Tag Archives: theft

Get Ready for More Debt!

07 Thursday Jun 2018

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , ,

Maybe the new editors at the WSJ can reinstitute some truth controls. There’s a glaring error in this story:

The Social Security program’s costs will exceed its income this year for the first time since 1982, forcing the program to dip into its nearly $3 trillion trust fund to cover benefits.

This is three years sooner than expected a year ago, partly due to lower economic growth projections, according to the latest annual report the trustees of Social Security and Medicare released Tuesday. The program’s income comes from tax revenue and interest from its trust fund.

The trust fund will be depleted in 2034 and Social Security will no longer be able to pay its full scheduled benefits unless Congress takes action to shore up the program’s finances. Without any changes, recipients then would receive only about three-quarters of their scheduled benefits from incoming tax revenues.

The report also said that Medicare’s hospital insurance fund would be depleted in 2026, three years earlier than anticipated in last year’s report. Absent changes, the program then would be able to handle 91% of costs.

The nation’s aging population is boosting the costs of Social Security and Medicare, while revenue gains lag due to slower growth in the economy and the labor force.

Where, exactly, is this $3 Trillion reserve fund, this “lockbox,” located? My guess would be in that D.C. museum with the Constitution, the dinos, and other things that don’t exist.

The “reserves” are but an accounting trick which, simply put, is just more debt for you and your kids to enjoy in the future.

There is probably some hidden truth in the story if one knows what to look for. Those dates in the late 20’s and early 30’s. Something else will probably fail around that time.

122206295

Found it!

Advertisements

Marvin Goodfriend is Nothing of the Kind; He Wants You Enslaved

22 Tuesday May 2018

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

In the interests of honesty and reality, the man should change his name to GoodFIEND. He seriously advocates robbing the people of their money and forcing them into servitude to the criminal banksters. He’s also nominated by the Trump to the Federal Reserve Syndicate.

Trump Federal Reserve Board of Governors nominee Marvin Goodfriend reportedly advocated on two different occasions the elimination of cash from circulation in an effort to prevent individuals from hoarding cash in the event that the Federal Reserve were to push a negative interest rate policy during a financial crisis.

The Mises Institute notes that Goodfriend first floated the idea in a 1999 paper called “The Case for Unencumbering Interest Rate Policy at the Zero Bound” and again promoted the concept at a 2016 Federal Reserve conference in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

Goodfriend reportedly said that the Fed needs the option to push interest rates negative, which would cause consumers to pay fees in order to keep their money in savings accounts, and that cash should be eliminated to prevent banking consumers from pulling their money out of banks to avoid paying those fees.

Bloomberg notes that Goodfriend suggested a few theories for how to phase out cash. He floated eliminating large bills to make cash less convenient. He suggested that the Fed charge banks and/or consumers fees for issuing paper currency. He advocated that the issuance of cash be taxed such that consumers only receive 90 cents when withdrawing a dollar. He also called for abolishing cash outright. The Wall Street Journal notes that Goodfriend additionally suggested that cash bills should contain a magnetic strip so they can be scanned and tracked as they move through circulation.

Word has it he will even graciously allow singing in the fields.

I really like Donald Trump. I like the idea of America, America first even. I like my swamps drained. But I wonder sometimes why a man, nominally at war with the NWO, keeps nominating one swamp rat after another. We shall write this off as 19-D chess or whatnot.

Anyway, the criminal banksters have already achieved real negative interest rates. That barrier proved just as easily broken as the one associated with 767.3 MPH. It’s a convenient mechanism to boost the already steady supply of funny money. Here’s, in brief, how it works:

Congress authorizes debt spending, money created from nothing. The Fed digitally prints even more fake currency. They loan that surplus crap to the commercial banking criminals at a negative interest rate, adding even more fiat elasticity. The big banks loan it to smaller banks, funds, and credit companies at a flat or marginal rate. The smaller bank deals with a credit card bank at friendly, discount terms. (All along the way, money is passed with either little cost, no cost, or an actual bonus). The credit card bank kindly loans you the fake money – at 19% interest. You have to pay that back, via the sacrifice of part of your life and livelihood. You are literally the only party in the chain that has to contribute something real to the cycle.

That’s the loan side of negative rates. For savers, it means that the bank that holds your money no longer has to pay you anything for the privilege of the holding and use of your hard-earned cash. In fact, under this plan, you will have to pay them a fee to keep your cash. You will have no choice in the matter. This is also known as robbery.

This plan, when (when not if) implemented, will be sold to the gullible public as a measure of safety and convenience. Something about fighting terrorists or feeding whales or feeding whales to terrorists or anything else they think 95 IQ teevee watchers will fall for.

What this all amounts to is a desperate scramble by the globalist elites to grab just a little more real wealth and control as their new hellish world heads south. This is kind of what the Pope was eluding to the other day, in flowery, economically vacuous terms. These wise, central planners are literally planning to force the people into conditions to shock a Roman peasant. The people, by and very large, for their part, pop pills, eat a lot of sugar, and contemplate new tattoos. Not all of them.

Today, millions of Americans are headed to the polls to make their voices heard, make their votes count. Rest assured that whichever Uniparty dipshit you endorse today, he is deeply educated about this brewing danger and surely has a ready plan to combat it.

(Hang on a second. I laughed myself off my chair).

Okay, seriously, there is a solution to problems like this. Honest solutions. Appropriate solutions.

All of these schemes, these dread issues of modernity – the banking fraud, the debt, the hands-free laws, the pitiful schools, the “refugees,” the rancor, the violence – all of it is connected. People elsewhere are slowly waking up. The Italians will probably leave the EU within a year. The Swiss and the Swedes are preparing for war. The Hungarians and the Polls are firmly saying, “No!” to more globalist “help.” Will you, the Trump, and the rest of the US join them?

Hogg Scratch Fever

01 Sunday Apr 2018

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns, Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Hello and Happy Easter!

This being the first of April I had wanted to play some sort of April Fool’s joke. Time being what it is, and this being Easter, I give you the most foolish thing I could quickly think of: this picture of popular star, influencer, and media darling, David Hogg (who most definitely is NOT a crisis actor):

david_hogg_getty

The Hill.

Young Hogg has unwisely drawn the ire of Ted Nugent. The Motor City Madman deemed the constant, whiny, and orchestrated attacks by Hogg and his troupe, “ignorant and dangerously stupid … soulless.”

I don’t think the standard SJW shriek and swarm tactics will work on Ted. They did work on Laura Ingraham, who is going on a “planned” vacation following the departure of over a dozen of her advertisers. That happened because of Hogg’s hissy fit.

So, this guy wants the spotlight when it’s convenient for the cause (of spreading communism) but not when it cues someone else’s free speech. The left used to be big on free speech. Remember that? Berkeley? Yeah. Now, offend their tiny sensibilities and off with your career. That’s what he’s doing: a woman, a single mother no less, speaks her mind, and he tries to get her show and livelihood destroyed. His rabble on Twitter are more than happy to play along. This is America?

Everyone plays along: adherence to the narrative. Predictable, preventable, lamentable school shooting. Hogg. Complete abdication of the facts and statistics. March for Our Lives. Actually, it wasn’t all scheduled in that order. The March, says the Metro DC Police, was scheduled “several months prior” with “several months of planning.”

DZk-JFUW0AAOMyd

MPD.

I thought the Florida shooting, ONE month earlier, proximately caused the March. Several months?

Make that several years of planning, decades even. This has been an ongoing movement since long before Hogg (or I) was born. He’s playing right into it nicely. Just as these lowlifes are happy to steal a single mother’s employment (Hey! Where’s NOW and the #metoo brigade??), they’ll be just as happy to steal the AR-15s, other firearms, Second Amendment, and freedoms of all Americans. I imagine the theft would continue thereafter. That’s what serial thieves do.

At least this troupe is entertaining, with the marches, magazines, and hysteria. But it’s still just Petrushka agitprop for the numbed masses. ‘Merica.

Tomorrow! A fun look at what happens to your Capital’s murder rate once the good subjects are disarmed. Stay tuned. Happy April.

Musical BONUS!

John Paul Stevens and John Paul Jones have similar names. I think they’re about the same age too. Anyway, with so many apologies to the great Johnny Horton:

John Paul Stevens was a communist,

and a communist was he.

He lied over here, 

and he drooled over there.

And he didn’t want Americans free.

The ‘Civil’ Side of Robbery

23 Friday Mar 2018

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

A few years ago the combined governments of America surpassed all other thieves and robbers in terms of the value of items and cash stolen from people annually. I read that somewhere and believed it without citation. And this has nothing to do with the theft and slavery of taxation, regulation, and inflation. Factor those in and gubmint gives Satan a run for your money.

No, this particular stealing is known as “civil forfeiture” though there’s nothing civil about it. Under Imperial law and the statutes of the several States the police can just seize your money or other stuff and haul it away. If you don’t successfully complete a Draconian legal procedure – literally pushing a boulder uphill, with a string, on ice, under gunfire, etc. – they get to keep it. This keeps us safe from terrorists, monsters, dope dealers, and unicorns.

I dealt with a few of these types of cases back in the dark days. I actually won a few. Believe it or not, the Feds can be easier to work with that local enforcers of the Big Club’s decrees of “justice.” Most people don’t win. Most don’t even try to recover their lost goods. The odds are not in their favor.

In these bizarre appropriations no arrest is necessary. In fact, the police don’t even have to accuse one of a crime or even (officially) suspect one. They literally just take things and keep them. Because. This usually involves cash money but can include: houses, cars, boats, planes, furniture, clothes, jewelry, guns, debit cards, and just about any other physical items.

Should one get indignant and demand the return of said items, one has to file a pleading in the eventual civil action – brought by the government against the things seized. They actually style the cases like this: The Empire v. $3,472 in Federal Reserve Funny Money, CV-BS-666. Really. Most folks just let it go. A judge rubber stamps the theft at a civil calendar call and that’s that. And it can be better to let it go.

The procedure for recovery places one in the near-impossible position of proving a negative – say, proving that the cash was not used in or gained through a drug deal. And they look to trip people into committing perjury or admissions of “real” crimes.

Sometimes a few folks win their own stuff back. Sometimes it’s as easy as writing a letter. Some small children in Georgia did just that: they got their piggy bank back from the man:

Kenneth Woods Jr. and his little sister saved all their money in their piggy banks, the same ones narcotics agents emptied during the execution of a search warrant last fall.

“I’m asking can we have our money we save(d) up back. We didn’t do anything wrong,” the then 10-year-old wrote in answer to a civil forfeiture action filed in Richmond County Superior Court.

A hearing scheduled Thursday ended before it could begin. When Assistant District Attorney Mark Shaefer read the boy’s reply, he agreed immediately to give the $420 back, said attorney Jason Hasty who volunteered to help the children and their grandmother, Corene Woods, after she told him about the piggy banks.

Grandmother wasn’t so lucky, losing her vehicles. At least she wasn’t SWATTED over the Devil’s Lettuce, scourge of civilization. And let’s give ADA Shaefer the Civil Servant of the Day Award! Thank you, sir, for having a conscience. That, and common sense and human decency, seems lacking elsewhere.

Yes, this is the law of the land. The government, gaining Billion$ in free loot, loves it. The Alabama Elf, for instance, is all over the concept, looking to expand it far and wide. He’s not alone. This is one of those things you’d know about, care about, maybe even get angry about, if you’d turn off the G-D television and wake up for once.

There are a few comments after the linked story, all sympathetic. Maybe it’s the child victim thing that got them. At least they’re aware now. They use words like “due process,” “leeches,” and “just wrong.” When leeches run the system, due process is just wrong.

‘Merica.

nimbus-image-1521824245766

Ill gotten.

Happy Tax Slave Day, 2017

18 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

Just a reminder that your 1040 is due today. Normally the joyous day of imperial compliance falls of the 15th of April. This year, as some, that date fell on the weekend. Thus, the magnanimous government gave you a few extra days to file. And, if you owe more than you’ve already paid, remember to pay that balance too.

Some don’t pay at all:

In tax year 2014, according to a report published by the Internal Revenue Service, the federal government hauled in a then-record $1,377,797,136,000 in individual income taxes.

Nonetheless, of the 148,606,578 individual income tax return filers that year, 52,062,499 filed what the IRS calls “nontaxable returns,” which means they paid no net individual income taxes.

Among these 52,062,499 filers who did not pay income taxes in 2014, according to Table 3.3 in the report, were 31,129,405 filers who also received $90,276,007,000 in payments from the federal government for “refundable” tax credits.

“In total, taxpayers claimed $105.6 billion in refundable tax credits,” said the IRS report. “Of this, $5.5 billion was applied against income taxes and $9.8 billion against all other taxes. The remaining $90.3 billion in refundable tax credits was refunded to taxpayers.”

“Tax credits are use to offset taxes,” the report explains. “Certain tax credits are also refundable in that if the credit exceeds the total tax owed, the excess can be refunded to the taxpayer.”

One example of a refundable tax credit is the “Earned Income Tax Credit.” “The Earned Income Tax Credit for 2014,” the IRS explains, “was a maximum of $496 for taxpayers with no qualifying children, $3,305 for one qualifying child, $5,460 for two qualifying children, and $6,143 for taxpayers with three or more qualifying children.”

For a married couple filing jointly to be eligible for the EIC in 2014, said the IRS, “earned income and adjusted gross income had to be less than $43,941 for one child, $49,186 for two children and $52,427 for three children or more.”

A married couple with two children earning $50,000 or more would not qualify for this refundable credit.

Thirty-five percent of workers pay no taxes at all. Add in those who could work, but don’t, and we have something approaching half the population paying nothing, no skin in the game. They still vote, however. Their votes cancel out those of the people who actually pay for the government.

All of this was envisioned back in 1913, when the income tax was federally instituted, and earlier when the communists plotted the downfall of the West. The plans are working seamlessly.

Oddly, the country somehow managed to exist and to grow, wildly, without any income taxes. In reality, as in history, it should be 100% paying no taxes.

01-US-CITIZENS-NOW-ONE-STEP-CLOSER-TO-BECOMING-PERMANENT-TAX-SLAVES

If you can believe it, there was a time when only one was guaranteed. Sovereign Man.

But, here we are. Pay up!

Puerto Rico Faces Bankruptcy: Watch YOUR Wallets

12 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , ,

A little less than a year ago I reported several times on Paul Ryan’s efforts to save banking profits by temporarily averting financial disaster in Puerto Rico. Then, I wrote:

May 24, 2016 I posted Paul Ryan Rescues Banksters, Globalists about Paul Ryan’s dastardly plans to force you (all of you) to pay Puerto Rico’s debts – all on behalf of the banksters of the world.

I said then:

The bailout will happen; consider it a done deal. Really $2 Billion or the whole $70 Billion is but a barely noticeable drop in the fed’s ocean of economic woe. Things like this add up though. When the whole system comes crashing down don’t count on the banksters to be found let alone lend a hand. They’re gathering the last of the cash (yours and mine) and preparing to flee. However, come hell or high water, the politicians will be easier to find. They’ll still expect to be re-elected. Remember this story and all the others. Hold them accountable or rinse and repeat with similar results.

U.S. Rep. Dave Brat (R-VA), who actually has a Ph.D. in economics, has caught on to the theft and deception:

“This makes the bill truly Orwellian — it remove[d] the consent of the Puerto Rican people and creates a fiefdom for unelected officials chosen by President Obama.

“As economist Thomas Sowell said, ‘The fatal attraction of government is that it allows busybodies to impose decisions on others without paying any price themselves.’ Congress can’t even get its own fiscal house in order, but [passed] a bill to solve Puerto Rico’s problems.

“This bill should [have been] subject to ratification by the Puerto Rican legislature or a vote from the Puerto Rican people. As it stands, I [opposed] PROMESA because it turns free citizens into subjects.”

He’s only talking about the loss of autonomy of the people of Puerto Rico; the rest of the American people will be losing their money. Pay up, subjects.

Temporary is almost over. The law passed and the wayward territory was given a year to get settlements in order. Like so much else Ryan touches, nothing has happened.

Bankruptcy for Puerto Rico is looking ever more likely as the clock ticks down toward a May 1 deadline to restructure $70 billion in debt, ramping up uncertainty for anyone betting on returns from the island’s widely held U.S. municipal bonds.

When U.S. Congress last year passed the Puerto Rico rescue law dubbed PROMESA, it froze creditor lawsuits against the island so its federally appointed oversight board and creditors could negotiate out of court on the biggest debt restructuring in U.S. municipal history.

The freeze expires on May 1, however, and an extension by Congress is “not going to happen,” said a Republican aide to the House Committee on Natural Resources, which is in charge of territory matters.

A round of mediated talks is scheduled to begin on Thursday. But absent an agreement soon, a growing number of analysts say Puerto Rico will seek protection from creditors under PROMESA’s court-sanctioned restructuring process, akin to U.S. bankruptcy.

Forbearance deals could let negotiations continue past May 1, but a source directly involved in the talks said avoiding an eventual bankruptcy is “impossible.”

Bankruptcy wouldn’t be the worst thing for P.R. In fact, it might be the best thing, here and now. It could give the people of the island room to decide if they want to continue their local fiasco. Hopefully, it will stay local and with them.

I have a funny feeling Congress won’t stand idly-by as the banks lose $70 Billion. Time will tell.

This case may serve as a canary in the economic coalmine. Watch and see what happens when governments default – more will surely follow.

This might be a good time to decide if P.R. should be granted sovereignty.

Might be a good look at the relationship between Congress and Wall Street.

It might be fun or funny, but probably not…

State by State Guide to Tax Theft Rates

12 Wednesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

Too often I focus on the criminal insanity emanating from Washington, D.C. The Empire also has 50 accomplices in the constant looting of your wallet. Martin Armstrong ran the numbers and came up with some informative maps.

Now filter in the State Income Taxes and what emerges is human nature. For all the people who complain about multinational companies moving offshore and then deny that it is tax related and try to characterize that as simply labor is cheaper, need to look more closely. The multinational companies I restructured we looked at the whole picture. Wages were a small part and only one component. What was the amount of social taxation on top of the wages, property taxes in a region, and then the corporate tax. Gee – it looks like the individual is making the same analysis.

The net migration of people within the United States mirrors the same thing taking place corporately on a global scale. They are leaving the highest taxed states and moving to the lower taxed states. Taxes are more than just what you pay, they push up the cost of living because everyone is paying a higher tax rate and raises all consumer goods. I took a friend out with his family down from NJ and they bought ice cream cones here in Florida. The bill was about half that of what they pay at the Jersey shore. I said see: high taxes ripple through everything within the economy raising the price of everything you buy. The net bottom line – taxes rob much more of your disposable income than anyone actually attributes to the government directly.

State-Income-Taxes-768x570

Armstrong Economics / Attom Data.

This report focuses on the combined effects of property and income taxes. There’s an overlay map of the two: red for higher taxes, green for lower. Go for the green, if you want to keep your own.

Note: In some few of the states with positive income tax rates, said taxes do not kick in before a certain income level is reached, or they apply to certain types of income. For example: NH has no tax on “wages” but they tax investment incomes (while taxing the fire out of property).

Boo Hoo: 17,000 Down, 80,000 to Go

05 Sunday Mar 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

The AP reports a wailing and gnashing at the IRS:

The number of people audited by the IRS in 2016 year dropped for the sixth straight year, to just over 1 million. The last time so few people were audited was 2004. Since then, the U.S. has added about 30 million people.

The IRS blames budget cuts as money for the agency shrunk from $12.2 billion in 2010 to $11.2 billion last year. Over that period, the agency has lost more than 17,000 employees, including nearly 7,000 enforcement agents. A little more than 80,000 people work at the IRS.

We should shoot for the same number of IRS employees we had in 1912. Same budget. And the same tax rates too.

ECON 666: Already Planning to Make the Next Recession Worse

03 Friday Mar 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

The Federal Reserve system is truly amazing.

Built, in secret in a dark room at Jekyll Island, Georgia, it was foisted on the American people more than 100 years ago. It is patently illegal; Congress abdicated its Article I authority to control the currency to a private, unelected, and uncontrollable bank. It destroyed the value of the dollar. It necessitated the 16th Amendment and the income tax (as a prop).

It institutionalized the normal business (boom, bust, boom,…) cycle – privatizing the gains and socializing the loses. It allows for concentration of wealth in the dirty hands of a few bankers and closely associated persons. It places all responsibility and liability on the public. It allows for unlimited government: spending, debt, programs, and wars. It works in conjunction with other central banks and the Bank for International Settlements to maintain a global system of debt slavery.

That this greatest and most evil of ponzi schemes has lasted for 104 years is a testament to either the wiles of its creators and operators or to the blind stupidity of the people. It could be both. And it could signal the completely corrupted nature of the American political class. None of it unfathomable…

Those who rule the economy like gods, even in the midst of preparing for a likely transition in leadership next February, are already plotting and planning their actions for the next American recession:

While in recent weeks there has been a material increase in Fed balance sheet normalization chatter, according to a new report from Deutsche Bank analysts, it may all be for nothing for one simple reason: should the US encounter a recession in the next several years, the most likely reaction by the Fed would be another $1 trillion in QE, delaying indefinitely any expectations for a return to a “normal” balance sheet.

As a reminder, as of this month, the duration of the latest expansionary cycle – as defined by the NBER – has reached 93 months, surpassing the 92 months of the 1982-1990 cycle, and is now the third longest in history. Should the cycle persist for another 27 months, or just under two and a half years, it would be the longest period of “economic growth” in history.

It’s like they know. Like they do this on purpose. “QE”means quantitative easing. That’s fancy banker talk for printing money. In this case, the U.S. Treasury will announce a sale of $1 Trillion in federal bonds. That’s more debt and interest for the taxpayers to work off. The Fed will then “expand its balance sheet” by buying the Treasuries. These are on sale at the Treasury but the Fed will buy them through their favorite middleman, Goldman Sachs.

Goldman will mark up the price, to give the people the worst deal possible and to make a profit. Goldman will finance the initial purchase from the Treasury with a fake money loan from guess who… And how will the Fed obtain the money for the Goldman loan and for the secondary Treasury purchase? By printing money! A lot of money. $1 Trillion for Goldman. And $1 Trillion plus Goldman fees for the Fed. Wait. There’s more (and more and more): the Treasury and the government now have an extra Trillion. That’s the multiplier effect. $3 Trillion+ in extra fake money in circulation.

I do not know what Goldman’s markup is. Let’s say it’s 10%. So $3.1 Trillion is created out of thin air. Poof! The money came from nowhere but it still has an effect. And it has to be paid for despite not being real.

The government gets to spend their Trillion in debt immediately – on war, healthcare, a mission to Mars – literally the sky is the limit (or space). Later the taxpayers will pay that back to the Fed, with interest (on money that never existed). Goldman will instantly pay off its $1 Trillion loan from the Fed through the subsequent sale to the Fed. They keep their 10% – $100 Billion! Good to be them.

Now the Fed will have on the crooked books: the asset of the Treasuries, and: the liability for the $1.1 Trillion to buy them. The balance went to Goldman, remember. Given enough time and hard work and sweat from the taxpaying saps, this liability and associated asset would balance out – back to zero. But, in the meantime, the Fed has that $1 Trillion asset just sitting there! They won’t let it go to waste.

They will use it as an asset to loan more fake money to more commercial banks (in America and abroad). More multiplying. More debt based on something that doesn’t exist.

All of this excess fake money floating around drives down the value of existing money – Gresham’s Law. This makes the taxpayer’s hard-earned money – that little money they’re allowed to keep when not repaying debt and interest via taxes on loans that never really existed – less valuable even as the prices of the things they must buy rise (monetary inflation). In other words, while the globalist instantly profit, the taxpayers take it in both ends for the duration.

Yes, even as the banks instantly get richer for doing nothing, the people get poorer. And this crazed debt cycle runs parallel to the usual business cycle (boom, bust, growth, contraction, …) until the next recession, depression, or downturn – when it will all be repeated.

That’s partly the nature of these bars on the graph from Zero Hedge:

expansion-duration

We’re at the end of the red bar (2009-present). That’s supposed to be a boom market or good times. For most they haven’t felt so good. And that’s because the people have struggled with the debt and inflation and lose of buying power from the last round of QE, circa 2008-09.

Cozy, huh? This cycle will keep repeating until the economy totally collapses or until the people finally wake up and rise up (or both).

From the graph one can also see we are, by historical average, overdue for a recession right now.

Additionally from the graph one might catch a glimpse of the Depression of 1921. It was the one immediately prior to the Great Depression. And it only lasted for six months. That’s because it was the last major depression/recession before the Fed really got the game up and running.

Cycles naturally come and go. They naturally correct themselves in very rapid fashion. It takes a central bank and a government, working together, to prolong their effects – and to build upon the cycle for the next time.

It seems the next time is coming and the criminals are already planning for it. If you don’t mind flirting with utter disaster and if you’re not ready to wake up yet, then at least heed the warnings. They’ve already told you so. If you’re caught off guard, that’s on you. Hell, it’s all going to be on you anyway…

Taxing Matters, the Waiting Game

23 Thursday Feb 2017

Posted by in Legal/Political Columns

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

Bloomberg laments (or ponders) that it has been 31 years since the U.S. saw meaningful tax reform. They looked at what happened in 1986:

The result was a comprehensive bill that slashed individual and corporate rates while compensating for the lost revenue by closing loopholes. That meant eliminating tax advantages enjoyed by powerful interest groups like the oil and real-estate industries and overcoming their formidable allies in Congress.

On the way, the 1986 tax bill nearly died on multiple occasions as lobbyists pressed their cases. Throughout almost two years of debate and negotiation, the conventional wisdom was that the proposal would not survive. It was defeated once in the House. The Senate, with Democrats and Republicans equally beholden to special interests, appeared to be a certain graveyard.

Then, as the bill reached final passage, Senate Republican Leader Bob Dole marveled that in a matter of days, it went from “immovable to unstoppable.” It cleared the Senate by 97 votes to three. A combination of will, skill and ideological flexibility made it possible.

While pining for has-beens who occupied Congress for far too long, they also looked, tentatively, towards the rest of 2017.

Republicans envision a new sales tax on domestic and imported goods and services dubbed a “border adjustment tax,” a variation of a European-style value-added levy that would favor exporters like Boeing and Caterpillar over equally powerful consumer-product companies like Wal-Mart and Target, not to mention consumers themselves. There’s economic merit to the idea since it would raise money to enable rate cuts and avoids the crude protectionism that Trump has championed.

But it would create a big new tax, and already some House conservatives are objecting. So has the right-wing advocacy group Americans for Prosperity, which was founded by the Republican mega-donors Charles and David Koch.

Yes, the border tax. Therein could lurk the double-edge. The playing field needs leveling. The taxes might, or might not, do it. Cutting regulations and taxes, and reigning in the Fed certainly would. Who knows at this point? But, there is always some cause for concern.

In 1986, the tax cuts in some areas were accompanied by increases in others. Federal spending and debt continued to grow, unabated. Then there was the quiet inclusion in the deal of the Firearms Owners Protection Act (FOPA). FOPA did nothing to protect anyone other than federal bureaucrats. It drastically limited the number of available automatic weapons – driving costs through the roof and into the stratosphere. Gun grabbers were pleased. Most of the public didn’t notice.

The grabbers are still at work, recent defeats aside. I suspect they will at least attempt to introduce some type of gun control into whatever tax reforms Trump proposes this year. They must be defeated.

Then again, we now know very little about what is planned for the rest of this year. Treasury Secretary Goldman Sachs Steven Mnuchin says a major overhaul is coming by August. We will see.

President Trump will address Congress next Tuesday, his first State of the Union remarks. It is a given he will discuss, in some fashion, the need for tax reform, among other measures. Details have been short. He’s also due to present a budget to Congress in the very near future. Tax details may be in there as well – again, details are in short supply.

So we’re going to continue on, and we’re going to take this budget, which is — in all fairness, I’ve only been here for four weeks, so I can’t take too much of the blame for what’s happened. But it is absolutely out of control, and we’re going to do things that are going to be tremendous over the years. We have to take care of our military. We have no choice, we have to take care of our military. It needs work; it’s very depleted. And we have to take care of a lot of other things.

Healthcare is moving along nicely. It’s being put into final forms. As you know, before we do the tax — which is actually very well finalized — but we can’t submit it until the healthcare, statutorily or otherwise. So we’re doing the healthcare. Again, moving along very well. Sometime during the month of March, maybe mid- to early March we will be submitting something that I think people will be very impressed by.

-Trump, Budget Meeting, Feb. 22, 2017.

I hope there’s something in it to be impressed with. The healthcare (or lack) is a tax itself. And I’m not sure why they can’t be reconciled together. At any rate, this is wait and see at this point.

While we wait we can look back at the history of taxation in America, the last 104 years. Bloomberg provided this graph:

nimbus-image-1487859364957

So much can be learned by simply tracking those little lines. Before 1913, the tax rates were ZERO – no taxes. Then, just as soon as they were in place, they skyrocketed. Their trajectory closely follows wars, economic turmoil, and social spending boondoggles. Their decline since the 70s paces the insane growth of debt spending – again, the spending is not dependent of the taxes and it does not stop.

It’s too much to hope that Trump wants to return to a 1912ish sound government. Still, there’s a modicum of hope. Hope tinged with caution. Keep the guns, kill the taxes.