tax cuts

Saturday Reads Around The Internets - Outsourcing Jobs and Tax Cuts

shocknews
Welcome to the weekly roundup of great articles, facts and figures. These are the weekly finds that made our eyes pop.

You may wonder why to create jobs, government doesn't just stop offshore outsourcing them? We sure do. With that, the theme of this week's links is offshore outsourcing.

 

What should be in Obama's State of the Union address, but isn't

My, my, my. Today we have a preview of President Obama's State of the Union address. What is most offensive is the claim this administration is trying to help the middle class.

We are being bombarded with these misleading headlines:

  • Obama announces initiatives for middle class
  • Obama announces economic aid for struggling middle class families

Right. So, guess what policy initiatives are in the speech? Tax cuts.

A doubling of the child care tax credit for families earning under $85,000; a $1.6 billion increase in federal funding for child care programs and a program to cap student loan payments at 10 percent of income above "a basic living allowance."

His initiatives also include expanding tax credits to match retirement savings and increasing aid for families taking care of elderly relatives. That program would also require many employers to provide the option of a workplace-based retirement savings plan.

Are these people shitting me? I'm sorry but we have massive unemployment. What a sorry ass excuse to help for the middle class. U.S. workers need jobs and they need good jobs now. Who cares about tax cuts! When your income is zero, what do tax cuts matter?

What should be in Obama's State of the Union Address?

How about these?

  1. Demand China float their currency. 83% of the non-oil trade deficit is due to China and their mercentile trade practices. It's pretty obvious too. China's GDP was 10.7% for Q4 2009. China holds the most U.S. treasuries. Meanwhile U.S. manufacturing shrank from about 15% of the economy to 12%.

Tax Cuts, Tax Cuts - Oh the Fictitious Mantra of Tax Cuts!

The House Just passed the Stimulus and the majority of the debate was on tax cuts.

Who here knows that continual mantra of tax cuts being sung in D.C. is just the echos of a dead religion? Yet debate it back and forth they go.

How about not give any tax cuts in the Stimulus and move onto the real portions of the package which will have the best effect?

Citizens for Tax Justice have just released an analysis on the GOP tax cuts versus the current tax cuts in the Stimulus bill.

What is in The Economic Stimulus Bill of 2009?

Stimulus, stimulus, everywhere the buzz word stimulus, devil in detailsbut where is the devil, you know that creature who screws up the details?

Navigating the politics, the lack of analysis, the specifics and more importantly, the time line of effectiveness is not for the faint of heart. To that end we must start with the latest publicly available legislative text.

The Bill Text

The working title for the bill is, The American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan . The bill is also in a state of flux. The House states the bill will be formally introduced on 01/26/09.

A fundamental look at the future

By now readers of my blog posts know that I tend to have a "muddle-through" point of view. Times may be good, or times may be bad, but rarely does Armageddon happen. In the last 100 years, it only happened 1 time -- in the 1929-39 Great Depression. There may have been inflation, there may have been recessions, but always people adapted and an equilibrium was struck, and growth resumed.
Even World Wars 1 and 2 (and 2 had a lot to do with the oppressive settlement of 1) occurred after 100 years of near universal international peace in Europe.

Over the last 25+ years the entire globe has been undergoing a disinflationary period of growth. Interest rates have declined; consumers in advanced countries who haven't made much progress in wages could at least refinance their debt, or perhaps cash in the value of booming stock or real estate assets.
All of that appears to be coming to an end.