Tom

Please ask your guests about the practicality of State-owned Public Banks.

The State owned Bank of North Dakota is credited in allowing North Dakota to achieve the healthiest state finances in the country, by avoiding dependence on corporate banking, and may be a model for other states:
http://publicbankinginstitute.org/home.htm

“Only one state, North Dakota, has not reported budget shortfalls in any of these years [2007-2012]“…ref: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=711

Bank of Dakota website:
http://www.banknd.nd.gov/about_BND/index.html

The sick elephant in the room is the Uniquely American Health Care System. It is so difficult to get good numbers on who is paying the bill for nearly 20 percent of our GDP.
Business owners rail at the extravagant health plans offered to state workers. What is lost in the argument is that those state plans are subsidizing under payments for Medicaid.
The health insurance balloon is squeeze on many different parts with little understanding how it sabotages our economic system.
We must make the choice if we are to remain a civil society or become a nation of day laborers.
The tension is real and the results are not clear, 1/2 of the US population have conditions that make private health insurance unfordable.
This results in cost shifting to the taxpayer.
We have universal health coverage in that any person can walk into the ER of a hospital and receive assessment and probably some treatment.
Over the past decade, as more people lose jobs with health benefits and the health burden is shared by fewer people, state budgets for healthcare have exploded.
The state budget crisis is all about our broken health delivery and insurance system.

Please draw a picture of this elephant so listeners can see how our regressive health taxes are crippling our country. Every dollar paid for healthcare is a redistribution (TAX) of wealth.

“any person can walk into the ER of a hospital and receive assessment and probably some treatment.”

Make that “AND treatment”. They MAY NOT turn ANYONE down.

The ER is the MOST expensive place to get medical care for non emergency situations. Two stitches in the chin – $1,200.

The “Revoke the job killing health care reform bill” should be renamed to the “Make sure health care is unaffordable, bankrupts people and gives LOTS of money to the insurance companies who fund my reelection bill”.

Much has been written lately (the Economist, 60 Minutes, etc.) on the rediculously generous pay and retirement packages for government workers at all levels. But of course, given the strong unions, reducing cost and enhancing productivity at the government level is off of the table. (it’s funny how the only place where unionization is increasing is in goverment, where competition is not in the vocabulary…if we are short of money, we just have to raise taxes…the public be damned!) So the straw man will be that we have to cut back on other services, social security, etc. which isn’t the real problem. I find it interesting that whether you are talking about the federal government, virutally all state governments, and many local governments, the problem is the same. What the Republicans should do is refuse to raise the debt ceiling until all of the stinking federal unions ante up a big pay cut and a raise in the retirement age until 66, like the rest of us. What other enterprise other than a government entity could continue to lose $8 BILLION A YEAR

The US used to have a strong proud middle class. I propose the weakening on the middle class has come about from Progressive policies, like expansion of welfare, unemployment, tax credits for the poor, re-distributive subsidies, and promotion of broken families.

In the booming 50′s anyone taking public assistance was ashamed of the fact they couldn’t support themselves and their family, while today people are almost proud of the money they can draw from the government and even more detrimental to society is the fact that they think society owes the money to them. As long as this continues society will continue to be dragged down by the poor and the poor will neither be motivated by shame or necessity to pull themselves up from the bottom.

The teachers’ unions are a big part of the problem as well. They are paid a rediculous wage for 9 months work, get a rediculous number of sick days per year which many of them use whether they are sick or not, the union protects incompetent teachers. They never experience a pay decrease, unlike those in the private sector. And in states where enrollment is decreasing, they fight staff reductions. Even though we spend tons and tons of money on public education, certainly multiple times what private Christians schools spend per student with much better academic results, they are always complaining that education will suffer. It is because of the liberal agenda of the NEA, etc. that has brought about the moral decline of our country and dumbed down the student population.

Cost shifting is a huge problem, since the federal government has been a major payer through Medicare and Medicaid they have set the price of many services. Most of those services the government underpays the providers so the cost burden gets shifted to a part of the hospital that doesn’t have government regulation.

Some people think this is good and the government should regulate all service costs, but these people are vary ignorant of the fact that if the government sets the prices too low, the providers will either be forced to give a deficient service compared to what they could do or not offer that service at all. If the government sets the price too high, the hospitals will make money at that task and try to do more of them then needed. The only way to truly set optimal prices (the lowest) is the FREE MARKET!

We haven’t had a Free Market in the healthcare field for decades!

I somehow knew that the resident neo-cons would be chiming in early with lots of phrases like “liberal agenda,” “Progressive policies,” “brought about the moral decline of our country,” “expansion of welfare,” “tax credits for the poor,” “re-distributive subsidies,” “promotion of broken families,” and the like…relying on talking points seems to be a neo-con’s stock and trade. Interestingly, the true conservatives (Rob from NY comes to mind) seem more invested in a conversation, a dialogue.

@WINSTON SMITH
Do you equally hate the Chamber of Commerce as you do employee unions? They are a union of business interests.

Blame games don’t get our nation to where we need to be.
Look at who pays what. Don’t pick select taxes, look at the system overall. I focus on healthcare as an example a regressive funding model.
I sure there are examples of employees gaming the system, but the gaming that occurs on the top tier of our economic structure is where we are really going off the rails from a civil society.
It is in the interest of all to make our structure work.
Anger at one group or the other only polarizes the debate, and doesn’t find solutions.
Most government employees actually care about doing a good job. They don’t deserve the taxpayer hate.

Why don’t public workers take a pay cuts anytime their department is loosing money?

No one would run a company that lost money every year and continue to give pay & benefit increases every year while continuing to hire more employees.

Many states are effectively bankrupt and more spending is never the answer to bankruptcy.

Winston Smith:

You dislike the “neo-con” term? I should think you’d be proud to be called such?!? You’ve stated characterizations, mostly (the phrases I quoted from yours’ and Brandstad’s comments would need substantiating otherwise, which you’ve not supplied). Saying a liberal agenda of any kind has brought about the moral decline of our country seems more in the realm of name calling than being called a neo-con, which you are, which Brandstad is…What would you call yourself, ideologically speaking. I’m happy to call you something else!

A lot of folks who sat idly by while we gave the rich the keys to the treasury (and dump trucks to haul the loot off in) are whining about how we can’t afford to pay people what their contracts say.

How can I convert my debts and mortgage into public sector union pensions? I want some of that sweet, sweet intellectual cover to renege on a promise I made to pay someone money.

Winston Smith:

You dislike the “neo-con” term?
Posted by Brett, on January 18th, 2011 at 9:41 AM

Brett,

I guess the best term is a silent majority pessimist. I pay my taxes, I come to work every day. I work hard and don’t take advantage of the system. I don’t use sick days unless I am really sick. I pay my bills and avoid debt. I am not a lobbyist who has just moved from congress and is taking advantage of my congressional contacts. I am not a greedly, short sighted investment banker that is foisting a Ponzi scheme on the public. I don’t like Sarah Palin. And I don’t see either political party willing to stick their neck out and do what is best for the country rather than themselves. It is very frustrating to see our slow but steady descent down the tubes!

Tom, oh my gosh! 67%! Are you kidding me?

Let’s look at the real numbers instead of the hyped numbers, shall we? Illinois is raising income tax from 3% to 5%. Which is an increase of 2% of wages. Two percent, now where have I heard that number recently? Oh yeah, that’s exactly how much the payroll tax was lowered in the recent sellout to the wealthy during the great “Tax Compromise” of 2010 brought about by the Republican kidnapper/extortionists.

Sounds income neutral to me.

A decade of war has hollowed out the American economy. United States cannot move forward in an unimpeded way until we end these wars of choice, slash the Pentagon’s bloated budget by at least 50%, and invest in education and sustainable technologies that create green jobs that pay a living wage.

John Randolph Hardison Cain,

Do your research. Spain was huge in Green Jobs and they found after years of investment that for every green job created 2.5 jobs were lost and the cost of the green job that was created was high on top. Be careful what you wish for.

“Many of Iowa’s services were added or created in the last four years”

Can I buy a bridge from you?

From Cedar Rapids, Iowa

With Gov. Pat Quinn’s history of reforming government, I can’t think of a better person to head up the efforts to straighten out the fiscal mess in Illinois. It took great courage for him to openly state the need to raise taxes to begin to deal with this situation.

The liberal spending and liberal government policies of states like Illinois have bankrupted the states, towns, counties, cities, and villages. Such spending has destroyed the tax base of these communities. Liberalism does not work. The liberals only believe in more spending. If liberalism worked, then such liberal states should be prospering. But they are not. They are all spending more than they take in. They have made promises that are unaffordable and not sustainable. The private sector did away with defined benefit pension plans years ago, yet the states continue to support these plans. Spending must be tempered and limited by results, need, and affordability. You cannot spend your way out of debt.

Where are ordinary people supposed to get the money to pay these taxes?

OK, we all hate tax hikes, but 3% to 5%? What other taxes does Illinois have? 5% is NOTHING!

People making up to $34,000 in Vermont pay 3.55%, between $34,000 and $82,400 it is 7%, between $82,400 to $171,850 it is 8.25% and there are 2 more brackets above that. There are deductions, and a plan this year to potentially reduce the deductions and the rates.

And that doesn’t include property taxes.

And a FLAT tax? Let the rich buy another luxury car and screw the poor who are trying to figure out if they buy food or medicine (or neither). Graduated taxes are the only fair method. A person trying to live on $25K a year should NOT be paying the same rate as someone making 2X, 5X, 10X, 50X.

This should be an interesting show and I hope to listen to the the tape later today. Tom, I would ask your quests to discuss top 5 or top 10 states with the largest budget gaps. It will no doubt that this list will be overly represented by states where tax rates are already very high and where public employees have the most influence (e.g. NY, NJ CA, Illinois), but I also believe states without a state income tax (or very low rates), such as Texas and Florida also have large budget holes.

Regarding state and local pension reforms, here are a couple for discussion. A good place to start could be by going after some of the more abusive practices, such as “padding” of overtime in the last three years that seems to becoming increasingly common. This is where employees (particularly common in the NYPD) work 25% to 30% overtime in their last three years to increase the pension income. A better system would base the pension off the last 5 years and include only the person’s base salary or the average overtime the person worked over his or her entire career.

States also can not afford to pay pensions after only 20 or 25 years of service (e.g. again, this is very common here in NY). Given that employees change jobs more often, I also think it makes sense to transition younger employees towards a fully funded defined contribution system, where the employers are forced to fund the employee’s retirement account annually, rather than making empty unfunded promises that ultimately pits the state employees (e.g. who rely on an unfunded pension) against future taxpayers (e.g. who get stuck with the bill)and the the only winners are the politicians who buy votes by promising benefits to state workers that the state can not afford to pay. More later.

Instead of using per cent, please share Illinois’s actual rates.

Going from 3-5% is not huge nor a large financial burden. Additionally the law was quite creative with an automatic setback to 3.25. And 5% is still 2nd lowet among neighboring states.

Iowa, with its surplus, plans on not using it for on-time captial expenses (buildings and bridges and roads and park improvements and land acquisition and flood mitigation). Rather the new old governor wants to treat businesses to a tax party on the backs of income tax of the people. I’ll take Illinois’s creativity over Iowa’s stupidity.

BHA in Vermont @ 10:20
Here in KY we essentially have a 6% income tax and a 6% sales tax and every year we have to do a special reconciliation of our Fed tax return numbers on the state form because we haven’t aligned our tax form to the Fed’s. Some special interest has control of a miniscule part of the Revenue cabinet apparently.

Central Iowan@10:27- Thanks for the real story on Iowa

Charles Bowsher: I forget, is it Kentucky which taxes food, or is it Tennessee?

(And is it the source of smack talk that I think it deserves to be? Taxing FOOD? Not prepared meals, alcohol, soda, but…canned beans, potatos, chicken parts?)

Yar: “They are cost shifting as well”

That was my point, sorry it wasn’t clear. The cost of ANY service in the ER pays for them to have the ABILITY to handle tragic medical emergencies and cover the people who don’t pay at all.

If we had single payer, the latter would not occur. Everyone who has insurance is paying ‘extra’ to cover for the overly expensive ER visits by people who do not have insurance so they go to the expensive ER when a a MUCH cheaper immediate care facility or Primary Care physician could take care of their problem.

I know a guy who was on a volunteer rescue crew. He told me of a lady who always called for an ambulance to go to the ER because she had no insurance and couldn’t afford a taxi or PC doctor. She found a VERY VERY expensive ‘free’ ride to the ‘free’ doctor.

Your guest is just flat wrong –the US does not enjoy the world’s highest standard of living, nor do we live the longest. The US is in the “Top Ten” but usually at the lower end of these kinds of data (check the “Human Development Index” of the UN). Claiming that the US is “Number One” is a comfortable fiction, but it is a fiction. People with these ill-formed notions are “in charge” of this coountry” God save us all!!

What are the four states that aren’t seeing huge deficits and what have they been doing right? Can we learn from these states, or have they already had austerity in place while the rest of the country has been in denial?
Seth
Winooski, VT
(reposting b/c I’m not sure if I posted correctly the first time, thank you)

Lets blame the Teachers and their unions for all the ills.
It’s amazing how so many people want to blame unions for all the ills of the nation. It’s a race to the bottom, period. Before people comment on pensions maybe they should do a little research on how they work. For instance in most states the workers PAY INTO the funds. In New Jersey one of the reasons it’s pensions are in trouble is that the state did not pay it share. Now the current governor is refusing to. People don’t seem to mention this.
The blame the unions.

Meanwhile we spend billions on two wars we cannot afford.
The corporate sector looks for tax breaks and loop holes instead of paying their fair share. The wealthy also find ways to pay almost nothing if the can. The real problem is here is as a nation we seem to be a very selfish nation. We want services but don’t want to pay for it. The Republicans have been very successful at demonizing taxes and services and cutting everything.
They think you can have tax cuts and balance budgets.
That’s fuzzy math that even a 6th grade kid can figure out does not work.

We need to ask some serious questions here on what’s important for the nations future. The infrastructure is falling apart, our roads are dire straits. The rail lines are antique when compared to Europe.

It’s a mess, that’s for sure.

Evidence of the further privatization of government is evidenced by the successful campaign of Rick Scott in Florida. He was CEO of a corporation whose business model was built on medicare fraud (overcharging patients for their healthcare) and bankrupted the company when his misdeeds came to light. My mother worked for one of the hospitals he bought up and ran into the ground with this model. My mother lost 20k of her 401k during the bankruptcy while he made millions on a golden parachute; and now he is rewarded with taking the reins of a once great state? The golden parachute kind of “wealth redistribution” that nobody wants to acknowledge is also a major driver in falling budgets. As wealth accumulates to lesser and lesser people, i.e., an oligarchy, these kinds of problems will only intensify.

Income or GDP per head does not tell anything about the distribution of wealth. The numbers do not tell anything about costs of living. The government services that cannot be supported by revenue, will have to be paid out of people’s pockets. The disposable income keeps sinking. Ever more goes toward household debt. Think only of the costs for education.

Even though state schools may deliver most bang for the buck, the costs keep rising:
http://brainmindinst.blogspot.com/2010/07/value-of-education-economically.html

Would someone please tell us what the per capita tax obligation is today compared to 10, 20, 30 years ago. Or alternatively what is the per capita tax obligation today compared to periods of sound fiscal management.

Additionally, what percent of current revenue comes from the jobs that will be cut by all of this fanatical talk of reduce spending, reduce spending, reduce spending. It seems so short sighted!

Denis

The corporate media have explained to me that the state’s problems are due to high living, greedy teachers and fireman. I hear it every day. Talk about class warfare!

john in danvers had it right. As all the wealth has shifted to the top, with states desperate for funds, we have cut taxes at the top! amazing! Hasn’t anyone heard of “follow the money”?

How often have you heard of a proposal for a state to raise the income tax rate at the top? No, what you hear about, if a legislator has the courage to raise the taboo subject of a tax increase at all, is sales taxes and fees. Those are regressive and fall mostly on working stiffs, exactly the wrong approach.

Our state and national deficits come from military spending, corporate welfare via the most expensive health care system in the world, offshoring of jobs via voodoo economics “free trade”, and low taxes at the top brackets. Oops, i forget those greedy teachers.

ThresherK @10:32- Yes we tax some foods, we also place sales tax on restaurant meals. Having lived here 96% of my 54 years we are in large part deserving of a lot the smack talk, but some is undeserved. We do feel like the countries red-headed step-child sometimes. Most recently for me when KY competed for The Department of Education’s “Race to the Top” program. It is well known that educationally we are behind and have been behind nearly every other state for decades. So it was painful and seemed a little unfair that we didn’t get any kind of consideration or “curve” as it were when it came to “grading” our entry. We finished in 11th or 12th place just out of the top ten that got the extra money. How are we ever going to really see any real improvement after decades of neglect if we aren’t given a hand up?

I love this place, but we are oftentimes our own worst enemies.

Comment letter for NPR’s host Tom Ashbrook

Massachusetts Budget Chief, Jay Gonzalez sends press releases about budget chops and budget deficits. And all the media picks up on the “poor me”, “poor me” mentality, I’ll bet NPR does the same. All follow the childish whining g, “We need to cut this and we need to cut that! In a December 14, 2010 article by Kyle Cheney of the State House News Service, http://www.statehousenews.com/cgi/as_web.exe?rev2010+D+15078760 Budget Chief Gonzalez says that there is a need for a $1.5 BILLION cut! Sounds like we have no money! In the same article, Governor Deval Patrick sighs, “There are lot of very, very painful choices that will have to be made and one thing that is clear is that the overall state budget will be smaller than it is this year.” Even CBS’s 60 Minutes, December 19, 2010, did a segment on various states of the Union having to cut, cut, cut various services from their budgets.
Spare me the deceptive rhetoric! IMHO (In My Humble Opinion) the above is something called, “selective presentation.”. While in part it may be true, it is misleading, very misleading!
Why? Because what these reports are actually doing is informing the public about a crisis or fear that does not exist!
Let me repeat that”.There is no money shortage in the State of Massachusetts!
What I know about money and credit comes from studying and researching over the last eight years. I was an ASA (Army Security Agency) Traffic Analyst in Vietnam with a Top Secret Clearance and worked within the NSA (National Security Agency) Headquarters, in Fort Meade, MD. I learned how to “read” enemy radio traffic to find out exactly where they were and gave that information to U.S. Air Force pilots.
Today I’m putting out a short synopsis of my findings of reading what is reported and written in the media and what is actually in the Massachusetts Financial Reports. (Side note; Please prove me wrong!)

The Statutory Annual Financial Report (SAFR) for 2009 is an annual statutory accounting and yes there are deficits because the annual revenue is less than the annual expenditures. This gives Mr. Gonzalez the “right” to say the State of Massachusetts needs to make this statement, “we are currently projecting that state spending next fiscal year will need to be one and one and a half billion dollars below estimated spending this fiscal year.” True but not the whole truth! It’s like your annual salary reported every year. There is a yearly total of revenue and expenses! It is not a “TRUE” picture of your wealth. Many of us have skills, savings plans or investments including the State of Massachusetts!

In the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) for 2009 there is a different picture. The CAFR shows the total accumulation of wealth in the Commonwealth over years! That is the real picture! And not much is going to the common people.,”most of it going to Wall Street investment gambling. You see friends”the Massachusetts Legislation Pension Fund has had nearly BILLIONS in assets for years! Annually only a small percent of that is paid out as retirement benefits. The rest is held tighter than Scrooge held his money in the Christmas Carol. And its restrictions can be released with a little ink on paper.

The Massachusetts Government is awash in wealth obtained by the Commonwealth and by my reasoning should be shared with ALL the people of the Commonwealth! A small Four Percent (4%) contribution from these assets (page 56-57 CAFR 2009) can easily cover the $1.5 Billion deficit the Budget Chief is concerned about and the media is buzzing about.

And ONE more thing, the debt service of over $2 billion can be self-funded. The State of Massachusetts can start their own bank and pay the interest to us (the owners of the Bank of Massachusetts) instead of to Wall Street. Am I making sense?

Let’s start the bank of Massachusetts for more honest money, for more transparency and for NO MORE TAXES! It is possible: Check out the booklet, MA PUBLIC BANK” available electronically or a signed copy by calling me at 617-964-2951

David Snieckus
99 Crescent Street
Newton, Massachusetts 02466
617-964-2951

For the last 30 years – unions have only added overhead to the cost of any business and added little value – unions are dinosaurs and are on their way out as reflected in the reduction of private sector union jobs – and the only union growth is in the public sector -where salaries and benefits have ballooned – completely out of proportion to any rationale value.

What is going to happen to future generations? Education costs are skyrocketing, and entry level pay is stagnant at best. Will future generations be able to retire and live a middle class life?

As was noted on the air, the four states — Montana, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Alaska — that are not in this predicament are drawing freely from their oil and gas resources. But they ARE paying a big price in environmental pollution, and they are benefiting from the subsidies and tax breaks that we in the rest of the United States are providing for these companies. Take those benefits away, and ask them to put aside huge chunks of cash for remediation in the future of the pollution of their land, and they would face the same problems the rest of the states do.

Your guest will not address the irrefutable reality that outsourcing has HURT THE AMERICAN ECONOMY and not helped it: tens of millions of jobs have been lost and wages have declined due to NAFTA, no holds barred trade with China and other developing nations. It is simple, obvious, impossible to ignore. Ross Perot’s words will remain as a harbinger: listen to the sucking sound. He speaks as if we were enormously dependent on exports of our manufactures prior to the Neoliberal Laissez Faire Globalization era of Supranational Plutocracy, and ignores the enormous, maimed elephant in the room: domestic consumption. In 1970, over 70% of the toys bought in the US were made in the US, under a relatively high real value of base labor costs (min. wage in 1968 was about $9.86 in 2010 USD). By 2007, over 70% of US consumed toys were made in China by underage, exploited female sweatshop workers, working 7 days a week, 16 hours a day, living in cramped, vile dormitories, similar to the conditions of Manchester or Lancaster in the early 19th century. There is one agenda of the unified Republican and Democrat-led Free Trade establishment: to reverse the New Deal in favor of “competitiveness”. In 2007, 27 GOP Senators (over half of the Republican caucus in the Senate) voted to ELIMINATE FEDERAL MINIMUM WAGE. Mark my words, in 10 years there will be serious proposals on BOTH sides to repeal the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (whatever shreds of Title 7 are left) and to privatize and then eliminate Social Security. The sweatshops and child labor will return, work, wage and age limits will be scrapped and trade unionists will be thrown in jail or fired en masse – all decreasing shipping costs on the goods the rich.

If I understand the complaints of those like Brandstad, Winston Smith, etc., if business interests can manipulate the flow of tax dollars to their own unique benefit, that’s “free enterprise”, but if wage earners use their power through a union to do the same thing, it’s the “ruin of our country”.

As to Mr. Smith’s question about what government entity other than the postal service can “continue to lose $8 BILLION A YEAR without having to reduce costs to return at least to break even”, I think the obvious answer is the military. It blows through that amount of money in about 1 day.

As to Mr. Smith’s question about what government entity other than the postal service can “continue to lose $8 BILLION A YEAR without having to reduce costs to return at least to break even”, I think the obvious answer is the military. It blows through that amount of money in about 1 day.
Posted by Jim

Yea, but the Tea Party loves the military. Too bad they love their Social Security checks too. Because without slashing the military budget their checks are going to get much much smaller.

dam teachers unions!

“Traders’ Smaller Bonuses Still Top Pay for Brain Surgeons, 4-Star Generals” (Bloomberg),

Even for 2008, the year the financial industry received unprecedented support from taxpayers, many Wall Street professionals got bonuses exceeding $1 million, according to data compiled by then New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo. At nine U.S. banks, 4,793 employees got such payouts, 311 were granted $5 million or more and 47 people got bonuses of $10 million or more.

Tom Ashbrook:
State Deficits Nightmares can be changed into Budget Dreams!

States can become their own banks and pay themselves the interest on ANY borrowed money.

For Example: Massachusetts has a $1.5 billion dollar deficit!

Guess what? It has a $2 billion dollar debt service!

With a State owned bank we would have surplus of $1/2 billion….

See MA PUBLIC BANK a booklet I wrote ( available upon request) and the upcoming bill for a state owned bank.

david snieckus
99 Crescent Street
Newton, MA 02466
617-964-2951

Alaska! You have to be kidding me. This state sucks more on the tit of the Federal government than any other state.
Without the subsidies this state would fail.
The only other thing they have is the oil and gas revenues.

Everyone is talking about “small government”, however regardless of the government size, why not look forward for an “efficient government” one that really is for the people, of the people and by the people?

Secondly, people who claim that our spending is high, it surely may be high, but not in the arena where it is cutting, e.g. public transportation, police, fire, school, highways, bridges, mental health, health care for elderly all are basic fundamentals of a strong and healthy country, if you cut on these things, I’m not sure what will it look like 20 years or 50 years from now.

Finally, people who really dont want any government involvement forget that, if you dont have some government involvement things will be like wild west, e.g. what if the restaurants are not required to follow the health safety practices or buildings not required to follow fire safety measures.

The key is, there has to be a balance, and being in democracy, if we dont like the policy of the governing party or person, we can vote them out!

When governments become fat,they like humans, become less effective and require more attention. They become a dredge on our society. They are less productive and become more needy of other’s help. Enter the governmental mentality, the government can solve all of our problems and our needs. This mentality will bankrupt any group.
JFK recognized this potential problem when he made his famous saying” Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your countey.” A wise saying???? How well did we listen??????
A poll given on CBS Sunday Morning program 1-16-11 shows we are not.
79% are more concerned about what our country can do for them. Only 15% are concerned about what they can do for our country.
So sport fans, here is your problem.

“When governments become fat,they like humans, become less effective and require more attention. They become a dredge on our society. They are less productive and become more needy of other’s help.”

I completely agree with your statement, however same is true for any corporation as well, just see our brush with the finance industry.

Same went by the BP, or Enron or any other major corporation in the past that thought it was the center of the universe.

We must have corporations, and we must have governments either side getting too big is dangerous, imho, and if I am proven wrong, I will be happy

“And if you think the financial crisis has changed peoples habits, just walk into your local Wal Mart or watch the infomercials on TV. People are still buying “stuff” that will end up on a lawn sale next summer.”

I really dont understand why we are buying so much, where as I never saw a buying spree like this on my recent (last summer) trips to Germany, Spain, UK, Ireland, Japan and France.

Are we so wealthy that we can afford to buy every new gadget that is out in the market?

We’ve spoken alot lately, and rightly so, about the need for civility in our public discourse…

Here is my problem with that.

I normally consider myself a civil person, but when I read the comments above from brandstad and Winston Smith, I want to tear out handfulls of my hair and scream. On my best day I can’t imagine compromise or common ground with those who blame American decline on organized labor or paying the pensions of public librarians or cops who were promised them in good faith thirty years ago. Winston Smith mentions some government entity losing 8 billion dollars yearly. He doesn’t mention that during the height of our Iraqi occupation being there was costing 1 billion dollars a month! This was money spent blowing things up or building IRAQI infastructure, not funding the retirement of an American school teacher. Brandstad references the utopian America of the 1950′s without mentioning that at that time labor unions were at their peak of strength.

Posters to this site have occasionally mentioned in jest the idea of splitting the US into a few smaller countries, and allowing folks to locate to a “province” that might more accurately reflect their beliefs. I’m beginning to see the appeal of this idea.

I just can’t find common ground with brandstad and Winston Smith.

Leftfield, Wisconsin

William, the top income tax rate is near an 80 year low. Americans are near or at the bottom of all the developed countries in total tax burden. Oromney just continued the disastrous bush tax cuts for the rich and made a “temporary” cut in the payroll tax, giving the oligarchs their best-ever line of attack on social security. What “massive tax increase” are you talking about?

If you still believe the voodoo that tax cuts are good for anyone but the elites, why not take a look at the facts? Bush cut taxes and deregulated the financial sector. How did that work out for average Americans? imo, evidence is better than ideological theories.

A 67 percent increase in taxes by the state of Ill. is pretty massive.

We have what, 44 percent of Americans not paying any Federal Income tax? That is an all time high.

Don’t the upper incomes pay the majority of the income taxes?

The average American has spent too much money and bought homes they could not afford. Now they are paying the price of their foolish dreams.

Winston, truly you jest about Unions? Post Depression we were a 35 percent union force, now 13 to 15 percent and declining. This should please you. However to suggest that teacher unions are responsible for the moral decay of today’s economical climate is plain and simply wrong. If you want to see moral decay look to the Supreme Court for giving Corporations the upper hand when it comes to campaign donations. Look to the wealthy who sent our jobs overseas to avoid taxes here which left a gaping hole in the budgets. Recognize that trickle down never worked and never will. Winston, unless you are one of the elitists that are responsible for the condition of my country’s financial abyss, you should be supporting unions and protesting government always covering the back sides of the rich. There is nothing wrong with wealth as long as it supports the very country that gave them all they have. Big business and the free market killed this economy by seeking out laborers from countries willing to work for pennies per day, are you Winston?

“Look to the wealthy who sent our jobs overseas to avoid taxes here which left a gaping hole in the budgets.

Also, look to the Clinton administration, which signed NAFTA and gave China Most Favored Nation Status. Clinton was notoriously in the pocket of the Chinese, and it has paid off for the Chinese in spades.

Frankly, I’ve heard very few politicians from any party say anything meaningful about protecting American industry. The last one that stands out was Ross Perot and look what they did to him.

William–

“Don’t the upper incomes pay the majority of the income taxes”?

Yes, in the aggregrate, but take a closer look. Sure, a millionaire or billionaire pays out more taxes in number of dollars, and at a higher rate than a teacher earning $44K (starting salary here in my town–goes up to a whopping $70K or so after 30+ yrs, with advanced degrees, if you’ve got ‘em). But after taxes, that million/billionaire has a whole lot more left to live on and to feed his/her family with, pay for doctors, pay for schools, pay for fancy cars and yachts, etc., The teacher earning $44K, after taxes, has a whole lot less to try to live on, for basic living expenses. If the very wealthy paid a greater percentage of their income in taxes, there’d be more to pay teachers and nurses and firefighters, police officers, restaurant inspectors, drug rehab professionals, military wounded with, more to help families send kids to college, etc., etc. We’re not talking about second or third or seventh mansions here (a la John McCain’s). We’re talking one simple house and basic needs met on one salary, after taxes. Can’t do it. It would be worse without a teachers’ union. At least teachers get health care through their contracts. And most teachers work all year. They paint houses, work at Wal Mart, whatever, to try to make up for the little they earn at their cushy jobs teaching kids to strive for the American dream. Hah. Dream on. Dream on. . . . .

How come no one is talking about the overly generous union benefits that allow state workers to work for 20 years, retire at 50 years old, then collect benefits for 20-30 years at 70% of their salary. That will bankrupt any state. In our state these people get hired back the state such they get retirement pay then collect another salary from the sinking state. Usually since they are well connected to the old guard state
machine”

Cory,

Yes, not everyone should or can start or run a business which means that job/career should be allowed to keep the reward for their risk and talent. Sure they should make much more than a cop, fireman, etc…it is all about choice. The real danger is “who decides how much we can keep? Should a cop make more than a farm worker? Where does it stop? Got it?

William,

“We” decide. It is the beauty of our democracy.

Do you think civilization requires engineering? Imagine capitalism as a powerful locomotive. Should there be an engineer determining speed, overseeing maintainance, and calculating fuel usage?

I don’t begrudge anyone for the accumulation of wealth, so long as a balance is maintained that allows a continuation of our civilization for my (and your) children.

Leftfield, Wisconsin

-NYC

If customers don’t have $$ to buy goods & services, the “job creators” don’t have a need to create jobs.

Unless domestic demand is enlarged massively & quickly, our infrastructure, education, business & public health will all suffer.

The “demand” created by the top 5% cannot support our local businesses, governments, NGOs & other services.

We need a domestic economic policy to rebuild domestic manufacturing, update & replace infrastructure from water systems, electrical grids & other “old” technology to a true world class & secure “Net 3″ that will at least put us on a level with Finland & Estonia.

“Austerity” kills off demand & puts more nails in the “recovery”

And everything mentioned above is a Matter of National Security! That’s Economic, Societal & International security.

William your analogy is a straw man if there ever was one.
Without teachers there would be no Bill Gates or any other CEO’s for that matter. Your arguments are so infuriating.
You say you don’t want to pay taxes on your cell phone.
Don’t own one. I don’t have cable TV, why? Because I don’t need it and I don’t want it. Then you complain about the local taxes being raised for the school system without doing any research to find out why. You make blind assumptions based on your hatred of school teachers and unions. Straw man argument is there ever was one.

The corporate sector has been slashing benefits for the last 20 years and most wages are flat. Saying that people who work for the state can retire after 20 years and collect 70% of there salary sounds pretty dubious to me as well. In my state of MA you would be lucky to get 40% at 20 years. Do people abuse the system, yes. They steal and cheat in the private sector as well. Or does that not count in your world.

And Tom Ashbrook (sorry about the Ashcroft), anyway, please try not to conflate numbers like you did today. I think any statistician will say it is deceptive or misleading at best to call a tax increase from 3% to 5% a 67% increase. While it is true mathematically, it is a speech or debate trick. I was also surprised no one ever brought up fact that the 2% increase exactly matches the 2% reduction in Federal payroll taxes.

I wish our state were as smart as Illinois. I love KY but we are habitually short-sighted where it matters most.

William,

I feel as though you do not understand Cory’s point of view. So I will try to help you.
This country has always had an issues with Teachers, why, I don’t know. Jealousy perhaps, ignorance, perhaps. I wondered after I read your comments if you went to school? Did you not accomplish all you wanted to and now you feel it is the fault of teachers? Maybe your parents were negative about education. Maybe if teachers could be paid by the private sector as opposed to relying on property taxes you would accept their profession more. And it is rather discouraging that people like you and many others have no clue as to how all success begins…it begins the first day we walk into that school and meet our Kindergarten teacher. From there we learn and grow and the potential to be anything we desire comes after years of studying. Let me ask you this…do you think any successful business person is going to hire someone to work for his company who has not been at least educated through high school, can do basic math, read, write and use the many other tools we receive from being educated? We expect our teachers to continue educating themselves, we want them to keep our kids safe and sound, in many cases we expect them to take over parenting duties because we don’t like to do it ourselves, then when our kids fail, we recite how over paid teachers are and what a cushy job it is. Well William, if it is such a glamourous position you should go to school, get a BA, an MA and get that over paid of teaching yourself.

TomK – The 44 percent that don’t pay any Federal Income Taxes are not too upset about not paying “their fair share”.

William, did you ever hear “follow the money”? Those who don’t pay income tax, but pay plenty of other taxes, don’t have much to give. However, the concentration of income in the top 1% is soaring. Harping on those at the bottom is simply misdirection.

The plain truth is that we are in an anomalously low tax environment. It’s insane to worry about deficits without taking this aspect of the revenue side into account.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/2010-05-10-taxes_N.htm

Tax bills in 2009 at lowest level since 1950

“Federal, state and local income taxes consumed 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reports. That rate is far below the historic average of 12% for the last half-century. The overall tax burden hit bottom in December at 8.8.% of income before rising slightly in the first three months of 2010.”

And, the top marginal rate is near its low point since the first great depression.

Deficit = tax revenue – spending. The right wants to talk about spending only, but that is not real. Why is it a surprise that after trashing the revenue side since 1980 we have a deficit?

Of course there are other causes, the job-killing deregulation of the financial sector, the free wars, the offshoring, the corporate welfare maintaining the world’s most inefficient health care system. But, keep is simple. Cut taxes enough, Dr Watson, and I deduce that there will be a deficit.

TomK at 3:16PM,
While federal taxes/ spending is a little off this discussion topic, I wanted to clarify a point in your earlier post that I believe is a a little misleading. Yes, federal taxes as a percentage of income are close to post WWII lows e.g. the number I have from the Treasury is about 16% of GDP), but this is at least partially due to the deep recession. Without any change in existing tax laws, this percentage will likely revert back to the post WWII average of about 18% or 19% (e.g. which also matched tyax collections from simply based on economic recovery (e.g. more people fall in higher income brackets, stock market recovery boosting capital gains income, etc..). The real issue is that federal spending has increased from the post WWII average of 19-20% of GDP to about 24-25% of GDP so federal spending is at a post WWII high relative to GDP, while tax collections at are a post WWII low.

I have stated many times that I like the approach used by the Simpson/ Bowles commission (e.g. which both the hard left and hard right hate so there is probably something that makes sense), which was to eliminate most or all deductions to a point where the statutory rate is closer to the effective rate.

TomK – Don’t you think there is a danger of the “44 percent” voting themselves even greater “goodies” since they don’t pay for them? Everyone should pay something in Federal Income Taxes just to keep everyone “in the game”.

Why raise taxes on the productive members of society so it can be spent on unproductive programs?

TomK,
Just to clarify, I am not promoting a flat tax rather a flatter but still progressive tax system that gets rid of deductions, tax shelters, etc… This is consistent with what the Simpson/ Bowles commission proposed and will get rid of much of the abuse in the system and treat tax payers fairly. I would also add that many on the left point to Germany and other EU nations when discussing models of what they consider a proper social safety net. However, most of these nations fund a large part of this social spending through a consumption based VAT, which by definition taxes middle income tax payers more. It is not possible to generate the income necessary to fund this type of social safety net without a broad based VAT.

As someone commented earlier, this budget deficit/national debt is our common ground. It will destroy our economy for the next generation if we do not get it under control.

Being a teacher, I feel sick at the negative comments towards my profession. I switched my career from software development in the financial industry where I was making 6 figures with annual 20% bonus to teaching where I now make less than $40K a year, and I have never worked harder!! I love teaching and engaging students to learn. Yes, there are poor teachers just like every industry has its strong workers and its weak workers, but for the large part, almost every teacher I know is dedicated and does it for the love of working with kids.

Bash the unions… go right ahead. Before unions, teachers could qualify for food stamps their pay was so low. Summers off… good teachers take that time to develop their next year’s curriculum and to improve their teaching strategies. Teachers get the blame for poor student performance, teachers get the blame for the budget crisis… etc, etc.

So I ask, do you want professional, dedicated teachers or daycare workers? I ask because professional, dedicated teachers are not free. And, even though many could earn more money in private industry, as I previously stated, they do it because they love teaching.

Until you have actually done a teacher’s job… stop bashing and complaining… go to your local school and volunteer. Get to know the school. Get to know the hard working staff and teachers. Get to know the students.

Oh, and I calculated my pay based on the numbers of hours I work…. $8.00 an hour!!!

I am not sure whether this thread is still active, but as someone who generally leans Center/Right, I can probably find common ground with some of the comments related above from Gary Kline and others ergarding to maintaining our infrastructure.

I would argue that the federal government (and states) should have a separate budget for day to day operations (e.g. including entitlements and most defense) and capital spending. This would illustrate when the nation is underinvesting in our infrastructure as one would see lower capital spending relative to depcreciation, more assets with $0 book value that are fully depreciated,etc…. Expensing capital assets over iruseful life more accurately reflects the fact that these assets have an economic value beyond one budget cycle. It would also force public officials to justify capital expenditures by looking at projected future economic benefit. This is how any sane enterprise manages its affairs, whether it is a private business or government.

One of the approaches to balancing state budgets is to hobble benefits that members of some unions receive. Today, 2/28/11, Cokie Roberts speaking on the NPR morning news, referred to ‘plastic surgery’ for police as “outrageous”. To me, Ms. Robert’s characterization of this benefit was outrageous. Almost all of the use of plastic surgery benefits for police and fire fighters responds to disfiguring injuries experienced while performing their duties, I suspect. If this is true, Ms. Roberts should apologize and re-characterize the benefit as “essential and fitting”. On the other hand, if there is widespread misuse of the benefit for personal purposes unconnected to job duties, then this supposition needs to be researched quickly and the results made public.