(12-04-2017 09:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  Assumption. Because that is assuming there were not higher or more important charges, and we don't know that for certain. We know that Flynn cut a deal to cooperate with the special counsel, which means he is not receiving the full force of the law.

I guess Mueller, if we are to believe your statements above, is tossing out any tie to DOJ policy.

Quote:Justice Department policy calls for prosecutors to indict a defendant on the most serious readily provable charge, not to plead out a case on minor charges to obtain cooperation. The federal sentencing guidelines also encourage this. They allow a judge to sentence the defendant below the often harsh guidelines calculation. This can mean a cooperator gets as little as zero jail time or time-served, no matter how serious the charges. This sentencing leniency happens only if the defendant pleads guilty and provides substantial assistance to the government’s investigation. That is what enables the prosecutor to entice an accomplice to cooperate; the prosecutor does not need to entice cooperation by pleading the case out for a song.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/45...mpeachment

There is a nonzero possibility that this investigation could lead to serious charges against Trump and/or members of his inner circle. There is also a nonzero possibility that it could lead to nothing. At this point, I think the most likely possibility is that it will lead to wrist-slap charges against some peripheral players. Sort of like Scooter Libby.

After spending this much time and money, the onus is on Mueller to produce something.

Without a doubt there is a non-zero possibility. In fact, a meteorite about the size of peppercorn drove a hole into my office window today.... . The non-zero possibility applies to both sides of your comment.

But it can be argued that the latter is a zero possibility with the charges pending against Manafort and Flynn.

I think the drive from the Mueller team is not necessarily heavy charges to peripherals, but to see how far up to drive the process charges. A point that McCarthy makes is that there is authority in the Nixon and Clinton impeachments that obstruction-like charges are a basis to kick off the predicate for such an impeachment.

And with that goal in mind, the process charges at the lower levels still make a lot of sense. Think Haldeman, Erlichman, dean, and Colson and how they were dispatched in order to reach Nixon.

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

With all respect Lad, why did you feel the need to include the bolded aside in a post about tax policy issues?

Not meaning to provoke, but I found it a strangely isolated aside not really a part of the issues re: to the tax bill.

(12-04-2017 10:11 AM)tanqtonic Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

With all respect Lad, why did you feel the need to include the bolded aside in a post about tax policy issues?

Not meaning to provoke, but I found it a strangely isolated aside not really a part of the issues re: to the tax bill.

Isn't the purpose of policy changes to influence outcomes that will have a desired effect? So in discussing a tax bill, why not bring in opinions on outcomes of said tax bill? I mean, Republicans didn't just pass a tax bill for sh*** and giggles, they did it to try and have an effect on the economy.

One of the arguments used to justify the cutting of the corporate tax rate was that companies would put their new found earnings (either via repatriation or an increase in profits due to lowering the tax burden) into the pockets of the average employees, this boosting the economy through higher wages (and increased spending).

I don't believe that the desired effect of repatriation of income or increased profits will actually be felt by the average worker, at least not for a long time. The sudden spikes in cash will almost certainly go to those at the top and not trickle down.

In short - a post about the outcomes of tax policy change is germane to a discussion on what the tax policy changes were.

(12-04-2017 07:29 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 01:04 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-03-2017 08:53 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(12-03-2017 05:17 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-03-2017 03:44 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  No, I did NOT completely ignore your point. I explicitly answered your point (which is that any amount of money is too much money) by disagreeing with it and stating that it is a worthwhile investigation. I even EXPLICITLY addressed your concern by comparing it to the Benghazi hearings, and how it would only be a waste of money if further investigations are held after the Mueller probe wraps up. See my post here: http://csnbbs.com/thread-797972-post-148...id14849097

I guess you missed that post.

A pointless investigation into an unaccussed crime that is not a crime is by definition a waste.

People who think it is a good use of resources should define what results they might bring.

Will collusion be shown? No.

Will Russian meddling in our elections be stopped? No.

So, why are we doing this?

bad use of resources = waste.

So, is disingenuous what you are going to stick with, or are you reverting to liar?

So back to seeing into the future I see.

Your line of thinking is predicated on a given outcome. Since there is still no outcome it’s hard to value the investigation. We’ll have to wait and see before we say for sure if it is, or was, a waste of money.

And I never quibbled with your opinion about this being a waste, in terms of truthfulness. I called out the three order of magnitude exaggeration of the cost.

You said this:

" i said you were either lying or being disingenuous"

So pick one.

I don't really care, but I hate the impreciseness.

Good grief, why do you think we have to wait for the investigation to end before making a prediction on how it would end? The guys who started it certainly had a vision of how it would end.

All life is making choices based on what you think will happen. If you think you can go through life always delaying your choices and actions until you have a sure thing, good luck.

I can foresee traffic at 8 in the morning and 5 in the evening. I don't have to wait and count cars to decide that may not be the time to go across town.

If I am asked to participate in a witch hunt, I can say no based on the unlikeness of finding a witch. Same for a tiger hunt or looking for a lost mine in my backyard.

Is there anything in your life life that you make decisions about based on probability and common sense, or does everything have to depend on the outcome?

There’s making a prediction on how something ends and then there is making a judgement about the validity of something based upon a predicted outcome. You’re asking me to counter your argument, which makes broad assumptions, with my own broad assumptions, which is pointless because you will just disagree with my assumptions because you have other assumptions.

There is no reason to debate whether or not this investigation is a waste of money because we won’t be able to agree on a common set of assumptions. That’s the issue here.

We can make predictions if we have enough information to do so. For your traffic example, we have countless previous days of traffic to use to build our assumption of how traffic will be tomorrow. We don’t have the same number of previous instances to draw upon her to try and predict the outcome of this investigation.

And because I know I don’t have all of the information about the investigation, then I don’t feel comfortable betting on a final outcome. If I had all the information then the investigation wouldn’t be ongoing - it would already be completed and an outcome would be had. It’s not like a trial has been had and the jury is now deliberating - the investigation is still ongoing. I think the problem is you’re assuming we all have a lot more information than we actually do - I’m assuming the opposite, that we are not a fully informed populace at the moment.

This goes back to what some other poster said recently - not only are those on the left and right in disagreement of a common ethos, we often seem to be in disagreement on reality and what is fact or fiction.

This is the information I have, which is readily available to all:

1. There is no credible narrative of collusion. By narrative, I mean a comprehensive account of what is alleged to have happened. What did Vlad expect from Trump? what did Trump expect from Vlad? When did they agree on Vlad providing this service? There is no reasonable or logical narrative to be proven or disproved.

2. Collusion is not a crime. There is supposed to be a crime alleged in order to have a special counsel investigation. For example, outing a CIA agent.

3. No quid pro quo has been been supposed or shown.

4. The people who originally agitated for this investigation were the ones who thought the election had been stolen from them. Even that bunch is a lot quieter now.

5. In the MSM, the name of this investigation has been changed into the investigation on Russia(n meddling). Why are the insiders not pursuing the collusion angle as much? And why does an investigation into Russia focus on Trump's campaign? If we were investigating North Korean or Chinese cyberattacks, would we focus on Hillary's campaign, or anybody else? Could it be, gasp, that the real target is political?

Those are out there, visible to anybody who cares to see. So the easy thing to predict is that this investigation, like all the others before it, will wander far afield from its ostensible purpose. That is similar to predicting the traffic based on experience. That means no collusion will be found, but some minor crimes will be discovered/will occur and indictments for those returned. Ever hear of Scooter Libby?

I think the real reason you want to wait is that you cannot rustle up a real narrative that supports the need for an investigation. But that is just my supposition. I could be wrong. it has happened before, for example, 11-8-16.

I am going to let the whole liar/disingenuous thing drop. It was amusing to hound you a little like you did me. Clearly, my opinion of you is higher than your opinion of me. (I think very well of you.) But i don't really care. Maybe being two faced (one of the synonyms) is a good thing if your first face is as ugly as mine.

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

What, making predictions? shouldn't we wait until all the results are in?

Clearly an imperfect bill, as would any bill be that has an automatic 46 votes against it from the obstructionist party before it is written, thus requiring horse-trading.

Your assumption that tax savings are supposed to go to average employees (what the heck is an average employee?) is flawed. Some may go to current employees, but most will go to corporate growth.

As a former business owner, I can tell you that most business owners and top managers want the company to grow, get larger, stronger, more widespread. They will use available capital to make this happen.

They will want to buy new equipment, as trucks and forklifts, or open new warehouses, or hire more sales staff, or open new branches with new employees in cities they were not in before. Lots of ways to reinvest available (key word: available) capital to foster growth. Giving across the board 15% raises to current employees is unlikely to happen in any but the smallest. Joe's Pie Shop may give raises to all four employees, or it may open a branch across town with four new employees.

What won't happen is that they will put it in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard. The money will flow back into the economy in some way, and all of them are productive.

Even the worst that Democrats envision is good for the economy. Suppose Joe, instead of raising employees or opening a branch, decides to buy a yacht. Bad, selfish Joe. But wait! Don't yacht builders have employees? Don't they pay taxes? Doesn't higher sales of yachts help everybody at the yacht builder's? And he needs to rent a space at the marina, and then he needs somebody to keep up the maintenance, and...

There is no stone that does not cause a ripple.

So I think the most important provision is the lowering of corporate taxes.

All the stuff about middle class and simplication is just window dressing. I would be in favor of lowering corporate rates and leaving everything else alone, but politically that doesn't fly.

Democrat opposition to a corporate tax cut is like saying we need to starve the cows so we can get more milk to the "everyday' people.

so I am in favor of the tax cut, whether or not it benefits me personally. I am guessing it does not, probably. But it benefits the country.

But just my prediction. I guess we need to wait ten years to see.

(12-04-2017 11:23 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

What, making predictions? shouldn't we wait until all the results are in?

Clearly an imperfect bill, as would any bill be that has an automatic 46 votes against it from the obstructionist party before it is written, thus requiring horse-trading.

Your assumption that tax savings are supposed to go to average employees (what the heck is an average employee?) is flawed. Some may go to current employees, but most will go to corporate growth.

As a former business owner, I can tell you that most business owners and top managers want the company to grow, get larger, stronger, more widespread. They will use available capital to make this happen.

They will want to buy new equipment, as trucks and forklifts, or open new warehouses, or hire more sales staff, or open new branches with new employees in cities they were not in before. Lots of ways to reinvest available (key word: available) capital to foster growth. Giving across the board 15% raises to current employees is unlikely to happen in any but the smallest. Joe's Pie Shop may give raises to all four employees, or it may open a branch across town with four new employees.

What won't happen is that they will put it in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard. The money will flow back into the economy in some way, and all of them are productive.

Even the worst that Democrats envision is good for the economy. Suppose Joe, instead of raising employees or opening a branch, decides to buy a yacht. Bad, selfish Joe. But wait! Don't yacht builders have employees? Don't they pay taxes? Doesn't higher sales of yachts help everybody at the yacht builder's? And he needs to rent a space at the marina, and then he needs somebody to keep up the maintenance, and...

There is no stone that does not cause a ripple.

So I think the most important provision is the lowering of corporate taxes.

All the stuff about middle class and simplication is just window dressing. I would be in favor of lowering corporate rates and leaving everything else alone, but politically that doesn't fly.

Democrat opposition to a corporate tax cut is like saying we need to starve the cows so we can get more milk to the "everyday' people.

so I am in favor of the tax cut, whether or not it benefits me personally. I am guessing it does not, probably. But it benefits the country.

But just my prediction. I guess we need to wait ten years to see.

This is probably the best post I have read ever, anywhere.

The image I have used, is not burying in a can, but burning for the fun of it. Either way same thing.

It is not a perfect bill, just as you note. But it is good for the country. I also would have preferred just corporate tax reform.

I anticipate, based on what little has been put out about the bill, that my taxes will increase 10 to 15%. I usually am against tax increases. But where, as here, it seems likely to spur the economy and benefit all Americans, it is a small price to pay.

(12-04-2017 11:23 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

What, making predictions? shouldn't we wait until all the results are in?

Clearly an imperfect bill, as would any bill be that has an automatic 46 votes against it from the obstructionist party before it is written, thus requiring horse-trading.

Your assumption that tax savings are supposed to go to average employees (what the heck is an average employee?) is flawed. Some may go to current employees, but most will go to corporate growth.

As a former business owner, I can tell you that most business owners and top managers want the company to grow, get larger, stronger, more widespread. They will use available capital to make this happen.

They will want to buy new equipment, as trucks and forklifts, or open new warehouses, or hire more sales staff, or open new branches with new employees in cities they were not in before. Lots of ways to reinvest available (key word: available) capital to foster growth. Giving across the board 15% raises to current employees is unlikely to happen in any but the smallest. Joe's Pie Shop may give raises to all four employees, or it may open a branch across town with four new employees.

What won't happen is that they will put it in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard. The money will flow back into the economy in some way, and all of them are productive.

Even the worst that Democrats envision is good for the economy. Suppose Joe, instead of raising employees or opening a branch, decides to buy a yacht. Bad, selfish Joe. But wait! Don't yacht builders have employees? Don't they pay taxes? Doesn't higher sales of yachts help everybody at the yacht builder's? And he needs to rent a space at the marina, and then he needs somebody to keep up the maintenance, and...

There is no stone that does not cause a ripple.

So I think the most important provision is the lowering of corporate taxes.

All the stuff about middle class and simplication is just window dressing. I would be in favor of lowering corporate rates and leaving everything else alone, but politically that doesn't fly.

Democrat opposition to a corporate tax cut is like saying we need to starve the cows so we can get more milk to the "everyday' people.

so I am in favor of the tax cut, whether or not it benefits me personally. I am guessing it does not, probably. But it benefits the country.

But just my prediction. I guess we need to wait ten years to see.

If that is your response, then you didn't read my post about making predictions.

And are your really quibbling over the term average employees? How hard is it to deduce what was meant by that? It is meant to encompass hourly wage earners, salaried employees who are not in management position, you know, an average employee at a company.

And I think that tax savings should go to your average workers, the executives, and the shareholders. Median wages have stagnated for decades, which is why I brought up the average worker (perhaps I could used the term median).

The economy is not a closed loop, so your right that money going to anyone will have some positive effect on the economy. But just as Henry Ford understood when he paid his workers a good wage so they could buy his cars, it's easier to boost the economy by increasing spending power of the masses, than by increasing the capital power (?) of the wealthy. I go back and forth on agreeing with cutting the corporate tax rate because of this.

Hopefully the decrease in corporate taxes does spur the type of growth you're hoping for - I just don't believe in trickle down economics and wish that the tax bill had helped find a way to address that likely outcome from reducing the corporate tax rate.

(12-04-2017 12:52 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 11:23 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

What, making predictions? shouldn't we wait until all the results are in?

Clearly an imperfect bill, as would any bill be that has an automatic 46 votes against it from the obstructionist party before it is written, thus requiring horse-trading.

Your assumption that tax savings are supposed to go to average employees (what the heck is an average employee?) is flawed. Some may go to current employees, but most will go to corporate growth.

As a former business owner, I can tell you that most business owners and top managers want the company to grow, get larger, stronger, more widespread. They will use available capital to make this happen.

They will want to buy new equipment, as trucks and forklifts, or open new warehouses, or hire more sales staff, or open new branches with new employees in cities they were not in before. Lots of ways to reinvest available (key word: available) capital to foster growth. Giving across the board 15% raises to current employees is unlikely to happen in any but the smallest. Joe's Pie Shop may give raises to all four employees, or it may open a branch across town with four new employees.

What won't happen is that they will put it in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard. The money will flow back into the economy in some way, and all of them are productive.

Even the worst that Democrats envision is good for the economy. Suppose Joe, instead of raising employees or opening a branch, decides to buy a yacht. Bad, selfish Joe. But wait! Don't yacht builders have employees? Don't they pay taxes? Doesn't higher sales of yachts help everybody at the yacht builder's? And he needs to rent a space at the marina, and then he needs somebody to keep up the maintenance, and...

There is no stone that does not cause a ripple.

So I think the most important provision is the lowering of corporate taxes.

All the stuff about middle class and simplication is just window dressing. I would be in favor of lowering corporate rates and leaving everything else alone, but politically that doesn't fly.

Democrat opposition to a corporate tax cut is like saying we need to starve the cows so we can get more milk to the "everyday' people.

so I am in favor of the tax cut, whether or not it benefits me personally. I am guessing it does not, probably. But it benefits the country.

But just my prediction. I guess we need to wait ten years to see.

If that is your response, then you didn't read my post about making predictions.

And are your really quibbling over the term average employees? How hard is it to deduce what was meant by that? It is meant to encompass hourly wage earners, salaried employees who are not in management position, you know, an average employee at a company.

And I think that tax savings should go to your average workers, the executives, and the shareholders. Median wages have stagnated for decades, which is why I brought up the average worker (perhaps I could used the term median).

The economy is not a closed loop, so your right that money going to anyone will have some positive effect on the economy. But just as Henry Ford understood when he paid his workers a good wage so they could buy his cars, it's easier to boost the economy by increasing spending power of the masses, than by increasing the capital power (?) of the wealthy. I go back and forth on agreeing with cutting the corporate tax rate because of this.

Hopefully the decrease in corporate taxes does spur the type of growth you're hoping for - I just don't believe in trickle down economics and wish that the tax bill had helped find a way to address that likely outcome from reducing the corporate tax rate.

If it doesn't trickle down, where does it go? The rich people in their tuxedos at the country club will do something with it. Put it in a bank? Invest in stocks? Those would be alternatives, but they would also benefit the economy. and incidentally, they would benefit the tycoons a lot less than using the money to expand the business. Nothing wrong with feeding the golden goose.

You say the money should go to the shareholders. I am sure some would. Those are dividends, and are one of the things that Schumer hates. he's afraid the money will just go out as dividends. If dividends from the stocks in my retirement portfolio go up, my retirement becomes more secure. Surely not something the Democrats want to see happen. But say 60% of the dividends go to wealthy people. What are they going to do with it? Spend it, save it, or invest it. All things that benefit the economy, and better economy means jobs.

Average workers do not mean just the people with jobs now. It also means the guys who will got new jobs as companies expand.

And yes, I would expect median wages to rise, as more and more companies compete for labor as they expand. Median wages have not risen, it is true, during the time of high corporate taxes. I wonder if there is a connection?

I guess we could try an experiment. let's raise corporate taxes to 80%. See if the workers are better off.

What exactly is it that you fear from a corporate tax cut? I know what Schumer fears. He fears that a lot of workers with new jobs and money to spend might vote Republican.

(12-04-2017 01:23 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 12:52 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 11:23 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(12-04-2017 07:32 AM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  On a policy note, how does everyone feel about the Senate passing the tax bill? Likely to increase the deficit which had been shrinking, but may get some repatriation of corporate holdings (but which will unlikely go to average employees). Is full of special interest provisions, but will help simplify tax filings by increasing standard deductions. Lots of bad in my eyes, but some good there.

Thoughts?

What, making predictions? shouldn't we wait until all the results are in?

Clearly an imperfect bill, as would any bill be that has an automatic 46 votes against it from the obstructionist party before it is written, thus requiring horse-trading.

Your assumption that tax savings are supposed to go to average employees (what the heck is an average employee?) is flawed. Some may go to current employees, but most will go to corporate growth.

As a former business owner, I can tell you that most business owners and top managers want the company to grow, get larger, stronger, more widespread. They will use available capital to make this happen.

They will want to buy new equipment, as trucks and forklifts, or open new warehouses, or hire more sales staff, or open new branches with new employees in cities they were not in before. Lots of ways to reinvest available (key word: available) capital to foster growth. Giving across the board 15% raises to current employees is unlikely to happen in any but the smallest. Joe's Pie Shop may give raises to all four employees, or it may open a branch across town with four new employees.

What won't happen is that they will put it in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard. The money will flow back into the economy in some way, and all of them are productive.

Even the worst that Democrats envision is good for the economy. Suppose Joe, instead of raising employees or opening a branch, decides to buy a yacht. Bad, selfish Joe. But wait! Don't yacht builders have employees? Don't they pay taxes? Doesn't higher sales of yachts help everybody at the yacht builder's? And he needs to rent a space at the marina, and then he needs somebody to keep up the maintenance, and...

There is no stone that does not cause a ripple.

So I think the most important provision is the lowering of corporate taxes.

All the stuff about middle class and simplication is just window dressing. I would be in favor of lowering corporate rates and leaving everything else alone, but politically that doesn't fly.

Democrat opposition to a corporate tax cut is like saying we need to starve the cows so we can get more milk to the "everyday' people.

so I am in favor of the tax cut, whether or not it benefits me personally. I am guessing it does not, probably. But it benefits the country.

But just my prediction. I guess we need to wait ten years to see.

If that is your response, then you didn't read my post about making predictions.

And are your really quibbling over the term average employees? How hard is it to deduce what was meant by that? It is meant to encompass hourly wage earners, salaried employees who are not in management position, you know, an average employee at a company.

And I think that tax savings should go to your average workers, the executives, and the shareholders. Median wages have stagnated for decades, which is why I brought up the average worker (perhaps I could used the term median).

The economy is not a closed loop, so your right that money going to anyone will have some positive effect on the economy. But just as Henry Ford understood when he paid his workers a good wage so they could buy his cars, it's easier to boost the economy by increasing spending power of the masses, than by increasing the capital power (?) of the wealthy. I go back and forth on agreeing with cutting the corporate tax rate because of this.

Hopefully the decrease in corporate taxes does spur the type of growth you're hoping for - I just don't believe in trickle down economics and wish that the tax bill had helped find a way to address that likely outcome from reducing the corporate tax rate.

If it doesn't trickle down, where does it go? The rich people in their tuxedos at the country club will do something with it. Put it in a bank? Invest in stocks? Those would be alternatives, but they would also benefit the economy. and incidentally, they would benefit the tycoons a lot less than using the money to expand the business. Nothing wrong with feeding the golden goose.

You say the money should go to the shareholders. I am sure some would. Those are dividends, and are one of the things that Schumer hates. he's afraid the money will just go out as dividends. If dividends from the stocks in my retirement portfolio go up, my retirement becomes more secure. Surely not something the Democrats want to see happen. But say 60% of the dividends go to wealthy people. What are they going to do with it? Spend it, save it, or invest it. All things that benefit the economy, and better economy means jobs.

Average workers do not mean just the people with jobs now. It also means the guys who will got new jobs as companies expand.

And yes, I would expect median wages to rise, as more and more companies compete for labor as they expand. Median wages have not risen, it is true, during the time of high corporate taxes. I wonder if there is a connection?

I guess we could try an experiment. let's raise corporate taxes to 80%. See if the workers are better off.

What exactly is it that you fear from a corporate tax cut? I know what Schumer fears. He fears that a lot of workers with new jobs and money to spend might vote Republican.

Median wages rose up until about the 1970s and then they have stagnated. Corporate tax rates in the US have generally been higher now, so I'm not sure what you mean by the bolded. The statutory rate was at 50% in the 1950s. Ironically, as GDP has fallen, so has the corporate tax rate (likely a corollary, not causal relationship). http://www.epi.org/publication/ib364-cor...ic-growth/

Also, our effective corporate tax rate (~27%) is lower than our statutory tax rate (35%). I would like us to have a single corporate tax rate so we don't have a difference between what the statutory rate and the effect rates are. I'd like to see it be very obvious that we're on par with the rest of our peers.

Also, we are doing fairly well with employment right now (unemployment is at 4.1%) so I'm not sure that job creation is our primary concern - increasing the median wage is what concerns me the most.

Also, I would actually be more confident that you would see better outcomes from a higher rate around 80% than say you put it down equally as low to say 5%. At 80%, you would see companies try to do everything they could to avoid paying taxes on profit, so they would likely be forced to invest their profit in their employees or through expansions of their company so that they would appear revenue neutral.

And finally, as I said, it is not a closed loop system. But after years of seeing tax rate cuts never really spur the amount of growth that one expects them to, isn't it fairly obvious that reducing tax burdens, which generally only greatly impact the already wealthy, is not going to trickle down and help the average American? We need to focus on getting median wages up so that Americans can buy homes for the first time, get out of personal debt, etc.

My fear from a corporate tax cut (or really, tax cuts right now) is that you and your generation are f***ing my generation with even more debt so that, in your own words, your retirement fund performs a bit better. My fear is that we no longer can fund the public services due to decreasing revenues, like education, as we did in the 50s and 60s, that allowed your generation to prosper and succeed because it opened doors for you to take advantage of. My worry is that we are getting to the point where my generation won't be able to build equity as easily because wages have stagnated and we're seeing things like the median house being more than 3 times the median salary.

Right now our economy is chugging along (we're seeing record Stock market numbers!) and instead of focusing on trying to pull up the median American, who was left behind and focusing on trying to repay the debt while things are going well, we're looking to add more debt and directly benefit those who weren't left behind after 2008, and hope that their gains trickle down to the rest of us.

One question Lad:

Do you think that the price of labor follows the same Adam Smith rules of supply and demand?

Or is it 'special'? If 'special' then please tell us the fundamental characteristic by which labor avoids the principal concept of microeconomics.

(12-04-2017 02:03 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  Median wages rose up until about the 1970s and then they have stagnated. Corporate tax rates in the US have generally been higher than now, so I'm not sure what you mean by the bolded. The statutory rate was at 50% in the 1950s. Ironically, as GDP has fallen, so has the corporate tax rate (likely a corollary, not causal relationship). http://www.epi.org/publication/ib364-cor...ic-growth/

When has GDP fallen? With a couple of brief exceptions, GDP has increased almost every year since WWII. The comparison of corporate tax rates to those in prior years is meaningless. I can move my factory from Pennsylvania to Poland, but I can't move it from Pennsylvania to 1965, so no decisions are made based upon historic rates.

US corporate tax rates are virtually unchanged since the 1980s. The only real changes have been changes in various state rates, which affect the overall average rates. Meanwhile, the rates almost everywhere else in the world have fallen precipitously in that same time frame, so we have gone from having among the lowest corporate rates to having the highest.

Quote:Also, our effective corporate tax rate (~27%) is lower than our statutory tax rate (35%). I would like us to have a single corporate tax rate so we don't have a difference between what the statutory rate and the effect rates are. I'd like to see it be very obvious that we're on par with the rest of our peers.

We have a single corporate tax rate (35%, plus state taxes averaging 4-5%) now. It's not like corporations can pay different rates, or take a myriad of deductions like individuals. The only two tax breaks they get are accelerated depreciation (and many places overseas allow even faster) and LIFO inventory (which pretty much nobody but us allows). Our effective corporate tax rate is lower than our statutory tax rate, almost entirely for one reason--corporations can earn profits overseas and have them taxed at lower rates there. The linked article notes that the 27% effective rate is pretty much the weighted average rate for all industrialized nations. That's not an accident. Corporations are going to move profits to places where they are taxed at lower rates. What results is effectively a worldwide rate for corporate taxes. As long as that rate is lower than the worldwide rate, that is going to push economic activity overseas; if the US rate is lower than the effective worldwide rate, then economic activity is going to migrate here to pay lower taxes. It is very obvious that we are not now on par with the rest of our peers, and as long as our statutory corporate tax rate remains at 35%, we cannot be.

Quote:Also, we are doing fairly well with employment right now (unemployment is at 4.1%) so I'm not sure that job creation is our primary concern - increasing the median wage is what concerns me the most.

Increasing the median wage will not occur by paying retail clerks more. It requires moving from retail and menial service jobs to value-added jobs. If your job adds little value, your employer cannot afford to pay you very much for it. If your job adds value, he can. The value-added jobs occur at precisely the points in the value chain where profits are greatest. And other things being equal, employers choose to have those jobs performed in the places where their tax rates are lower.

Quote:Also, I would actually be more confident that you would see better outcomes from a higher rate around 80% than say you put it down equally as low to say 5%. At 80%, you would see companies try to do everything they could to avoid paying taxes on profit, so they would likely be forced to invest their profit in their employees or through expansions of their company so that they would appear revenue neutral.

At 80%, they simply move those profits to places where they pay 20%, just as they do now with an average rate in the 39% range--only more so. at 5% they would be rushing to move profits here. The effect on government revenues might be about the same, but the effect on the economy would almost certainly be vastly different.

Agree that at 80% corporations would try to do everything they could to avoid being taxed on profits. But they have a simple way to do that which you are overlooking. Make those profits overseas, where the tax is 20%, not 80%. How does that help us?

Quote:And finally, as I said, it is not a closed loop system. But after years of seeing tax rate cuts never really spur the amount of growth that one expects them to, isn't it fairly obvious that reducing tax burdens, which generally only greatly impact the already wealthy, is not going to trickle down and help the average American? We need to focus on getting median wages up so that Americans can buy homes for the first time, get out of personal debt, etc.

The benefits don't "trickle down." That is a horrible misconception, caused by Keynesians who don't understand the supply side because their models are all demand-based. What does happen is that if you increase tax-efficiency for investors, you raise their expected ROI and attract investment. And that investment pays workers, whose wages do go to grow the middle class. That's not "trickle down," that's economic growth.

If you're talking about anything since 1987, those "years of seeing tax rate cuts" do not include any cuts to the corporate tax rate, so you cannot draw any conclusions about the impact there. Actually, that's not entirely true, you can draw conclusions from the fact that as other countries have lowered their corporate tax rates, they have experienced significant growth.

Quote:My fear from a corporate tax cut (or really, tax cuts right now) is that you and your generation are f***ing my generation with even more debt so that, in your own words, your retirement fund performs a bit better. My fear is that we no longer can fund the public services due to decreasing revenues, like education, as we did in the 50s and 60s, that allowed your generation to prosper and succeed because it opened doors for you to take advantage of. My worry is that we are getting to the point where my generation won't be able to build equity as easily because wages have stagnated and we're seeing things like the median house being more than 3 times the median salary.

If corporations are choosing to move profits overseas and be taxed at 20% instead of keeping them here to be taxed at 35%, then how does raising corporate taxes, or even keeping them at current levels, produce more revenues?

If the corporate rate is set at a level that attracts, rather than repels, business investment, then that creates higher-paying jobs for your generation, and that ultimately does more for you than anything else that can be done.

Quote:Right now our economy is chugging along (we're seeing record Stock market numbers!) and instead of focusing on trying to pull up the median American, who was left behind and focusing on trying to repay the debt while things are going well, we're looking to add more debt and directly benefit those who weren't left behind after 2008, and hope that their gains trickle down to the rest of us.

I can assure of this. Until we get our corporate rates in line with the rest of the industrialized world, we can't count on much economic growth getting down to average Americans, whether "trickle down" or otherwise.

(12-04-2017 04:07 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  One question Lad:

Do you think that the price of labor follows the same Adam Smith rules of supply and demand?

Or is it 'special'? If 'special' then please tell us the fundamental characteristic by which labor avoids the principal concept of microeconomics.

Evidence would suggest that it does not follow that basic principle. If it did, CEO pay would not be skyrocketing as median income stays the same. As theoretically the supply of executives is likely growing at the same rate as the supply of median wage earners, especially since business school attendance is at an all-time high.

I would imagine that labor doesn't exactly follow supply vs demand because of a number of factors such as location of jobs vs potential employees, access to knowledge about potential income earnings (supply vs demand relies about all parties being well informed and action on that info), and so on and so forth.

I dont think I have ever heard someone say that labor doesnt follow a basic supply/demand price model. Interesting point of view, to say the least.

Funny thing, most CEOs of companies I advise swear 8 ways to Sunday that it does ---- the only exception being 'bottom rung' minimum wage positions that are legally set at the, well, minimum wage.

By the way your item about 'skyrocketing' CEO pay really falls short; perhaps you should actually compare apples to apples (i.e. CEO wages against one another, and a consideration that the skill set of a CEO is limited to literally no more than 5 per cent of the working population at tops.)

All you are doing is comparing the wages of one subgroup to another subgroup where the skill sets do not overlap much. And, I hate to tell you, B-school degree does not equal just add water CEO skill set.

I would not expect to see the unemployment rate drop much. Abooming economy needs 3-4% to grease the wheels. What would rise is the participation, as people currently not working would come out to apply for the better paying new jobs. So, more people working, more people paying Federal Income Tax, more people able to afford more things. A Democrat's nightmare.

Well, I take some objection to the stated goal of dropping the corporate tax rate to funnel directly to worker's salaries. The goal of the dropping of the corporate tax rate is to provide a healthier economic environment for the generation of profits; and the increase in available capital for expansion and investment.

That expansion (on a micro scale) leads for more demand across the workforce descriptions per each company. The integral of that on a per position basis simply means more demand for labor per defined position. Which, in classical terms, a shift in the demand curve leads to higher prices overall for given product (the product being a particular work skill set).

But if you dont believe that demand has any impact on the labor force on a per position basis, you almost have to make the aside that corporations and other entities should dedicate the savings on a direct basis to workers as increased salaries, as opposed to indirectly affecting the salaries through expansion in demand.

To be blunt, I was lucky enough to have a skill set that was in short supply and high demand right after law school. I am finding now that it wasnt that confluence in events that fueled a 170 per cent salary bump between day one of year one and day one of year 3 in the law firms. Stupid me thought it was a very basic supply / demand problem.

And OO, I have to agree with you. There will be a lot of slack for salaries given the grotesquely bad participation rate that evolved from 2008.

(12-04-2017 07:25 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  Well, I take some objection to the stated goal of dropping the corporate tax rate to funnel directly to worker's salaries. The goal of the dropping of the corporate tax rate is to provide a healthier economic environment for the generation of profits; and the increase in available capital for expansion and investment.

That expansion (on a micro scale) leads for more demand across the workforce descriptions per each company. The integral of that on a per position basis simply means more demand for labor per defined position. Which, in classical terms, a shift in the demand curve leads to higher prices overall for given product (the product being a particular work skill set).

But if you dont believe that demand has any impact on the labor force on a per position basis, you almost have to make the aside that corporations and other entities should dedicate the savings on a direct basis to workers as increased salaries, as opposed to indirectly affecting the salaries through expansion in demand.

To be blunt, I was lucky enough to have a skill set that was in short supply and high demand right after law school. I am finding now that it wasnt that confluence in events that fueled a 170 per cent salary bump between day one of year one and day one of year 3 in the law firms. Stupid me thought it was a very basic supply / demand problem.

And OO, I have to agree with you. There will be a lot of slack for salaries given the grotesquely bad participation rate that evolved from 2008.

So to summarize, you think the best way to increase profits for a corporation is to reduce their taxes, so with those savings they can expand production to fill the same amount of demand that already existed for their products.

My thought would be that if you focus on reducing taxes for more people (i.e. the average worker) they will have more buying power, and thus more demand. Then corporations will use extra profits from extra sales, or loans, to expand their business to meet the new found demand.

In my mind, it makes more sense to try to increase demand from the bottom up to lift all boats, then to hope that demand increases with an increase in supply. But I could be misunderstanding your point.

And to the labor market and wages, I maybe should have been clearer - I will reiterate the labor market does not STRICTLY follow the principle of supply and demand. The legal field is actually a really great example of this. There is a serious glut of lawyers right now, yet wages still remain very high for them on average. If wages followed supply and demand, one would expect wages in law to have bottomed out, but they haven't. The effect of supply and demand on wages is a bit more complicated than the fundamental Econ 101 theory (and I already outlined a bit of why it is). There is certainly a connection between the fundamental concept, but it is not strictly bound to it.

(12-04-2017 04:35 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  By the way your item about 'skyrocketing' CEO pay really falls short; perhaps you should actually compare apples to apples (i.e. CEO wages against one another, and a consideration that the skill set of a CEO is limited to literally no more than 5 per cent of the working population at tops.)

All you are doing is comparing the wages of one subgroup to another subgroup where the skill sets do not overlap much. And, I hate to tell you, B-school degree does not equal just add water CEO skill set.

Why is it not appropriate to compare the ratio of the CEO's compensation to the median worker over time? This helps to normalize for inflation. Also, one could reasonably expect pay across the spectrum of jobs to increase at a similar rate because we're offshoring a lot of the menial labor jobs, so even the average employee's job is getting more complicated and difficult. And that says nothing about increases in work efficiency over time.

Regardless, this article (http://www.epi.org/publication/top-ceos-...1-percent/) provides CEO pay and the ratio to average pay - so both numbers being discussed. I don't have time to dig deep into what companies or what the data set was, but it shows that average CEO compensation has (in 2014 dollars) increased significantly since 1965 (first year in the data set; $832k to $16.3M; 20x increase) while worker compensation has increased by 1.4 times in the same period.

So even if we were just comparing CEOs, how do you not think that a 20x increase in annual compensation (in 2014 dollars, so inflation is accounted for) is considered sky rocketing?