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To: i-node who wrote (756145)	12/5/2013 1:17:48 PM
From: bentway	Respond to of 1577894

Fast Food Strikes Return as Wage Debate Looms OBAMA SPEAKS UP IN FAVOR OF MINIMUM WAGE HIKE By Kevin Spak, Newser Staff newser.com Posted Dec 5, 2013 7:53 AM CST (NEWSER) – Fast food workers in 100 cities will walk off the job today, and protesters will show up in 100 more to call for drastically higher wages for the nation's lowest-paid workers. The movement started with a small strike in New York City last year, and has ballooned since, with an August edition hitting 60 cities—though the AP notes that in many of those places only a few people actually showed up. But this time the strikes come as the living wage issue is heating up. "I think there's growing recognition that a nerve has been touched," the head of the Service Employees International Union tells the New York Times. "This isn't going to blow over." Here's how that debate is shaking out: Fifty-three Democratic congressman sent a letter to executives at McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, Domino's, and YUM! Brands yesterday calling on them to increase wages, Bloomberg reports. President Obama himself jumped into the fray in a speech yesterday, saying that fast food employees "work their tails off and are still living barely above poverty."He also tackled the idea that this was a racial issue, in some of his first comments on race since the Trayvon Martin shooting, Politico observes. "The opportunity gap in America is now as much about class as it is about race," he said. "The gap in test scored between poor kids and wealthy kids is now nearly twice what it is between white kids and black kids."Obama said he'd support raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. But protesters and the labor organizations backing them are pushing for a more dramatic $15 an hour. Some experts worry that number would have drastic effects on prices and hiring. "It might lead to the substitution of automation for workers," says one professor who's been a vocal advocate for wage bumps. He estimates that the price of a $3 hamburger would jump to $3.50 or $3.60.The industry is dismissing the movement. The National Restaurant Association calls it a "coordinated PR campaign engineered by national labor groups," while McDonald's contends that the demonstrations were not strikes, but staged protests from outside groups, CNNreports. But some workers undoubtedly are striking. "I'm tired of working for $7.25," one Milwaukee mother and Popeye's employee tells The Nation. "We've been busting our butts and we finally want a raise," agreed a Charleston Bojangles' worker. "I'm glad to be one of the people going on strike, because this is ridiculous."

To: i-node who wrote (756145)	12/5/2013 1:22:44 PM
From: bentway	Respond to of 1577894

Companies That Pay High Tax Rates Create More Jobs Than Tax Evaders By Alan Pyke on December 4, 2013 at 9:37 am Paying high tax rates doesn’t stifle job creation at the country’s biggest, most profitable companies and low tax rates seem to be more correlated with job losses, according to a new report from the Center for Effective Government. The 30 Fortune 500 companies that paid the highest tax rates from 2008 to 2010 created about 200,000 jobs from 2008 to 2012, the researchers found. By contrast, the 30 companies with the lowest actual tax rates in that time frame shed a collective 51,289 jobs. The report compared tax data compiled by Citizens for Tax Justice with employment data from corporate filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The tax data include only companies that turned a profit in each of the three years in question. The 30 high-tax companies each paid at least a 33 percent tax rate over the time frame in question, and only eight of them saw a net decrease in employees. In the low-tax grouping, just two of the 30 profitable companies paid any federal taxes, and a full 15 of them cut their payrolls. Many of the companies report their employment data on a global basis, so the jobs figures are not necessarily representative of solely American job creation. Despite that fuzziness, the report’s findings align with previous research on the linkage between corporate tax rates and economic success. There is no association between lower rates and higher growth. Making corporations pay higher tax rates makes the overall tax code more progressive, which is good for the poor and working-class. There is ample room to raise the rates corporations pay without necessarily raising the on-paper tax rate. That’s because companies have gotten very good at paying far less than the top-line corporate tax rate of 35 percent. The gulf between the statutory tax rate and the effective tax rate — what companies actually pay the government — is massive. About 11 percent of the S&P 500 paid a zero percent tax rate over the past year, in many cases due to flagging sales. But even among profitable corporate giants, effective tax rates are about a third of the statutory rate. At 12.6 percent, the effective tax rate paid by large, profitable companies in 2010 was lower than what the median American middle-class household paid to the tax man. So far, none of this evidence has curbed corporate enthusiasm for cutting tax rates. Business interests that want corporate tax reform have gone on the road to campaign for a cut, sometimes even holding events at companies like FedEx, which paid a 4.2 percent effective tax rate on $9 billion in profits over the past five years. thinkprogress.org