TAX POLITIX
The Politics of Taxes
Eric Schneiderman’s Anti-Speech Problem
Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) won a major court victory last week in a lawsuit against New York Attorney General Schneiderman. They demanded he disclose documents under New York’s Freedom of Information Law that outlines agreements he made with other attorneys general and allied non-profits regarding Attorneys General United for Clean Power - the coalition which subpoenaed CEI about our climate and energy work. CEI’s General Counsel, Sam Kazman noted: “CEI's court victory is a blow to...
Tax Cuts are Not the Problem; Overspending is!
Nick Timiraos’ recent article in the Wall Street Journal ( Donald Trump’s Spending Push Rankles Fiscal Conservatives, 11/28/16) , is rather disingenuous with his so-called analysis of Trump’s fiscal roadmap. He clearly aims to torpedo Trump’s plan to cut taxes by tying the discussion to deficits -- though correlation, of course, does not necessarily mean causation. Timiraos' analysis is full of half-truths, but it is not entirely certain if that is willfully written or just plain economic...
Why Voters Voted For Trump
On Election Day, many people were willing to overlook Donald Trump’s personal weaknesses because they realized that the biggest factor in this election was the economy -- it affected their day-to-day lives more than anything else. Many people - uniformly partisan Democrats - have accused Trump’s supporters of being bigots; but facts dispute this. A simple look at the voting changes between 2008/2012 and 2016 shows that fully one-third of counties that went for Obama in both 2008 and 2012 went...
New Yorkers Leaving in Droves
The New York Post had an article recently regarding the continuous stream of New Yorkers leaving the state. An analysis found that “in 2014, 126,000 tax filers moved out of New York,” more than any other state in the nation. Also significantly, “The Empire State also lost the most “high earners,” who reported making more than $200,000 a year.” This particular phenomenon has been going on for years, as I have written about in previous articles. But it seems like some people and groups want to...
NYU is Getting Ridiculous
I recently attended a dinner in NYC and sat next to a very nice professor from NYU. He was non-tenured, and have moved to the United States from Europe a decade ago. Because he was somewhat low-level, he felt he could not speak out any anything controversial or conservative, which is anathema to the idea of a university being a free exchange of ideas. What’s more, this professor relayed how he had gotten an email from senior level administration at NYU after Trump was elected; the email pretty...
IRS Finally Issues Tea Party Status: DENIED
As we've been following this story regarding the IRS for years, here's the latest update from the Washington Times: Nearly seven years after it applied to the IRS for nonprofit status, the Albuquerque Tea Party has finally been given a decision: Denied. The tax agency, under orders from a federal judge, is belatedly tackling the remaining tea party cases that it delayed for years, and so far the tea party isn’t doing well. Only one of the three groups in the case was approved, and the other...
Jay Cost on Obama: Disintegrating Coalitions
Jay Cost is one of my favorite writers these days, blending history and analysis in a straightforward tone. Here's his take on why Clinton lost: "Political coalitions are tricky things to manage in the United States. Ours is a country of more than 320 million people but only two major political parties—so each side's voting bloc tends to be unstable at the margins, where national elections are actually won and lost. It is hard to build a winning coalition, harder still to maintain it during...
Trump Wins — Here’s His Tax Proposal
Over the next week or two, I'll do a more thorough analysis of portions of Trump's tax plan. Here it is in full, so that you don't have to go searching for it: DONALD J. TRUMP’S VISION Reduce taxes across-the-board, especially for working and middle-income Americans who will receive a massive tax reduction. Ensure the rich will pay their fair share, but no one will pay so much that it destroys jobs or undermines our ability to compete. Eliminate special interest loopholes, make our business...
Trump Taxes
As a financial guy, I find that there are certain things that Trump is suggesting in his tax plan that are just flat out ridiculous. For instance, his childcare plans are ludicrous -- because we simply cannot have things that add huge complexity to the code anymore. The idea is worth exploring, but his suggested implementation is atrocious. We can't keep doing this. The tax code is already Byzantine enough for taxpayer and tax preparer. A potential problem with his plan is in regard to his...
Gruber: The Problem of Obamacare is That We Need A LARGER Penalty
"Obamacare is working as designed" -- except for the part about "individuals free-riding the system," according to Jonathan Gruber, one of the chief architects of Obamacare. His assertion is that Obamacare doesn't need any kind of overhaul; the people are the problem. They aren't doing what they are supposed to in order to make Obamacare work. “We have individuals who are essentially free-riding on the system, they're essentially waiting until they get sick and then getting health insurance....
TAX
Tips
Food Stamps Growth Soars; Jobs Stagnant
Romney Paid More Than His Fair Share of Taxes…In 2010. MSM Blinked.
So, Mitt Romney released his 2011 taxes. And on cue, Think Progress rolls out this inane hit piece entitled "By Romney’s Own Standard, His Tax Returns Would Disqualify Him From The Presidency". The summary of their argument accuses Romney of paying...