Reading John’s post on the lack of national media coverage of the worker protests in Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio and elsewhere, I have to say, I’m not surprised or even particularly disheartened. I anticipated this well prior to the (understandable) media focus on events in Japan.
In Ohio our new Republican governor is a former FOX News personality who was promoted singularly and relentlessly by that cable channel during his campaign. The free media was worth tens of millions to Kasich, and he still barely pulled it out.
I think we got a sneak peek in Ohio at what may be a new political reality: the revolving door between paid media personalities and “public service”. Kasich went from the US House to FOX and ended up running Ohio. Huckabee and Palin won’t be far behind him. A paid platform on FOX News in between runs for office might be the new normal for conservative politicians. We’ll have to learn to deal with that.
But back to the issue at hand: in Ohio (unlike in Wisconsin), the bill ending collective bargaining included firefighters and law enforcement. Those two groups have traditionally supported conservatives in Ohio (not all, certainly, but most). There’s been quite a bit of blowback.
From the excellent all-Ohio political site, Plunderbund, here’s two letters that explain the situation better than I can:
On March 9, 2011, the members of the Columbus Fire Fighters Union voted unanimously to rescind your endorsement for Ohio’s 3rd Senate seat. This decision was reached due to your misleading comments during our Political screening process and your subsequent actions conflicting with your commitment to our members.
Your actions in supporting and voting for Senate Bill 5 do not reflect the commitment you made to our members. We must hold you accountable for this lack of integrity. In a further act of misinformation, you sent letters to my members today indicating that SB5 “does not eliminate anyone’s right to collectively bargain.” In fact, SB 5 strips the rights of almost one quarter of Ohio’s union fire fighters to collectively bargain by making it illegal for supervisors to have bargaining rights.
The Fraternal Order of Police Capital City Lodge #9 is announcing that it has formally withdrawn its prior endorsement of Senator Kevin Bacon (Republican) of the Ohio 3rd Senate District. We hold our endorsed elected officials accountable for their statements to our members, especially when it comes to public safety and our law enforcement officer’s safety. His support of and public statements on Senate Bill 5 and the negative impact it has upon our ability to bargain issues of safety demonstrates he is no longer worthy of the support of our organization.
When Senator Bacon appeared before our membership, he represented that he supported collective bargaining and binding arbitration. His actions demonstrate otherwise. It now appears that Senator Bacon was not forthcoming with his true beliefs when he sought our endorsement.
As to what we can do, SEIU, moveon and others are planning pro-worker events this Tuesday. I’ll be attending one of the Tuesday evening events in northwest Ohio. You can find an event near you. If there isn’t any media coverage and you attend, well, you’ll be there, so you can see for yourself what’s going on.
Finally, we spend a lot of time here on Balloon Juice talking about the ever-widening income gap in the U.S. I am not an economist and I don’t know what the math demands, but it occurs to me that one way to narrow the yawning gap between the very rich and the rest of us is for working people to organize and bargain collectively. I recognize that this is not a new idea, but it may be time to revisit it. We’ve been waiting for the trickle-down effect for thirty years. I don’t think it’s coming. Progressive tax policy coming from the top down is one mechanism to attempt to retain a vibrant middle class, but it’s not the only way.
To me, this is about the work that middle class people do, and the kinds of work that we say we value and admire, regardless of whether that work is glamorous or prestigious or maybe most importantly, profit-producing. Cops and firefighters and teachers and other public workers don’t do work that turns a profit. However, they make it possible for others in this country to turn a profit by helping to create or maintain the civil society and public system that makes for-profit markets possible.
Do we value that work with a seat at the table, or are we just going to pat them on the head and repeat patronizing platitudes about how we recognize the importance of their contribution?
FlipYrWhig
Very nicely put.
singfoom
No, we don’t pat them on the head patronizingly and repeat platitudes. We get out there with the unions even if we’re not in one and we march with them in solidarity.
Step 1 is to prevent any further rollback of worker’s rights.
Step 2 is to suport the unions as they fight back and increase their rights. We get out in the street and go support them. Maybe if the crowds do get big enough, we’ll get a mention in the MSM where they downplay the numbers and call us DFHs.
Step 3 is to INCREASE teacher pay to make it a prestigious position so our best and brightest to the profession instead of other industries.
Step 3 1/2, 4 is a bit OT, but we also should start paying our regulatory officials the same kind of salary they could find in the private sector business they’re regulating. Stop that revolving door!
My hope is that Wisconsin, Indiana and Ohio energize the democratic base for 2012. And not just the democratic base, but all of us who realize we’ve been losing the class war for 30 years for this trickle down bullshit.
The Political Nihilist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@FlipYrWhig:
Which is precisely why Republicans are hard at work at creating an environment where we can successfully privatize police forces, firefighting forces, and schools wholesale.
kay
@FlipYrWhig:
I had a great conversation with a (conservative) local judge. We were talking about corruption in the Mexican legal system, and he mentioned the value of a working, predictable and not-corrupt court-legal system to private entities. All our high-flying masters of the universe are relying on a public infrastructure that they take for granted.
bleh
… a new political reality: the revolving door between paid media personalities and “public service”.
Hmm, now hang on, something’s ringing a faint bell. Who was the 40th president of the United States? Oh, right. And then wasn’t there some guy in California recently?
kdaug
@FlipYrWhig:
Precisely.
The Moar You Know
The only thing in this nation that “trickles down” is urine from old men with prostatitis into a toilet.
Income, not so much. But yet the
sheeppopulace still believe.Not sure how to cure stupid.
Roger Moore
@kay:
Not to mention a well educated workforce, a functional transportation system, and good public safety. It’s almost as though the US has had those things for so long that we take them for granted and assume they’ll always be there no matter how badly we neglect them.
slag
This point reflects a big problem in private business as well. The cost centers of organizations continually competing with the profit centers for resources and respect. In more abstract terms, this issue is about organizational cohesion and efficiency.
Can any organization function well when the burden shouldered by operational support staff dramatically outstrips the rewards received? Wouldn’t acknowledging and respecting every individual’s contribution to the business actually promote cooperation, thereby furthering the goals the organization is trying to achieve?
Of course, I realize that just by asking these questions, I am outing myself as a dirty Stalin-loving commie.
Zifnab
They’ve been getting less pats on the head and more backs of the hand. The attacks on public sector anything these last few months have been viscous.
The Political Nihilist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@The Moar You Know:
Obviously, you cure stupid by dumbing down the rest of the average population so those who were once considered ‘stupid’ are now perfectly representative of the public as a whole.
kay
@bleh:
Right! Thanks. I just think the FOX News thing is worthy of mention. There wasn’t a damn thing we could do about it in Ohio, but it hurt us.
Can they appear on FOX News as paid staff, resign, then win (or lose) officially, appear on FOX News as ‘the candidate” and then re-up when they “public service” ends?
I think they can! It may get hard to tell the difference between FOX News and “your government”.
JenJen
Which is why we should always, always refer to him only as Governor Heartland. Of course Governor AssKnob works, too.
David in NYC
Unfortunately, as the current economic situation clearly indicates, its effects are here, and they will be long- (if not eternally-) lasting. And that’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
The Reaganauts got exactly what they wanted: they have all the money and all the power (or close enough to “all” to make it work that way), while the remaining 98% (and soon to be 99%, if current trends continue) of the country fights over the crumbs and whether they will be forced to have gay abortions performed by Messicans while waiting for their death panels.
Welcome to the end of the American Empire.
Brian S (formerly Incertus)
I think we also need to start encouraging more union drives in the service sector, since that’s the area, unlike manufacturing, for example, that can’t be offshored. A national movement to unionize Wal-Mart, for example, would be a good place to start.
FlipYrWhig
@kay: My whole thing lately, ethico-politico-philosophically, has been that idea of “the public.” I just particularly like the way you accept that it’s NOT profit-generating but nonetheless indispensable. I think there’s a lot of polemical value in that stance.
singfoom
@slag: You mean, gasp, the partnership model? Back in the old days, partners at a bank/financial institution were on the line for losses.
Somehow, that kept them from making crazy ass bets that tanked the entire economy (see CDO shorts and playing both sides of the table). Now they’re all LLCs and no one’s personal money is at risk.
Barry Ritholtz at the Big Picture has a good WaPo editorial about fixing that problem. Linky>/a>
I have no problem with Wall Street peeps making tons of money as long they’re making tons of money for their investors and that capital is being spread around the economy…
But now, it never leaves the FIRE sector and these guys get their multi-million payouts regardless of whether they make money or destroy companies.
Great work if you can get it.
Lev
Looks like Kaisich’s approval rating’s down to 40%: http://www.librarygrape.com/2011/03/the-gop-wave-troughs.html
Too soon to tell if it will be permanent, but his (and Walker’s) first impressions have been lousy.
kay
@Roger Moore:
I don’t think I’m some pollyana-ish civic model and it occurred to me when I was educated at public schools for undergrad and grad. I knew they didn’t JUST APPEAR, and then, poof, gone when I walk out. I assumed I was entering into some kind of long-term arrangement, where I would TAKE and then PAY (taxes). Seems like a good plan to me.
spongeworthy
it occurs to me that one way to narrow the yawning gap between the very rich and the rest of us is for working people to organize and bargain collectively.
Brilliant! Why has nobody thought of this before? We’ll organize abd make the rich pay us more money. Step Three: Profit!
If you’re looking for the missing growth in middle-class income, look to India and the rest of the developing world where they want a heated home and flush toilets. They’re willing to work to get them and they’ll work much cheaper than you will.
You can collectively bargain yourself a raise but you can’t bargain yourself a job.
Culture of Truth
withdrawn its prior endorsement of Senator Kevin Bacon
“All is well!! ALL IS WELL!!!”
Lev
@spongeworthy: Standard Republican boilerplate. Corporate profits have surged over the past decade–they can afford to pay workers more. They just don’t have to, and don’t want to.
kay
@spongeworthy:
Well, but that’s not true for those jobs that can’t be shipped. We’ve seen an enormous rise in compensation at the top, in the US. It’s not just stagnant in the bottom 90%. The top ten is rising and rising. There’s money there. How does that fit into your theory of brutal merit-based competition?
singfoom
@spongeworthy: OR, you could look at how the income gap between the standard American worker vs. the standard American CEO has leaped exponentially in the last decades…
Hmm, I wonder if the CEO making 500x that of the typical worker has anything to do with the erosion of the middle class.
It’s almost as if all of the profit has been channeled upwards….
spongeworthy
They just don’t have to, and don’t want to.
And you think collective bargaining will force them to pay you more? I think it will force them to outsource your job.
Looking at recent history, which of us, do you suppose, is correct?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@spongeworthy: They can’t outsource every job. And – it has occurred at my company as well – they are bringing back jobs that can’t be done overseas as well or as cheaply as they thought.
kay
@Lev:
Kasich is a bad politician in a different way than Walker. Waler to me is a robotic ideologue.
Kasich thinks he’s charming. The problem is, he’s not. He comes off as combative and angry and inauthentic as a “regular guy”. He also acts like a US House member. He’s bored with nuts and bolts state stuff. He’s unappealing. In a wave GOP year with all that help from FOX, he barely won.
spongeworthy
Well, but that’s not true for those jobs that can’t be shipped.
No, but you have a lot more workers competing for those jobs because theirs have been outsourced. The market for labor is global even if you are a policeman. This will hold wages down until the rest of the world catches up–soon, I hope.
rufflesinc
Wait, what happened to their democratic opponents? Did they throw a kitten off a roof or something?
spongeworthy
It’s almost as if all of the profit has been channeled upwards….
And you think you can collectively bargain it back down. I support your struggle. I support your wishful thinking. And I will end up supporting your family, too, if that’s your plan.
kay
@Lev:
He’s doing a big “kindler, gentler” push to appeal to women, I think. I recognize when politicians are marketing to women, because I am one. I think that’s what they’re worried about. I can say he’s not appealing to me, but I don’t know if that has anything to do with gender.
slag
@singfoom: Thanks for the tip on that column, I’m checking it out.
But as for this:
I honestly couldn’t disagree more. The work you’re describing would suck the life out of me. And honestly, I think it does suck the life out of those who do it. Half of me despises the FIRE squad and their narcissistically catastrophic worldview, while the other half of me pities them as I would any other villain of Shakespearean tragedy. We’ve created a system that hugely rewards sociopathy and, consequently, have created a bunch of sociopaths. They may be rich, but it still sucks to be them.
singfoom
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): This, this exactly. I’m not sure what it’s like in other industries, but you’re starting to see some software engineering jobs come back to the US after outsourcing to India has caused problems.
Sure, India can train software developers that are just as talented here in the U.S., but the logistics between having clients in the US and the developers in another country inevitably have communications breakdowns that lead to faulty software.
It’s doable, the the energy expenditure in terms of project overhead is so high that you eat in the very profits that you expected based on the lower cost of labor.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@JenJen: I call him Gov. Napoleon Heartland(TM) because he thinks he’s a general. The fuckwad. Anybody for a Tshirt that reads “Charlie Sheen makes more sense than John Kasich” — might they sell? (Which I stole form a Texas protest sign about Gov. Good Hair.)
But it was Gov. Napoleon Heartland(TM) who said ~7M state subsidies to move Bob Evans HQ to New Albany from Columbus because “cities are losing population.” In his universe that connection makes sense, perhaps.
Roger Moore
@kay:
Too bad the Republicans have taken the IGMFY approach to keeping public services running. Maybe the reason they care more about police and fire fighters than other government workers isn’t because they’re traditionally supportive of conservative candidates but because you notice faster when you underfund them than when you underfund schools and roads.
Lev
@kay: I hear you. I saw him on Colbert once and he came off poorly. And not in the way that Colbert guests are supposed to come off poorly. No sense of humor, no gravitas, nothing. He kept telling stories that were dull and pointless.
spongeworthy
they are bringing back jobs that can’t be done overseas as well or as cheaply as they thought.
Yes, there is some hope here. We are still the most productive workers by miles, so wages don’t have to be equal to employ Americans, just closer. We may be reaching that point a little sooner than I had feared, which is great. I don’t see unionization as a positive thing for the trend, do you?
kay
@spongeworthy:
I don’t think the theory matters. They’ve been told to retrain over and over again, and all they’re ending up with is a lot of student debt. Two wage earners with two kids in Ohio making minimum wage X 40 are just eligible for food stamps. That’s not sustainable, not with a top 5% or 10% accumulating massive wealth.
kay
@Lev:
Strickland is an older man, and he’s not at all slick. Still, he was a good “fit” for Ohio (in rural areas, certainly). Kasich was just very flashy, and (I hate to say this) our state media were a bit over-awed. The whole FOX News, Lehman Bros magic bowled them over.
His governance has been a bit of a reality check.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@slag:
One sociopath is a tragedy. Millions of sociopaths are a statistic.
/Stalinist Broccoli
spongeworthy
…not with a top 5% or 10% accumulating massive wealth.
Hah. Well, I’m in that top 5-10% and no way am I accumulating massive wealth. Maybe you left out a decimal point.
In my town, two families working for the school system for around 10 years, they’d be in the top 10% of incomes in America.
Lev
@kay: Hmm…interesting. An appeal to women, eh? Here’s what interests me: you spend all this time building up how tough you are, how you won’t compromise and won’t listen to reason–dig in with the machismo, basically–and then try to smooth it over with some kind words. Yeah, that oughta work.
Only the greatest politicians ever made can change the tone like that. Otherwise, it becomes as coherent as those Star Wars prequels, where we cut from serious doings to the Wacky Comedic Stylings of Jar Jar Binks. In the end, it’s not coherent. But I guess it makes sense he’d try.
kay
@Roger Moore:
Well, they run on law ‘n order, Republicans. Uniforms, whether military or police, standing behind the candidate has become part of the Republican “brand”.
Southern Beale
Co-ops. We should form them for everything. Co-ops collectively bargain.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@spongeworthy: One of the companies bringing back jobs is GE, specifically their refrigerator manufacturing. I don’t have time to do the research, but I suspect there is a union there. (I work in software in Texas, so I’m not in a union personally.)
I don’t see unionizing as stalling returning jobs, and I think what hurts the unions here is most people ignorance about what unions have done. I think if most people learned that unions are not represented by Jimmy Hoffa and that things like weekends and paid vacation came from unions the unions would do much better. Companies can make the same amount of money with or without a union (and I would argue more), it’s just that CEOs and investors won’t be taking home all of it. I have no problem with that.
kay
@Lev:
He launched this fake-initiative on prenatal health. I think the problem with it is it focused exclusively on babies. I can’t speak for all women, but I think the conservative “women as baby-makers” falls a little flat.
I woulda put a sentence or two on women’s health in there. He has a notably non-diverse staff, so maybe that’s it. He’s listening to people like him.
schrodinger's cat
@spongeworthy:
People in India want heated homes, when average temperatures in vast parts of the subcontinent barely dip below 70F even in January, who knew?
kdaug
@slag: This, exactly. The most miserable people I’ve ever known have been millionaires (most through inherited wealth, though a few obsessed with the “push,push,push” mentality).
singfoom
@spongeworthy: While I disagree with your larger point, the smaller point about the percentages is spot on.
Sponge, I don’t care about the top 10%. I don’t even care about the top 5%. I care about the top 1% and especially the top .01%.
That’s where ALL the wealth has gone to in the last 20 years. There’s a difference between wanting a policy and knowing it’s possible in the current political climate, and I get that, but jesus I want 80% marginal rates on the top .01%.
Unless we restore sanity to our tax policies and make the super ultra mega double rich pay their share, we’re screwed. Then you get bullshit like people using teachers as an example of an overpaid boogeyman.
Yeah, sure the teachers are bankrupting our economy. It couldn’t possibly be the hedge fund manager making billions and paying 15% capital gains tax or the already a billionaire paying roughly the same rates as someone making $120K a year.
Of course, the political will to bring taxes back in line with reality doesn’t exist at this point. We can keep fighting and hope it does soon.
Maude
The offshore tax reversal was repelled by the Repubs last fall. That would help.
Unions that can go international would go a long way in evening out wages and workers rights.
I have to mention Apple.
In the intro to ipad2, Jobs said how many ipad1 units had sold and how much money Apple had made. Apple values its stock price.
The Political Nihilist Formerly Known as Kryptik
Speaking of the revolving door between media personality and “public service”…
Fox News is expected to announce its hiring of former Sen. Evan Bayh. Because of course the partisanship of Congress was simply too much to bear.
kay
@Southern Beale:
I’m open to any idea. There has to be something else than collecting taxes and issuing food stamps. I think, given their druthers, working people would prefer to feed their own kids, ya know, with their wages.
lou
This. I was just ranting to my DH yesterday that reducing pay for public servants would basically turn us into a country the conservatives seemingly revile — Mexico. Or any other third world nation beset by corruption. Maybe the ultra rich don’t care. they can live in protected, gated communities and helicopter everywhere as they do in Sao Paulo.
So the solution to getting rid of “crappy” teachers is to pay them less? Zuh?! How does that even make an iota of sense?
Yutsano
@Southern Beale: One of the big health insurers up this way started as a co-op. It’s still technically non-profit although I have no idea how true that is now because they’re affiliated with BCBS.
Alex S.
@The Political Nihilist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
I had something to say, but then I decided that it would be insulting to whores.
Lev
@kay: Yeah, Strickland seemed that way to me.
It really seemed as though the whole Midwest (except Illinois, for some reason) got a little dazzled by what all that Chamber of Commerce/Koch/Tea Party money was able to do last year. At least, that’s what I’m getting from what I read and people I know in OFA who worked in the Midwest last year. Here on the West Coast, we get that every cycle so it didn’t work. In California specifically, Republicans who get nominated for statewide office tend to be too moderate for the party to help them out, so usually super-rich people run and carpetbomb the airwaves with ads. I don’t think Kaisich is that much better of a politician than Carly Fiorina or Meg Whitman (of course, Ohio’s quite a bit less Democratic than California, too, so there’s that), but neither of them were even close by the end. Whitman wasted $175 million of her own money on a humiliating defeat.
Not that I’m bragging. I dearly wish it hadn’t been the case that voters figured it out a bit too late over there.
BGK
@lou:
See: “the beatings will continue until morale improves.” Refer also to the scene in “The Dark Knight” where the Joker offers each of the “job candidates” half of a broken pool cue.
Bug, feature, and something about a chicken…
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
So next time I call the cops because someone is breaking into my house, I’ll have to wait 14 hours for one to arrive from India?
liberal
@Mnemosyne:
I think (he?) is emphasizing No, but you have a lot more workers competing for those jobs because theirs have been outsourced.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@kay:
Combining bits of your wisdom, kay. Thank you for the post. It was hard to “get” why the media here liked him so much, as he’s such an obviously obnoxious dipweed. But they were a bit awed. And now buyer’s remorse, from both media and voters, is becoming apparent.
liberal
@kay:
LOL!! Are you kidding me?
Mnemosyne
@liberal:
He seems very confused as to how labor markets work and what the current trends are, so I wouldn’t be so sure.
liberal
@Lev:
That was one of the silver linings of 2010. Man, that was sweet.
Alex S.
@liberal:
They can make billions of dollars disappear! Noone knows how….
liberal
@singfoom:
Looking at historical data, the only conclusion one can come to is that the entire FIRE sector is just an enormous rent-collection machine.
BGK
@Mnemosyne:
India will probably just be the call-center equivalent for 911. You will, however, need to flip the main breaker for your house on and off, unplug and plug all the lamps, and use your house plans to remove all your additions and furniture to restore your home to post-construction default condition before they will dispatch
an onsite techniciana patrol car.Lev
@liberal: No kidding. At first I was indifferent (my reaction was: Jerry Brown? Really? Okaaaay…), but once I read Meg Whitman’s issue positions I donated and volunteered for the guy. No joke, on the first page of her pamphlet on the jobs she proposed a capital gains cut. Only a true wingnut could really think those two things connect.
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
I don’t know which is worse – poor media coverage or dishonest media coverage. Almost everything I’ve seen about Wisconsin falls into the second category. Both PBS and network evening news were just providing stenography for Walker with no analysis or balance.
we can be heroes
Public servants add value, period.
piratedan
@BGK: your call is very important to us, please listen closely to the following menu:
please press one if you are being personally assaulted, please press two if your residence has been burgled, please press three if this a domestic dispute, please press 4 if you are witnessing a crime, please press 5 if there has been an accident, please press six if this is a medical emergency, please press seven if there is an illegal alien involved, please press 0 for more options or hold for the next available operator
Omnes Omnibus
Weird, I know Kevin Bacon from law school. He was an authoritarian twit back then; nice to see that some things never change.
ETA: I am also three degrees removed from the actor Kevin Bacon.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus:
I’m two, so I’m not allowed to play that game anymore.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Omnes Omnibus: Kevin Bacon hasn’t cured well. The OH version that is. Sigh.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Fuck, outside of show biz peeps, no one ever beat at this game before.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Blame my old friend Robert. His grandmother lives next door to their ranch in Montana. Says they’re very good neighbors. So he has met the Bacony goodness several times.
Judas Escargot (aka ninja fetus with a taste for bruschetta)
@spongeworthy:
If you’re looking for the missing growth in middle-class income, look to India and the rest of the developing world where they want a heated home and flush toilets. They’re willing to work to get them and they’ll work much cheaper than you
willcan.FTFY.
Galtian value-creators always seem to forget that an American can’t work for $300/mo even if he wanted to- it wouldn’t cover his food, housing, health and other costs.
Yet no one ever seems to blame the landlords, the health insurers or the banks for high US labor costs.
spongeworthy
but jesus I want 80% marginal rates on the top .01%
Why? I mean, I do get that they are making obscene amounts of money for any individual to make–I get that. What I don’t get is why anybody cares as much as you seem to. It’s not like there so much money there that we could give the rest of us some relief. Or build schools in every poor neighborhood.
There’s lots of money but not enough to make much of a difference in anybody’s life. Especially after it gets laundered in D.C..
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Went college with Campbell Scott who was in Singles with Kyra Sedgwick.
Ash Can
@Lev: Illinois was a close call, gubernatorally. Patrick Quinn won a squeaker over the teabagger darling and Kasich/Walker clone Bill Brady. The difference between Brady and the other shitheels is that he’d have had to railroad his state-crippling policies through a state assembly controlled by Chicago Dems. That would have been somewhat entertaining, but not nearly entertaining enough, I’m sure, to be any meaningful consolation over his election. And seeing what has transpired in Wisconsin and Ohio, I now know how big a bullet we dodged here in IL.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: You’re so wrong about that. There are OCEANS of money there. Take a look at Perfectly Legal by David Cay Johnston if you want a super detailed explanation about how the tax rates on the super rich have led to them making shit tons of money at the expense of the rest of us and the exact numbers involved. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not about punishing success.
I’m about getting the ultra-rich to realize that they would not be in the situation that they are in without the community around them.
The reason I’m so concerned about it? The same reason a ton of idiots are concerned that school teachers have benefits that are too good and too high of wages. Our governments of all levels have financial problems….
It’s not the middle class that’s fucking us, it’s the Kochs and the super wealthy. You want to fix our deficits? We have to take in more in taxes as well as reducing unnecessary spending (I’m looking at the Pentagon and Healthcare, not discretionary bullshit that adds up to pocket change relative to the government budget..) And those at the top should pay the most.
spongeworthy
He seems very confused as to how labor markets work
I don’t know if I am “very confused” about how they work. I am a little confused about how organizing for higher wages would work positively in this globsl environment.
I think anybody who says they can’t see a potential problem in organizing for higher wages right now is being dishonest or whistling past the graveyard.
Internationalizing unions is one idea, but you may go first with organizing the Chinese. With some luck, you may only end up in one of their fine collective jails.
The world’s wages will catch up, or get close enough. Until then we need to hunker down, do whatever it takes to promote productivity and soldier on. This is what Americans used to do best, but I fear we aren’t determined to actually compete anymore.
Skippy-san
One of the things about Kasich is he has a long history of screwing people over. He was the brainchild behind REDUX retirement scheme for military signed in 1986. Only during the Clinton adminstration was that abomination repealed.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@spongeworthy:
henry ford for all his faults, had a concept, one that might not have been universal in his day, but one that gained popularity for a while, but now seems non-existent from all these discussions.
he thought he should build a car, and pay his workers, enough so they could be purchasers of his car.
more than he could have paid them, and he could have built more expensive cars, and made car ownership harder to achieve, the demand likely would have stayed close to the same, just that people would have to spend more of their income for the luxury of driving, but the advantages were great enough, that enough people would….
he didn’t really profit maximize in that sense.
by today’s standards, he would have been a terrible businessman and quite possibly a kenyan soshallist.
at some point, one has to take a longer view, that paying more for workers isn’t being exploited, its making an investment…
yes, i have been called an idiot, and quaint, and atavistic before, thanks.
cat48
Evan Bayh is joining FOXNEWS……per Howard Kurtz…….BASTARD!
spongeworthy
You want to fix out deficits? We have to take in more tax.
Well, you need to show me some evidence here. From what I understand, you could completely confiscate the entire wealth of ever billionaire in the country and it would not cover this year’s deficit, let alone budget.
And then their wealth, and the income it produces, would be gone and never to be taxed again. MMoore is simply wrong on this and best ignored on issues of economics.
BTW, I have yet to hear anybody claim teachers should make less take-home. Mostly it’s the benefits that have the rest of us shaking our heads. Here it’s health benefits for life, free, no co-pay for the entire family. Similar sweetness on pensions, too. That’s pretty far out of line with the private market.
spongeworthy
he thought he should build a car, and pay his workers, enough so they could be purchasers of his car.
Well, it is antiquated, I am sorry. How many Ford workers would buy his car when they could buy a Kia for half? Sure, collectively they’d be cutting their own throats, but you cannot force consumers to make the best decision for the collective.
This, in a nutshell, is where middle class wages increases have gone. You may not want to hear it, but take heart: Those Kia workers aren’t going to work for a potato much longer.
Yutsano
@spongeworthy:
A universal health care system would adjust that easily but that’s not the main focus here. Instead of saying why is the public benefit so good the question should be why is the private contract so terrible? Why are you so damn willing to put up with shit just so your CEO can buy a fourth yacht or a gold-leafed private jet for his second mistress? Just so you can say you have a job?
Thanks. I now know I can no longer take you seriously. Baka.
Nicole
And they get these benefits in lieu of a higher salary NOW. Why is this so hard to understand (because most of the country doesn’t seem to understand it)? It’s not “benefits” really, it’s “work for crap now, we’ll pay you later.” Until you’ve worked for crap and then they decide to not pay you later after all.
Omnes Omnibus
@spongeworthy: What about making billionaires and corporations pay their share?
And yet public employees tend to make less as a total package that private sector employees of equivalent education and responsibility.
gene108
I was watching a documentary yesterday on HBO about the Triangle Shirt factory in New York, which is nearing its 100th anniversary, and the rise of the labor movement in the garment district. They went through the current state of textile manufacturing the U.S. and they did a bit about Kathy Lee Gifford’s sweat shops in Honduras, which employed kids for $.35/hr.
One thing I realized about the sweat shop in Honduras is the reason certain jobs pay middle class wages is purely based on our values as a society. From a purely business perspective, it makes no sense to pay an American $18/hr, plus overtime, when someone in Honduras will do it for $.35/hr.
I support free trade. I think it is essential to reverse the plunder Third World countries endured, during colonialism. In some ways, I think free trade is correcting the flow of capital that went from places like India, China, etc. to Europe and the USA, during the 19th and part of the 20th century.
I don’t think free trade’s inherently a race to the bottom, but it could be, if Americans stop valuing their middle class. People in India and China, want to come up to our standard of living. I don’t think the common folks want us to come down to their standard of living.
I think the folks at the top may have a different view. Why pay an American $18/hr or a Chinese worker $5/hr, when someone else, somewhere, will do it for $.50/hr? Something has to be done to curtail businesses instinct for pushing us into a race to the bottom. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: There’s lots of money but not enough to make much of a difference in anybody’s life.
That’s the problem with lots of money. There’s never enough to actually do anything with.
freelancer
@Omnes Omnibus:
He was great in Roger Dodger, not so much as the lead in The Spanish Prisoner, but I blame Mamet for that one.
Svensker
@spongeworthy:
What does that mean?
If there are no jobs that pay more than the minimum wage, mortgages are underwater, people’s savings are gone, how do we “hunker down”?
My friend who lost his stores and then his house a few years ago is about to run out of unemployment bennies. He could get a $10/hour job at Starbucks if he’s lucky, but rents where he lives average about $1600/mo for a one bedroom. He’s been living in friends’ and family basements for the last year and a half. He could move somewhere out in the sticks where rents are more affordable, but then it’s tougher to find a job. How’s he supposed to hunker down and get more productive?
What do these words mean that are coming out of your mouth?
Omnes Omnibus
@Svensker: Dude’s a troll.
cincyanon
Kasich buyer’s remorse? He now, after only a few months on the job, sits at 40% approval.
http://www.bizjournals.com/dayton/news/2011/03/14/ohio-gov-john-kasich-approval-at-40.html
Stillwater
@Svensker: What do these words mean that are coming out of your mouth?
Lots of pain for everyone but the rich?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@spongeworthy: you would be surprised the social pressure a parking lot full of ford employees who are leaving work before you can have.
seriously?
i think the american middle class has proven they can be sold just about anything in opposition to their own personal financial interests, the whole gop platform for example.
just convince them kias are made by tree-hugging baby killers or some such. seriously though, its not the workers that abrogate the social compacts, its the elites. nice trying to pretend the market would behave purely on a rational basis though.
i mean elitists and their sympathizers might cut their own throat to save a buck, but the middle class has proven time and time again a willingness to sacrifice for a greater good.
its the elites and their sympathizers who didn’t get the memo.
JenJen
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Love it!!
matryoshka
.
@spongeworthy: Would you mind saying where you live? I’d love to apply for a teaching job there. A lot of teachers will probably want to since the pay is astronomically higher than anywhere else.
spongeworthy
What about making billionaires and corporations pay their share?
Well, what about it? We already have nearly the highest corporate income tax in the world. Other nations are adjusting their rates down to attract industry. Would you have us raise them now? Does that actually sound like a good idea?
Seriously, I would like an answer to this. I would like an answer to the question I posed above: Do you really think it is a good idea in this environment to organize all the workers in the country for higher wages?
I want higher wages too. Not just for me but for everybody. Especially the Chinese, Koreans and Indians!
spongeworthy
Dude’s a troll.
By what definition am I trolling? Be specific.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: Sorry, that’s just a fundamental disagreement. I think we should aim towards raising incomes to decrease income inequality as a priority.
Unless I’m mistaken, what you’ve written implies that you’re ok with the current arrangement and you think it’s fine that the middle class suffers while our little CEO neros fiddle.
If I’ve mistaken your position, I apologize.
But if I haven’t, please tell me why it’s better to screw those still making it by and making their lives financially harder by removing tough fought for compensation because the private sector has gutted it’s responsibility to it’s workers.
I mean, if you think that there’s not enough to balance the deficit in the billionaire’s bankbooks, how is it that you think it’s in the teacher pensions?
Does not compute.
spongeworthy
And they get these benefits in lieu of a higher salary NOW.
I canonly speak for my community–really statewide here in NJ–but our wages are really a lot better than average and you cannot completely ignore that 10-month year. Your community may not be out of hand but ours is.
Now I do think teahers should probably make more than the community average in most towns and I don’t grudge them their salaries unless they are terrible teachers. But those bennies!
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@JenJen: I’m so glad! Now, how do you feel about
I’m actually considering Tshirts, LOL. That’s what Cafe Press is for.
Omnes Omnibus
@spongeworthy: By mine.
spongeworthy
Unless I’m mistaken, what you’ve written implies that you’re ok with the current arrangement and you think it’s fine that the middle class suffers while our little CEO neros fiddle.
Well, I am not fine with it. I just don’t think you can do anything about it. Well, short of organizing the entire world’s workers to strike for higher wages.
You can tax the corporations and their CEO’s out the wazoo, but they’ll just move and take the jobs with them.
I am not making this up. If you have a plan that deals with this I and many others would love to hear it. So far, I am hearing only what we wish would work, not what might actually work.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: I think you’re wrong. I think you tax the hell out of the superrich. They’ll stay. They didn’t leave during Eisenhower, when marginal rates were at 90%.
I do have a plan. Get rid of the tax loophole that allows hedge fund managers to pay just capital gains.
1)Up the marginal rate on the superrich to 80% or more.
2)Remove ALL corporate welfare and subsidies on anything other than renewable energies.
3)Remove the tax code loopholes that allow corporations to evade their tax burden.
Those 3 steps would bring a lot more tax income and make it so we don’t have to cannibalize our public employees or infrastructure to keep the gravy train rolling for those who already so much.
Sure, we may have the highest tax rate, but you’re mistaking tax rates for what’s actually paid.
Those are not the same.
Forbes tax rate vs paid
piratedan
@spongeworthy: and tell me, how many of them are paying it? No, they are “locating” their business addresses in the Caymens and not paying anything. How about we simply tax every business that operates here a minimum and shoot all the lawyers instead?
http://money.cnn.com/2010/04/16/news/companies/ge_7000_tax_returns/
corporate taxes are for suckers who haven’t hired a bunch of congresscritters to create their tax loopholes for them.
Pococurante
@The Political Nihilist Formerly Known as Kryptik: When life imitates fiction. You just described the primary plot device in “The Cape”.
Maybe I will soon get a pet replicant.
NonyNony
@kay:
Reality check for the people, but as far as I can tell the media in Ohio continues to slobber all over the slimeball.
The worst offender in my mind is the statehouse reporting coming out on NPR. Just amazingly bend-over-backwards slobberingly pathetic – like they think that if they kiss his ass he’ll love them. Pathetic.
Of course the rest of the media in Columbus isn’t much better, but I’m used to our Republican-controlled airwaves and Ohio Public Radio used to be a good check on that. But apparently not anymore – they want to get in line to polish this turd just like everyone else in the city.
Emma
You can tax the corporations and their CEO’s out the wazoo, but they’ll just move and take the jobs with them: I used to believe that until I realized that we keep cutting taxes and cutting taxes and they still take the jobs to China. And that no matter how high taxes are in places like Canada and the UK and France, millionaires and companies don’t decamp at any faster rate than here in the US.
urbanmeemaw
@kay: Can we dub our state “Foxhiostan?” I want a cool nickname like Wisconsin has!
Chyron HR
@spongeworthy:
Sure, right alongside all the Teabaggers who are moving to a first-world country that doesn’t have socialized medicine.
urbanmeemaw
@singfoom: I’ve heard that, too. Also, aren’t companies in India now demanding higher payment and wages? I heard that would be a trend as well.
FlipYrWhig
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
You can’t underestimate how much the media loves obviously obnoxious dipweeds. John McCain, Chris Christie, Rex Ryan, Donald Trump, etc. It’s bizarre, but it’s consistent.
spongeworthy
A lot of teachers will probably want to since the pay is astronomically higher than anywhere else.
You can see from the charts here
http://schools-wikipedia.org/wp/h/Household_income_in_the_United_States.htm
that any household making 6 figures easily qualifies for the top 10%. Teachers here start at 44k, so two could easily be in the top 10% after a few years. Some teachers here in NJ make more than 100k. YMMV.
Please don’t move here if you are a lousy teacher. Those we have, though not many.
gene108
@spongeworthy:
We actually don’t need to raise our tax rates. We need to do what Ronald Reagan did in 1986: Close all the goddamn loopholes.
If you cut back the number of deductions a business can take, you can start moving the effective tax rate to be close the marginal tax rate. With all the deductions we have, the effective tax rate, i.e. what a business actually pays on income, is always going to be lower than the marginal tax rate, which right-wingers like to bitch about.
Our corporations in no way, shape, or form are the most heavily taxed.
Yes. It would be a great fucking idea. Corporations are very profitable right now. So where are the profits going? To the workers or the investors and CEO’s, who have huge stock options to cash out?
It would be better for the economy and corporations, but maybe not CEO compensation, if the worker bees got more money. The problem with the economy is a lack of purchasing power from the worker bees. Their wages have not kept up with the rate of inflation.
If this got corrected, we’d be in much better shape. People would have more money to pay to buy more products, which would increase demand and boost sales.
Of course the cost of this is CEO’s pay, so I’m not holding my breath waiting for it to happen.
Paying people well is a value we can embrace or reject, as a nation. Like I posted up thread, there’s no economic reason to pay an American adult $18/hr to do a job, when you can get a 9 year old Honduran to do it for $.35/hr. Also, the Honduran kid won’t be getting OT pay, sick pay, vacation pay, health benefits, etc.
Right now Republicans don’t seem to believe giving Americans a middle class living is a value we should embrace.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@spongeworthy:
LOLwut?
What, do you think the plan is to collect those taxes so we can make a pile of the cash and burn it?
You want to lecture people about economic realities, yet you seem to think that money vanishes in a puff of smoke when it’s spent.
Right now, in America, the 400 richest individuals hold more wealth than the bottom 155 million individuals. American corporations are sitting on more than $1.9 trillion dollars. If you can understand these simple facts and say with a straight face that the reason the economy sucks just boils down to outsourcing, and the only possible solution is for American workers to “hunker-down” as their communities are turned into slums where the former middle class battles over scraps, then you’re a fuck-brained imbecile.
Or you’re a paid shill.
demz taters
Spongeworthy is afraid that if we rock the boat, our corporate overlords will withhold even the crumbs that they bestow upon us now. This fear, more than anything else, is what stands in the way of real change.
Pococurante
@spongeworthy:
We are talking about the folks with upper graduate degrees right? Folks whose median salary for years to nothing close to private sector wages?
Please tell me you’re not one of those folks who look at average wages for a state and average wages for a highly educated workforce and think they are comparable…
The outsourcing of jobs is on a downward cycle. Turns out paying less for less wasn’t working out so well.
First world wages have depressed enough and developing nation wages / standard of living have increased enough that even Chinese manufacturing jobs are beginning to price themselves out of the market.
spongeworthy
I think you’re wrong. I think you tax the hell out of the superrich. They’ll stay.
They’re leaving already, as Emma points out. I think the numbers are pretty clear. Do you think every nation that’s cutting their tax rates is making a huge mistake? Are you willing to bet your job?
Omnes Omnibus
@spongeworthy: I bet your cost of living is extraordinarily high as well. You have pay people enough to live a decent life in the communities in which they work.
spongeworthy
Like I posted up thread, there’s no economic reason to pay an American adult $18/hr to do a job, when you can get a 9 year old Honduran to do it for $.35/hr. Also, the Honduran kid won’t be getting OT pay, sick pay, vacation pay, health benefits, etc.
But you think we should demand higher wages for our workers anyway? You’renotmaking a great deal of sense. There is little we can do to improve wages in Honduras, and if we don’t employ those kids some Chinese guy will and run us out of business with his cheap labor costs.
Sucks, but this is the problem. I am waiting on your solution.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: Where exactly are these galtian superman going to go to?
You’re also confusing corporations and people. People have roots and families. Was there an exodus of the rich during the 50s?
Corporations are going to do what they do because they are amoral sociopathic entities. Make them actually pay their taxes here.
People, on the other hand, as I said, have roots and families in communities. They will stay. Their personal taxes will be higher elsewhere anyways if they leave.
I merely want the superrich to pay their fair share. If you are too afraid to try, so be it. I am not.
Omnes Omnibus
@singfoom: But a hedge fund manager might relocate to London…
singfoom
@Omnes Omnibus: And the british will tax him like he’s never been taxed before.
Though, he’ll probably get more value for his taxes there than here, based on NHS.
R-Jud
For the time being, anyway. We’ve got free market fundamentalists running the show now, too. Ain’t no party like a neo-Thatcherite party.
Omnes Omnibus
@singfoom: I didn’t say the relocation was a good idea tax wise. People chose the north shore suburbs of Chicago over Cicero even though Lake Forest has higher property taxes. I wonder why?
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Or Dubai, though no telling how long that party is going to last now that a large portion of the Arab world is going boom.
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: Spongeworthy, your argument seems to be that the current reality, given neoliberal trade policy, is that we all have to suck eggs. And that’s true. But only insofar as we accept neoliberal trade policy as the terminal end of economic evolution and change.
There was a time when government imposed tariffs at the request of domestic manufacturers to maintain profitability in that sector. There was a time when government created bi-lateral trade agreements because they were advantageous to particular sectors of the domestic economy. The list is endless.
Government has a long history of using it’s power to shape the domestic economy in conformity with it’s preferred interests. There’s no reason it can’t happen again. It’s just a matter of determining which interests the government prefers to prioritize.
spongeworthy
What, do you think the plan is to collect those taxes so we can make a pile of the cash and burn it?
I get it! You’re talking about the Stimulus Bill now, right?
Good one!
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: But wait, if the hedge fund manager is US citizen or permanent resident, he or she will owe tax on any money earned in foreign countries (with a credit for money paid in taxes to the foreign government). I guess they won’t actually escape taxes unless they become citizens of their tax haven.
spongeworthy
Make them actually pay their taxes here.
If they’re domiciled in, say, Ireland? How, exactly?
spongeworthy
This fear, more than anything else, is what stands in the way of real change.
Call it fear if it makes you feel like a big fellow. “Real change” is mighty fine talk, big fellow, but you haven’t exactly specified what you’d change except that everybody should get a unicorn that shits money.
Yutsano
@spongeworthy: Ooh, ooh, I got this one. The IRS has several international compliance divisions all over the world. The US also has treaties and agreements relating to matters of taxation of nationals in their borders (basically it’s we help you find your tax cheats if you help us find ours) with about 100 countries, and they’re working on expanding that list. I could work for the IRS in Paris if I wanted, in fact I’m trying to bend my career curve that direction. But the mechanisms for compliance already exist.
spongeworthy
There was a time when government imposed tariffs at the request of domestic manufacturers…
Like Smoot-Hawley? How’d that work out?
And that was a time when our workers were actually competetive in world markets because others couldn’t produce much of anything. Now, not so much.
Bad idea, if history tells us anything. See: Great Britain.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: I’m beginning to tire of this game. In that specific quote, I was referring to corporations. The Ireland dodge The Double Irish is another tax loophole.
Close that loophole and all the others.
spongeworthy
But the mechanisms for compliance already exist.
C’mon. They’re legally domiciled in Ireland. (They moved there for the lower taxes.) What right do you have to levy–let alone collect–any tax on them?
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: Don’t you think you’re very conveniently missing the point here. Or do you have a point?
ETA: Hasn’t the name been changed – ‘offically’ – to Hoot Smalley?
TheF79
@spongeworthy:
One change I’d like is for people who just found a toy trade model of undifferentiated labor with perfect mobility to avoid uncaveated pontificating.
Chuck Butcher
Spongworthy comes in and repeats GOP/Teabaggery/Libtarian bullshit talking points. One of the reasons for a high marginal rate on wealthy was to make it unreasonable to take that last gazillion out of the economy. What use is it to wring that last dollar out when it’s worth $0.20?
Yes it does help to fund the government, but the government does a lot better with that money spread around than in the hands of a few. He also manages to ignore that real wealth depends a hell of a lot more on dividend and capital gains than something as prosaic as wage. They pay less than the FICA/SS rate on that. If you make less than the cut-off your entire income is subject to that rate plus taxes (with employer payments). The employer side of the contribution was never any more than a shell game to hide the actual tax rate from those paying. You think there’s howling about the nearly 8% rate? Try having the real numbers on a pay stub.
As for the Corp rate, you fucking idiot, between loopholes and assorted deductions we have one of the effectively lowest rates going. Yeah, right – the corp heads sit at the kitchen table doing their taxes right off the base rates. Shoot me with a gun for paying an accountant good money with a pissant S-corp. The way you talk nobody can figure out a way to tax money that’s going to the Caymen Is, it doesn’t happen for reasons other than it being hard to figure out.
Yutsano
@Stillwater: There is no point, it’s just making noise because it likes to hear itself type. And I’d like to see it try that line of reasoning with the nice revenue officer who gets to go to Ireland to tap on the shoulder of the American citizen ducking American taxes there.
spongeworthy
singfoom, I’m not referring to a shell game and loopholes. I’m talking about picking up and moving to another coutry to avoid higher tax rates. It could be anywhere. Say it is Singapore if you like.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: I’m done with you. Good day, sir. I don’t want to play hypotheticals about Galts leaving the US because their fee fees have been hurt by the evil tax man.
People don’t move around for tax rates. We’re not utility optimizing automatons. I’ll grant you that there might be a rare few, but there is no risk of the rich just fleeing the US because they have higher tax rates.
If you really intend to pursue that meme continuously, you’re just concern trolling.
Stillwater
@Yutsano: There is no point
Wisdom prevails! Thanks for that. And I just wanted to mention that if his name refers to any of the well known contraceptive devices, then at least he’s being honest with himself.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@spongeworthy: The stimulus that prevented dozens of states from going into financial meltdown? That’s your idea of burning money?
Here, let me help you out. You see, when money is spent, it goes to another party. Then, that party spends it elsewhere, causing that money to move yet again. Repeat indefinitely. We call this an economy.
On the other hand, money that’s horded by a tiny sliver of the super-wealthy and the corporations they control just sits there, doing nothing. This is the money that may as well be torched, because it’s not a part of the economy any more.
This isn’t even econ 101. It’s 6th grade social studies.
spongeworthy
Don’t you think you’re very conveniently missing the point here.
No, I don’t. I lurk here a lot. A recurrent theme here is where are the middle-class wage gains? I am trying to supply part of the naswer. You can complain all you like and bust on me for truthing you, but you guys have no facts on your side, just wishes and dreams.
Take your plan to tax the CEO’s income because he makes 500 times his hire wage. Or better, pass that out to his workers. Show me what has improved!
Shit, I know the guy makes too much. I’d rather see his workers get the money too. But this is a drop in the bucket to any company whose CEO makes 500 times his hire wage. The workers wouldn’t end up with much of anything and all you’d do is increase the chance some knucklehead will be your next CEO. (There is a market for good CEO’s who feel they are underpaid.)
What did you accomplish besides making yourself feel better about social justice?
Stillwater
I’m suspicious that Spongy may be a s-puppet of Stuck. There’s the same compulsive focus on the irrelevant simply to prove a point no one cares about. I’ll have to think about this more.
Chuck Butcher
@spongeworthy:
A box of bricks has as much sense as you do with this argument, it is the taxes that hold the wage down and those would apply to any company hiring a CEO. “I’m going to take my talent and go …” where?
Yes the structure in place today does guarantee fucking up so it is the way it is now. Well as has been proved ever since St Ronnie – telling people like you anything is a waste of time.
spongeworthy
People don’t move around for tax rates.
Well they do. Especially between states here. If you don’t accept this as fact then it is just as well you leave the discussion here.
But I was mostly referring to corporations and jobs, and they do move to find lower rates or choose to start up in other countries. Germany lowered its rates–now the entire EU has lowered their rates to less than ours. Are they fools for doing so?
I am not much for concern trolls either. If you are convinced that’s the case here, I don’t blame you for leaving!
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: What did you accomplish besides making yourself feel better about social justice?
I didn’t realize that’s all I was doing – you know, just trying to make myself feel better in the face of inexorable horrific forces beyond human control. I thought I was suggesting the path by which all these problems are solved: by changing policy.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Stillwater: Well done! Thanks, as I was thinking something similar. The sponge troll probably likes Chris Christie.
spongeworthy
The stimulus that prevented dozens of states from going into financial meltdown? That’s your idea of burning money?
The very same. Since those same states are back with their hats in their hands and simply used stimulus money to avoid hard decisions when it would have bee better to make them, then maybe burning would have been preferable.
And moving money from one source to another isn’t stimulative. It doesn’t create wealth, it just transfers it.
And if you think the money people and corporations are sitting on isn’t working, then why are they being paid interest on it? (That is actually Micro 101.)
Omnes Omnibus
@spongeworthy: As I noted above, the US taxes the income, wherever earned, of any US citizen or resident alien. As Yutsano noted, the US has b- and multi-lateral treaties that make tax enforcement possible.
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
I think you may have missed some recent events in the news if you think companies are still clamoring to move to places like Ireland. The Celtic Tiger has rolled over and died.
Omnes Omnibus
@spongeworthy:
Oh, good lord.
Chuck Butcher
In the face of abject failure people with spongeworthy’s talking points are still taken seriously. That is a measure of where the pol/soc/econ dialogue in this county has gotten to.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Stillwater: I think the General often makes more sense than the sponge has here though. Not to mention having a sense of humor (except when he doesn’t).
spongeworthy
if you think companies are still clamoring to move to places like Ireland.
I swear I do not get this argument. Are you saying that the entire EU, every man-Jack of them, lowered their corporate tax rates below ours because they are fools? Answer, please.
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
Wow. You have never even heard of Keynesian economic theory, have you?
Here’s a thought experiment for you: Let’s say that your state has a bridge that has been closed to trucks because you don’t have the money to repair it. The government gives the state money to repair the bridge.
Because the bridge has been repaired, trucks are able to drive over it again.
Because trucks are able to drive over the bridge again, companies can get more of their products to market.
Because companies are able to get more of their products to market, they make more money.
Now let’s go your preferred route: the state gets no money to repair the bridge, it remains closed to trucks, and it’s more difficult for companies to get their product to market, so they sell less of them.
Which creates more wealth, a company that sells more products, or a company that sells fewer products?
I’ll let you puzzle that one out for a while.
spongeworthy
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, where do you think investment capital comes from? The government? A unicorn?
You don’t understand these things as well as you think you do, obviously.
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
I want to know who still gets paid interest in significant enough amounts to make a difference. My bank is advertising the amazing rate of 1% on new CDs, and if you let them use your money for five years without touching it, they’ll give you a princely 3% interest.
Right now, the US can borrow money from other countries for very close to 0% interest. That’s not a typo. Zero percent. And spongeworthy doesn’t think we should take that deal and use it to repair our roads and bridges because it doesn’t directly create wealth for the top .01%, so therefore it’s a failure.
Chuck Butcher
@Mnemosyne:
That would depend on where you stand with politicians as oil currently makes that point.
TheF79
Ya’ll are “discussing” international economics with someone who has an economic model that predicts every single good and service in the world would be produced in the Congo for $1/day wages. The fact that the heavily regulated EU has any jobs is a fucking mystery of epic proportions. Are we surprised that the policy conclusions he/she derives are nonsensical?
Jrod the Cookie Thief
So, you actually admit that you’d prefer to burn money than use it to stave off disaster for the middle and working class? Because that would force the states to make the big, manly, tough, hard decisions about how to deal with a country where the tax base has been hollowed out because all the wealth that once flowed through the middle class now sits in a corporate bank account?
Here’s a nutty idea. If the people hording all the wealth refuse to use it to create jobs, then the government should tax it the fuck away from them and put it to use. We have no obligation, moral, ethical, or otherwise, to allow ourselves to be plunged into misery and poverty because the sociopaths playing this rigged game get their jollies from the suffering of the common people.
@spongeworthy:
Yes. Wealth transfer is what’s called the fucking economy. Are you going to now rail against paychecks? After all, they’re just transfers of wealth.
See, by “working” I meant “preventing catastrophic economic meltdown into the conditions of the 1890s.” No shit sitting on all the wealth is working well for the people who have it. You know, until they find themselves swinging from lampposts.
spongeworthy
You have never even heard of Keynesian economic theory, have you?
I probaly understand it as well or better than you. Here’s just one thing I know about it–it has never worked. It didn’t work in the Great Depression and it didn’t work this time.
Bridges that work are a good thing and this is a case where government provided the good thing. But the money came from somewhere. You cannot assume it wasn’t doing something just as useful where it was. I know you have all these ideas about what the money was doing and believe the government can do better with the money. I think the history of governments and Other People’s Money doesn’t bear you out.
Though in small measure, in some cases, it will.
spongeworthy
If the people hording all the wealth refuse to use it to create jobs, then the government should tax it the fuck away from them and put it to use.
I agree that hoarding profits is a problem. I just think your solution is worse. You’re killing the Golden Egg Goose on the premise that government knows better what to do with the Egg. What in our history would lead you to believe this?
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@spongeworthy:
That’s why the US was so poor and destitute during the 1950s. Taxing the wealthy with a top marginal rate of 90%, and then transferring that money to the middle class by paying for their housing and education… brr. It sends chills down my spine just thinking of that dystopian hellhole.
@spongeworthy:
1950-1970.
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
Despite those magical lower rates, corporations actually pay more in taxes in Europe than they do here, because here they get massive loopholes. Did you know that we actually give oil companies government money so they can keep all of their $3 billion in profits from last year? Very few, if any, corporations actually pay that “highest rate in the world” thanks to the system of loopholes and subsidies that Republicans have set up so companies can take our tax dollars, make a profit using those tax dollars, and then keep all of the profits for themselves.
But, yes, let’s lower corporate tax rates so those guys can get our taxpayer money transferred to themselves even more quickly! That will totally work!
TheF79
Wow, I was going to gently suggest that Mnemosyne’s example was a bit off because it confused macroeconomic stimulus with public good provision, but apparently public goods don’t exist either.
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
Ah. You’re one of the idiot Amity Schlaes conspiracy theorists who has crackpot ideas about how he knows so much better than actual economists because you know the truth!
Now that I know you’re a nutjob who has lost contact with reality, I can stop arguing with you and can return to mocking you. Thank you.
Mnemosyne
@TheF79:
I probably was off by at least a bit, but you have to admit, even my muddled example makes more sense than a guy who thinks government spending made the Great Depression worse.
spongeworthy
Are you going to now rail against paychecks?
Oh for crying out loud. A paycheck is freely earned by a man who chose–as part of an economic decision–to work for it. A paycheck is paid–as part of an economic desision–by a company that chose to employ him. This was determined–by econimic decision-making–to be the best use of funds for everybody, worker and company alike.
Your stimulus is a political decision made in Washington with little to no economic thought given–you can tell by the results.
You guys seem to think we can “run” an economy by taking great chunks of corporate profits and passing them out like candy to groups the government thinks will make us all better off. Name a single time they have ever been able to do this.
I’ll take ANYTHING.
spongeworthy
@Jrod the Cookie Thief:
You really think that tax rate on the wealthy is where that money came from? Got a link?
Mnemosyne
By the way, anyone who hasn’t heard of insane nutjob and trained English literature specialist Amity Schlaes, here’s a good debunking of her idiocy.
She actually has less credibility and fewer facts on her side than global warming deniers, if you can believe that.
spongeworthy
@Mnemosyne:
I hope you don’t think you have made any sort of argument here. If so, seek help.
Stillwater
@Jrod the Cookie Thief: Wealth transfer is what’s called the fucking economy. Are you going to now rail against paychecks? After all, they’re just transfers of wealth.
See, the problem here is that when you frame the issue in such an ideological way, and beg all the important questions, it’s hard to give a neutral, unbiased answer …
Mnemosyne
@spongeworthy:
Considering that you’ve developed a bizarre delusion that government spending made the Great Depression worse, I think we’d have better luck trying to convince you that aliens have not put an implant in your brain.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@spongeworthy: So, what you’re saying is that if an economic decision is made to take a certain amount of money and give it to another party, that’s not a transfer of wealth, because… um…
@spongeworthy: Do I think that the government’s money came from taxes? You’re seriously asking me this?
I’m done with you.
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: I just think your solution is worse.
What’s your solution? All we’ve heard so far is that this intolerable state of affairs can’t be remedied without doing greater damage to … what exactly?
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@Stillwater: Da, komrade.
Stillwater
Someone upthread said this wasn’t a good troll. I dunno. I’m pretty impressed so far.
FlipYrWhig
@spongeworthy:
Yes, the money did come from somewhere. It was printed. By the government. It has value because the government protects it. That’s why we don’t pay our doctors in poultry anymore.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@singfoom:
Higher tax rates on income drive down excessive executive compensation. When the top rates were high, businesses had to make money ‘disappear’ to keep the government from getting their grubby little hands on it. This ‘disappearing’ money went in to things like growing the business, improving product and compensating employees, all of which make the economy stronger.
By lowering the top rates to where they are now, our government has encouraged the siphoning of money out of business and the economy. Since there is no need to make their money ‘disappear’ like there once was, businesses and financial industries focused on reducing expenses so they could haul even more of that money home.
High taxes can shape the behavior of the wealthy and the disproportionate effect they have on our businesses and economy. Low taxes encourage greed at the expense of the economy, while high taxes encourage investment, development and business growth.
Combine that with the fact that our financial markets look at businesses as short term investments, and you have a recipe for disaster. The financial interests want immediate payoff and will do everything they can to milk an investment for everything they can get out of it, even if it ultimately ends up destroying that investment. Low tax rates encourage the looting and pillaging of a company, all in the name of increased profits. No matter the true economic costs, damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead! Nothing is long term to our financial markets, investment is a dirty word if there isn’t a quick payoff for them. They expect “results”, they expect that their brilliant ideas will pay off without any ‘investment period’.
Investment used to be something that you thought of in the long term. I know the idea is quaint but there was a once a time that people thought that if you invested wisely, you would get a modest return on that investment over the long term. That mentality leads to a stable economy over the long term. Now everything has to be done yesterday. If you have to wait a long time for a modest return then you are a failure as a financial market wizard or investor.
In the financial world, everything that doesn’t return a dollar is an expense. Businesses that wanted to exist over the long term wanted to invest in their employees because those people were going to make or break them. This concept costs money that the financial wizards are loathe to invest when they can find a cheaper way to do it, putting more money in their pockets.
Big business treats workers as a liability, not an asset. The Repubs who are pushing to kill the unions are doing so because they have bought into this idea. Liabilities are something that need to be minimized or eliminated. The Republican party sees the typical American worker as a liability, except at election time. Until they learn different, taxes will stay low and the workers are screwed. The business of America used to be business. Not any more.
Now the business of America is profit. Taxes can fix that problem.
Stillwater
All suspicions about Stuck’s sockpuppetry are gone. This is, unlike Stuck, an awesome troll, and we haven’t yet been criticized for buying into leftwing Greewaldian lies about Obama.
Mnemosyne
@FlipYrWhig:
Oh, come on, that’s almost as crazy as saying that FDR’s actions helped end the Great Depression. I’m sure the Department of the Treasury must be a private corporation headquartered in South Dakota, because I can’t believe that the people who issue our money have anything to do with the government.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Jrod the Cookie Thief:
Exactly. High tax rates on the wealthy forced a type of behavior that was good for our economy and gave them a fair return on their work and/or investment. It also encouraged the goose to not sit on the golden egg until it rots. Our economy and businesses grew during that time (1950-1970) because tax policy encouraged it.
The problem is that the financial forces out there saw all of that economic power and they decided to go after it. Weakening tax policy on the rich allowed them to pump lots of money into the political system, buying one party and enough members of the other to kneecap it. This ‘investment’ bought them the ability to reduce their expenses and increase profits by outsourcing jobs, cutting pensions, killing unions and the like.
Politicians discovered that they could get a piece of the golden egg if they helped the goose polish it, so they lowered taxes more, encouraging even more looting of the economy.
Jim, Once
Lots of ‘definitive’ statements here, with nothing to back them up. I’m a former teacher who, at the time of retirement, was earning one of the top salaries in my high school ($58K) – this at a school district about 150 miles west of Madison WI. Starting salaries in the area, BTW, which are reflective of most of the districts in my state, are $31K – $34K. I paid 3.5% of my before-tax income into the pension fund, and now take out $17K year. Because I have this pension, my SS benefits have been reduced, so that my total income now is about $33,000 per annum. Lifelong health benefits? After retirement, I had to pay COBRA until I reached Medicare age. I mention all this because I have to ask you: do you really consider this to be gold-plated bennies? Really? And ALL of it paid for by the taxpayers? Because it wasn’t. So please – just shut up.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@Odie Hugh Manatee: Yup. Of course, the whole goose and golden egg metaphor doesn’t really apply here. That gold wasn’t laid, it was taken; transferred, if you will.
If there’s any aristotarian boogeyman that really pisses me off, it’s their quivering pretend fear of wealth transfer. They make believe that our economy currently works by magical money faeries giving cash to people in accordance with their inherent worth, and if we started gasp transferring money around we’d ruin the whole system. Meanwhile, in reality all the wealth is rapidly being transferred to the super-rich from everyone else in accordance with man-made rules written by the politicians they bought.
But, as a way of fooling the rubes, I can’t fault it. I don’t understand how someone could be so ignorant as to not notice that our entire economic system has, since the dawn of trade 10000 years ago, been a system for transferring wealth, but then there’s a lot about human stupidity I don’t understand.
moderate indy
@spongeworthy:
Actually, a dramatic rise in union membership would have a direct affect on the return of jobs, as well as wages, and a more favorable distribution of wealth. It wouldn’t be immediate, hell it took 30 years of conservative fiscal, trade, and economic policy to get us here. However, the trend towards sending jobs offshore can be reversed with a change in trade policy. The return of tariffs would be the quickest way to mitigate the advantage of dirt cheap labor. Negotiating trade deals that require our trading partners to follow basic labor (including allowing foreign workers to organize), and environmental policies would also rid corporations of obscene cost advantages, and would change the dynamic that has sent our manufacturing base overseas. If we could increase union membership back to where it was in the early 70’s and beyond, you would have a seriously substantial voting block that would force pols to actually change trade policy, and even the playing field for the worker. Unionized people would be less likely to be swayed by typical right wing scare tactics about gays and guns and such, because they can be easily scared about their own job and financial security. Why? because it is easier to see and fight against the behemoth that is our global corporate overlords when in a group. As an individual you realize you have no chance and act accordingly. Look at the influence a small political block like the tea party has had. Plus a larger membership for the unions mean more dues, which also mean more cash to fight the ridiculous amount of cash being used by the right wing.
kay
@gene108:
I always like your comments because yo ask hard questions. Sadly, I think no one answers them because no one has an answer.
You keep asking (in so many words) what is the liberal economic plan, and no one ever answers. Conservatives have a plan. It sucks, but they have one.
The one and only reason I’m looking at unions is no one is offering me anything else. I know there are problems with unions. But telling people “we need to tax wealthy people more” is not a rallying cry. It’s top down. Like the conservative “plan” (wait for profits to trickle down!) It doesn’t give them any control.
I asked what we (liberals) have to offer people that they themselves can do, and we got nothing.
We can’t keep telling people to “retrain”. They’re retraining 3 and 4 times over their working lives, and they’re losing ground with each interruption.
That’s why I think the service sector should organize. It’s something they themselves can do, and I haven’t seen a single other suggestion on how they can leverage their work for a living wage.
Tax policy at the top is fine, but that’s one piece. It’s the piece they have the least control over. Is that all we’re offering? Is it any wonder people aren’t rallying around the liberal economic message, which is “change the marginal tax rates!”?
kay
@spongeworthy:
Kasich in Ohio just took a big chunk of tax revenue and handed it to Bob Evans. He just gave it to them. They moved their headquarters within Ohio, and people in Ohio just covered the cost of that.
Do you want to tell me why we can’t pay teachers in Ohio, but we can pay the shareholders at Bob Evans?
350 jobs. We’re paying them a handsome sum to retain 350 jobs. It’s not enough, apparently, that Bob Evans makes a profit. Now I have to subsidize them while they do that.
I have no idea why this wealth transfer, from taxpayers to a private corporate entity, is any better for me than paying a teacher.
I’d rather pay the teacher. At least there, I’m getting a potential benefit.
debbie
I for one can’t wait for that town hall later today when he announces his budget plan. Talk about whoring out…