Washington’s blog says:
Virtually all independent financial experts say the size of the big banks is hurting the economy
and fortunately George Washington been keeping (documented) count. It’s a total of 30 (mostly individuals but including a few coherent small groups), of which at least three have received the “Nobel” prize.
So why does “the market” cause such large banks to exist? Perhaps because correlates of bank size include political influence and chief executive salary.
Eight area advocacy organizations have issued “Chicago’s Sustainable Transportation Platform,” recommending public policies for a better transportation system. Since I’m a paying member of at least two of the eight, and on the mailing list of a well-funded third, I had hoped that maybe a few sensible things would be included. You can decide for yourself which of the ideas are sensible (“Design streets that are safe and convenient for all users.”). Pretty much all of them could be construed as “Create additional jobs and funding opportunities for us and our friends,” but that’s true of most public policy discussions.
I’m mainly concerned about what’s missing, for instance:
Other ideas?
Lots of discussion lately about income tax rates, pointing out that individuals reporting high incomes once were subject to marginal federal rates in excess of 90%, whereas today that rate never exceeds 35%. And corporate incomes face federal tax rates of 39.3%, higher than most other countries. Various ignorant or deceptive interests use these figures to make all kinds of arguments, such as that America’s rich are undertaxed, or American corporations are overtaxed.
But the secret, that all lobbyists know, is that income tax rates don’t much matter. When wealthy Americans were subject to 90% taxes, they didn’t really have to pay them. Instead, accountants and lawyers and various other shysters put together all kinds of partnerships, trusts, and other mostly imaginary constructs, which were used to legally hide or redefine income into something else. It was a bother and an expense, but way cheaper than paying taxes.
As for corporations, they have all kinds of manipulations available to reduce their taxes, as I discussed two months ago. (If individuals figured their taxable income the way that corporations do, we could deduct all our expenses for food, clothing, medical treatment, and practically everything else). If a few corporations appear to pay taxes in excess of the federal rate, it is due to state income taxes, local real estate taxes, other nonincome taxes, or special circumstances.
What brings all this to mind is this post, which provides two nice examples to illustrate my point. Read them if you have the patience, but the basic point is that corporations are able to entice many very intelligent, experienced people to devise ways to avoid taxes that legislators intend (or at least pretend to intend) to impose. They are opposed by many very intelligent, somewhat less experienced (and less well-compensated) people employed by IRS and other agencies, many of whom hope in the future to be employed by the corporations. The net result of taxing incomes, especially corporate incomes, is that many of the most intelligent and creative people, who might be providing goods or services that people need or want, are instead playing word-games with each other.
I would appreciate if someone would explain to me how a land value tax could possibly waste 1/10th of the brainpower absorbed by this useless, destructive system.
The draft report from the Fiscal Responsibility Commission, subject of my previous post, has some proposals for reform of how Congress makes (or doesn’t make) expenditure decisions. Frankly, I do not understand them. Perhaps this is because the draft report is simply a series of slides, not really a report. Or maybe these things are too complex for a simpleton like me to understand.
Separately, there is apparently a proposal to cut Congresspersons’ pay, and even one to reduce their pay every year that the government runs a deficit.
But these won’t work, for a very simple reason: Continue reading Real Congressional Reform– The Art Auble Plan
The “President’s National Committee on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform” has issued its “draft report,” actually just a series of powerpoint-like slides in pdf format, with a few complete sentences here and there. Yves Smith [correction: These comments were guest-posted on Naked Capitalism but originate at The Daily Bail] has already posted comments, of which I fully endorse the last sentence, but I would like to expand a bit here on my own site.
Now, it would be too much to expect the President’s Commission to suggest anything that would seriously change the way the powers-that-be conduct their business. Continue reading Fiscal responsibility and reform
At the Monetary Reform Conference a couple weeks ago, Michael Hudson asserted that banksters, like biological parasites, change the way the host thinks, to better suit the parasite’s needs. I wouldn’t question this regarding banksters, but I doubted the biological fact. Then I encountered the October 9 episode of Radio National’s All in the Mind. Mice infected by toxoplasma lose their fear of cats. Fish infected by trematodes behave in ways to attract predator birds, etc.
The site includes a transcript, audio, and (scroll way down to) an extensive bibliography.
That’s how Yves Smith describes the probable outcome of the latest bunch of mortgage finance scandals. We already know that lenders lied, brokers lied, consumers were instructed to lie, and the whole house of cards was built on perpetually-rising land prices. In recent weeks, and especially the past couple of days, we are learning that the back office lied too, nobody bothered to process much of the paperwork, it was easier to just forge documents as needed, and for many parcels it will be difficult or impossible for tell who really owns the mortgage (which likely will never be repaid anyway as it far exceeds what the property could be sold for).
The solution? Smith (and others) expect the federal authorities to move in, Continue reading We Institutionalize Kleptocracy
…we could reduce medical costs by 2.4%. That’s the finding of a new Harvard study as reported in today’s Tribune.
The analysis included payments made to plaintiffs, administrative costs such as attorney fees and the costs of doctors’ lost work time. It also included the costs of “defensive medicine,” in which doctors perform or order extra tests and procedures to protect themselves legally.
I don’t know about you, but my medical insurance costs go up by more than 2.4% every year. I am happy to pay an extra 2.4% to give medical staff some incentive not to screw up, and so that if they do screw up I have some possibility of receiving compensation.
Those who really want to cut the cost of medical care will look at monopoly interests such as licensing and patents, and the way that government subsidies increase costs. They’ll find many multiples of a 2.4% savings.
Turns out that back in February, Kevin Carson wrote the article that needs to be written, analyzing how government regulation and protection makes medical services far more expensive (and less effective) than they could be. With a link to another article that more broadly exemplifies how government makes it impossible for the poor to support themselves.
Mostly by subsidizing it heavily while failing to enforce anti-trust. This one isn’t about insurance, patents, or even unions; it concerns hospitals, suppliers, sole-source contracts and kick-backs. Like most medical stuff, there’s too much money and power involved to expect a good result.
via Naked Capitalism