Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tejek who wrote (658400)	6/13/2012 12:37:37 AM
From: i-node	5 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1578290

>> If lower taxes are job creators, why do southern states have to pay good money to 'steal' industry from other states? "Steal" industry? Hell, we're taking it away from you fools fair-and-square. This is competition. You people have spent yourself into so much debt you'll never get out and you're trying to dump it on business and they're running like hell from it. Ten states with HIGHEST per-capita debt: 1. Connecticut 2. MASS 3. Hawaii 4. NJ 5. NY 6. DE 7. CA 8. WA 9. RI 10. OR EVERY LAST ONE OF THEM A BLUE STATE. Ten states with LOWEST per-capita debt: 50. Nebraska 49. Iowa 48. Wyoming 47. South Dakota 46. Arkansas 45. Tennessee 44. North Dakota 43. Montana 42. Colorada 41. Indiana 40. Texas Every last one of them a red state. You've done it to yourselves.

To: tejek who wrote (658400)	6/13/2012 10:55:05 AM
From: Brumar89	1 Recommendation Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1578290

1/3 of US welfare recipients in California? Wow. California: America’s Welfare Queen Disregard for federal standards has inflated the state’s program. By Nash Keune California is the nation’s welfare queen: The state accounts for one-third of America’s welfare recipients, though it only contains one-eighth of the population, and there’s no good reason for it. Some of California’s welfare problem can be attributed to its particularly severe economic slump (California’s unemployment rate is 2.7 percentage points above the national average). But states in similar situations have significantly smaller caseloads; for example, Nevada, with the nation’s highest unemployment, at 11.7 percent, has a welfare-participation rate about one-quarter of California’s. In California, 3.8 percent of the population receives monthly welfare checks. In no other state is more than 3 percent of the population on the dole. Some may assume that the illegal-immigrant population in California expands its welfare rolls. But in Texas, which also has a large illegal-immigrant population, less than one half of one percent of the population receives welfare. The main reason that California is so dependent on welfare is its uniquely lax enforcement of the provisions of the 1996 welfare reforms. As part of the creation of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, the federal government put in place a set of regulations on welfare payments to help or encourage recipients to return to work, such as the five-year lifetime limit on benefits. California, however, is one of nine states that don’t unconditionally enforce this supposedly nationwide provision. Even when adults do exhaust their welfare payments in California, under the Safety Net Program, the minors in their families continue to receive checks. Only three other states have similar policies. Unsurprisingly, three-fourths of California’s welfare recipients are 18 years old and younger. A 2009 Public Policy Institute study showed that strengthening the enforcement mechanism by moving from “California’s current grant-reducing sanction to a policy of gradual or immediate grant elimination” for recipients who fail to comply with welfare’s work-participation requirements “would reduce California’s welfare caseload, substantially increase its work participation rate, and slightly reduce poverty among children with single mothers.” The effects of decreasing the time limit itself are harder to predict, but the study indicated that doing so would, at least, not harm welfare recipients to a measurable degree. Efforts to reduce the size of monthly checks in order to cut costs have been, at best, a temporary solution for California. Work-participation rates continued to lag behind the rest of the country. By 2010, only 22 percent of welfare recipients met the minimum federal work requirements. In this case, the cost of the program is a cosmetic concern, concealing persistent structural problems. It wasn’t until his 2007, 2008, and 2009 state budgets that then-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed reforms to the most important provisions, regarding overall time limits and sanctions for not meeting requirements. At the end of his term, Schwarzenegger was successful in cutting the time limit to four years and imposing stricter sanctions, effective July 1, 2011. This year, Governor Jerry Brown has proposed to cut the time limit to two years. It remains to be seen whether or not Brown’s plan will pass, or whether it’s enforced even if it does become law. The mere fact that a Democratic governor proposed such reforms shows that his state’s economic reality is finally stark enough that it’s affecting political realities. Brown’s plan will inevitably be called heartless, draconian Social Darwinism, even though the state technically passed a two-year time limit back in 1997 (lack of enforcement rendered it meaningless). If Brown’s proposal passes, the state will still need another round of reforms (such as the elimination of the Safety Net Program) for it to fall in line with the rest of the nation. Reforming a program as thorny as welfare can be difficult, but California need only follow existing federal standards to alleviate its problems. nationalreview.com

To: tejek who wrote (658400)	6/14/2012 11:47:39 AM
From: TimF	Respond to of 1578290

If lower taxes are job creators, why do southern states have to pay good money to 'steal' industry from other states? Paying out money (or more commonly having special targeted tax breaks) for companies to move in, is hardly exclusive to the South. Overall there isn't any net benefit from these payouts or special breaks, it would be better to just use the money to have generally lower taxes, but politicians don't want to just get out of the way and let things happen, they want to do something that they can use to claim that they made something happen.