by | ARTICLES, BUSINESS, ECONOMY, GOVERNMENT, HYPOCRISY, TAXES
Yesterday the Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, painted a picture of class warfare, claiming his side does not have any billionaires.
“The decisions by the Supreme Court have left the American people with the status quo in which one side’s billionaires are pitted against the other side’s billionaires,” he said this morning on the Senate floor. “Except one side doesn’t have any billionaires.”
Here’s the video:
Seems Harry Reid conveniently forgets:
George Soros
Tom Steyer
Ann Cox Chambers
Irwin Jacobs
Ron Burkle
Marc Benioff
Penny Pritzker
James Simons
David Shaw
Jon Stryker
Haim Saban
Who are we missing? Fill in the comments section below!
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
We now know that the state of affairs within the VA system was abhorrent for years — and that Obama, like his predecessor, knew there were problems. And yet, several well known left-leaning columnists spoke highly about the VA health system anyway, especially ramping up the rhetoric right at the time Obamacare began to take shape in Congress in 2009.
Obama’s objectives regarding the VA were laid out in the Obama Transition Plan for when he took office. Obama had been warned about the problems in 2008, so he stated that he wanted to “make the VA a leader of national health care reform so that veterans get the best care possible”.
Therefore, shortly after his inauguration, Obama spoke to Congress in February 2009 to discuss healthcare reform, and the process toward the Affordable Care Act (ACA) began.
At the same time in 2009, both Nicholas Kristof and Paul Krugman of the NY Times and Ezra Klein of the Washington Post heaped praised the VA system. They must have read Obama’s VA talking points:.
Kristof: It is fully government run, much more “socialized medicine” than is Canadian health care with its private doctors and hospitals. And the system for veterans is by all accounts one of the best-performing and most cost-effective elements in the American medical establishment.
Paul Krugman: Let’s talk about health care around the advanced world…. By the way, our own Veterans Health Administration, which is run somewhat like the British health service, also manages to combine quality care with low costs.”
Klein: The “VA is actually socialized medicine, where the government owns the hospitals and employs the doctors. If you ordered America’s different health systems worst-functioning to best, it would look like this: individual insurance market, employer-based insurance market, Medicare, Veterans Health Administration”.
It is clear that these writers never had any information, nor had they done any research on the VA, the quality of its services, or its financial and operational efficiency. They write what they wish to be as if it were fact, hoping that their readers won’t find them out. You are certainly free to wonder about the credibility and integrity of their other writings.
The ACA began to be debated seriously during the fall of 2009 and it passed on March 25, 2010. It was during this same time that the secret waiting lists were developed at many VA centers. In the midwest alone, ten facilities have been found with the secret waitings lists, along with the most widely known problem in Arizona. These were clearly not “rogue” employees but signal part of a wider, concerted effort to keep issues quiet.
How did this happen? At least one attempt to fix the problem never got off the ground after nearly a decade of trying.
Apparently a medical scheduling project for the VA was begun in 2000 and was discontinued in 2009, 9 years after it the project began — and it remained utterly unfinished. Nothing seems to have been done for another 3 years until 2012, when the Secretary of Veteran’s Affairs launched a contest to create an app for scheduling — a contest which didn’t close until the summer of 2013.
According to a press release in 2013 announcing the winners in the “scheduling app” contest, it was noted that the “VA started to develop a Medical Scheduling Package replacement in 2000. This effort was not successful. When VA ended the project in 2009, none of the planned capabilities were delivered. It had cost more than $127 million”.
And was used at the VA between the end of the Medical Scheduling Package project in 2009 and the Medical Scheduling App Contest of 2012/2013?
We now know there were secret waiting lists as some of the facilities. It also appears the the Obama Administration knew about the “secret waiting lists” as early as 2010. The Daily Caller reports that there was an internal VA investigation in 2010 regarding “paper” waiting lists:
“We conducted this review to determine the validity of an allegation that senior officials in Veterans Integrated Service Network 20 (VISN) instructed employees at the Portland VA Medical Center to use unauthorized wait lists to hide access and scheduling problems,” according to an August 17, 2010 VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) report entitled “Review of Alleged Use of Unauthorized Wait Lists at the Portland VA Medical Center”
So, while the merits of the ACA was being debated, the VA’s scheduling system was scrapped, wasting $127 million. $127 million is a lot of taxpayer monies that could have been used on veterans’ treatments over the years.
But who was talking about it? No one. Certainly not the most widely read papers in this country.
Instead, we got reassurances from the press to a nervous public about the government’s ability to overesee healthcare, especially after the ACA passed in a controversial way. What’s more, the VA continued to be offered as a model even when the backlash to the law began.
In 2011, Paul Krugman of the NYT happily explained how successful the VA system: “The V.H.A. is a huge policy success story, which offers important lessons for future health reform. Many people still have an image of veterans’ health care based on the terrible state of the system two decades ago.”
Now we find out that it was clearly not working.
Underfunding the Department of Veterans Affairs is not the problem. From 2007 to 2012, enrollment in VA services has increased by 13% from 2007 to 2012. At the same time, the VA budget went from $82 million to $125 million — a 53% increase, and the biggest jump in the VA’s budget history since records go back to 1940. Yet the VA could not deliver quality services to our Veterans.
Government should not be handling our health systems. The fact that secret waiting lists existed shows just how far the government went to hide its incompetence in running a health system at the very time that Obamacare was being debated both in Congress and then in the public square. And the media supported the narrative that government delivered quality and efficient health care to our Veterans without checking to see if it was actually true.
If Congress and Americans knew the truth of the condition of the VA health system, it is quite possible that Obamacare would never have been allowed to become law.
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
Do you know who is on the hook for many student loans? You, the taxpayer.
From CNS News:
“Since President Barack Obama took office in January 2009, the cumulative outstanding balance on federal direct student loans has jumped 517.4 percent.
The balance owed as of the end of May was $739,641,000,000.00. That is an increase of $619,838,000,000.00 from the balance that was owed as of the end of January 2009, when it was $119,803,000,000.00, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement”
The largest reason for this is Obama’s “Pay As You Earn” (PAYE) program implemented in 2010.
There are several portions of PAYE that are particularly concerning:
1) PAYE repayment is based on 10% of discretionary income;
2) If the payment doesn’t cover the accruing interest, the government pays your unpaid accruing interested for up to three years from when you begin paying back your loan under the PAYE program.
3) The balance of your loan can be forgiven after 20 years if you meet certain criteria
4) Your loan can be forgiven after 10 years if you go to work for a public service organization
Think the debt balloon is bad now? The program will be severely unsustainable once loans start to be repaid — with interest often being covered by the federal government– and later, loan forgiveness options kick in, with the balance paid by the federal government.
And the federal government is…YOU.
More on how the PAYE program hurts the economy:
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
Obama issued an Executive Order today that brought extra relief to some student loan borrowers. A 2010 law allowed for repayment caps at 10% of a borrower’s income, though some loan holders were ineligible. This Executive Order expanded those who could qualify for the income repayment plan.
From the NYT: “Mr. Obama’s main action will be to expand on a 2010 law that capped borrowers’ repayments at 10 percent of their monthly income. The intent is to extend such relief to an estimated five million people with older loans who are currently ineligible — those who got loans before October 2007 or stopped borrowing by October 2011. But the relief would not be available until December 2015, officials said, given the time needed for the Education Department to propose and put new regulations into effect”.
Though this Executive Order — and its 2010 law counterpart — may sound well and good, financially it is a disaster. The 10% income repayment does not help any young person get off on a solid financial footing. Likewise, because some sectors allow for loan forgiveness after a period of time, that amount gets written off by the federal government, thereby substantially adding to the federal debt.
For example, if someone borrows $30,000 a year for 4 years for a degree, that is $120,000 of student loan debt. The debt carries an interest rate of at least 6%. The Obama repayment plans offer an option that allows borrowers to pay 10% (it used to be 15%) of what they earn, and if not fully paid back by the end of ten years, any balance is forgiven.. So for instance, if a new graduate lands a job that pays a generous $50,000/year, he/she would pay back $5,000/year. With interest of at least $7,200 ($120,000 x 6%) which likely does not even cover the interest on the original $120,000 loan.
There is almost no way a borrower can begin to pay back anything on their loan, and by the time they actually can make a dent, the additional interest accrued would have ballooned the total loan amount to at least $150,000. This is financially crippling for a young person.
The costs for the 10% repayment program since its implementation have ballooned from $1.7 billion in 2010 to $3.5 billion in 2013 to an estimated $7.6 billion for 2014.
This Executive Order seems to be a precursor to a bill being pushed by Senator Elizabeth Warren, which Obama has said to endorse. It “would allow borrowers to potentially save thousands of dollars by giving them a chance to effectively pay off their high-rate existing loans in exchange for new loans that carry substantially lower interest rates”.
How would this program be paid for? A new tax or increased taxes on the wealthy, of course.
The real impact of this higher education reform is that the government is now encouraging people to borrow substantially for their education, while simultaneously providing an avenue for students to avoid paying back much of their funds — leaving the taxpayer on the hook, a deficit in freefall, a tax increase for targeted high income earners, and an economy in stagnation.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA, TAXES
From the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS):
Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 217,000 in May, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 6.3 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment increased in professional and business services, health care and social assistance, food services and drinking places, and transportation and warehousing.
Household Survey Data
The unemployment rate held at 6.3 percent in May, following a decline of 0.4 percentage point in April. The number of unemployed persons was unchanged in May at 9.8 million. Over the year, the unemployment rate and the number of unemployed persons declined by 1.2 percentage points and 1.9 million, respectively.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (5.9 percent), adult women (5.7 percent), teenagers (19.2 percent), whites (5.4 percent), blacks (11.5 percent), and Hispanics (7.7 percent) showed little or no change in May. The jobless rate for Asians was 5.3 percent (not seasonally adjusted), little changed from a year earlier.
Among the unemployed, the number of job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs declined by 218,000 in May. The number of unemployed reentrants increased by 237,000 over the month, partially offsetting a large decrease in April. (Reentrants are persons who previously worked but were not in the labor force prior to beginning their current job search.)
The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was essentially unchanged at 3.4 million in May. These individuals accounted for 34.6 percent of the unemployed. Over the past 12 months, the number of long-term unemployed has declined by 979,000.
The civilian labor force participation rate was unchanged in May, at 62.8 percent. The participation rate has shown no clear trend since this past October but is down by 0.6 percentage point over the year. The employment-population ratio, at 58.9 percent, was also unchanged in May and has changed little over the year.
The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers), at 7.3 million, changed little in May. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.
In May, 2.1 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, essentially unchanged from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.
Among the marginally attached, there were 697,000 discouraged workers in May, little different from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them. The remaining 1.4 million persons marginally attached to the labor force in May had not searched for work for reasons such as school attendance or family responsibilities.
by | ARTICLES, BUSINESS, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA, TAXES
This is a tad worrisome:
Nonfarm business sector labor productivity decreased at a 3.2 percent annual rate during the first quarter of 2014, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today, as hours increased 2.2 percent and output decreased 1.1 percent. (All quarterly percent changes in this release are seasonally adjusted annual rates.) The decrease in productivity was the largest since the first quarter of 2008 (-3.9 percent).
And this:
In the first quarter of 2014, nonfarm business productivity fell 3.2 percent, a greater decline than was reported in the preliminary estimate. The revised figure reflects a 1.4 percentage point downward revision to output and a 0.2 percentage point upward revision to hours.
You can read the whole report here
No one else seems to be reporting on the revised numbers, which mirror that of the 1st quarter of 2008 (-3.9).
Couple this with the report last week that the “economy in the U.S. contracted for the first time in three years from January through March as companies added to inventories at a slower pace and curtailed investment”.
It will be interesting to see what the unemployment numbers show on Friday.
Friday update: Unemployment stays flat
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
Diana Furchtgott-Roth wrote an article this past week outlining the economic impact of Obama’s newest regulations. Obama has decided through Executive Order to institute environmental regulations similar to those in the failed “cap-and-trade” legislation from a few years ago. But Obama will now go a step further than just the regulation of power plants; regulations will include regional emissions.
Regulation is stifling. It creates more barriers for American businesses which drives up costs for consumers. Businesses which are abroad are not subject to such regulation, which means they will often be able to charge less for products than American ones. With the economy at such a sluggish pace right now, of course consumers will purchase the lowest price. With higher costs to run the business, as well as drop in demand for product, employees will face the risk of losing jobs as a cost-saving measure for their employer.
Some lawmakers are waking up to the economic impact over-regulation has on our industries. Several legislators introduced a bipartisan in 2011 aiming to reduce regulatory burdens in particular agricultural endeavors. According to records, “this legislation passed the U.S. House of Representatives on March 31, 2011 as H.R. 872, The Reducing Regulatory Burdens Act of 2011. Additionally, it advanced out of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, but the full Senate failed to consider it during the last Congress”. It is now known as H.R.935, “The Reducing Regulatory Burdens Act of 2013”. Yesterday, on June 2, it was placed on the Union Calendar, which means it has not been defeated in Committee. Such legislation is a starting point for raising awareness of the destructive nature of burdensome regulation.
Back to Obama’s new Executive Order environmental rules. Furchtgott-Roth summed up her article nicely when she wrote,”For those concerned about economic growth, poverty, and inequality, cap-and-trade makes no sense, either nationally or regionally. Our air is getting cleaner, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future as new capital replaces old. Cap-and-trade did not pass a Democratic Congress in 2010, and Mr. Obama should not impose it on a regional basis through regulation”.
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA
From Bloomberg:
“The economy in the U.S. contracted for the first time in three years from January through March as companies added to inventories at a slower pace and curtailed investment.
Gross domestic product fell at a 1 percent annualized rate in the first quarter, a bigger decline than projected, after a previously reported 0.1 percent gain, the Commerce Department said today in Washington. The last time the economy shrank was in the same three months of 2011”.
Is this temporary? Is it a signal of another downward slump? Next Friday’s job report will be especially interesting to see.
by | ARTICLES, BUSINESS, ECONOMY, OBAMA, OBAMACARE, TAXES
The NYT reported that the IRS made yet another law clarification this past week:
“Many employers — some that now offer coverage and some that do not — had concluded that it would be cheaper to provide each employee with a lump sum of money to buy insurance on an exchange, instead of providing coverage directly.
But the Obama administration raised objections, contained in an authoritative question-and-answer document released by the Internal Revenue Service, in consultation with other agencies.
The health law, known as the Affordable Care Act, builds on the current system of employer-based health insurance. The administration, like many in Congress, wants employers to continue to provide coverage to workers and their families”.
However, it seems that the real issue is less about continuing coverage and more about getting as much tax revenue for the government as possible:
Christopher E. Condeluci, a former tax and benefits counsel to the Senate Finance Committee, said the ruling was significant because it made clear that “an employee cannot use tax-free contributions from an employer to purchase an insurance policy sold in the individual health insurance market, inside or outside an exchange.”
If an employer wants to help employees buy insurance on their own, Mr. Condeluci said, it can give them higher pay, in the form of taxable wages. But in such cases, he said, the employer and the employee would owe payroll taxes on those wages, and the change could be viewed by workers as reducing a valuable benefit”.
The ruling comes as the IRS seeks to finish establishing the plans and programs for employer coverage that starts in 2015.
by | ARTICLES, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
The Pease Amendment came into play for high income taxpayers this year once again, after a bit of a hiatus. The Pease Amendment was passed as part of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990, and named after Congressman Donald Pease, who introduced it. This rule provided that if your adjusted gross income (AGI) passed a particular threshold, then some deductions would be reduced on your taxes — thereby curbing your ability to limit your tax liability.
This rule has the effect of increases tax rates for those individuals by 1.2% — therefore a tax rate that was 39.6% became 40.8%. The way it was done is patently criminal because it uses the tax system to incorporate a complicated formula to hide the fact you are raising tax rates. There is no rational or logical reason for a formula like that to be used unless its intent was to deceive.
Acknowledging the irrationality of the Pease Amendment, Congress slowly scaled it back and then eliminated by 2010 after the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. During 2010 session, Congress passed the 2010 Tax Relief Act which extended the elimination of the Pease Amendment, but only through 2012.
By that time, it was understood that the tax reductions of 2001, including across-the-board rate reductions, the Pease Amendment and Personal Exemption Phaseouts (PEP) would all be gone forever. And yet, Congress declined to extend the Pease Amendment elimination further past 2012 which meant that 2013 saw a return to the previous Pease Amendment rules that existed before 2001.
Also during that time in 2012, Obama insisted as a revenue-raising measure that the rates in the Bush tax cuts be reinstated for the high income earners in 2012. This is a simple, straight-forward tax hike. But in an action that can only be considered mean spirited, and counter to any attempt to simplify the tax laws, Obama personally insisted that both the Pease Amendment and the similarly convoluted Personal Exemption Phaseouts (PEP) be reinstated for high network individuals. Their reintroduction into the tax code by Congress is unconscionable.
The tricky thing about the Pease Amendment is that it actually has very little to do with deductions, because the trigger to implement it is based on earned income thresholds. Eliminating deductions based on income — which then affects the amount of increases tax paid — is underhanded.
Coming on the heels of the actual margin rate increase in 2012 when rates for highest earners reverted to the 39.6% rate of the Clinton years, many taxpayers found themselves with even higher tax bills in 2013 without an actual tax increase due to re implementation of the Pease Amendment. The result of the rule ensured that wealthy taxpayers were squeezed just a little bit more for their “fair share” — now nearly 41% on income tax alone.
The Pease Amendment carefully obfuscates the net effect of raising taxes without having to actually do so. Perhaps the most interesting thing about the amendment is that Pease’s only claim to fame as an eight-term Congressman is that he is responsible for writing a tax rule that tricks people into paying more taxes than they believed they were paying.
