gdp's Comments

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:56:26 +0000

Yeah, you got it all figured out. Maybe we should make you Treasury Secretary. A high school education isn't actually a qualification for the job, so you are in the clear on that account.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:51:42 +0000

Really? Is that why we piled up massive surpluses from 1997-2002? Why we stopped selling 30 bonds due to lack of market? Why I heard people whining in 2001 - 2002 about what we were going to do with no public debt by 2011? Those things really happened. All your talk aobut credit cards, and bankruptcy, and all that is just that.... talk.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:48:46 +0000

It worked REALLY well from 1994 to 2002. Were you out of the country or something?

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:46:54 +0000

You are confusing "marginal" rates with "effective" rates. The marginal rate is the percentage you pay on the next dollar earned. The effective is the rate you pay after factoring all marginal rates (because you pay a different rate on the dollar one than dollar one million), all deductions, exemptions, etc. That is why warren buffet, or hedge fund billionaires, or heiresses pay lower effective rates than us, because the vast majority of their income is taxed at LTCG rates.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 22:02:21 +0000

Wrong. My overall effective federal rate for 2010 on just under $7.0m of income was 29.7%. My effective NYS rate was 6.25% and city 3.5%. Effective rates, particularly federal given state and local tax deduction, are always lower than you think. I had heavy capital gains as well, but basically all at the 15% rate, which only serves to lower my overall effective rate. I am my own accountant. I know.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 21:57:35 +0000

I've experienced them as a W-2 wage earner. I have an LLC, so we are a pass through, but I understand and share your frustration on limitation of deductions and lack of flexiblity.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 21:48:57 +0000

http://www.deptofnumbers.com/blog/2011/07/revenue... The numbers above give lie to the "Laughter" curve. If supply side was in any way valid, you'd have to see it here... and you don't. The only time since 1980 that revenues have exceeded expenditures is during the Clinton years, when we had marginally higher rates. Not a peep of "expanding the tax base", or lower taxes spuring growth, or anything of the kind. Obviously, if we taxed people at 90% marginal rates, they'd work less. I would too. Whether we tax people at 35% or 39.5% has never impacted behavior and never will. Fail.... miserably.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 21:25:54 +0000

http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm For the record, I'm not a member of "Warresisters". But, they do understand federal math, and present it in a way that is honest. Those of us not watching Fox 24 / 7 know the following breakdown: Medicare, Medicaid, 33%; SS 21%, Defense 20%, Non-Defense discretionary, 18% and interest 8%. That break down alone makes your absurd assertions above, well, absurd. Now, if we drop SS and Medicare / Medicaid, you find an even starker imbalance to the $2.5T of non-trust funded spending: current and past military 54%; non-defense human resources, 30%; general government 11% (basically, non-personnel spending on all non-defense related activities; physical resources 5%. Your numbers are bogus. This proves it.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:57:42 +0000

Honestly... do you own a tri-cornered hat? Be honest.....

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:55:54 +0000

Laffer Curve? Seriously? How cute. Its like talking to my daughter about Scooby-Do.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:44:15 +0000

One can't be a creditor to themselves. That is an accounting entry, most of which is the evidence that our generation has paid the SS benefits of the prior, and will have ours paid that the one after us.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:41:42 +0000

EPA? Personally, I like clean air and water, so I'll pass. The rest of your math is clownishly wrong. Go get fitted for some bigger bells.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:37:54 +0000

Thank god, you quoted a Heritage foundation report.... 'cause that's authoritative. You are correct in the sense that social security is funded by current contributions, with the accrued obligtations in the trust evidenced by treasury notes. This is no different than our other unfunded mandates.... roads, defense, etc. In fact, there isn't any substantial investment that we've "saved" for. Why would we? We have huge future revenues of which we can take advantage. What we have after we have agreed that Social security is merely a transfer tax, as it was designed to be, is the fact that we are currently borrowing $0.40 for ever dollar in revenue we bring in. So, I ask again, short of the money fairy coming down to shower us with her goodness, who do you propose NOT paying if we can't borrow to fund our annual deficit? Nothing you so sagely illustrate above at all address that question.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:35:49 +0000

The fact still remains that if we can't borrow to fund our annual deficit, that is as good as default to creditors. If you spent more time in the real world and less time beating off to Heritage reports, you would know that is generally called a "cross-default", or "technical-default". Laymen would call it a "mess", and creditors will call it a significant risk event, given its not plausible that we won't pay grandma or veterans for very long. Well done. You've added absolutely nothing to the discourse. Par for the course with you teabaggers I guess.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:30:32 +0000

You could make more money. That's a solution as well. That was the solution we utilized from 1994-2002, when we generated surpluses of such magnitude that we stopped selling 30 year bonds because there was no market for them. In your world, one has to be dressed up in revolutionary war cloths to have common sense, but its not actually true. In fact, the last pinko commie democrat to hold the white house showed us a pretty good way to solve this problem. The fact that you all are too brainwashed to see it doesn't make it untrue.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:05:48 +0000

And grow a thicker skin. Your collective grasp of the issues so infantile, your analysis of the circumstances so weak, and your proposed solutions so dumb, it's actually a public service heaping ridicule on you.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:03:39 +0000

Again, I'll ask you who we should not pay? Veterans? Or Grandma? I'm curious to whom you think we should break our promise?

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:01:57 +0000

As I said, our single largest creditor. Thanks for proving my point. "Monetizing its own debt"? I'm not sure what you mean, and absolutely confident you don't either. Social security has never been "fully funded". Its is and always has been a transfer tax. We have to borrow to pay benefits because its not fully funded. By the way, we have a huge "unfunded liability" in our defense budget. We have to spend almost 1/2 a trillion per year for that. Should be "save" for it?

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 17:53:10 +0000

First of all, the notion that the Federal Government is like a family budget, and we should operate the same way is silly. You are suggesting that the government shouldn't borrow, which almost every family can do to say, buy a house. That makes no sense. Secondly, the services provided by the government are way more important than shoes, coffee, and all that nonsense. If you think that we can cut "waste" out of the budget to the tune of 40%, you are out of touch. I'll let you decide whether grandma or the disabled vet doesn't get their check next month. What I know is you all sat around as calm as Hindu cows while "W" funded two wars, a prescription drug benefit and tax decreases on the credit card, and NOW you want to figure it all out in a month? Get real. I never voted for that clown, and I never supported those policies, yet I have pay the piper just like you. At least I'm not crying about it like a child.

Big Government : Rope-A-Dope Debt-Ceiling Strategy Fails

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 17:38:10 +0000

I paid every cent I owed. I was a hard working W-2 earner, so had amost not access to deductions. In New York State, my income was a level where my deductions actually got eliminated, and I paid New York City Income tax, and I STILL didn't pay an effective rate of 52%. That's just a nonsense, made up number. One may have withholding at that level.... and if so its your own fault and you should fix it. Now, I did start my own business, and its amazing how much more flexible the code is for corporate and partnership entities. I suppose I should thank the republicans for that.