Articles tagged as

Taxes

Breaking The Addiction To Government

Image: thesassyminx.comThe December New Hampshire labor report, period ending October 2010, is not all that remarkable.  Coos County is still suffering while overall the state is hanging in at 5.4%.  This number is still reflective of issues with the size of the labor force versus mid 2009 numbers.  We have to watch that as we head through the November and December reports into January, where holiday hiring will add to the labor force, and then most likley drop off.

What may have been the most interesting aspect of the new report however, was this paragraph from the first page.

In New Hampshire private industry GDP growth was below that of government. The current dollar change in private industry between 2008 and 2009 was almost non-existent. less than a $1 million dollar difference.  When adjusted for inflation private GDP saw a 1.5% percent decrease.  Government however (this is New Hampshire State Government) saw a 4.6% increase in current dollars.

This is how Democrat-controlled states feign growth. 

Read more

For Quite Some Time

For quite some time more than a few of us out here in the private sector have been paying into our own retirement plans–if we can–for years.  After the Housing bubble burst many of us began reducing the amount we contributed as a lousy economy consumed opportunities, wage growth and jobs–our neighbors jobs or even our own. 

Companies, small businesses in particular, that were once able to provide some benefits and 401K matching dollars shifted gears, re-directing that revenue (if they had it) to keeping the business afloat so they could pay enough remaining core employees to keep the company "a company"–with desks, paperclips, sticky-notes, and a space to keep them in.  We paid for our own retirement plans, owners and managers paid for theirs, took pay cuts, employees took pay cuts, millions accepted reduced hours, part time status, or were overcome by the recession and had to be let go.

At the same time various levels of government were handing out (or handed) billions and billions of dollars that did not exist, to prop up the public sector unions.  These unions, collective bargaining groups (emphasis on collective) were the primary benefactors of the past two years accumulation of debt.  Government rules favored them in opposition to all else and in contradiction to common sense, not just for cash handouts but the hand out of sparse jobs as well.  Even at the local level, the public sectors union handlers, who are really nothing more than fat cat capitalists selling shares in human flesh for a profit, in the from of a dues check each pay period, have fought against the tide to raise union salaries, benefits, and keep or create more jobs that must be paid for by the people going the opposite direction.

So the public sector unions, operating as nothing more than a private business, whose goal is to grow revenue, continued to do just that at taxpayers expense, all the while whining about private sector greed and malfeasance. We need to call them out for this. 

Read more

The Invertebrate Jeanne Shaheen?

So did Jeanne Shaheen vote for cloture on the Reid’s Frankenstein tax compromise and will she vote to pass it? I ask because it includes Billions for a one year extension of ethanol subsidies that Senator Shaheen just insisted we could not afford.

Where Is That Elusive Middle Ground?

Grassroots is at the root of all politics in New Hampshire these days (most days really) and in response to that the Sunday News has taken notice, publishing an article this morning by Shawne K. Whikham which highlights a handful of groups from around the state.

Just Throwing This Out There…

The House Democrats have balked at a bi-partisan deal that while not perfect, is an actual compromise, and would end a good deal of the uncertainty about tax increases (that is stagnating the economy) by ensuring that for the most part, there are almost none. (The estate tax survives)

When did “not taking” and “giving” become synonymous?

A brief look at the current tax cut affair going on in DC.  As always, it is important to look back in history, to get a better context of what is happening today.  When we do this, we see what "is" now, and how it got there, in a whole different, more critical light.  What "is", … Read more

Good Cop – Bad Cop

iStock Photo ImageEveryone knows Good Cop, Bad Cop. 

You have gruff and uncompromising on one side, and then someone else shows up sweet as pie.  The goal is to get something you want that they do not want to give up. 

So is Mr. Obama’s compromise on stopping a tax increase part of the good cop bad-cop formula?

 

Read more

Show me the Tax cut

All those years of left wing class warfare about cuts for the rich but none for the rest of us we’re liberal lies. Plain and simple. You can’t extend something that does not exist.

Liars!

Yes, the very tax cuts that did not even exist, the ones GWB screwed the Middle class out of for the better part of the decade, just appeared at the wave of a talking point memo, whipping out seven years of dishonest, backhanded, left wing class warfare rhetoric, simply because it had suddenly become politically convenient to have democrats extending something they insisted never even existed.

Food For Thought

Over here, you’ll find Senator Shaheen crowing about how great the new food safety bill is, and how she, Senator Jeanne Shaheen, helped pass it. (It’s crap like all the other dem bills but that’s not why she’s an ass.)
She is an ass because (and if it makes you feel better Judd Gregg is an ass for being both a co-sponsor and a yeah vote) there are provisions in this Senate bill (S510) that….raise taxes.

Meet Professor “Screw You”

On the front page of this mornings Union Leader reporter Clyntnon Mamuo covers negotiations between the University of New Hampshire, and some 630 professors over their new contract.  As is often the case with such things, there is some disparity between what the University feels is economically feasible and what the white-tower and it’s union representatives actually want.

Keep in mind that the article quotes inflation at around 0.5%, and we know that over the past few years the government method of calculating inflation overall have shown it almost flat.  Using these figures along with what we know about pension issues and what Obamacare is doing to the cost of health insurance ‘the smartest people in the state’…

"…proposed a 12.5 percent pay increase, one percent of which would be merit-based, and no increase in health insurance premiums."

So the education establishment liberals in the university system think like the establishment progressives who ran up the state budget in the past four years. Screw the economy we deserve a huge raise. (The progressive political class gets their reward through a larger public sector union, which gives them money to try and keep them in office so they can rinse, lather and repeat.) And it is no surprise that they, democrats and educators, are fiscally (and ideologically) co-dependent.

Read more

Fun With Paul And Carol

Anyone know if Paul ‘Sugar Daddy’ Hodes and Carol Seiu-Porter have decided to raise taxes yet?  That’s what that is you know?  If they allow any existing cuts to expire, they are raising taxes. Now I realize our liberal friends don’t see it that way.   They look at it like this.  Since 2003/2005 the … Read more

Raising taxes to shrink the deficit? Sure: “Our research indicates this is a sucker play”

Most of us on the Right have known this innately for years – how?  Just look at budgets.  At the town level, at the city level, at the county, or State or Federal level – how often have you ever seen a budget DECREASE?  Even a slowing of rises are decried by those whose favorite program is "a cut".

Now, from the Wall Street Journal, some research shows what we have known all the time; my paraphrase is this:

A raising of an existing tax, or the birth of a new tax revenue stream is like a hit of crack to the vast majority of politicians and Progressives; it is never enough and they only want more and more to support their spending habit. 

Higher Taxes Won’t Reduce the Deficit (emphasis mine):

The claim here, echoed by endless purveyors of conventional wisdom in Washington, is that these added revenues—potentially a half-trillion dollars a year—will be used to reduce the $8 trillion to $10 trillion deficits in the coming decade. If history is any guide, however, that won’t happen. Instead, Congress will simply spend the money.

In the late 1980s, one of us, Richard Vedder, and Lowell Gallaway of Ohio University co-authored a often-cited research paper for the congressional Joint Economic Committee (known as the $1.58 study) that found that every new dollar of new taxes led to more than one dollar of new spending by Congress. Subsequent revisions of the study over the next decade found similar results.

We’ve updated the research. Using standard statistical analyses that introduce variables to control for business-cycle fluctuations, wars and inflation, we found that over the entire post World War II era through 2009 each dollar of new tax revenue was associated with $1.17 of new spending…

Read more

Follow on from this morning: Patriotic Millionaire – and the Agenda Project?

My, how connections can be made!  So, what’s the connection with this T-Shirt and the "Patriotic Millionaires" that Jeff Chidester and I discussed this morning on WGIR?

You know how I can tell this is a Progressive idea, vs just "Patriotic Millionaires"?  First, just look at some of the names on their list:

  • Michael Steinhardt
  • Gail Furman
  • Guy Saperstein,
  • Ben & Jerry Ice Cream co-founder, Ben Cohen

Not exactly rock-ribbed conservatives in this bunch, eh?  Also, the tactics:

  • A collective mentality with an insistence that ALL pay – not just the willing. As Chris over at RightWingNews put it in playing at being a liberal: "Why should I pay more unless they force me to pay more?".  They simply wish to achieve the Progressive ideal of the top paying the entire freight for society’s bill of Government.
  • No indication that the other side of the equation, spending, be addressed.
  • An unwillingness to "just do it" and send a check if they really felt this strongly about "be Patriotic – send money!". 

And the most stunning part – who was doing the organizing of these folks: "The Patriotic Millionaires campaign, pulled together quickly by the Agenda Project in New York City,".  Once again, we meet up with Erica Payne (who said "This is not an orchestrated campaign").

Yeah, totally believable, that.  Let’s see what she says about herself – not exactly all that altruistic in my reading:

Read more

Some Advice From Across The Pond

Want to better understand the relationship between public and private sector jobs, tax production and consumption, without sitting through a boring three hour lecture?  Here it is an just under six minutes from our friends in England.   Now, go explain it to your progressive friends, the ones who have been supporting all those high-paying … Read more

He who has the Gold makes the rules (or, the bribe / lure of free money)

Part 1: The "lure" of free money – all the politicians jump for it, thinking that they can "give" something to someone and it doesn’t cost local taxpayers anything.  During yesterday’s show, we got this from Dan (using GrokTALK@GraniteGrok.com): Using the 16th amendment the federal government takes our money, then turns around and gives a … Read more

Republican Suckers!?

John Lynch could only win re-election with the help of Republicans and independents and so he did.  So are they all liberals in denial, or just a bunch of suckers?  Someone fell for the lies about the budget.  They believed the liberals and their RINO agitators who sold them on a $70 million dollar surplus while the state was still trying to rob the JUA and sell off property.  Never occurred to ask why the state needed to spend taxpayer money on lawsuits and litigation to steal money from the JUA when they claimed to have a "surplus?"

I asked that question often.

But when votes showed up in adequate numbers to take every branch of government with a super majority of Republicans, they still left the little governor that could.  Suckers.

We are suckers because on November third, as if by magic, the surplus smoke screen cleared to reveal the wreckage of years of democrat majority rule.   Now that the election is over we have a budget crisis again. 

Cathy Silber of the very partisan (so-called non-partisan) GSFTC began early by trying to sell the solution for our resurrected funding woes on a more modern revenue structure. (Sales and income taxes if you didn’t know.)  Every major democrat began talking about the challenges of dealing with a Republican majority and our budget situation–and how it might affect services.  And now John Lynch admits we have a huge problem.

Have?  We always had this problem!  And we have it because John Lynch let the democrat majority spend and spend, then used gimmicks and one time money to hide it, and now it is time to pay.

When will we learn?

Read more

Picking Up The Gauntlet

The morning after I had taken my first casual whack at eliminating the deficit–The New York Times has a nifty interactive form you can use (here) to check off items it chose from the debt commission report to see if and how you might solve the problem–I wake up to a Google Alert that’s practically calling my name.

"Where Will Frank Guinta, Granite Grok, The Republican Liberty Caucus Of New Hampshire & The NH Tea Party Movement Come Down On Bowles-Simpson?"

The link leads to content from Heather Mac Donald (great last name) via the The Monday Morning Clacker--which is where we find out that "this is our last chance to meet Heather’s challenge."

That’s a bit dramatic, and hardly accurate.  If it wasn’t for Google Alerts, the mention of Guinta, and the fact that Heather and I share a last name I never would have even known about it, or the imagined arbitrary deadline.  Be that as it may, I accept.

Read more

Governor Rapes School Funding To Hide Budget Shortfall

Again, we see the smoke clear over the wreckage of the Lynch budget.  In this mornings UL Tom Fahey reports on how the Legislative Fiscal Committee plans to pilfer half of the $41 million dollar federal educations stimulus meant to save teachers jobs and the minds of our future leaders. They voted for a plan … Read more

Share to...
BufferCopyFlipboardHacker NewsLineLinkedInMastodonMessengerMixPinterestPrintRedditSMSTelegramTumblrVKWhatsAppXingYummly