TAX POLITIX
The Politics of Taxes
Class Warfare Continues With Clinton
After nearly 8 years of listening to Obama talk incessantly about the need for the wealthy to "pay their fair share," Hillary Clinton has picked up the mantle in her new tax proposal unveiled this week. Clinton spoke about the need for "an additional 4 percent tax on people making more than $5 million per year, calling the tax a "fair share surcharge." It is reminiscent of the failed "Buffet Rule" proposal put forth by Obama a few years back. According to a Clinton staffer, “This surcharge is...
SCOTUS To Examine Labor Union Fees
Earlier this week, the Supreme Court heard arguments about the constitutionality of union fees. The case involves an Orange County teacher who has sued to strike down the mandatory fees which pay for both collective bargaining and union activities. The current law is governed by a 1977 SCOTUS ruling which stated that "public employees can be required to pay a “fair share” fee to reflect the benefits all workers receive from collective bargaining. But at the same time, employees who object...
Government Outpaces Private Sector in Wages and Benefits
Government wage increases vastly outpaced the public sector, and the number of government jobs have soared. For the federal government alone, there are 2.1 million workers, “costing over $260 billion in wages and benefits this year.” according to recent data analysed by the US Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). There is no justification for government workers to earn more than the private sector. What was once a noble profession -- the idea of ‘public service’ -- has been replaced by as system...
An Updated Obamacare Analysis
Today, Forbes did an updated analysis of the current state of Obamacare, as the enrollment numbers are trickling in. The news is rather poor: "To briefly recap this year’s enrollment figures, late sign ups and automatic renewals pushed the number of people signing up for Obamacare through Healthcare.gov to 8.6 million through the end of 2015, before any attrition. Extrapolating from the current numbers implies that total Obamacare sign-ups will reach about 14 million (once the figures from...
Taxpayer Advocate 2015 Annual Report to Congress
CEI: 2015 Was A Record Year for Regulations
In 2015, the federal government’s published 82,036 pages of rules, proposed rules and notices. It surpassed last year's 77,687 pages broke the previous record of 81,405 pages in 2010. Competitive Enterprise Institute issued their yearly survey of the federal regulatory state. Among them are some of their findings: *3,378 final rules and regulations were created *2,334 proposed rules were issued in 2015 and are at various stages of consideration. *29 executive orders and 31 executive...
Clinton’s Abominable Corporate Exit Tax
Last month, Hillary Clinton revealed an idiotic idea in her tax plax that would yet again target American businesses. Clinton proposed creating an “exit tax” for companies that might try to merge with another foreign company. While that concept is ridiculous enough in and of itself, the writers at the Wall Street Journal, Richard Rubin and Lauren Meckler, were just as ridiculous. Where in the article do they discuss the fact that we have the highest corporate tax rate in the world at 35%? And...
Epstein: Will the Real Paul Krugman Show Up?
Recently, Gene Epstein of Barron's made a fascinating observation about Paul Krugman, the New York Times' darling of economics. On December 18th in the NYTimes, Krugman wrote about the film, "The Big Short", which was about the "housing bubbles and retold lies." In his article, Krugman stated that the housing bubble "was largely inflated via opaque financial schemes that in many cases amounted to outfight fraud." Unfortunately for Krugman, some folks like Gene Epstein have long memories and...
WSJ: Obama Still Spied on Bibi, Leading to Spying on Congressional Members
In a stunning report issued today by the Wall Street Journal, it was revealed that Obama has continued to spy on certain international allies even after pledging not to more than two years ago. The Wall Street Journal "conducted interviews with more than two dozen current and former U.S. intelligence officials. Government officials representing Israel, Germany and France all declined to comment to the Journal. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the NSA also declined."...
IRS Questions and Answers Regarding Individual Insurance Forms
Today, the IRS issued a series of questions and answers about health care forms that individuals will receive in the next few months. These forms are the 1095-A, 1095-B, and 1095-C. The information is "intended to educate individual taxpayers and describe the forms, who will provides them, and the purposes they serve. The Q&As also provide information as to when taxpayers can expect the forms and what taxpayers need to do with the forms once they are received." The bulletin answers the...
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