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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (52720)	7/10/2012 10:53:48 PM
From: TimF	1 Recommendation Respond to of 71588

Not like a gift of the whole amount, only like a gift of the time value of money on that amount. If X is supposed to pay Y $100 right now, and then gets to pay it back 5 years later, with no interest, that's worth something to X, but it isn't worth $100. Its also not like a gift in that its the government getting less from the company, not the government giving to the company, the money is still flowing to the government, from the company. The government gets the gift (well not much of a gift when your forcibly take it). Beyond that the way we tax companies is on their profits not on their revenue. Allowing deducing of expenses isn't a "gift" at all. Immediate deduction, 2 year deduction, 5 year, 20 year, whatever, are all rather arbitrary, not somehow inherently correct with any lesser term being a gift. If oil companies had a lower effective tax rate than other companies then you could argue they are getting "a gift" in that they are getting favored status and special treatment, but that isn't the case Once again - mjperry.blogspot.com

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (52720)	7/11/2012 12:47:15 AM
From: greatplains_guy	2 Recommendations Respond to of 71588

No place to hide in this economy Posted on July 10, 2012 by Paul Mirengoff Last week, we noted, per the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), that American manufacturing shrunk in June for the first time in three years. This struck us as quite significant. However, according to the Wall Street Journal’s Real Time Economics blog, some economists warned against reading too much into the report. They noted that manufacturers aren’t a huge part of the U.S. economy compared with the service-related businesses that cater to ordinary Americans. But now, the ISM has followed up with a report on the service sector showing that activity there fell in June to its lowest level in more than two years. Moreover, Real Time Economics tells us that confidence among small-business owners is tanking. The National Federation of Independent Business’s Small Business Optimism Index fell to 91.4 in June, down 3 points from May. Economists had predicted a milder fall to 93. And a sub-index that tracks expectations about economic and business conditions over the next six months sank eight percentage points to minus 10%, after rising three points to minus 2% in May. Another sub-index that tracks plans to hire dropped three percentage points to 3% in June after rising one percentage point in May. The manufacturing sector, the service sector, the small business sector — it seems that this economy has no place to hide. And neither does the president who presides over it. powerlineblog.com

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (52720)	7/15/2012 10:08:06 AM
From: greatplains_guy	1 Recommendation Respond to of 71588

Dog-Eat-Dog Welfare State Is Lose-Lose Don Watkins & Yaron Brook, Forbes July 15, 2012 John Maynard Keynes—not exactly history’s greatest opponent of government spending—is reported to have said he would be worried if government outlays ever surpassed 25 percent of GDP. Well, in recent years both American and British government expenditures have hovered around 40 percent of GDP. The bulk of that spending, perhaps as much as 70 percent in Britain, goes to feed the ravenous welfare state. Clearly it’s time to question the welfare state. But such questions are too often viewed as taboo. Anyone who challenges it is viewed as seeking a return to the “dog-eat-dog” world of unfettered capitalism—a world where sellers supposedly exploited buyers, employers exploited workers, the rich exploited the poor. But capitalism, to say nothing of poor old Fido, has gotten a bad rap. Capitalism—real capitalism, not the mixed economies that have existed for the past century—is the system based on private property, free production, and voluntary trade. It’s not a zero-sum game where people battle over a fixed pie. Each person is free to create wealth and to trade it with others, such that they all benefit. That’s the beauty of capitalism. Because all economic relationships are voluntary, people only enter into them when each party thinks it’s to his advantage. When you accept a job, for instance, it’s not because the employer forced you to work at the point of a gun. It’s because you valued the paycheck more than other possible uses of your time. It’s a gain for you and a gain for your employer. In some cases you may not be thrilled with the work or the pay, but the fact that a win may be smaller than you would have preferred doesn’t change the fact that it’s a win. And if what first seemed like a win turns out badly, you’re free to make a new bargain. Capitalism isn’t dog-eat-dog: It’s win-win. We don’t have capitalism anymore—not in Britain, not in the rest of Europe, not in the United States. What we have instead are massive welfare states. And if the false charge against capitalism is that it allows “the strong” to exploit “the weak,” then the true nature of the welfare state is that it allows “the weak”—i.e., the unproductive—to exploit “the strong”—i.e., the productive. And exploiting they are. The Davey family, for instance, made headlines in 2010 for receiving £42,000 in state-provided benefits while driving a Mercedes, enjoying cutting-edge electronics, and continuing to have children (at the time of the story they had seven with another on the way). Mrs. Davey had never worked, and Mr. Davey had quit his job after he figured out he could do better by living on the dole. “I don’t feel bad about being subsidized by people who are working,” Mrs. Davey told The Daily Mail. This sort of story does not represent some bizarre failure of the system—it captures the system’s spirit. The truth is that the goal of the welfare state is to make the productive sacrifice for the unproductive. It establishes the principle that a person is entitled to state support simply by virtue of his need. But the state doesn’t have any money. In order to provide support, it has to take money from the people who earned it. Translation? A person’s need entitles him to your money. The less value he creates, the more rewards you owe him—and the more value you create, the greater your duty to serve him, and all the Daveys of the world. As Ayn Rand put it in her novel Atlas Shrugged, “If you succeed, any man who fails is your master; if you fail, any man who succeeds is your serf.” How is that fair? In place of capitalism’s philosophy of win-win, the welfare state puts everyone’s wealth up for grabs, ensuring that one person’s gain comes at his neighbor’s expense. Talk about dog-eat-dog. forbes.com

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (52720)	7/15/2012 12:17:40 PM
From: Hope Praytochange	2 Recommendations Respond to of 71588

Yes, house prices nationwide have stabilized. Of the 20 cities tracked by the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller Home Price index, 16 are in the black for this year. But the housing market isn't like the stock market. Bouncebacks are typically slow. The last crash took more than a decade to work through—and this market could take an especially long time because the huge accumulation of empty, foreclosed houses will hold down prices for all properties. When adjusted for inflation, the Case-Shiller index didn't return to its 1989 peak until 2000. Some markets, such as New York and Los Angeles, didn't hit new highs until 2002. This time may be even worse because the bubble was much, much bigger. Some locations may not recover their inflation-adjusted peak in our lifetimes. Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies calculates that there is a backlog of around two million home loans in foreclosure, waiting to come onto the market. Some estimates put the number much higher, especially when you include "shadow inventory" held back by banks. Unless you are willing to wait for a long time, you may not want to get too hung up waiting for a big rebound.