By Walter Geiger
When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. Sell not liberty to purchase power.”
-Benjamin Franklin
Faced with an abundance of cucumbers from the garden, I turned to the area’s expert on pickling, jarring and canning Julie Knott.
Julie had a very successful catering business but now concentrates on gardening and putting up the proceeds of said garden for future use. She also makes, jellies, jams, relishes and as a kicker - is comfortable fooling round under the hoods of antique Fords.
Comments
Tue, May 21, 2013 - 02:02 PM
Renting a movie or taking kids to the movies doesn't compare to buying alcohol. If 6 [...]
Tue, May 21, 2013 - 12:37 PM
Yes Julia, there are organizations that we may, choose to join. I believe the one yo [...]
Tue, May 21, 2013 - 11:34 AM
This is whats so screwed up with you religious nuts.I can go rent a movie or take my [...]
Tue, May 21, 2013 - 07:53 AM
Hi Carol,
There are organizations for Jockeys and for track safety. Here is the t [...]
Tue, May 21, 2013 - 07:50 AM
If you can't buy alcohol during a six day period then you probably have a problem. L [...]
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Read a portion of the article below written by Brook Jackson of FactCheck.org that ran in USA Today dated 2/6/2012:
"Newt Gingrich claims that "more people have been put on food stamps by Barack Obama than any president in American history." He's wrong. More were added under Bush than under Obama, according to the most recent figures.
Gingrich goes too far to say Obama has put more on the rolls than other presidents. We asked the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition service for month-by-month figures going back to January 2001. And they show that under President George W. Bush the number of recipients rose by nearly 14.7 million. Nothing before comes close to that.
And under Obama, the increase so far has been 14.2 million. To be exact, the program has so far grown by 444,574 fewer recipients during Obama's time in office than during Bush's.
It's possible that when the figures for January 2012 are available they will show that the gain under Obama has matched or exceeded the gain under Bush. But not if the short-term trend continues. The number getting food stamps declined by 43,528 in October. And the economy has improved since then.
Update, Feb. 5: Revised USDA data released in February showed the downward trend continued for a second straight month in November, when the number of persons getting food stamps was 134,418 fewer than it had been at the peak."
"About 17 million people received food stamps back in 2000. Some 30 million received them in 2008. Roughly 46 million people receive them today. From 1 in 50 Americans on food stamps at the program’s national inception in the 1970s, 1 in 7 Americans are on them now"
Here is some of what is said on the link. I cannot put the charts here though and they are VERY interesting!
"SNAP spending and participation reached record levels in 2011
Nearly 45 million recipients, one out of every seven U.S. residents, received SNAP benefits in an average month in fiscal year 2011. Total federal spending for the program was $78 billion.
Spending on SNAP benefits grew by about 135 percent between 2007 and 2011
Spending growth was driven by increases in the number of people receiving benefits and by increases in benefit amounts per person.
About 65 percent of growth came from an increase in the number of people receiving benefits. That increase was driven primarily by the weak economy.
About 20 percent of growth can be attributed to temporarily higher benefit amounts. That increase was legislated in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
The final 15 percent of growth stems from other factors, such as higher food prices and lower income among beneficiaries, both of which boosted benefits."
Those numbers are from the government folks, not the newspaper!
I have no problem at all with folks who are in trouble and need them because of events beyond their control. I have a LOT of trouble with people who live off welfare and SNAP programs who are able bodied and would rather spend their time just hanging out, using what I and many others earn to support their bad habits...Cigarettes, alcoholic beverages, fast food, junk food and some more things I can think about should be banned from the program, starting YESTERDAY!
Julia
He told me, "They think we're stupid because we work for a living. They hold us in contempt."
Mind-boggling, isn't it?
Julia
We now are paying for the fake bubble caused by letting banks and Wall Street do their thing, and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to find Bin Laden (who wasn't in Iraq).
The recent upward turn in unemployment is a lingering result of the severe recession, unpaid wars, and tax cuts instead of good tax policy. We stupidly think giving a person who has too much money more money will somehow create jobs, when MOST jobs are created by people earning less than 250k per year. ~96 percent of small businesses have less than 250k profit, yet create most jobs.
It follows about the same upward slope as with Bush, and not out-of-line with what we should expect for a country that has given away jobs with bad trade deals, and allows the Chinese to walk all over us.
This is a historical problem with BOTH political parties, and is rooted in the fact that big money now picks who we vote for. Because of that, every elected official only works to be re-elected by the people who can afford to buy them.
We have no long term planning to help our population, only more and more bad trade deals. We only need look at Carter's. What jobs replaced Carter's, when they moved manufacturing?
Remember when WalMart used to advertise American goods?
Someone has to feed people who no longer have jobs, unless we send them all offshore to work. The problem we have wasn't created by Bush or Obama, but is the result of 40 years of selfish politicians selling our future to the highest bidder.
Instead of fixing what is really wrong, too much money buying our representatives and no future plan, we stay divided. We think a 40 year problem can have a four year fix.
I take issue with both of these statements.
1) Last I check no one is giving anyone more money through the tax code. They are getting to keep or getting returned to them what they earned. Unless they earned it illegally or use it illegally, what does it matter what they do with it? Your argument is a slippery slope because who gets to decide what too much money is? Your logic reflects the same kind of thinking espoused by most socialist ideologues.
2) So, in your thinking, there is some how more virtue in the person making less that $250K than the person making more? Why $250K then? Why not more or less? And I challenge you to validate your statement. What sources can you reference for your information? There is a difference between an individual making $250K a year and hiring people versus a company that makes that much. A lot of businesses have CEOs that don't make $250K a year, but their company does quite well and they employ a lot of people. I don't know of an individual that makes $250K a year can employ more than 1 or 2 people based on that personal level of income and still pay all their bills. So, again, your logic, information and reasoning is apparently flawed.
Historical data shows tax discounts for large sums of NET income have never created jobs or spurred an economy on.
If we want to encourage job investment, tax breaks should come from hiring people, and not for exporting jobs or making profit.
I understand the popular rumor or myth, for those who have no direct experience in manufacturing cost and manufacturing location selection, is to repeat the party line they are fed that "it is easier to do business in China".
Statements like that are unfounded nonsense, just as statements that high domestic corporate taxes force jobs overseas are nonsense.
The core problem in the USA is we have a higher minimum living standard for the general population. We have two choices:
1.) Lower our living and life-quality standards so we can be competitive in costs
2.) Increase import duties to equalize cost differences associated with our higher life-quality standards
There really isn't any way around one of the two.
By the way, being in manufacturing product design and management, I've been part of discussion about where to locate manufacturing. A move was never triggered by local taxes, or taxes on profits over $250k per year. That was far down the checklist.
Nike got applauded when it left the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce over climate change, because, oh, Nike must care about the planet—it wants to regulate greenhouse gases! Nike
makes all of its shoes in Malaysia, Indonesia, China—outside the United States. Regulating greenhouse gases here doesn’t add to their costs. (Cato.org)
Point: EPA policies drive companies out of the US. It's easier to do business in China
Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent thinks U.S. corporations are at a disadvantage compared to those based elsewhere thanks to America’s labyrinthine tax code, he told the Financial Times in an interview published earlier this week
Point: US Federal tax laws are killing job growth in the US
Cisco Systems CEO John Chambers said Thursday that doing business in other countries, including Russia, is easier than in the United States. Cisco is holding $43 billion overseas and not bringing it back to the U.S. because of the tax on repatriated profits. Chambers said this tax is 33% in the United States. "No other developed country in the world pays more than 2% on their foreign earnings," he said
Point: Flight of capital because of US tax policies
Rauch Economics: “Historical data shows tax discounts for large sums of NET income have never created jobs or spurred an economy on.”
Only twisted economic theory can try to suggest that taking money from a company and handing it over to the government for redistribution can make for more job growth or a stronger economy. Henry Hazlitt writes in “Economics in One Lesson”, that a certain level of taxes is necessary for government to carry out essential services. Hazlitt says, “The larger the percentage of the national income taken by taxes the greater the deterrent to private production and employment. When the total tax burden grows beyond a bearable size, the problem of devising taxes that will not discourage and disrupt production becomes insoluble.”
Mr. Rauch – you speak the Party line as well.
I'd like you provide a reference that validates your statement. Otherwise, your assertion defies any sense. I can first hand tell you that every time I got a tax break that allowed me more net income I was immediately able to turn it right around into growing the business (new buildings and branches and well as new employees) and spurring the economy (spending more both as a company and personally).
And, unfortunately, it is true that it is easier to do business in China (or India, South America, etc). I don't know why you discount that as a party line when obviously it is a true statement. In many branches of industry (manufacturing, software, hardware, etc), it cost much less and there is far less hassle to relocate jobs. If it were not, companies would not be doing it.
By the way, concerning your statement about the high corporates taxes not being the reason that jobs have been driven overseas: it may not be the only reason, but it is a big factor. Companies exist to make profit. They have to stay competitive price-wise in order to make that profit. If they cut their cost as much as possible and then because of the wage demands and tax burden than can cut no further, they will relocate/rebase so that they can. Many companies I do business with have move all or the bulk of their operations overseas primarily because the tax burden (which is something they have little control over) is excessive. They moved their operations, lowered consumer cost of their product and still increased profits.
If people don't like companies going overseas, how about they start lobbying their representatives to lower the corporate tax burden? I can assure you that it would not only help bring back companies that have left, but would also attract businesses from other nations and encourage new businesses.
You also present a false dichotomy about choices. Those are two choices, but not the only ones. There are other options available, but a lot of people (of which you seem to be one) do not want to embrace and try other alternatives.
Some of what you say is true and I agree with, but a large part of it is just your party line. I have no particular party affiliation and am only pulling from my business experience, education and real world data I have reviewed. It seems to me you have a bias that you look for data to support rather than arriving at a conclusion based on the data. Either way, you are wrong.
While additional profits (from reduced tax payments) might provide a source of extra capital to invest, that capital is generally available through deductions for investment anyway. Lowering the maximum rate for income removed from the business does not spur reinvestment, and does not spur growth.
You can find comparisons here:
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/signal/does-28-top-marginal-tax-rate-mean-175706337.html
and a search of tax rate vs. GDP will show the lack of connection. There are hundreds and hunders of analysis that show no correlation between upper tax rates and growth.
The alleged connection was invented for people who have high personal incomes to retain personal income under the guise of being a "job creator", when in fact most true "job creators" earn far less than $100,000 per year.
As for relocation and ease of doing business....
The Chinese manipulate their currency (like the Japanese once did) and use Government support to attract jobs, but this is not startup business. It is relocation of existing American manufacturing technology to China.
Typically the Chinese come in and ask for details on the manufacturing technology, and require companies dismantle or scrap existing manufacturing infrastructure. This is usually part of a long term pricing agreement.
I design for various electronics manufacturers, and have dealt directly with production moves since the late 1970's. I personally negotiated from the side of businesses, and still do. I can tell you **exactly** how it works, and it is nothing like the wholesale marketing of myths to the American public implies.
If anyone doubts this, look at Carter's closely. Barnesville would have done anything possible to retain Carter's, and made life as easy as possible for them here. The problem is our community trusted executives to be honest and tell the truth, and be up front.
I've ridden in vehicles to meetings where owners or managers laugh about negotiating with local development groups, and what the local people give away, when they have no long term commitment to the area. The entire system we have, including tax codes, would be laughable except for how it hurts employment.
To have short term investment, all we need do is give things away short term. To have long term investment in jobs, we need resources like trained well-educated people.
Otherwise, we compete to be the lowest bidder against someone in China making $3000 US per year. $3000 US would not even keep someone who walks to work and lives in a box alive in this country.
This is where proper taxes come in, to equalize the standard of living we expect against the standard of living in our trade partners.
The only politician who ever had this correct was Ross Perot, because he built, ran, and owned a real business.
Republicans and Democrats will both eventually bankrupt us and destroy our country. One faster than the other, but we will wind up at the same place eventually. This is because they work for the people who pay their reelection costs.
I am glad you have been gainfully employed for such a long time. However, asserting you know how something works gives no more credibility to you that anyone else (such as myself) who knows differently. Even calling yourself "Tom Rauch" doesn't mean much since there is no requirement for truth or accuracy here.
What you have is opinion and assertion, which you are entitled to, but little else. Even the poster "Robert Heiney" was able to concisely and quickly refute much of your statements with little effort and I notice you have taken no steps to address his information. Write all you want. Pontificate all you like. Mix real facts with your misinformation all you like, but it will not make it so.
I agree with you that something has to be done, but coming to bad conclusions based on improper data sets is not going to help.
Enjoy your day. I have to go out and put some money back into the local economy and employ a few more people from my personal wealth. Next week I will be doing the same through my business.
What some would have us do is ignore all science and statistical fact, and pretend we can pollute and/or drill our way to wealth in a few years. All we need to do is let the middle class or working poor take more and more hits, and give more to the people who have the most. Eventually the top few percent will have so much money they won't have anything to do with it all, except help others. :-)
Trickle down has not worked in 40 years, and factually we are producing more gas and oil under the present administration than we did under Bush.
As a matter of fact, natural domestic gas and oil production is at a 25 year high, but domestic production has very little effect on price.
http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec3_2.pdf
There is no statistical correlation between increased domestic production and decreased oil price. There is no correlation between trickle down and jobs for the middle class and poor.
If there is, you should be able to point to consistent data. All data actually points to failure of the path we have been going down since the 70's or 80's.
The truth is really quite evident and very logical. If we want jobs to come back, we either hold the Chinese and others to our standards of living.....or we lower our standards to theirs.
We can't tax cut, drill, or mine our way to jobs.
"Science" claims everything you see in the world today originated out a single celled organism sitting in a primoridal soup. Of course no "scientist" can tell you where the "single celled organism" came from or using observable science, can they prove even the most basic macro-evolutionary theory.
Now you claim "science" to promote the concept that taking money from individuals and companies, and then handing it over to government bureaucrats, creates economic stimulus and jobs.
When you take money from one group of people and hand it over to another, you simply deprive one group of people the money they rightfully earned. It's like bookkeeping. You debit one account and credit another. One group loses and the other gains. Company revenue that could be spent on employees and R&D, is gone into the black hole called government. And for what? Because you have decided they just have too much?
Taking money from one group means that group has less to spend on purchases, goods, and investments. That's economics 101.
And who wants to take a business risk when the Tom Rauches of the world demand the government whack off a great big chunk of your earnings simply because they think you have too much?
Businesses lose 100 cents on the dollar when they lose. When they win, government steps in and takes 50% and more. Sure, there are right-offs and loopholes but the fact remains, businesses have to create something to survive. Government exists by siphoning off money at gun point from just about everybody, like ticks on a dog. And then they try to justify their existence by pretending they are servants of the people.
Tom Rauch is a cheerleader for those who serve to stoke class envy in people who went to government schools and never learned even the most basic economic theory.
Remember, economic growth in America was the envy of the world until the Marxist-Socialists landed in America. It's been downhill ever since. Read "The Five Thousand Year Leap" to learn how America became the economic powerhouse she was. And then follow Tom Rauch to learn how to end up like the rest of the failed socialist countries.
I'm working from your script, of which I partially copied here: "Your statements are nothing but repeats of the "party line" that, as an overall view, tax breaks on gross profits spur reinvestment and hiring."
In addition, many people gambled on the housing market and lost. How? By using borrowed money to purchase much more house than they could afford. Result: when the housing market crashed, they stuck the banks with the loans. And then the banks stuck the taxpayers with the loans with government assistance.
Food stamps: then we reward those same careless and irresponsible borrowers with free food. And let's not ignore the well known fact that the Marxist inspired USDA has a program to encourage people to go on food stamps. EBT cards make food stamps much more user friendly.
Upturn in unemployment: much of this is caused by federal government meddlers who if you look at their activities, bills passed, and agencies created; have done more to kill jobs than any other single entity. While Keynesisn and socialist “economists” claim that taxes somehow stimulate the economy, Austrian economists such as the group at the Von Mises Institute have much data to prove otherwise. Government spending harms the economy, kills jobs, and funnels money to cronies.
Stupidly giving a person who has too much money more money: so you are saying, that it's not in the best interests of government and society to let a person keep more of the money they legitimately earn. Instead you wish to empower government bureaucrats to plunder the wealth of achievers – for the benefit of others of course.
Chinese: you mention the flight of manufacturing to China as if this was solely due to evil corporate greed. You don't mention government policies that make it easier to do business in a communist country than it is in the once free United States.
On to the next thing .
The government does not assist building jobs in America, HWACA does, but the government went and took credit for that as well . If you are going to or have started a business and received funds you think the government provided, then your wrong ! HWACs provided those funds !
Finally,
to those that are without work but applying for it every opportunity or truly disabled receiving HWACA , I wish you the best !
To those that are sorry worthless pieces of crap, you deserve to starve with nothing more than the clothes on your body ! I bet if that took place then you would find work and contribute !