Has anybody asked any Congresscritter why we have to pay for oil so many times over? We pay for it at the pump, we subsidize these super-wealthy corps–heck, we even front the military costs for “acquiring” oil in foreign lands, etc.

O/T, with apologies. Grrrrrrrrrr. Timmie is being real busy.

Annual trustees report says finances of Medicare, Social Security worsened in past year

“Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who chairs the trustee’s panel, said the new report underscored “the need to act sooner rather than later to make reforms to our entitlement programs. … We should not wait for the trust funds to be exhausted to make the reforms necessary to protect our current and future retirees.”’

LINK.

Well said…

Study: Canceling Oil Subsidies Would Have No Impact on Gas Prices

That’s entirely beside the point. That’s like saying that ending kidnapping won’t lower child care costs. You do it because it’s the right thing to do. It won’t make much of a dent in the deficit either but 21 billion dollars a year would hire a lot of teachers and every effort should be made to cut out pork before even beginning to discuss benefit cuts to those who can least afford it.
EDIT: yep DDay I know that’s what you’re saying too but I was in this same conversation a couple of hours ago.

Study: Canceling Oil Subsidies Would Have No Impact on Gas Prices

It would stop them from screwing us twice: first as customers at the pump; second as taxpayers who are watching all the money they’re not paying in taxes go into their pockets.

If they can’t be stopped from screwing us at the pump, then they shouldn’t be allow to screw us out of revenue to pay off debt.

Breaking oil related news

As we reported previously, Obama has found himself on the verge of another environmental scandal now that he has no choice but to redirect the Mississippi river via the Morganza spillway – either lose millions in barrels of daily refined production and potentially the impairment of the Colonial Pipeline, two events which would promptly cause gas prices to soar to new records, or redirect the river via the Spillway, and cause the flooding of millions of acres, and numerous towns and cities, and possibly another New Orelans bases crisis.

Guess which one Obama is picking

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/here-are-refineries-and-nuclear-power-plants-threatened-if-morganza-spillway-openedshut

Tiny Tim Terrific is a real pip isn’t he, fatster?

At virtually every stress point, there you’ll find the astute Little Man, up to his elbows in “solving” things in such a way that ever more money gushes upward, while on planet Earth, things, for the majority who are not on high, appear and are becoming more grim and crushing every single day.

Amazing amount of destructive power for a wee lumpish thug and one has to wonder precisely “who” it is that thinks so very highly of such a smug complacency?

DW

I’m not going to slam him this time. Flooding a refinery can cause one hell of a lot more environmental damage than a fresh water flood. Sounds like both of his choices are shitty and I’m not going to render judgment. Oil prices aside, thousands or millions of barrels of oil in various stages of refinement in the Mississippi river system seems by far the greater of two evils this time.

Terminate the oil subsidies.

What Timmeh won’t tell you is that the trust fund grows nicely when the economy averages at least 2.7% per year over a long-term period. Cure the economy, and Social Security heals itself.

Zero Hedge stuff has to be taken with a grain or eight of salt. There’s some useful stuff, but also lots of crap from people with an agenda that trumps their innate honesty.

what agenda? I mean everyone has some kind of agenda, but what do you this their agenda is?

Let’s see… Obama’s campaign was heavily funded by Wall St, and his cabinet is stuffed with Wall Street banksters and CEO’s. I wonder how regulating speculation will work out. Hmmmm….

Obama and the Army Corp of Engineers better do this right (the bold is my emphasis):

[..] three nuclear power plants are also in danger of being flooded: Entergy’s 1,176-megawatt Waterford nuclear plant in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana; its 978-megawatt River Bend nuclear plant in West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana, and the 1,268-megawatt Grand Gulf nuclear station in Clairborne County, Mississippi.

This alone is a post.

I just got badmouthed at the Orange Satan for having the temerity to say that the “Affordable Care Act” is an abomination. They are over there celebrating the fact that the White House Spokesman just admitted that it’s based on Romney Care. They’re celebrating because this is bad for Mittens you see. I pointed out that just because a “Democratic” President and a “Democratic” Congress passed the thing, doesn’t make it any less a Republican plan. I was told ~no shit~ “So Republicans can’t have good ideas too? Litmus test fail!” (their bold)
Yeah, they’ve gone that deep down the rabbit hole.

I’m hep. Which is also why I’m saying that he looks like he’s taking the best possible course in a bad situation.

Speak softly, PW, if the truth of what you are saying gets out, there are two political parties that will have some ‘splainin’ to do.

What do you think are the chances that either party will mention that fundamental economic truth?

How about Obama, himself?

He ought to, dont’you think?

But then, eleventy-eleven, coupled to 9/11 gets us the perpetual fog of class war …

(Who is that guy with the lantern, talking about looking for an honest politician? …)

DW

Check. Tip: folks should be reviewing the Texas levees and dams.

Yep but I wasn’t offering an opinion on Zero Hedge. Anyway, I’m finally done with my week. I applied for 21 jobs, (two of which were scams), got my car inspected and changed my inside driver’s door handle and now it’s time for a bike ride.

See y’all later.

I agree and not to mention that New Orleans would be flooded again… No good choices for anyone to have to make. It is a lose lose situation…

WOO HOO!– all good things. Ride safe and preferable not on Loop 360.

It’s not a big deal to the oil companies and also it’s only a half of one percent of the federal budget. The Pentagon spends almost that much every single day.

No big deal either way, and why focus on the trees instead of the forest?

21 billion could surely be of use in environmental stewardship in the areas of the country where these oil companies have destroyed; Gulf of Mexico would be a good start.

I like to monitor certain writers there after I get to know their work. Occasionally I see something really good in the comments that interests me. Same here.

speaking of corruption:
The People vs. Goldman Sachs
A Senate committee has laid out the evidence. Now the Justice Department should bring criminal charges

They weren’t murderers or anything; they had merely stolen more money than most people can rationally conceive of, from their own customers, in a few blinks of an eye. But then they went one step further. They came to Washington, took an oath before Congress, and lied about it.

If ya missed Mat Taibbi in his latest Rolling Stone article.. When are we going to see some major PERP Walks??? Great read on Goldman Fucks!!

It’s way too easy for Obama to now call to end oil subsidies. I wonder why he didn’t raise the issue when the Dems. controlled the Presidency, the House & the Senate?

…why focus on the trees instead of the forest?

I take your point, but I disagree that by focusing on the “trees,” it negates the ability to focus on the forest at the same time.

Incemental improvements add up. Yes, the subsidies are not a big part of the budget, but at this stage, capturing what is fairly owed may result in some increase in jobs on Main Street. If we don’t start somewhere smaller, we may not get anything at all.

JHMO. I disagree witht the subsidies and would like to see them stop.

Link please.

Seems to me that we have been forecasting doom for these entitlement programs even during boom periods. You really think this Ponzi scheme is going to last until the time that today’s 20-year olds are old enough to collect?

The tax code “subsidizes” these companies in the same way that the mortgage interest tax deduction “subsidizes” homebuyers. Let’s just get rid of all tax deductions and go to something like a flat tax.

It’s 21 billion over ten years — a trick to make it seem like more. It would be a hundred billion over fifty years.

Show me your evidence that it is an “entitlement” program and a Ponzi scheme please.

I disagree that by focusing on the “trees,” it negates the ability to focus on the forest at the same time.

If comparing two billion (annual) to over 100 billion oil profits or so is fair, than comparing the 2B to seven hundred billion spent by the Pentagon, including a couple hundred billion just for ongoing wars, is fair too.

As for the focus, when was the last FDL diary on the military spending, a good chunk of it for corporate welfare, that is hundreds of times greater than this subsidy? Is there an FDL conspiracy to overlook wasteful military spending do you think?

Corporations need to pay their fair share instead of cost-shifting to those that actually do pay taxes while they asset strip this country via legal and illegal means. There’s a huge body of evidence here. Treasure Islands is a great start but there is much more in these transcripts and a backlog of reading at this website.

You have to be kidding, right? The very definition of a Ponzi scheme – where investors are paid off out of the funds collected from more investors, instead of out of profits from business activity – fits Social Security to a tee.

Treasure Islands has absolutely nothing to do with the US tax laws that are a subject of this congressional hearingm and you know it.

This tax break was given to ALL manufacturers in, I believe, 2008. All it is is an ability to write off expendatures at a faster rate. If you want to get rid of it, then get rid of it for all manufacturers. No picking and choosing here. Now, if you are interested in the real problem, watch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMKqc-kjOD0

We use 20 million bbls of oil PER DAY. The strategic oil reserve has a mere 727 mill bbls in it. That is just a drop in the bucket. Will not lower prices at all.
And, do you know what a speculator is? It is an invester. If you have a 401K, I can promise you that some of the funds in that 401K are investing in oil futures.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/05/13/nrsc_ad_obamas_hot_air_alternative_energy_plan.html

OK, so you’ve got nothing.

Corporations do not pay taxes..people do..Any tax that a corp pays is passed on to the consumer, period, end of story. You can play with the rhetoric and convince yourself otherwise, but that will never change the reality.
ie: corps. should not be taxed. You tax the people who work in those corporations, you can tax the product, you can tax the purchasers, but you can never tax the corp.

Very good point. It’s a method of accelerated depreciation. That means that the taxes are really just deferred, not eliminated. But I’m guessing that not a lot of people understand that point.

I don’t know what you are worth but 2 billion is still a lot of money for most people and its a start. What if we actually took that 21 billion and actually invested in finding new alternatives over 10 years? Landing on the moon didn’t cost that much and was done within 10 years since Kennedy’s address. “The US space effort had more funding than the Soviet space program. NASA spent about $23 billion dollars on manned programs from 1961 through the first lunar landing in July 1969 (Mercury: $.4 billion; Gemini: $1.3 billion; and Apollo: $21.3 billion)”.

I just gave it to you, pal. Social Security relies on the people paying into it NOW to pay for the people taking money out of it NOW. The money you and I put into it is simply going to take care of others and we will never see our money, much less a return on it.

I don’t have the exact numbers, but when SS was initially set up, there was something like 15 people paying for every payee. It’s not more like 4 to 1 now, and soon it will flip to 1 person paying to take care of 6.

That sound stable to you?

First of all, you don’t have $21 B now. You have less than $2 B now. And who is going to actually do that research into alternatives? The energy companies are doing it now, and the ones they have come up with suck.

Exactly.

Do you support the following?

1) Money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights.

2) The guarantee to human beings in the US the right to vote and to participate, and to have their vote and participation count.

3) The protection of local communities, their economies, and democracies against illegitimate “preemption” actions by global, national, and state governments.

Please re-read my comments before trying to reply. Secondly notice it wasn’t a private entity that got us to the moon it was a government project. Thirdly oil companies are not doing it no matter how many commercials they put out, it simply isn’t profitable at this point. Fourth, scientist in laboratories at universities that are government funded through various agencies such as the NIH is where actual research happens not at some corporation.

Again zero-sum loss thinking, misrepresentation of a publicly funded insurance program, no evidence to back up your assertions and no links.

1) Money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations nor unions, are persons entitled to constitutional rights.

2) The guarantee to human beings in the US, who can prove citizenship, the right to vote and to participate, and to have their vote and participation count.

3) The protection of local communities, their economies, and democracies against ILLEGITIMATE “preemption” (preemptive) actions by global, national, and state governments.

Corporations and small businesses produce the bulk of R&D

Would you like to add anything else to your stated position?

Links? Evidence?

suthrnluvr is exactly correct. If you don’t know how SS works then don’t comment on the subject.

I don’t know where you get that from, perhaps some libertarian tripe you may have read somewhere?

Hey Mzchief,

I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter. I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days.

Certainly no one on this site..Liberals don’t understand economics 101..if they did, they would not be liberals. They are takers, not makers.

I don’t know where you get that from, perhaps some liberal tripe you may have read somewhere?

And I believe that bin Laden is dead!!

Yes you are correct that fact and opinion are two different things.

Be careful – thay have not called you a paid troll yet, but it’s coming.

No I am an actual scientist and know many other scientist and actually have to read scientific journals for a living. I have also studied economics, business, law, and philosophy at universities.

$21 billion would pay for all the food stamp cuts that were passed in two bills last year, with billions left over.

Jon, I like your suggestion to redirect the public spending from oil corporation subsidies to the SNAP program.

WAIT!!!! I thought the Dems. needed the $$$ to help with the debt!! But like Sen. Hatch said at yesterdays dog and pony show, “If they raise these taxes, Congress will spend every penny of it!”

That’s impressive..but it doesn’t change the fact that you do not know how SS works. And that you underestimate how much R&D is done by private entities..especially in the energy, biomedical and tech industries.
Mr. Ironcomments, I am not afraid of corporations but I am very afraid of a large central government. A large central government always always leads to control and control always always leads to tyrrany..

Link please

Here ya go. From Forbes, no less.

http://blogs.forbes.com/louiswoodhill/2011/03/09/social-security-needs-growth-not-cuts/

An average annual real GDP growth rate of 3.5% would make all of the financial problems of Social Security disappear, with no tax increases and no changes in benefits. This also happens to be about the minimum required to get the U.S. back to full employment, and create the experience of “prosperity” for average Americans.

stewartm

Corporations do not pay taxes..people do..Any tax that a corp pays is passed on to the consumer, period, end of story. You can play with the rhetoric and convince yourself otherwise, but that will never change the reality.

I work for such a reality. And I can tell you there is a difference in corporate behavior, for the worse, when corporations don’t pay taxes as opposed to when they do. Taxing corporations has the effect of encouraging them to spend their EFOs on things such as a) maintaining and improving their plant; b) R&D, and c) employee wages and benefits–all good for the corporation and all good for society at large.

The low- or no- tax model rewards giving the largesse to CEOs and stockholders, and is harmful to the corporation and society at large.

stewartm, I see it every day.

Exactly!!and there will be no growth with the raising of taxes on anyone.
The current tax rates need to be made permanent, then real tax reform..which includes making sure that everyone, no matter their monetary position pay some income tax..even if it is a paultry $100.00 a year. No more 47% not paying any income tax.
We also need to edit the Fed. and stop them from monetizing our debt, which has caused an unprecedented fall of its value. We also need to drill drill drill..Oil and Gas, (which is different than gasoline) companies pay enormous taxes and royalties to State and Federal Governments. The more oil and gas discoveries, the more royalty revenue..the less reason to tax individuals.

excuse me: economics 101: A corporations allegiance is to it’s STOCKHOLDERS, not its employees.

I don’t have the exact numbers, but when SS was initially set up, there was something like 15 people paying for every payee. It’s not more like 4 to 1 now, and soon it will flip to 1 person paying to take care of 6.

Which was why payroll taxes were raised in 1983 to take care of it. There’s nothing wrong with SS except:

a) economic downturn–its finances always look worse when there’s slow or no GDP growth. As I posted, a 3.5 % GDP growth now would solve all problems.

b) income inequality– the 1983 adjustment and payroll tax increase was based on a base that covered 90 % of US wages and the cap set based on that. However, since under ‘free enterprise’ Reaganomics median wages have *fallen* while the wage income (let alone the non-wage income) of the top skyrocketed, the assumptions of 1983 no longer hold true.

Ergo, the solutions are a) to raise or eliminate the cap and b) create a full-employment economy. Moreover, if you made Social Security taxes apply to ALL income, including capital gains, the program could afford to pay out at least 50 % more than it does now.

stewartm

How in hades did you get that from stewartm’s intelligent comment? Your spinning machine is just amazingly powerful, I’m almost jealous of it.

excuse me: economics 101: A corporations allegiance is to it’s STOCKHOLDERS, not its employees.

That has nothing to do with economics, nothing at all, but everything to do with social organization and law.

stewarm

So we should bleed the largest dividends out of a corporation until they are dried out shells of their former selves?

Ironic you bring out the troll argument, on someone else. Apparently the discussion of subsidies was just not exciting enough for ya to stay on topic.

Thanks for your comments, and some data! You saved me some time looking for some ammunition on this topic.

Not spin, just common sense.

Well there you have it..I simply don’t believe in what you call “social organization.” In fact that is a scary thought to me. Almost cultish.
I don’t know if cultish is a real word.

You start by saying exactly, then fly off into left field, vault the wall and continue on making your nonsensical point. How do you agree with stewartm and end up riffing on effective tax rates, and increasing commodity production? Continue using “common sense”, it’s hilarious.

But but You identities ARE TROLLS by any definition… specially mine… You add nothing but try to detract on a constant basis… Hey how $$$ a comment do ya make??

The current tax rates need to be made permanent,

No, a return to the tax rates pre-1964 are what are called for–when the top 1 % paid 71 % effective tax rates.

When corporations face steep taxes on profits, they take their EFOs and *SPEND IT* to avoid declaring it as profit. Look at the behavior of corporations before the low-tax era–companies like Kodak and Bell built research labs that even did fundamental research unrelated to their product lines. Kodak used to give its employees routinely bonuses large enough so that the average employee could *go out and buy new automobiles* in the better years. They purchased new instrumentation and built new plants to a much greater extent than they do now.

Now, in modern day corporate America, with low- or no- corporate taxes, the largesses goes to the stockholders and the board of directors. Meanwhile, back on the shop floor, pretty much something has to break before you can replace it. The result is (as Ian Welsh call it) akin a homeowner “burning down one’s house in order to keep warm”. It’s to the detriment of the individual corporations and society at-large.

stewartm

Well there you have it..I simply don’t believe in what you call “social organization.”

Well, you’d better. You live in one. Everyone does, whether they live in a mansion and fly in jets and earn their living via computers, or live in a thatched hut and walk and earn their keep by slash-and-burn agriculture. It’s part of being human.

-stewartm

read this

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703730804576317140858893466.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

No sir..I am an individual. I am not a part of any organization, expecially social organization. I, sir, determine my future..

In reality, the stampede of businesses from forced-union states like Washington has accelerated in recent years.

Yeah, a race to the bottom. What’s that to crow about?

And how has exactly making American workers poorer and slashing their benefits helped the economy, except to make a very few very rich?

-stewartm

BTW, I love the photo of your cat. I have 2..precious babies they are..One is blind. The animal shelter said he was unadoptable, until I walked in and said I would adopt him. My former blind cat had just passed on from renal failure. Bless his heart. Then my female is a lovely skittish calico.

How does your link do anything but support stewartm’s point that the corporation is hurting itself by avoiding using the union workers (who I’m sure aren’t well trained, or professional at all /snark) to make a bit more on their bottom line for this project. Thanks for the help?

No sir..I am an individual. I am not a part of any organization, expecially social organization. I, sir, determine my future..

Ahem…you’re speaking English, are you not? Just for starters. And heck, you mention a part of social organization which is enforced by law. There are lots, lots, more.

(The people who are unaware of their cultural indoctrination are the ones most likely bitten by it).

-stewartm

Did you read the whole article? It has led to an increase in workers wages and benifits, not to mention much better and closer relationships between worker and exec.
And let it be known, it is something to crow about..since I detest Unions.

You are an individual, your own special flower, nobody is just like you… Just like everyone else, isn’t like anyone else.

BTW, I love the photo of your cat.

Alas, he passed away in June 2009. I still honor him as the faithful friend he was.

stewartm

Well, Mr. Economics 101 – please explain the duty to shareholders vis-a-vis Goldman Sachs.

GS dividend payments are $0.35 per share, quarterly for 2010 with payments made in 2011.

There are about 518M GS shares outstanding at 4 Q’s at .35, that’s $1.40 per share X 518M = $725Million.

Lloyd Blankfein’s compensation alone this year is $19M or = to ~26% of all outstanding dividend payments for 2011.

Do the rest of the homework on the rest of the management team down to director level and total GS compensation is far greater than the dividend payments to shareholders.

I am stunned to say the least..It in no way supports his argument.

As of today there are 22 right-to-work states and 28 union-shop states. Over the past decade (2000-09) the right-to-work states grew faster in nearly every respect than their union-shop counterparts: 54.6% versus 41.1% in gross state product, 53.3% versus 40.6% in personal income, 11.9% versus 6.1% in population, and 4.1% versus -0.6% in payrolls.

Right-to-work states are also getting richer over time. Prof. Vedder found a 23% higher per capita income growth rate in right-to-work states than in forced-union states, which over the period 1977-2007 amounted to a $2,760 larger increase in per-person income in those states.

Employers that move away from forced-union states mainly do so not to scale back wages and salaries—although sometimes that happens—but to avoid having to deal with intrusive union rules, the threat of costly work stoppages, lawsuits, worker paychecks going to union fat cats, and so on.

I had a calico, my most precious of all that was taken by Coyotes..in 2008.
I have a lovely shrine to her..I know how you feel..It can be devistating

Um, you might want to review “Republicans Threaten NLRB After Boeing Decision” (by David Dayen, May 11, 2011)

You completely miss the point, I’m not arguing cutting out the costs of unions does nothing the bottom line, of course the corporation makes more. Thus allowing them to pay higher wages, and I’m sure those pay increases are equal from the lineworker all the way up to the head office… It just goes to the shareholder, the guy to set up the deal to move production, and not to the company itself as reinvestment, or across the board pay increases.

Did you read the whole article? It has led to an increase in workers wages and benifits

Uh. Only when regarding the states where the corporation moved, compared to their incomes before. The overall labor payout by the corporation was less, else the corporation wouldn’t have moved it, no? It’s still a race to the bottom.

This is in keeping with this graph:

http://seiu1000.org/news/union_middleclass_income.png

And let it be known, it is something to crow about..since I detest Unions.

Hey, I don’t believe in corporations. My ideal economy would be composed of *small* individually-owned businesses and large worker-owned cooperatives who compete against one another. The latter could raise capital by selling bonds to investors who would expect a return, but theses would have absolutely no right to ownership or control–as they shouldn’t as they are far removed from what the business needs to do to survive.

stewartm

I agree that CEO’s salaries are rediculous..but I believe stronger in a free marketplace. That is why stockholders need to get more involved. As with GE, I am working feverishly to get rid of Jeffrey Immelt. He is inept and incompetent..and relies on Govt. subsidies to make money..He has no interest in innovation. But with the introduction of 401K’s. many people have many many shares that they are unaware of. The fund managers don’t really care what the CEO’s make as long as their shareholders make money.
I pick my own companies to invest in and I make sure that the dividend is substantial.
Did you know that Microsoft and Apple pay NO dividends? And did you know that the BIG THREE 3, oil companies that is, pay by far, the largest dividend of any and all corps? So me thinks, that you are kicking the wrong dog. So, forget the tax breaks, they are inconsequential, drill so that socal, state and federal governments benifit from the royalties, and buy oil company stock. This is the recipe for prosperity.

No no no – you are not off the hook for your statement that the duty is to shareholders – indeed, you just dug your hole further.

I read it and the Republicans had better Threaten the NLRB..this is tyrrany at its finest.

Bye..going out to DRINK

You completely miss the point, I’m not arguing cutting out the costs of unions does nothing the bottom line, of course the corporation makes more.

The stats cited in the article almost certainly address the before/after growth in individual states. Note that *percentages*, not absolute numbers, were presented.

I.e., for a crude example, a non-union state where the median wage was $9/hr before might see it grow to $12/hr, while the union state might see its wages (say $16/hr) stagnate or fall as corporations left for cheaper labor. However, it clearly does not mean the corporation is paying out more in labor costs. (Here, in this example, from $16/hr down to $12/hr). It wouldn’t have pulled up and moved if it wasn’t saving money.

And thus, it still represents an economic race to the bottom for nearly everyone but the top 1 %.

-stewartm

Bye..going out to DRINK

You know, that’s bad for you.

-stewartm

Not surprised you need a drink.

You just lost the argument on your Econ 101 duty-to-shareholders, and immediately argued for shareholder activism to reduce management compensation.

Have a margarita on me…

Agreed, the movement of production was clearly done for a reason. Sorry if that sentence you quoted from my comment was not up to snuff for troll bashing, I don’t mean to misconstrue.

Somehow I’m not surprised.

Did you know that Microsoft and Apple pay NO dividends?

That is another facet of the disaster of Reaganomics. It used to be, when the stock market used to be about “investing”, that the dividend payout was the most important thing to investors. Funny, the great American prosperity of 1947-1973 wasn’t matched by a corresponding rise in the stock market. It apparently didn’t correlate nor was necessary.

The shift in importance from the dividend payout (which tracks the slower-but-surer process of wealth creation) to the “casino” Wall Street economy of today where stock price appreciation is all-important, exhibits the shift of the America economy from accomplishing real things as opposed to just shuffling paper assets.

Low taxes on the rich, and corporations, reward the paper shufflers, which in the absence of regulation is the easy and fast way to get rich. It’s also a way to get rich that doesn’t result in anything real being created. So money flows away from the true wealth creators towards the wealth manipulators and paper shufflers under Reaganomics.

stewartm

Yup! Well said and explained… Reagonmics has been the downfall of the middle class and a windfall for the top.. Who as you sate create nothing. St Ronnie and his handlers have raped this country and will continue to do so until they are reigned in by their wholly owned government…

St Ronnie and his handlers have raped this country and will continue to do so until they are reigned in by their wholly owned government…

I argue with libertarians who decry what they see as meddling from corporations who buy influence then use it to distort their “free market”. To their credit, some of them decry our ‘wholly owned government’ too.

But my counterargument is–”Well, what exactly did you EXPECT to happen? In your low-tax heaven, what ELSE are corporations and the wealthy going to do with all the extra loot they’ll get but use it to buy the government?” It’s not like we not run this experiment before, it it always produces the same result. The Age of Robber Barons was also an age of great governmental corruption.

-stewartm

Gee that’s shocking. He detests unions.

Try again.

The reason that Social Security is in bad shape has little to do with the ratio of people and more to do with the fact that the surplus was used by politicians to fund wars and other programs that weren’t related to why the funds were collected to begin with. There would have been trillions in excess payments if Social Security were actually only utilized for social security.

http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/11/abuse-of-the-social-security-trust-fund-began-in-the-1980s/

In other words, politicians ran up the charge card and now they want seniors to pay the tab.