TAX POLITIX
The Politics of Taxes
Paying For TAA Through Tax Penalties
One of the major sticking points regarding the free trade talks is a portion known as TAA, or "Trade Adjustment Assistance". "The Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) Program is a federal program that provides a path for employment growth and opportunity through aid to US workers who have lost their jobs as a result of foreign trade," and this program is slated to expire at the end of September, unless Congress reauthorizes is. The funding source for the new TAA bill, as passed by the Senate last...
Rand Paul’s Tax Plan: A Different Perspective
Daniel Mitchell, a libertarian economist and Senior Fellow at the CATO Institute, offered an overall positive review of Rand Paul's tax plan that was released today. He had three minor quibbles and one major concern with the proposal. It his his evaluation of Paul's 14.5% business activity tax that is the interesting point for discussion -- Mitchell asserts is a Value-Added Tax (VAT) for all intents and purposes. Paul's argues that he "would also apply this uniform 14.5% business-activity tax...
Rand Paul: Blow Up The Tax Code
Rand Paul blew up the pages of the Wall Street Journal this evening with his Op-Ed he released a few hours ago on his plan to reform the tax code. The formal announcement comes tomorrow, but his tax plan is what he calls "The Fair and Flat Tax". The basic tenets call for a 14.5% tax for both individuals and businesses, elimination of the payroll tax, gift tax, and estate tax, and more. He'll keep mortgage and charitable deductions, as well as the Earned Income Tax Credit, and the first $50,000...
The Decline of American Business Start-ups
The number of new businesses has been on the decline since 2008, with more businesses closing than opening. The US Census Bureau confirmed the statistics, which was reported on by Gallup earlier this year. This startling trend also reaffirms a study released last year by the Brookings Institute, which noted that 2009, 2010, and 2011 saw the collapse of businesses faster than their creation. The annoying thing about the Brookings Institute’s study is that they do not attribute the decline to...
Social Security Musings
I recently read a letter to the editor about Social Security in the Wall Street Journal that irritated me. Not the letter writer per se, but more by the Wall Street Journal choosing to print a letter that perpetuates a widely perceived myth about Social Security. The letter was simply this: “Oh, please don’t blame older Americans for “eating up the budget” through payments of Social Security and Medicare benefits. It is the federal government that raided the Social Security Trust Fund. Older...
An Education Loan Bailout — And The Backstory
On Monday, the Department of Education announced student loan debt forgiveness for students at the now-closed Corinthian College system in California. At the end of April, the Department of Education slapped the for-profit college group with $30 million in fines for allegedly misrepresenting post-graduation job prospects and/or placement rates to some 900 students in 12 schools since 2007. Read the letter here. Never mind that in 2010 (a year for which I have numbers), 110,000 students were...
Presidential Race 2016: Taxpolitix Scorecard
The upcoming Presidential Election Cycle is beginning to get crowded already. Since I'm undecided right now, I've chosen to do a scorecard of sorts of each of the major candidates in four policy areas: *Taxes *Immigration *Free Trade *Entitlement Reform These issues are among the most crucial for me. Over the next couple of weeks, I'll be posting about what I believe is the best, most optimal policy in each of these four areas, and then I'll score the candidates on their positions. I'll also...
Obama’s Low 1st Quarter GDP Numbers
In lieu of the recent news that the GDP actually contracted during the 1st Quarter, some folks at the White House seem fit to blame both the winter and the actual process and algorithms by which 1st Quarter numbers are analyzed. CNS News decided to take a look at Obama's 1st Quarter numbers and compare them to previous presidents all the way back to 1947, which is the earliest data offered by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The result shows that Obama has the lowest 1st Quarter numbers of all...
Economy Still Down and People Don’t Have Money To Spend
I came across this little piece in the NYPost discussing the sluggish economy and the arbitrary numbers that come out of the Labor Department. It starts off discussing the 1st Quarter GDP contraction, which stumped many "economists", and even went so far as to possibly blame the algorithms themselves by which the government analyzes 1st Quarter numbers. Because it certainly couldn't be domestic policies, could it? This writer posits that we could indeed be on the bring of a recession, the...
Unions Want Exemption From $15 Minimum Wage Hike
We have entered the Twilight Zone. Because there is virtually no other explanation of the latest crusade by labor leaders in Los Angeles. Union leaders are lobbying Los Angeles city council members to be EXEMPT from paying a $15 minimum wage in workplaces where unions exist. Tim Worstall from Forbes got it right in his opening salvo on the matter: "This is really quite glorious as a display of sheer naked chutzpah." The unions themselves have been some of the biggest supporters of the wage...
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