quote ***

We have examples – ophthalmology and veterinarian services come to mind first. You can get an eye exam for $50, and then order glasses online for another $20. Overall, that’s less than a pair of running shoes, or a meal out with the family at Applebee’s. The wide variety of eye surgeries available and the competitive and safe nature of these surgeries speak to the working of a freer market than what we see for the rest of our health care. The argument by the statist left and statist right is falsely premised by the idea that the current health care “system” is a free market system, and based on the ideas that free market systems can’t work for health care because people are not all equal in either health, desires for health or finances.

*** end quote ***

We have to keep hitting the gooferment on all fronts. It’s ineffective, inefficient, and screws up everything it touches!

# # # # #

MONEY: A dollar is worth a dollar, except when the dollar is a gold coin

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://federalism.typepad.com/crime_federalism/2009/06/are-gold-american-eagles-worth-what-congress-has-said-they-are-worth.html

June 16, 2009
Are Gold American Eagles Worth What Congress Has Said They Are Worth? Or: The IRS v. Robert Kahre

*** begin quote ***

[Editor’s note: I am not a tax protester. Until researching the issue that is subject to this blog post, I thought all of the arguments raised by the tax protester crowd were frivolous. On this issue, I am not so confident.]

Take a look at this gold coin. It’s a Gold American Eagle. Look at the image on the right. Do you see what the coin says on the bottom half, underneath the nesting baby eagle?Gold American Eagle 50 Dollars

It says $50, right?

Indeed, it is (as I will explain below) $50. It’s worth as much as an Ulysses S. Grant. Well, if you believe it’s really only worth $50, send all of your Gold Eagles to me. I will sell them on eBay for about $1,000 each.

And now you can see the problem of Robert Kahre. Mr. Kahre is facing federal prison because he claimed that Gold Eagles are worth what Congress has said that Gold Eagles are worth.

Is Mr. Kahre’s position frivolous? I don’t think so. Please indulge me.

*** end quote ***

I blogged about this one.

*** begin quote ***

https://reinkefaceslife.com/2008/02/26/goldbug-why-buy-and-hold-gold/

(4) There are some interesting nuances in holding American Gold Eagle, which are produced by the gooferment (i.e., the Treasury Department’s Mint), and are asserted to be dominated in dollars. The one ounce gold American Eagle is stamped 50 “dollars”. AND, it is really worth ~940 “dollars” in Federal Reserve Notes. (There’s a recent tax case where the employer declared his employees earnings in “dollars” as represented on the Eagles he gave them. Everyone paid less taxes.)

*** end quote ***

This is an interesting quirk that can be exploited.

Of course, at your own risk.

Sigh, what is a dollar anyway!

# # # # #

POLITICAL: You WILL have health insurance, even if you don’t want to pay for it!

Published on by reinkefj2 Comments

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aj5HHIKfogR8&refer=worldwide#

Democrats Weigh Health Mandate as Obama Urges Taxing Wealthy
By Laura Litvan and Ryan Donmoyer

*** begin quote ***

June 7 (Bloomberg) — President Barack Obama wants Congress to consider taxing the wealthy instead of workers to pay for a health-care overhaul, as House Democrats discuss a plan to require health insurance for most Americans.

*** and ***

The effort to overhaul health-care would affect a sector that makes up 17 percent of the U.S. economy. The goal of Democratic supporters is to provide insurance to most of the nation’s 46 million uninsured, and lower the soaring cost of care. A key challenge is the potential impact of legislation on an already rising U.S. budget deficit that may reach $1.8 trillion this year.

*** end quote ***

Stupidity!

We have Medicare for the old; Medicaid for the poor.

We have young people who don’t want insurance.

We have congresscritters who know what’s good for us.

But, we can’t afford them any more!

# # # # #

POLITICAL: Class Warfare doesn’t work

Published on by reinkefj1 Comment

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124329282377252471.html

* REVIEW & OUTLOOK
* MAY 27, 2009

Millionaires Go Missing
Maryland’s fleeced taxpayers fight back.

*** begin quote ***

Maryland couldn’t balance its budget last year, so the state tried to close the shortfall by fleecing the wealthy. Politicians in Annapolis created a millionaire tax bracket, raising the top marginal income-tax rate to 6.25%. And because cities such as Baltimore and Bethesda also impose income taxes, the state-local tax rate can go as high as 9.45%. Governor Martin O’Malley, a dedicated class warrior, declared that these richest 0.3% of filers were “willing and able to pay their fair share.” The Baltimore Sun predicted the rich would “grin and bear it.”

One year later, nobody’s grinning. One-third of the millionaires have disappeared from Maryland tax rolls. In 2008 roughly 3,000 million-dollar income tax returns were filed by the end of April. This year there were 2,000, which the state comptroller’s office concedes is a “substantial decline.” On those missing returns, the government collects 6.25% of nothing. Instead of the state coffers gaining the extra $106 million the politicians predicted, millionaires paid $100 million less in taxes than they did last year — even at higher rates.

*** end quote ***

Does anyone really think these “liberal” politicians, bureaucrats, and media cheerleaders have any clue about human behavior?

Maybe they should get CSI to look into where all the rich folk went!

Idiots.

Read the Austrian School of Economics and you will find “Human Action”. Humans act. Maybe not ALWAYS rationally, but the do eventually. Unlike the frog in the mythical pot to be boiled, rich people have the most ability and incentive to move.

The loss is worse than the unnamed author makes it out to be!

And, who’s more likely to have a business, hire a staff, and have a big property tax bill? Sure not the low and middle class.

And, by turning up the fire, the gooferment may have induced those 1,000 rich folk to jump before the real estate market collapsed. I can here the conversation at the new (Pick one: Yacht, Tennis, or Country) Club now. “Yes, Muffie, I miss Maryland too. But not 16 grazillion dollars worth. Now here’s a new Mercedes SUV that I bought to console you.”

OK, corny, sure, but you get the idea. Ten per cent of a million is 100k a year. That’s the minimum bite. That is a powerful incentive to move.

Makes you wonder why there are 2,000 left. Cal Ripken is probably one. Who else?

So who gets to make up the missing 200k$ that the politicians planned for? You don’t expect them to cut anything, do you?

# # # # #

GOVEROTRAGEOUS: The White House hustled the Chrysler bankruptcy judge?

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://apps.detnews.com/apps/blogs/autosblog/index.php?blogid=746

Category: Chrysler bankruptcy
Posted by Manny Lopez (The Detroit News) on Mon, Jun 1, 2009 at 6:19 AM
Carefully orchestrated indeed

*** begin quote ***

The bankruptcy judge hearing the Chrysler case said Friday he wasn’t going to rule on the asset sale until today or Tuesday, but a call from the White House must have prompted him to move faster because he ruled in the wee hours of this morning.

See, the administration wanted to hold up Chrysler as an example of a “quick and speedy” bankruptcy, but Judge Arthur Gonzalez – deciding he needed more time to rule – put a crimp in those plans and left the White House looking at a GM filing today and Chrysler still in. Oops.

Remarkably, Gonzalez got all his work done just in time and filed his opinion after midnight to save the show.

I’m sure we’ll hear today when questioned that the White House had nothing to do with that timing, just as we’ve heard that it is not making management decisions at GM or Chrysler.

*** end quote ***

Please you expect “justice” from a government court when the President is involved?
Don’t make me laugh!
Sheeple!
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LIBERTY: “Too big to fail” is a gooferment failure

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=12177

Break Up These Banks
by: Mike Lux
Thu Mar 12, 2009 at 17:00

*** begin quote ***

I also fundamentally agree with David Sirota that if these corporations are too big to fail, then they are too big to exist: a proposition also agreed to by the populists and progressives of the late 1800s/early 1900s, by Abe Lincoln, by Teddy Roosevelt, by FDR, by Harry Truman. Progressives of all eras have understood that corporations that grow too enormous threaten our economy and our democracy, and should be woken up into smaller entities that can’t do so much damage when they are mismanaged. The era of bank consolidation has to come to an end, and these monsters need to be broken into smaller companies just like Standard Oil was in the early 1900s.

*** end quote ***

Very good point.

“To big to fail, then they are too big”

It would seem that’s a great principle of regulation!

Wonder why none of the “brains” ever thought of it?

Could it be that the politicians need things big to get political contributions?

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MONEY: Why would anyone ever buy a bond?

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Shelby-assails-large-govt-apf-15380626.html?.v=4

Shelby assails large gov’t role in General Motors
Top Banking panel GOP member raps large federal stake in financially beleaguered GM Corp.
    * On Friday May 29, 2009, 8:27 am EDT
    * General Motors Corporation

*** begin quote ***

WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Richard Shelby said Friday the government should have allowed the marketplace to decide General Motors’ fate and that the huge federal stake in the company puts Washington on “the road to socialism.”

Shelby, ranking Republican on the Banking Committee, argued that the financially beleaguered GM could have saved “lots of money” if it had chosen six months ago to file a Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition.

“What I worry about” is Washington’s large interest in the company, the senator said in a nationally broadcast network interview. “It’s basically going to be a government-owned, government-run company … a company that has been sadly run into the ground.”

*** end quote ***

IMHO, the gooferment has no right to steal from the bond holders their rightful value. It would seem that there is a Fifth Amendment (“takings”) suit here.

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RANT: Unidine or Obama’s Heathcare proxy

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

RANT: Unidine or Obama’s Heathcare proxy

LADIES4LIBERTY do a skit for universal dining … err, healthcare. Hey, amateur? Yes! Dead on accurate? Yes! See your local VA patron for how they feel about gooferment health care.

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GOVERNACIDE: Government Health Care? Think VA or Medicare!

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

I suggest EVERYONE get active. Hillary tried to nationalize Healthcare; Obama is back to try again. I don’t know about you but I’ve seen the VA’s health care and Medicare. Canadians come to Buffalo for MRIs; it’s well documented that by the time a Canadian can get their “free” MRI, cancers have had time to metastasize and kill people. England has a booming “medical tourism” industry where the English go to India and the Far East for cheap medical care that they can’t get at home. Don’t forget that medical care is the classic economic service with an inelastic demand curve. (Demand isn’t very responsive to cost.) So, the only way that the government can control demand is with rationing. If you think that dealing with Insurance Companies is bad, try dealing with the Government. Sorry, the current system has problems, but imho they are caused by government at the State and Federal level. They have the FDA a captive of the drug companies, the AMA restrict who can “practice medicine”, and the Pharmacists have a monopoly on dispensing drug. Plus don’t forget the psuedo drug war. Sorry, but I need quality medical care for spouse. Remember, if Fritz had been in England, then he’d have been too old for dialyses. Rationing, like gas lines, will kill people. And, once “it” is started, like Social Security, Medicare, and the Medicare Drug Benefit, there will be no way to stop it. And, future generations will go broke paying for it. Argh!

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http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/05/tea_party_americans_can_stop_a.html

May 16, 2009
How to Stop a Healthcare Hijack
By J. Robert Smith

*** begin quote ***

Stop an arcane parliamentary maneuver – “reconciliation” – and the odds improve at stopping the Democrats march toward socialized medicine. But Republicans can’t do it; not alone, anyway. It’s up to the legions of Tea Partiers and average Americans to win the fight.

Reconciliation is aimed at dramatically restricting debate and banning filibuster on budget-related matters. It allows for a simple up or down vote. Senate Democrats are keeping it as an option if progress lags in recasting healthcare as a government-run enterprise. A good bet is that they’ll invoke it. Why?

Because a thorough public airing and extensive Senate debate will expose the Democrats’ plan for what it is: a demolishing of the doctor-patient relationship in favor of a politician-bureaucrat driven system; and a system all about rationing.

Democrats are quick to say that Republicans used reconciliation when they were the majority. That’s true, but it was used principally to get up or down votes on lowering taxes, not upending a huge portion of the nation’s economy.

{Extraneous Deleted}

*** end quote ***

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RANT: Votes do NOT count.

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20090513/D98573FG0.html

Report: One-fourth of overseas votes go uncounted

May 13, 3:07 AM (ET)

By JIM ABRAMS

*** begin quote ***

WASHINGTON (AP) – One out of every four ballots requested by military personnel and other Americans living overseas for the 2008 election may have gone uncounted, according to findings being released at a Senate hearing Wednesday.

*** end quote ***

Guess every vote doesn’t count. AND, they were probably voting for the “wrong candidate” any way.

Sheeple!

Propaganda and fraud.

That’s how dictatorships happen! And, we have a “two party” one now.

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GOVEROTRAGEOUS: Release if he signed papers forfeiting his property

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/05/05/texas.police.seizures/

Texas police shake down drivers, lawsuit claims

   * Police stop drivers, take their money and jewelry, alleged victims say

   * Drivers threatened with arrest, loss of children if they don’t pay up, plaintiffs say

   * Most targeted drivers are minorities who won’t fight back, lawyer says

   * Town, county officials deny any wrongdoing, say officers follow the law

updated 9:00 a.m. EDT, Wed May 6, 2009

From Gary Tuchman and Katherine Wojtecki

CNN’s “AC360°”

*** begin quote ***

TENAHA, Texas (CNN) — Roderick Daniels was traveling through East Texas in October 2007 when, he says, he was the victim of a highway robbery.

The Tennessee man says he was ordered to pull his car over and surrender his jewelry and $8,500 in cash that he had with him to buy a new car.

But Daniels couldn’t go to the police to report the incident.

The men who stopped him were the police.

Daniels was stopped on U.S. Highway 59 outside Tenaha, near the Louisiana state line. Police said he was driving 37 mph in a 35 mph zone. They hauled him off to jail and threatened him with money-laundering charges — but offered to release him if he signed papers forfeiting his property.

*** end quote ***

Well, my Luddite friend always fights with me telling me that “the police are our friends”. Not my friend, my friend. They are worse than the Mafia. At least, the Mafia doesn’t pretend that they aren’t robbing me.

These armed bureaucrats are nothing more than form filling out clean up squads. Unless they blunder into something.

(Hey, if he can exaggerate, so can I!)

It comes from the basic premise about the use of force. It all comes down to force.

Argh!

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MONEY: The dollar is a figment of your imagination

Published on by reinkefjLeave a comment

http://www.campaignforliberty.com/article.php?view=59

The Fed and the Golden Fleece
By William Anderson
Published 04/22/09

*** begin quote ***

When I teach my economics classes about money, I pass around a $10 gold coin that is a replica of those that were in circulation around 1913, the year Congress created the Federal Reserve System. The coin is made from one-half of an ounce of gold, dating from the time when the dollar was based upon a standard of $20 an ounce.

If I were to value that coin today, according to current gold prices, it would sell for more than $400, which means that according to this way of measuring the value of money, the dollar is worth about 1/40 of what it was when the Fed came into being. Now, this is not necessarily the best or most accurate measure of the decline of the dollar, but it is good enough for the purposes of this article.

*** end quote ***

Regardless of how you calculate it or the timeframe you use, the dollar is NOT a store of value.

In my book Church (page 113),  “Money is a matter of functions four, a medium, a measure, a standard, a store.”

The dollar, after the 1913 creation of the Fed, was no longer a measure, standard, or store.

As a youth, reading the Count of Monte Cristo, I dreamt of someday finding a pirate’s treasure. (Hard to imagine anyone not dreaming to find that chest, win the lotto, or such.)

Imagine instead of a chest of gold, finding a chest of dollars. When they were put in, they were valuable. Now they’re worth a fraction.

I often remember my now deceased father-in-law carrying a fifty dollar bill in his wallet ever since he was a young man. He always said: “With that, I’m never poor!” Sad to say, that each year, the value that fifty represented was inflated away. Stolen by the govenrment!

Gold is the only defense.

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