waitforufo

Great idea. I'm sure if congress and the president starting pushing such laws gun and ammo sales would go through the roof. Of course they would ultimatlely fail, but economic growth here we come.

Talk of gun control always produces the opposite of the desired result. So much so the wall street journal recently mentioned that perhaps the gun industry pushes gun control to increase sales. Below are data the wsj published on gun sales in the first three months of the year from 1998 to present. Also Sturm Ruger firearms says they currently have a back order of 2 million guns. http://www.guns.com/2013/05/01/sturm-ruger-firearms-backlog-hits-a-record-breaking-2-million/ Also ammo is in very short supply due to hording by the public. http://triblive.com/news/allegheny/3804304-74/ammunition-million-gun#axzz2S56ooott So an unintended consequence of pushing gun control is economic stimulus. What a way to fix the economy.

Really? Congress members and their staff had no more to do with this than I did? I think you are wrong on that point. Why do they deserve punishment? Government forces us to participate in this program. They should force themselves as well. I haven't seen your posts in a while. Good to hear from you. The Grassley amendment is intended to make sure those in Government feel the full force of Obamacare. Those exchanges were supposed to be the cats meow. If they are not so great, those in government should feel it first. I hope they do.

So why not exempt all people who for whom Obamacare will have a negative financial outcome? Why only government employees? Right now employers across the country are putting people on part time to avoid paying for medical insurance, cutting their medical coverage of others because the tax penalty is cheaper than insurance, or both. My opinion is that if Obamacare is going to hurt anyone, it should hurt government employees the most. Also why not just extend the subsidy mentioned in your link? My guess. Eliminating the subsidy was part of the Obamacare "savings."

If Obamacare is such a great idea, why shouldn't it apply to our lawmakers and their staff? http://www.politico.com/story/2013/04/obamacare-exemption-lawmakers-aides-90610.html Why does anything need to be done? Obamacare is awesome! Hypocrites? Why would anyone think that? We all know that those in government are better than the rest of us. Right? Well for this to be true one has to assume that those in government have brains, which is a stretch. Now why would anyone want to flee the amazing benefits of Obamacare? It's fun to watch the White House try to delay Obamacare mandates due to come into effect next year in the hope of winning the House in 2014. The above won't play into that too well.

The hard part is figuring out that it can be done. Hence the Manhattan project. Once its been done, repeating it is generally not a problem.

Airbrush, I think the general consensus is that bombs don't kill people. People kill people.

Don't you think the cat is out of the bag on this one? As a 12 year old I made black powder from instructions I found in an old set of encyclopedias. The black powder worked great.

“Someone with clout wants it that way” sounds too much like a conspiracy theory to me. I think the complexity in the tax code is there for a simple reason. Greater tax revenue is desired. So instead of simply raising taxes that would be immediately perceived by the public, clever ways are found to hide taxes. Doing so reduces the ire of the public towards those raising taxes. This begins the shell game. No, it’s not you paying for this new tax we are told, it’s corporations, It’s the rich, its someone else, so don’t worry about this new tax. Don’t buy into the lie. It’s you paying the taxes. All taxes trickle down. In terms of percentage of personal income the poor always more greatly impacted. Tax simplification would only expose this in clear terms. Those that want increased tax revenues will therefore always avoid tax simplification.

Phi for All, The intention of my question “Why do you find this to be complex?” was not intended as a personal attack. I apologize for my clumsy question. My intention was simply to understand further you line of thinking. Yes, the people pay for all the manufacturing equipment, the buildings and the rest of the real assets businesses own. They pay for this willingly because they desire the products or services that the business provides. If this were not true the business would fail. The business owns these assets because they took the risk and provided the initial capital creating the ability to provide the desired goods or services. Those that take the risks reap the rewards. That is the way it has always been and always will be. You believe the business have mastered media spin and that “This spin makes them seem patriotic and wholesome while they withhold a fair share of taxes that help maintain the country whose protections and bounty they enjoy.” Again you fall into the trap that businesses withhold a fair share of taxes. They do no such thing. Yes they avoid taxes in meeting their fiduciary to their shareholders. They also avoid taxes to keep the price of the goods or services they sell low so as to increase their market. All the taxes they do pay however are passed on to their customers. So who pays these taxes? Look no further than akh’s post above. He states that “80 percent of Americans hold only 8.4% of the stocks.” That 80% are the customers of these tax paying businesses. So, those business taxes are paid primarily by this same 80%. Is that your intention? This was the source of my question “Why do you find this to be complex?” I really would like to know how you see this differently than I? My belief is that ultimately I pay every tax. No matter how the government structures the tax code ultimately I am impacted by every tax enacted. I pay. So do all my fellow citizens. I’m not going to fall victim to this tax code shell game. I know where the pea is. It is always under my shell and the shell of my neighbors. There is no other place for it to be. I’m baffled by the needless complexity of our tax code. Why not just have a value added tax? At least such a tax system would be honest. Not progressive enough for you? Well that can be taken care of by progressive distribution of tax revenues. Akh, I reread the Bloomberg article. The article states over and over again the profits made offshore are being held offshore. Nowhere does it say they are transferring profits made domestically to offshore accounts to avoid taxes. The article states that holdiing profits made offshore “is increasing because of incentives in the U.S. tax code for booking profits offshore and leaving them there.” As an example look what the article says about Apple. “A reason for the overseas cash growth can be linked in part to Apple’s performance. Sales in Asia, Europe and Australia rose 43.7 percent to $80.2 billion in fiscal 2012.” Earnings booked offshore and being held offshore.

Well, I hate to break this to you but businesses pay commercial vehicle registration taxes which are much higher than the vehicle taxes you and I pay. They also pay fuel taxes. They also pay taxes when they use airports. All of these taxes pay for infrastructure. All of those taxes paid by business are then passed on to the consumers of the products and services provided by those businesses. They should be. The consumers are the beneficiaries of the infrastructure use. The people pay all the taxes. They always have and always will. Yes the government comes up with creative ways to fool some into believing that others are paying but its not true. Why do you find this to be complex?

There are lots of banks. To suggest otherwise is rather silly. Banks are competitive so I'm sure there are other banks that provide competitive return. There is nothing immoral about profit. There would be no business without profit. As I mentioned, corporations are morally bound to make profit for their investors. Without profit, why would anyone invest? GE is a multinational conglomerate corporation. People who invest in GE appreciate this. Most who invest in GE treat it like a blended national/international mutual fund. The advantage GE has over such funds is that stocks have lower fees than mutual funds. You act as if you are being robbed of your national infrastructure dividend, but can you site some source that shows that these offshore funds had anything to do with GE operations within the US? How do you know that these offshore funds were not made in foreign countries by foreign entities owned by GE to be reinvested into those foreign countries to give them their infrastructure dividend? I find it interesting that anyone believes that increased corporate taxes will only result in reduced corporate profits. Taxes are a business expense. Business expenses are charged to customers. So increasing corporate taxes will simply increase prices to consumers. As these prices increase there will be less demand for the products or services taxed. Corporations will then reduce production and their workforces in response to lower demand in order to keep the profit ratio per good or service sold the same. With the money they save in reduced operations they will invest in other operations which meet their profit goals. The location of those other operations will in part be based on the tax structure of the location involved. So if you want more companies offshoring there operations, tax corporations more. Finally, don't you think you are overplaying this whole infrastructure dividend idea? Do you not personally receive great benefit from our infrastructure? If you want to receive more, why don't you take greater personal advantage of the infrastructure? The infrastructure is available to us all.

Corporations have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. Avoiding taxes is an integral part of meeting this fiduciary responsibility. To do otherwise would be immoral. Yes, they must operate within the law when acting in this fiduciary capacity, but holding earnings made offshore from the US in offshore accounts, from the links you provided, does not appear to be illegal. So it is not criminal. You state that “As far as I can tell, shareholders don’t even get a return, its straight profit for the corporations.” This is nonsense. The shareholders own all the assets of the corporation, both domestic and foreign. Corporate stock prices generally increase when a company holds more cash. The fact that corporate officers are wise enough to avoid needlessly paying taxes also tends to increase stock prices by providing greater faith in the corporate officers. Shareholders can profit from these cash holdings any time they choose. They simply need to sell some of the stock. Perhaps I’m behind the times but last time I checked HSBC is a British bank. The money laundering they did was very bad, but I don’t see how it is related to American corporations holding profits from foreign operations in foreign banks. Based on the actions of HSBC I think American corporations should avoid HSBC but I’m sure there are other banks. With regard to these foreign accounts being unpatriotic, I don’t see how. Americans own these corporations. Stocks from these corporations are in the mutual fund accounts of many Americans. These Americans will rely on their stock holdings and mutual funds for their retirement. Why would rewarding Americans who have saved for their retirement be unpatriotic? With regard to schools, I believe the US out spends most countries per student. So the problem isn’t spending. The problem seems to be more related to how we teach and importance we culturally place on education. I believe H-1B visas have lowered my salary. But then again day laborers must not be too happy with the federal government turning a blind eye to illegal immigration and amnesty for those who come here illegally.

Akh, swansont, and overtone; I have reviewed my above posts (21, 25, and 28) to see if I ever claimed that the poor were lazy. I cannot find such a claim. What I said was that the poor in the US have been made dependent and those that have made them dependent know of the damage that they are doing and persist. Counter to such a claim of laziness, I have pointed out that America is a country where people have in the past, and continue to find to be a refuge from poverty. A country where immigrants arrive with nothing, don’t speak the common language, and succeed in moving up to the middle class. While overtone might think this to be "bullshit" it is a common American story. So common it applies to all of my great grandparents. People who succeeded during a time without welfare. swansont; Mobility has always been and will continue to be an important tool in elevating oneself out of poverty. My initial post was in part in response to your statement regarding a lack of trailer parks in big cities, and my response to that was two part. One, move it you can't succeed where you are. Two, government assistance makes staying put a more attractive alternative hence creating dependency. Why go into the unknown when your assistance check makes where you are tolerable? Also, most assistance it tied to where you live. Move and you lose it. Finally, since you all brought it up I guess we have to talk about "corporate welfare." While I would love to talk about subsidies for wind, solar, and biofuel, a total waste of money, I'm sure you would rather talk about Exxon-Mobile. Exxon-Mobile pays billions of dollars in taxes at local, state, and federal levels. Yes, the government feels the need to encourage them to conduct their business in ways they may not choose through the tax code. Also the government further incentivizes them to act in ways they may already choose to act for the benefit of the country through the tax code. Either way they still pay billions in taxes providing a product that is then further taxed when purchased by consumers. I know you feel that these tax based incentives are "corporate welfare" and a great injustice. But if they are abolished, who do you think will actually pay for the elimination of these tax incentives, or "corporate welfare" as you prefer? The shareholders of Exxon-Mobile? No. Exxon-Mobile will simply pass these costs onto consumers. That is how all business deal with taxes. If they didn't, they would go out of business. So go look in a mirror if you want to know who will pay for the elimination of "corporate welfare."

Obviously you are intelligent enough to understand that North Dakota was simply one example. Immigrants flood into this country every year to take advantage of the opportunity found in various locations in the US. These immigrants often arrive without the ability to speak English. 11 million of them have come understanding the difficulties of succeeding while being here illegally, and yet they come. Our domestic poor however stay where they are locked in government dependency. Why? America is a country made from people that arrived on its shores with nothing but the clothes on their backs. People that started out on the bottom rung of the ladder and then move from there to the middle class. How did this get broken? Bleeding hearts like menageriemanor who strive to make poverty tolerable broke this. They created a welfare system that teaches the poor to work harder for government benefit checks than for pay checks.

Are the people south of the US border somehow more ingenious than the people living in NY City, Boston, or Philadelphia? Somehow 11 million current illegal immigrants to the US have figured out how to move. The Irish in the middle of a famine figured it out. Millions of Italians in poverty figured it out even though the immigrated without papers (WOP). But people in our own country can’t figure out how to move from one state to another? Perhaps they don’t move because they don’t trust that there assistance checks will be forwarded.

Thank you for pointing out that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. By the way who would invest in a retirement plan that only promised to pay out as much as they paid in? I have a mattress at home for that. Any person that invested 15% their money (personal plus employer contribution to Social Security) in a ladder of bonds over their lifetime would retire very comfortably. Guess what? Such a person would also receive way more from such a retirement fund then they put in. So what is your point? The government forces you to pay into a system with a promised benefit. I paid, so I’m entitled. The least they could do is keep their promise. In my lifetime they have changed the retirement age, and they have made Social Security income taxable. Now they talk about means testing it. What's next? No but they do have trailer parks in North Dakota. Lots of jobs too. Somehow the people south of the US border have figured this out. People who live in real poverty. So why don’t the poor in NY City, Boston, or Philadelphia move like those people from Mexico and nations further south? I have moved several times in my career. Why shouldn’t the poor in NY City, Boston, or Philadelphia? ParanoiA, you are wasting your time with this topic. Never forget that that the welfare state is the foundation of liberal political thought in America. The worst part is that they know the damage they are doing to those that they have addicted to dependency. The payment they receive from the addicted is votes. The sad thing is that they are winning.

Never let a crises go to waste.

They do waste incineration in my area. The point of incinerating waste is to reduce the volume of wasted before it is placed in a landfill. Power generation is simply a byproduct. We also have a very active recycling plan but not all waste is fit for recycling. For example, cardboard is recycled but pizza boxes are not because they are too greasy. We have two trash cans; one for waste and one for recyclables. There is no sorting of the trash in the trash can. I is simply considered too labor intensive for the limited amount of clean recyclables that would be recovered. It is my understanding that some of what is put in the recyclables can is also incinerated. This is mostly because people are not careful and don’t clean items before putting them in the recyclables can. So for example if you put a half full plastic container in the recyclables can and the contents spills onto other items in the can much of that can is often rejected and incinerated.

"The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation. " -Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler, Publ. Houghton Miflin, 1943, Page 403

I don't think this statement quite hits the nail on the head. Isoroku Yamamoto, Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II, at the onset of war with the United States is quoted to have said "You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass." Any domestic would be tyrant would have the same problem. So citizens of the United States don’t have to worry about Hitler or their twinkies. Would be tyrants and twinkie takers have to worry about us. The second amendment is just part of our checks and balances.

Since you ride you can't be all bad. Also, I appreciate the kind words. I'm not quite sure what it is with liberals, but you hang on to your idealism longer than most. I have read many of your posts where you express frustration and disgust over how the government spends the public's money. We only disagree on the topics for such expressions. When you lose your idealism you will begin to realize that the best way to end the madness is to simply leave the money with the public. A good place to start is to turn off the TV news. I haven't watched in 10 years. I'm sorry, but when someone takes your money, even with the best of intentions, and flushes it down the toilet, that's stealing. Last time I was in Texas, all I remember is that was very flat and hot. Everywhere I have lived I found good rides and I'm sure Texas is the same. North Carolina and Tennessee have particularly good rides, but the mountain people are racist aholes. Nothing however beats the rides in the inland Northwest. Washington, Idaho, Montana, British Columbia, and Oregon have lots of twisties, friendly people, cheap motels, and great watering holes for after the ride. The bear tooth Hwy, Chef Joseph Hwy, lost trail pass, Lolo pass, Thompson Pass, the ice fields parkway, the devils tail (Oregon) and the Olympic Peninsula to name just a few. Lot's of dirt trails and roads too if that's your preference. If you get tired of hot and flat head north and I will show you.

There have been a lot of comments since my last post. Forgive me for not providing quotes from these comments in this reply. It would take too much effort particularly since I haven’t figured out the new science forums system. Perhaps a little more about me would provide some context to my posting. I was raised in a middle class family in a middle class neighborhood. I have 8 siblings so my family was always cash strapped. Like my neighbor friends, most of the clothes I wore came from thrift stores or hand-me-downs. Several of our neighbors received welfare assistance in the form of food stamps and government surplus food. I remember how good that government peanut butter that came in a large can tasted. I had dyslexia so I was never a stellar student. I was put back a grade in primary school in part because of this learning disability. Also because I liked to day dream a lot instead of studying. I graduated from high school with a 2.8 only because I took the minimum state requirements and filled in the rest with shop classes. I remember taking the Washington State college placement test and it said I read at a 7th grade level. I don't recall anyone having high expectations of me at my high school graduation. After high school I got a job working at a local tractor trailer factory and moved into a small studio apartment in part to relieve my parents of my financial burdens. After 6 months of this I thought I could achieve a bit more in life with a better education. I switched to swing shift at the factory and went to community college to become a certified electronics technician. I did not receive an associate's degree in this one year course. At the end of the one year of training I took a test, which only required a 70% to pass, and earned my Certified Electronics Technician (CET) certificate. I also passed FCC tests and earned my 1st class radiotelephone license. I spent a year fixing stereos and CB radios at a local electronics shop while living in my studio. During that time I met a girl going to a local university. She talked me into trying college. I went expecting to flunk out, but I tried hard wanting to have no regrets when the inevitable flunk out happened. I took electrical engineering simply because I thought my previous education would help me out. I continued to work through collage so by BSEE took me six years to earn. When I graduated in '85 I was married to my pregnant wife, owned a '69 VW beetle, had $800 in the bank but no debt. Since then I have lived in 5 states and have had 7 employers. I was laid off 4 years ago and worked as an engineering contractor for year before finding my current employer. Other than that one year I have always worked for a wage. I live in a modest middle class neighborhood in a modest home. I have three grown children who attended public school. I drive second hand cars and motorcycles which I fix myself. I have a passion for riding motorcycles. I would say it's the only real risk I take in my life. I own my home, have no debt, and have over a million dollars in investments and cash. I have never inherited a dime from anyone and neither did my parents. Because of my parents frugality I may share an inheritance with my siblings. I say may because my 80 year old widow mother is doing a good job enjoying her retirement savings. I hope she spends it all before she is done and I hope the government gets none. The only part of the above I remember being a hardship was the teasing I got for being put back in the third grade and the year I worked as a contractor. My secret to financial success? Work hard, push for promotions, quit and find another job if advancement isn't available, delay gratification, and save money like you just might run out one day. By the way I ran out quite often early on. Perhaps I could add take jobs others won't take and always be willing to move across the country. I think I would even have more wealth if I had any talent at investing. Knowing that I suck at investing I put most of my money in conservative domestic mutual funds, corporate bonds, and cash. The bonds and cash part however meant the recent stock crash didn't hurt me as bad as others. It still hurt. I always considered housing to be disposable so I didn't get caught up in real estate boom. I don't remember acquiring wealth to be particularly difficult. Four of my eight siblings are in similar financial circumstances. Some of them still live in my home town and have kept up with our childhood friends. Some of those childhood friends are dead, some are struggling financially, and some are doing as well if not better than I am. iNow, it amazes me that you need citations to prove that above is common. Perhaps you should change your attitude. I always knew it was possible and found acquiring wealth to be a simple routine aspect of life. Also your images in post 30 are quite telling about your attitude. If I'm in either of those images, I'm one of the people in the bleachers that paid to get in. While I'm sure you will disagree, I always pay my own way. I think Airbrush says it best with "The reason you should pay a greater percentage of taxes is because the poor certainly cannot pay more ". To me this says "we don't care how honestly you came by the cash, we don't have any so we are taking yours." I like honesty. That is why iNow's comment about "asking" bothers me. It implies that he and those like him are the reasonable ones. There is nothing reasonable about the situation. Coveting and stealing are common human flaws and those that do it always find good sounding rationalizations. Tearing me down by stealing wealth won't build anyone up. You will just have to move on to coveting a stealing from others with less. Margaret Thatcher said it best when she said eventually you will run out of other people's money. You should worry more about making stories like mine possible. Instead you are working to increase dependency.

Well I guess I just need to blow all my cash and join handout crowd. Thankfully it is easy to become deserving and entitled. At least I will have a lot of toys to enjoy.

Luck. I never felt particularly lucky. Does your belief in luck make it easier for you to take from those that you have deemed lucky? Superior. If anything my belief in my inferiority has been a main motivation to hard work. I was put back a grade in primary school do to dyslexia. Life has taught me that I have to work considerably harder to achieve comparable results to others. I have always been willing to do that work and more. Do you consider that luck? Does it make me more deserving of taxation? In your rebuttal you stated "What's wrong with asking people who have benefited from our common infrastructure to give back and help pay for that same infrastructure once they've realized that benefit?" To me this seems to be the cardinal on which your argument hangs. This is why I responded only to this comment. My comment regards how, in this statement, you look only at the current outcome. For most people wealth isn't acquired in a day it is acquired over a lifetime. One person benefits from our common infrastructure by enjoying the moment. Another person stores up his benefits over a lifetime as wealth. To each their own. Both pay along the way but only one ends up with wealth. There is no justice in forcing the latter to pay more in taxes. Your "asking" statement, in my opinion, is implying that it is only reasonable to expect a wealthy person to pay more. It would be generous but not reasonable. I meant no aspersions in my statements. You are simply being too sensitive.