For a change, use this poll and comment space to discuss whether those who can most afford it should be treated the same as the rest of us or should they be treated differently. In other words, ignore the issue of raising taxes vs. cutting spending. That has been discussed to death. This is purely about who pays for what taxes there are. Tied up with this is keeping or eliminating tax loopholes and other things that allow the wealthy to pay less taxes. Discuss!
President Obama will propose that people earning more than $1 million a year pay at least the same tax rate as middle-class earners to help reduce the soaring budget deficit, according to administration officials.
Obama will call the plan the “Buffett rule” after billionaire investor Warren E. Buffett, a supporter of his who recently called the tax system unfair, noting that it lets him pay a lower rate than his secretary does.
The plan would replace the complicated alternative minimum tax, which was enacted decades ago to ensure that the wealthy paid at least some income taxes, according to the officials, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
Chris–I’ll quibble just a bit. To call the structural reshaping of world commerce as much psychological as anything else in its consequences is to miss what is reshaping the world. When the world evens out—those on the bottom do come up, but those on the top==do come down=======ESPECIALLY if those on top think its mostly psychological. It ain’t.
I know you know what I mean.
There are obviously big changes, but that is always the case. The psychology part is the idea of risk. Before 2008 there was NO risk and today the world is going to end. Or at least that’s what I’ve been told.
The rebalancing of our relationship with China is going to be disruptive, but so was the rise of China. We exchanged jobs for the ability to get cheaper shit at Wal-mart. People got hurt then too.
Long term we’re actually good. Better demographics than China, Europe, or Japan. If we can choose to relinquish our overbearing military role, rather than having it taken from us like the British did we can extremely competitive long term.*
I mostly see greater problems in other places around the world. The crucial problem the US faces is the GOP. They really remind me of the European monarchies on the eve of WWI.
It’s so easy to break things, so it must be similarly easy to put them back together… too bad it doesn’t work like that.
*Of course Keynes was right, in the long run we’re all dead anyway.
If you want the job creators to get capital moving, show them how hiring more people makes them *more* money. You don’t hire just for the hell of it, you hire because you need the new hires to help you make more money.
Chris–you lost me. Or did you get lost while I stayed on the straight and narrow.
Is the state of USA’s economy today and the challenges it faces mostly a matter of psychology or something more basic and transactional?
If mostly psychological, will the economy revive if everyone on subsistence wages, unemployment, and those with no money at all just go out and buy whatever? Or does “Psychology” mean something else to you?
I think Pres Amabo has it about right: jobs are created on demand for goods and services.
Just saw a report on the building of the New Oakland Bay Bridge. Seems the parts were manufactured in China because it cost half as much, half a billion less, than the same parts would cost if made in the USA, and they could be delivered more timely. I doubt thats entirely true, but its probably somewhat true? I keep hearing the USA leads the world in efficient new steel production. Maybe that is a recent advance like in the last 3 weeks?
Nothing but lies. THAT is very psychological. Could almost lull one asleep.
China’s currency should be higher, which will make their products cost more. With less of a price advantage a lot of manufacturing will move back to the US. There’s a shitload of infrastructure that needs to be in place to handle container ships. Other places that want to take the over China’s role may need to pony up a couple of billion for major port facilities. That is just to buy into the big game. You’ve still got to produce shit after that.
I think oil is artificially high, but even if it goes down everybody has noticed that there is huge variability there.
Europe is screwed, or at least the Euro is. France and Germany appear to have done a 180′ on whether they even want to hold the Greeks and others in. Before they absolutely couldn’t leave and now they’d better get out. It’s too big a mess not to hit France, and maybe Germany too.
The Middle East would appear to be the natural source for cheap plastic shit, lots of oil and low wage labor available. It just isn’t going to happen then.
Japan is screwed in a ton of ways. They appear to be making better moves about their demographic bubble, but their position is a lot worse.
Brazil has an absolutely massive property bubble coming up. That, combined with wealth disparity even worse than ours makes Brazil a risk.
Russia is facing maybe the worst demographics, and they might decide not to give back investment money. Got a problem with that.
We’re going back to our Cold War role as being marginally less bad than the next guy. We are decently convincing in the part.