Economics

[Foxfyre]

. Thinking that government can manage the economy more effectively than the private sector can.

the liberals thinks this because he lacks the IQ to understand capitalism. Lacking the IQ to understand, the liberal turns to faith in govt like a child turns to faith in Santa Claus or religon.

But even there the liberal has faith only if the government is leftwing and politically correct. Look how they can't find ANYTHING in the Bush 43 administration to praise--everything that was done was considered wrong even though in some things he was almost as leftwing as Obama. I disagreed with W on his prescription entitlement, his immigration policy, his Iraq policy, his support of the global warming doctrine, and an energy policy that only a full-fledged flaming left winger could love. But I can also acknowledge what he got right just as I an acknowledge what Obama gets right. But they can't be any kind of objective when it comes to a Republican.

But you are right that they do not understand capitalism. They have been taught certain code words involving the greedy rich, getting rich 'on the backs of the poor', and other key prhases, but most have almost no concept of what any of it really means and they couldn't explain it in their own words, without using assigned talking points, if their lives depended on it.

 

[Dad2three]

. Thinking that government can manage the economy more effectively than the private sector can.

the liberals thinks this because he lacks the IQ to understand capitalism. Lacking the IQ to understand, the liberal turns to faith in govt like a child turns to faith in Santa Claus or religon.

But even there the liberal has faith only if the government is leftwing and politically correct. Look how they can't find ANYTHING in the Bush 43 administration to praise--everything that was done was considered wrong even though in some things he was almost as leftwing as Obama. I disagreed with W on his prescription entitlement, his immigration policy, his Iraq policy, his support of the global warming doctrine, and an energy policy that only a full-fledged flaming left winger could love. But I can also acknowledge what he got right just as I an acknowledge what Obama gets right. But they can't be any kind of objective when it comes to a Republican.

But you are right that they do not understand capitalism. They have been taught certain code words involving the greedy rich, getting rich 'on the backs of the poor', and other key prhases, but most have almost no concept of what any of it really means and they couldn't explain it in their own words, without using assigned talking points, if their lives depended on it.

Another ignorant right winger who ONLY has false premises, distortions and lies in his bucket


Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory



The conclusion?

Lowering the tax rates on the wealthy and top earners in America do not appear to have any impact on the nation’s economic growth.

This paragraph from the report says it all—

“The reduction in the top tax rates appears to be uncorrelated with saving, investment and productivity growth. The top tax rates appear to have little or no relation to the size of the economic pie. However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution.”

These three sentences do nothing less than blow apart the central tenet of modern conservative economic theory, confirming that lowering tax rates on the wealthy does nothing to grow the economy while doing a great deal to concentrate more wealth in the pockets of those at the very top of the income chain.

Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory-GOP Suppresses Study - Forbes




Why Thomas Jefferson Favored Profit Sharing
By David Cay Johnston

The founders, despite decades of rancorous disagreements about almost every other aspect of their grand experiment, agreed that America would survive and thrive only if there was widespread ownership of land and businesses.

George Washington, nine months before his inauguration as the first president, predicted that America "will be the most favorable country of any kind in the world for persons of industry and frugality, possessed of moderate capital, to inhabit." And, he continued, "it will not be less advantageous to the happiness of the lowest class of people, because of the equal distribution of property."

The second president, John Adams, feared "monopolies of land" would destroy the nation and that a business aristocracy born of inequality would manipulate voters, creating "a system of subordination to all... The capricious will of one or a very few" dominating the rest. Unless constrained, Adams wrote, "the rich and the proud" would wield economic and political power that "will destroy all the equality and liberty, with the consent and acclamations of the people themselves."

James Madison, the Constitution's main author, described inequality as an evil, saying government should prevent "an immoderate, and especially unmerited, accumulation of riches." He favored "the silent operation of laws which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigents towards a state of comfort."


Alexander Hamilton, who championed manufacturing and banking as the first Treasury secretary, also argued for widespread ownership of assets, warning in 1782 that, "whenever a discretionary power is lodged in any set of men over the property of their neighbors, they will abuse it."

Late in life, Adams, pessimistic about whether the republic would endure, wrote that the goal of the democratic government was not to help the wealthy and powerful but to achieve "the greatest happiness for the greatest number."



http://www.newsweek.com/2014/02/07/why-thomas-jefferson-favored-profit-sharing-245454.html

 

[regent]

and where in the Constitution is capitalism found?

capitalism was the system in place at the time. THe Commerce Clause was designed to improve capitalist competition and prevent states from interfering.

The system in place at the time, is not a clause in the Constitution. Many things were in place at the time but now gone or altered. Capitalism is not found in the Constitution.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

. Thinking that government can manage the economy more effectively than the private sector can.

the liberals thinks this because he lacks the IQ to understand capitalism. Lacking the IQ to understand, the liberal turns to faith in govt like a child turns to faith in Santa Claus or religon.

But even there the liberal has faith only if the government is leftwing and politically correct. Look how they can't find ANYTHING in the Bush 43 administration to praise--everything that was done was considered wrong even though in some things he was almost as leftwing as Obama. I disagreed with W on his prescription entitlement, his immigration policy, his Iraq policy, his support of the global warming doctrine, and an energy policy that only a full-fledged flaming left winger could love. But I can also acknowledge what he got right just as I an acknowledge what Obama gets right. But they can't be any kind of objective when it comes to a Republican.

But you are right that they do not understand capitalism. They have been taught certain code words involving the greedy rich, getting rich 'on the backs of the poor', and other key prhases, but most have almost no concept of what any of it really means and they couldn't explain it in their own words, without using assigned talking points, if their lives depended on it.

well put!! I would add that much of liberalism is based on a sense of moral superiority growing out of their support for every form of welfare entitlement there is. This false sense of superiority makes them bigots on top of everything else.

 

[Dad2three]

IMO the problem we run into trying to discuss economics on the Internet is that it so often boils down to absurd statements:

1. Reagan (or whomever is in office at the time) did this that produced bad results, therefore nothing he did that works counts and should be dismissed. . . or. . .Obama (or whomever is in office at the time) did this that produced good results and therefore everything he does is wonderful. . .or . . .this or that country did this or that with good or bad effect and we should do or avoid what they did.

2. Capitalism bad - Keynesianism good - or vice versa or whatever when it is obvious the poster was assigned what to say about both and doesn't have a clue what either actually is.

3. Thinking government is the best agent to fix the economy.

4. Thinking government can fix the economy.

5. Overstating and understating the effects of taxes on the economy with no real understanding of what the effects actually are..

6. Thinking more taxes, regulation, government authority, etc. would automatically fix everything. Thinking less taxes, regulation, government authority would automatically fix everything. . . in both cases without understanding the effect that all these have on the economy.

7. Thinking we can tax and/or spend ourselves into prosperity.

8. Thinking that prosperity can be achieved by making the rich less rich or the strong less strong.

9. Thinking that poverty can be relieved by giving more benefits to the poor.

10. Thinking that government can manage the economy more effectively than the private sector can.

Name a country that cut it's way to prosperity?

(Re-)Introducing: The American School of Economics



When the United States became independent from Britain it also rebelled against the British System of economics, characterized by Adam Smith, in favor of the American School based on protectionism and infrastructure and prospered under this system for almost 200 years to become the wealthiest nation in the world. Unrestrained free trade resurfaced in the early 1900s culminating in the Great Depression and again in the 1970s culminating in the current Economic Meltdown.




Closely related to mercantilism, it can be seen as contrary to classical economics. It consisted of these three core policies:

protecting industry through selective high tariffs (especially 1861–1932) and through subsidies (especially 1932–70)

government investments in infrastructure creating targeted internal improvements (especially in transportation)

a national bank with policies that promote the growth of productive enterprises rather than speculation.


Frank Bourgin's 1989 study of the Constitutional Convention shows that direct government involvement in the economy was intended by the Founders.

The goal, most forcefully articulated by Hamilton, was to ensure that dearly won political independence was not lost by being economically and financially dependent on the powers and princes of Europe. The creation of a strong central government able to promote science, invention, industry and commerce, was seen as an essential means of promoting the general welfare and making the economy of the United States strong enough for them to determine their own destiny.

American School of Economics


American School (economics) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Toro]

rofl

leftards

 

[Dad2three]

why did they meet the second time?

because first time not enough showed up to change Articles! In the end there was barely enough support to move from Articles.

Ignorant right winger

At what came to be known as the Annapolis Convention, the few state delegates in attendance endorsed a motion that called for all states to meet in Philadelphia in May 1787 to discuss ways to improve the Articles of Confederation in a "Grand Convention." Although the states' representatives to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were only authorized to amend the Articles, the representatives held secret, closed-door sessions and wrote a new constitution

 

[Dad2three]

rofl

leftards

NOT a fukng right wing moron

 

[Toro]

rofl

leftards

NOT a fukng right wing moron

Deranged leftard thinks that not swallowing idiotic lefttard garbage makes someone a conservative.

And by idiotic leftard garbage, I mean this

Unrestrained free trade resurfaced in the early 1900s culminating in the Great Depression and again in the 1970s culminating in the current Economic Meltdown.

rofl

what a retard.

 

[Dad2three]

rofl

leftards

NOT a fukng right wing moron

Deranged leftard thinks that not swallowing idiotic lefttard garbage makes someone a conservative.

And by idiotic leftard garbage, I mean this

Unrestrained free trade resurfaced in the early 1900s culminating in the Great Depression and again in the 1970s culminating in the current Economic Meltdown.

rofl

what a retard.

"In the early part of the 20th century, we erected a series of protections – the Federal Reserve as a lender of last resort, federal deposit insurance, ample regulations – to provide a bulwark against the panics that had regularly plagued America’s banking system in the 20th century. Yet, over the past 30-plus years, we permitted the growth of a shadow banking system – opaque and laden with short term debt – that rivaled the size of the traditional banking system. Key components of the market – for example, the multitrillion-dollar repo lending market, off-balance-sheet entities, and the use of over-the-counter derivatives – were hidden from view, without the protections we had constructed to prevent financial meltdowns. We had a 21st-century financial system with 19th-century safeguards."


Get the Report : Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission


A long-time cheerleader for deregulation, Greenspan admitted to a congressional committee yesterday that he had been "partially wrong" in his hands-off approach towards the banking industry and that the credit crunch had left him in a state of shocked disbelief. "I have found a flaw," said Greenspan, referring to his economic philosophy. "I don't know how significant or permanent it is. But I have been very distressed by that fact."



"I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests of organisations, specifically banks and others, were such that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders and their equity in the firms," said Greenspan.


Greenspan - I was wrong about the economy. Sort of | Business | The Guardian


NO, IT WAS MONETARY POLICY, LOL, Fkng morons!

 

[Dad2three]

Punish the Executives, Not Just the Banks (New Yorker)

The short-term incentives for individuals on Wall Street continue to encourage risky and destructive business practices, writes James Surowiecki, which is why bank settlements aren't effecting change.


Punishing Wall Street Institutions Instead of People : The New Yorker

 

[Dad2three]

Roosevelt Take: William Lazonick explains how stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits.

Taking Stock | Roosevelt Institute


It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it.


Compensation schemes encouraged gambling: Wall Street’s compensation system was—and still is—based on short-term performance, all upside and no downside. This creates incentives to take excessive risks. The bonuses are extraordinarily large and they continue–$135 billion in 2010 for the 25 largest institutions and that is after the meltdown.


Wall Street became “creative”: The demand for higher-yielding paper led Wall Street to begin bundling mortgages. The highest yielding were subprime mortgages. This market was dominated by non-bank originators exempt from most regulations.

Lest We Forget: Why We Had A Financial Crisis - Forbes

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

Roosevelt Take: William Lazonick explains how stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits.

Taking Stock | Roosevelt Institute


It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it.


Compensation schemes encouraged gambling: Wall Street’s compensation system was—and still is—based on short-term performance, all upside and no downside. This creates incentives to take excessive risks. The bonuses are extraordinarily large and they continue–$135 billion in 2010 for the 25 largest institutions and that is after the meltdown.


Wall Street became “creative”: The demand for higher-yielding paper led Wall Street to begin bundling mortgages. The highest yielding were subprime mortgages. This market was dominated by non-bank originators exempt from most regulations.

Lest We Forget: Why We Had A Financial Crisis - Forbes

stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits

I'm glad Clinton punished rich execs by limiting deductible cash salary to $1 million.

 

[freedombecki]

Punish the Executives, Not Just the Banks (New Yorker)

The short-term incentives for individuals on Wall Street continue to encourage risky and destructive business practices, writes James Surowiecki, which is why bank settlements aren't effecting change.


Punishing Wall Street Institutions Instead of People : The New Yorker

So, The New Yorker wants a pound of flesh from those who earned their way to success? That is the fuzziest math I ever heard.

 

[Dad2three]

Roosevelt Take: William Lazonick explains how stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits.

Taking Stock | Roosevelt Institute


It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it.


Compensation schemes encouraged gambling: Wall Street’s compensation system was—and still is—based on short-term performance, all upside and no downside. This creates incentives to take excessive risks. The bonuses are extraordinarily large and they continue–$135 billion in 2010 for the 25 largest institutions and that is after the meltdown.


Wall Street became “creative”: The demand for higher-yielding paper led Wall Street to begin bundling mortgages. The highest yielding were subprime mortgages. This market was dominated by non-bank originators exempt from most regulations.

Lest We Forget: Why We Had A Financial Crisis - Forbes

stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits

I'm glad Clinton punished rich execs by limiting deductible cash salary to $1 million.

$1 Million unless it qualified as “performance based” pay




The 1980s witnessed a flourishing of different types of compensation, following Reagan's deep cuts in the top rates of income tax. Some of the techniques were seemingly unrelated to performance, such as "signing bonuses" for new CEOs and "guaranteed bonuses."


The highest federal marginal tax rate on income over $400,000 stood at 91 percent throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. Few executives in this era ever made more than 30 to 40 times the pay of their workers. By 1981, the year Ronald Reagan
entered the White House, this top rate had dropped to 70 percent. Under Reagan, the top rate quickly fell further,
first to 50, then to 28 percent.


The current top federal tax rates: 35 percent on “ordinary” income and just 15 percent on dividends and capital gains (20% today).


The pay ratio between CEOs of S&P 500 Index companies and average U.S. workers widened to 380-to-1 in 2011. In 1980, the average large company CEO only received 42 times the average
worker’s pay.



One key reason why: Our nation’s tax code has become a powerful enabler of bloated CEO pay.


Some tax rules on the books today essentially encourage corporations to compensate their executives at unconscionably higher multiples of what their average workers are paid.

Other rules let executives who run major corporations routinely reduce their corporate tax bills. The fewer dollars these
corporations pay in taxes, the more robust their cash flow and eventual earnings. The more robust these cash and earnings
numbers, the higher the “performance- based” pay for the CEOs who produce them


....Unlimited tax deductibility of executive pay

The more corporations pay their CEO, the lower their tax bill
Annual cost to taxpayers: $9.7 billion

Our laws currently impose no meaningful limit on how much corporations can deduct off their income taxes for the expense of executive compensation
.
A 1993 law capped executive pay deductions at $1 million, but left a huge loophole.


Corporations can exempt “performance-based” pay. Most companies simply limit top executive salaries to $1 million or so and then add on to that total various “performance-based” awards, with stock options making up the largest share.


http://www.ips-dc.org/wp-content/up...xcess-2012-CEO-Hands-In-Uncle-Sams-Pocket.pdf

 

[Dad2three]

Punish the Executives, Not Just the Banks (New Yorker)

The short-term incentives for individuals on Wall Street continue to encourage risky and destructive business practices, writes James Surowiecki, which is why bank settlements aren't effecting change.


Punishing Wall Street Institutions Instead of People : The New Yorker

So, The New Yorker wants a pound of flesh from those who earned their way to success? That is the fuzziest math I ever heard.

Earned? lol

 

[Foxfyre]

the liberals thinks this because he lacks the IQ to understand capitalism. Lacking the IQ to understand, the liberal turns to faith in govt like a child turns to faith in Santa Claus or religon.

But even there the liberal has faith only if the government is leftwing and politically correct. Look how they can't find ANYTHING in the Bush 43 administration to praise--everything that was done was considered wrong even though in some things he was almost as leftwing as Obama. I disagreed with W on his prescription entitlement, his immigration policy, his Iraq policy, his support of the global warming doctrine, and an energy policy that only a full-fledged flaming left winger could love. But I can also acknowledge what he got right just as I an acknowledge what Obama gets right. But they can't be any kind of objective when it comes to a Republican.

But you are right that they do not understand capitalism. They have been taught certain code words involving the greedy rich, getting rich 'on the backs of the poor', and other key prhases, but most have almost no concept of what any of it really means and they couldn't explain it in their own words, without using assigned talking points, if their lives depended on it.

Another ignorant right winger who ONLY has false premises, distortions and lies in his bucket


Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory



The conclusion?

Lowering the tax rates on the wealthy and top earners in America do not appear to have any impact on the nation’s economic growth.

This paragraph from the report says it all—

“The reduction in the top tax rates appears to be uncorrelated with saving, investment and productivity growth. The top tax rates appear to have little or no relation to the size of the economic pie. However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution.”

These three sentences do nothing less than blow apart the central tenet of modern conservative economic theory, confirming that lowering tax rates on the wealthy does nothing to grow the economy while doing a great deal to concentrate more wealth in the pockets of those at the very top of the income chain.

Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory-GOP Suppresses Study - Forbes




Why Thomas Jefferson Favored Profit Sharing
By David Cay Johnston

The founders, despite decades of rancorous disagreements about almost every other aspect of their grand experiment, agreed that America would survive and thrive only if there was widespread ownership of land and businesses.

George Washington, nine months before his inauguration as the first president, predicted that America "will be the most favorable country of any kind in the world for persons of industry and frugality, possessed of moderate capital, to inhabit." And, he continued, "it will not be less advantageous to the happiness of the lowest class of people, because of the equal distribution of property."

The second president, John Adams, feared "monopolies of land" would destroy the nation and that a business aristocracy born of inequality would manipulate voters, creating "a system of subordination to all... The capricious will of one or a very few" dominating the rest. Unless constrained, Adams wrote, "the rich and the proud" would wield economic and political power that "will destroy all the equality and liberty, with the consent and acclamations of the people themselves."

James Madison, the Constitution's main author, described inequality as an evil, saying government should prevent "an immoderate, and especially unmerited, accumulation of riches." He favored "the silent operation of laws which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigents towards a state of comfort."


Alexander Hamilton, who championed manufacturing and banking as the first Treasury secretary, also argued for widespread ownership of assets, warning in 1782 that, "whenever a discretionary power is lodged in any set of men over the property of their neighbors, they will abuse it."

Late in life, Adams, pessimistic about whether the republic would endure, wrote that the goal of the democratic government was not to help the wealthy and powerful but to achieve "the greatest happiness for the greatest number."



http://www.newsweek.com/2014/02/07/why-thomas-jefferson-favored-profit-sharing-245454.html

I may indeed be ignorant on many things, but you illustrate the point I was making by using the language/code words/talking points of the left to infer that the Founders meant something that they in fact did not mean at all. Certainly the goal of government should not be to help the wealthy and powerful but to treat every citizen the same and no differently than anybody else. They would have been horrified at the federal meddling in areas of welfare, entitlements, grants, etc. that they, pretty much to a man saw as no function of the central government. They would have known that the trillions that the federal government has poured into poverty programs in an effort to redistribute wealth has ultimately done more harm than good. They didn't look to anecdotal evidence but always to the whole picture.

The Founders were determined that the federal government was to NOT give anybody discretionary powers over the property of their neighbors, but the left constantly pushes for the government to control more and more of the property of its citizens.

The federal government was set up to give the people every chance to take advantage of being in a classless society. As for 'monopolies of land', what would Adams have said about a federal government that owns and controls more than 30% of the total land within the borders of the USA and is constantly seeking to control more and more? Just in these few states alone, the totals are staggering. Just look at these states alone and the percentage of land the federal government owns and manages through a dozen bloated expensive government agencies:

Nevada 84.5%
Alaska 69.1%
Utah 57.4%
Oregon 53.1%
Idaho 50.2%
Arizona 48.1%
California 45.3%
Wyoming 42.3%
New Mexico 41.8%
Colorado 36.6%

Before calling somebody ignorant, one should be aware of what he/she is actually talking about. Remember when you point your finger at somebody, three fingers are pointing back at you.

And all of this is important, some of it critical, to the U.S. economy.

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

Roosevelt Take: William Lazonick explains how stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits.

Taking Stock | Roosevelt Institute


It is clear to anyone who has studied the financial crisis of 2008 that the private sector’s drive for short-term profit was behind it.


Compensation schemes encouraged gambling: Wall Street’s compensation system was—and still is—based on short-term performance, all upside and no downside. This creates incentives to take excessive risks. The bonuses are extraordinarily large and they continue–$135 billion in 2010 for the 25 largest institutions and that is after the meltdown.


Wall Street became “creative”: The demand for higher-yielding paper led Wall Street to begin bundling mortgages. The highest yielding were subprime mortgages. This market was dominated by non-bank originators exempt from most regulations.

Lest We Forget: Why We Had A Financial Crisis - Forbes

stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits

I'm glad Clinton punished rich execs by limiting deductible cash salary to $1 million.

$1 Million unless it qualified as “performance based” pay




The 1980s witnessed a flourishing of different types of compensation, following Reagan's deep cuts in the top rates of income tax. Some of the techniques were seemingly unrelated to performance, such as "signing bonuses" for new CEOs and "guaranteed bonuses."


The highest federal marginal tax rate on income over $400,000 stood at 91 percent throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. Few executives in this era ever made more than 30 to 40 times the pay of their workers. By 1981, the year Ronald Reagan
entered the White House, this top rate had dropped to 70 percent. Under Reagan, the top rate quickly fell further,
first to 50, then to 28 percent.


The current top federal tax rates: 35 percent on “ordinary” income and just 15 percent on dividends and capital gains (20% today).


The pay ratio between CEOs of S&P 500 Index companies and average U.S. workers widened to 380-to-1 in 2011. In 1980, the average large company CEO only received 42 times the average
worker’s pay.



One key reason why: Our nation’s tax code has become a powerful enabler of bloated CEO pay.


Some tax rules on the books today essentially encourage corporations to compensate their executives at unconscionably higher multiples of what their average workers are paid.

Other rules let executives who run major corporations routinely reduce their corporate tax bills. The fewer dollars these
corporations pay in taxes, the more robust their cash flow and eventual earnings. The more robust these cash and earnings
numbers, the higher the “performance- based” pay for the CEOs who produce them


....Unlimited tax deductibility of executive pay

The more corporations pay their CEO, the lower their tax bill
Annual cost to taxpayers: $9.7 billion

Our laws currently impose no meaningful limit on how much corporations can deduct off their income taxes for the expense of executive compensation
.
A 1993 law capped executive pay deductions at $1 million, but left a huge loophole.


Corporations can exempt “performance-based” pay. Most companies simply limit top executive salaries to $1 million or so and then add on to that total various “performance-based” awards, with stock options making up the largest share.


http://www.ips-dc.org/wp-content/up...xcess-2012-CEO-Hands-In-Uncle-Sams-Pocket.pdf

....Unlimited tax deductibility of executive pay

The more corporations pay their CEO, the lower their tax bill
Annual cost to taxpayers: $9.7 billion

And when the executives pay their taxes, the Treasury gets the $9.7 billion back. So what?

 

[Toro]

stock-based performance pay pushes executives to focus on short-term profits

I'm glad Clinton punished rich execs by limiting deductible cash salary to $1 million.

$1 Million unless it qualified as “performance based” pay




The 1980s witnessed a flourishing of different types of compensation, following Reagan's deep cuts in the top rates of income tax. Some of the techniques were seemingly unrelated to performance, such as "signing bonuses" for new CEOs and "guaranteed bonuses."


The highest federal marginal tax rate on income over $400,000 stood at 91 percent throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. Few executives in this era ever made more than 30 to 40 times the pay of their workers. By 1981, the year Ronald Reagan
entered the White House, this top rate had dropped to 70 percent. Under Reagan, the top rate quickly fell further,
first to 50, then to 28 percent.


The current top federal tax rates: 35 percent on “ordinary” income and just 15 percent on dividends and capital gains (20% today).


The pay ratio between CEOs of S&P 500 Index companies and average U.S. workers widened to 380-to-1 in 2011. In 1980, the average large company CEO only received 42 times the average
worker’s pay.



One key reason why: Our nation’s tax code has become a powerful enabler of bloated CEO pay.


Some tax rules on the books today essentially encourage corporations to compensate their executives at unconscionably higher multiples of what their average workers are paid.

Other rules let executives who run major corporations routinely reduce their corporate tax bills. The fewer dollars these
corporations pay in taxes, the more robust their cash flow and eventual earnings. The more robust these cash and earnings
numbers, the higher the “performance- based” pay for the CEOs who produce them


....Unlimited tax deductibility of executive pay

The more corporations pay their CEO, the lower their tax bill
Annual cost to taxpayers: $9.7 billion

Our laws currently impose no meaningful limit on how much corporations can deduct off their income taxes for the expense of executive compensation
.
A 1993 law capped executive pay deductions at $1 million, but left a huge loophole.


Corporations can exempt “performance-based” pay. Most companies simply limit top executive salaries to $1 million or so and then add on to that total various “performance-based” awards, with stock options making up the largest share.


http://www.ips-dc.org/wp-content/up...xcess-2012-CEO-Hands-In-Uncle-Sams-Pocket.pdf

....Unlimited tax deductibility of executive pay

The more corporations pay their CEO, the lower their tax bill
Annual cost to taxpayers: $9.7 billion

And when the executives pay their taxes, the Treasury gets the $9.7 billion back. So what?

And liberals wonder why so many companies are leaving our shores.

 

[Dad2three]

But even there the liberal has faith only if the government is leftwing and politically correct. Look how they can't find ANYTHING in the Bush 43 administration to praise--everything that was done was considered wrong even though in some things he was almost as leftwing as Obama. I disagreed with W on his prescription entitlement, his immigration policy, his Iraq policy, his support of the global warming doctrine, and an energy policy that only a full-fledged flaming left winger could love. But I can also acknowledge what he got right just as I an acknowledge what Obama gets right. But they can't be any kind of objective when it comes to a Republican.

But you are right that they do not understand capitalism. They have been taught certain code words involving the greedy rich, getting rich 'on the backs of the poor', and other key prhases, but most have almost no concept of what any of it really means and they couldn't explain it in their own words, without using assigned talking points, if their lives depended on it.

Another ignorant right winger who ONLY has false premises, distortions and lies in his bucket


Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory



The conclusion?

Lowering the tax rates on the wealthy and top earners in America do not appear to have any impact on the nation’s economic growth.

This paragraph from the report says it all—

“The reduction in the top tax rates appears to be uncorrelated with saving, investment and productivity growth. The top tax rates appear to have little or no relation to the size of the economic pie. However, the top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution.”

These three sentences do nothing less than blow apart the central tenet of modern conservative economic theory, confirming that lowering tax rates on the wealthy does nothing to grow the economy while doing a great deal to concentrate more wealth in the pockets of those at the very top of the income chain.

Non-Partisan Congressional Tax Report Debunks Core Conservative Economic Theory-GOP Suppresses Study - Forbes




Why Thomas Jefferson Favored Profit Sharing
By David Cay Johnston

The founders, despite decades of rancorous disagreements about almost every other aspect of their grand experiment, agreed that America would survive and thrive only if there was widespread ownership of land and businesses.

George Washington, nine months before his inauguration as the first president, predicted that America "will be the most favorable country of any kind in the world for persons of industry and frugality, possessed of moderate capital, to inhabit." And, he continued, "it will not be less advantageous to the happiness of the lowest class of people, because of the equal distribution of property."

The second president, John Adams, feared "monopolies of land" would destroy the nation and that a business aristocracy born of inequality would manipulate voters, creating "a system of subordination to all... The capricious will of one or a very few" dominating the rest. Unless constrained, Adams wrote, "the rich and the proud" would wield economic and political power that "will destroy all the equality and liberty, with the consent and acclamations of the people themselves."

James Madison, the Constitution's main author, described inequality as an evil, saying government should prevent "an immoderate, and especially unmerited, accumulation of riches." He favored "the silent operation of laws which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigents towards a state of comfort."


Alexander Hamilton, who championed manufacturing and banking as the first Treasury secretary, also argued for widespread ownership of assets, warning in 1782 that, "whenever a discretionary power is lodged in any set of men over the property of their neighbors, they will abuse it."

Late in life, Adams, pessimistic about whether the republic would endure, wrote that the goal of the democratic government was not to help the wealthy and powerful but to achieve "the greatest happiness for the greatest number."



http://www.newsweek.com/2014/02/07/why-thomas-jefferson-favored-profit-sharing-245454.html

I may indeed be ignorant on many things, but you illustrate the point I was making by using the language/code words/talking points of the left to infer that the Founders meant something that they in fact did not mean at all. Certainly the goal of government should not be to help the wealthy and powerful but to treat every citizen the same and no differently than anybody else. They would have been horrified at the federal meddling in areas of welfare, entitlements, grants, etc. that they, pretty much to a man saw as no function of the central government. They would have known that the trillions that the federal government has poured into poverty programs in an effort to redistribute wealth has ultimately done more harm than good. They didn't look to anecdotal evidence but always to the whole picture.

The Founders were determined that the federal government was to NOT give anybody discretionary powers over the property of their neighbors, but the left constantly pushes for the government to control more and more of the property of its citizens.

The federal government was set up to give the people every chance to take advantage of being in a classless society. As for 'monopolies of land', what would Adams have said about a federal government that owns and controls more than 30% of the total land within the borders of the USA and is constantly seeking to control more and more? Just in these few states alone, the totals are staggering. Just look at these states alone and the percentage of land the federal government owns and manages through a dozen bloated expensive government agencies:

Nevada 84.5%
Alaska 69.1%
Utah 57.4%
Oregon 53.1%
Idaho 50.2%
Arizona 48.1%
California 45.3%
Wyoming 42.3%
New Mexico 41.8%
Colorado 36.6%

Before calling somebody ignorant, one should be aware of what he/she is actually talking about. Remember when you point your finger at somebody, three fingers are pointing back at you.

And all of this is important, some of it critical, to the U.S. economy.

Got it, ALL you can do is SAY they didn't REALLY mean the words I presented to you as FACTS.

THE FOUNDERS WERE THE MOST RADICAL LIBERALS OF THEIR DAY. They CHOSE the STRONG federal Gov't over the weak states rights Articles, they understood a SOCIETY was needed to create the world they wanted, they began by limiting Corporations and Corp involvement in the US society!

The Federalist Party supported Hamilton's vision of a strong centralized government, and agreed with his proposals for a national bank and heavy government subsidies. In other words, they were socialists.


The Founding Fathers supported aggressive government regulation through the Commerce Clause


If there was one thing the Revolutionary generation agreed on — and those guys who dress up like them at Tea Party conventions most definitely do not — it was the incompatibility of democracy and inherited wealth.


Stephen Budiansky's Liberal Curmudgeon Blog: Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, and other fellow travelers



The history of welfare in the U.S. started long before the government welfare programs we know were created. In the early days of the United States, the colonies imported the British Poor Laws. These laws made a distinction between those who were unable to work due to their age or physical health and those who were able-bodied but unemployed. The former group was assisted with cash or alternative forms of help from the government. The latter group was given public service employment in workhouses.


US Welfare System - Help for US Citizens