monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

Ten-year yields in Germany - the Euro-zone's benchmark issuer - have been trading below zero percent in the secondary market for a long time during the past years, and hit a record low some time at around minus 0.50 percent. (At the moment, it's +0.3% - the current inflation rate is 1.5%)

Golly. I hope they're going to be truthful.
Politico

If Tim Phillips is involved, then you are looking at the Koch brothers' and their acute interest in a matter. In this case, their interest was to design and support the tax bill (more money for them and the realization of a John Birch nation where government of and for the people is made difficult or impossible). These guys do NOT want a Dem wave election in November and they definitely do not want citizens realizing how this tax bill was a con. So, they are going to ladle out the bullshit from here until November.

Some here are already chanting "in dulce jubilo", namely Mercedes and BMW (Mercedes pays now 1.7 billion Euros less taxes in the USA, BMW expects a less than that number, about 1 billion)

I hope they appreciate the gift that the citizens of America wanted them to have.

Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA) on Fox. Now here's a smart cookie, this fellow.

He's a celebrity. He can do anything. He can even grab her by the pussy. No problem here.

Tax Bill Hysteria
Bret Stephens DEC. 22, 2017



NYT
I think the tax bill stinks. It's unfortunate, however, that the worst features of it actually need more explanation than the average citizen has time to process. Such as changing the way in which inflation rates are calculated by using a "chained" index instead of the Consumer Price Index. So the Dems are pushing the idea that the cuts will only help the rich — which is correct in the long run but which might look sort of dumb if the average opioid-eater notices that he actually has more take home pay for a while.

I think Stephens is exactly wrong. If the story is told factually, citizens will become aware of how a $200 tax gift is of no positive consequence given what the citizens and their children will lose. And if they understand that this bill works to further increase disparities of wealth and power.

But as noted earlier, there will be (there already is) a major campaign being run by the Koch brothers and others of the same sort to make US citizens believe that the bill is in their interest.

Spoken like a true fanatical ideologue. Such individuals, whether it's the KKK, Black lives Matter, or any other extremist position they advocate, ALWAYS think that their particular brand of "reality" is so self-evident that every person will agree with it as soon as it is "explained."

Lefties have this idea that THEY own everything and that every thing they dole out to you is an absolute gift.

If the highest tax rate were 99% and it was cut to 98%, they would scream about how it only benefits the rich and serves to "rip-off" the poor.

Good luck with that, cheese-eaters.

Well, OK, then!



The more massive, the more better, eh!?

Thank you

Is anyone here under the impression that they own their home? Wrong. You don't own ****, you just rent it from the government. If you don't believe it, just fail to pay your property taxes and see what happens, eh?

Well, everybody could just stop paying their property taxes, right? Hell no one would miss the local fire department, neighborhood school, or mind driving on snow-covered, pot-hole filled roads. Yeah, the opioid-eaters will love it!

Mafia Godfathers demand, and receive, under threat of drasic consequences, a cut of the loot from every crime committed by every criminal in their turf. They call it a "tribute."

No one who refused to pay it would miss the "protection" that money buys once their life was lost, eh?

Ask any strong-armed robber--there are a million ways to rationalize and justify, in your own mind, stealing **** from others.

If you happen to have more money than me, for example, I am merely following the immortal example of Robin Hood--taking from the rich (you) and giving to the poor (me) if I rob your ass blind.

For decades, over a century, actually, an income tax was believed by all to be unconstitutional. Not no more. Within a few years, after the socialist FDR got power, the tax rate was 94% on the "wealthy." Course, they weren't wealthy for long, but, still.....

Yeah, those Mafia godfathers provide a lot of useful social services — ask any opioid-eater!

I don't know, layman — since we don't collect taxes at anywhere near the rate to actually fund our government and fulfill its obligations I'd say we're getting a pretty good deal. Hell the country's got a multi-trillion dollar national debt and the opioid-eaters and their political representatives are bitching about having to pay peanuts! How'd you like a bill for $41,000 levied on every single individual? Hell no, let the next generation pick up the tab.

"Today, on March 16, the debt limit returned at $18.1 trillion in total national debt. The largest share of this debt—$13 trillion—comes out to $41,000 for every individual living in the U.S. today."

That applied to anyone making over $200,00---reducing their "net" to $12,000. Of course no thief limits himself to stealing from the rich. By then the percent of the population being taxed had increased from 7% to 64%.

Seems poor ole Muddy was dead wrong, eh?

Who's sticking up for Jill Stein these days?

Newsmax.

Fascinating turn of events. Not surprising exactly. Fascinating.

https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/jill-stein-vladimir-putin-rt-dinner/2017/12/22/id/833357/

Some sort of accommodations for the poor have been around in the West since the 15th century although for most of this time they weren't as luxurious as modern homeless shelters.

How have the poor fared in America during those periods of time when our government was led by demand-siders? We can start with the Underconsumption Paladin, FDR. Despite all of the liberal myth-making, underemployment rates were well into the teens throughout his presidency. The best way to remove people from the ranks of the Poor is to create an economic environment in which jobs abound. In the end, FDR did lead America into an economic Golden Age, but he did so by getting us into WWII, not by The New Deal, and I have a feeling that even during the post-war boom there were probably a few homeless people and Poor Farms to accommodate them.

The percentage of people in America who are homeless is an indicator...of something, but what? The success or failure of supply-side or demand-side economic policies? Massive transitions in the economic base? Cultural influences? Something else?

Perhaps someone can provide us with verifiable data that demonstrates a marked increase or decrease in the number of homeless Americans that is directly linked to prevailing supply-side or demand-side policies. If so, I hope they will.

I sincerely commend anyone and everyone for charitable volunteer work. I have engaged in it myself and it is very gratifying. You help others and you feel good about yourself. It's a good deal No one is obligated to devote their entire lives to such charitable work nor to continue it for decades. Life sometimes intervenes. I did volunteer labor for Habitat for Humanity for eight years. Why I ceased is immaterial, but it wasn't because we had run out of people who needed help getting a home. If someone volunteered in homeless shelters in the 80's but stopped in the 90's it certainly wasn't because homeless shelters were no longer in existence or needed. They've been around and needed when Democrats have control of Congress and when a Democrat has occupied the White House.

In any case, my prior comment was not specifically an endorsement of "trickle-down" (although anyone who has read my comments here knows I am a "supply-sider") My point was that the vast majority of workers who are receiving bonuses and wage increases since passage of tax reform most likely don't give a damn about what the motivation of the CEOs who approved the moves might be. I suppose there may be a relative handful of righteous left-wing firebrands among them who will tell their companies to shove the bonus or raise up the corporate ass, but most employees will be happy and a great many will be grateful. It doesn't really matter whether the CEOs goal was to make the employees happy or to provide cover for the decrease in the corporate tax rate, does it?

Corporations around the world now have large departments with large budgets that have been created to demonstrate that the company has a social conscience; that it is a good member of the community. I've met a goodly number of the people who work in these departments and they love their jobs. Why wouldn't they? Getting paid to administer corporate philanthropy must be a very satisfying position, and pretty damned easy. None of those I met were insincere about their desire to help (on behalf of the company) individuals or communities, nor in their conviction that the motivation of the corporation was anything but essentially charitable. In some cases, I knew they were suckers as to the latter and that their CEO saw the efforts strictly in terms of PR, but so what? People were helped, employees in and outside of the department felt good about working for the company, and the company got good PR. Everybody won!

Unfortunately, some people are so fevered with partisanship and ideology that they can't help but look a gift horse in the mouth, and cynically question the motivation for good deeds. A certain amount of skepticism is sensible. People and organizations have for a very long time done good deeds to hide much worse ones, or as a gambit to enable them to commit fraud and other crimes. At some point, though unfounded skepticism becomes stubborn cynicism, and fanaticism leads to illogical conclusions or demands.

For instance, here and elsewhere there are questions about senior management also getting bonuses or pay raises as if the only way the largess extended to the workers can be sincere and meaningful is if it doesn't include management. That makes no sense at all. CEOs and their senior management teams very often overstate their importance to their organizations, but this doesn't mean they don't provide any value at all, and I have worked at and with a good number of companies where the top management team was very clearly the reason why the company was so successful. In many, if not most, cases employees are a company's most important asset, but senior management are employees too and their positions are of real value even if the current holders are useless fools. Investment in employees means investment in all employees.

I've seen the fanatics on the Web demanding that in connection with these bonuses and raises, the CEOs take pay cuts. Again, what sense does that make? I've also seen elitist fanatics sneer at $1,000 bonuses and a minimum wage increase to $15 (even though these same clowns have been insisting that $15 is the magical Living Wage). A grand is essentially nothing to someone in the 1%, but if you're making minimum wage, you're not in the 1%. Would these folks love to receive $10,000 bonuses? Of course but, again, I very much doubt any, but a very tiny few, have told their bosses to stuff the $1,000. Even after taxes, a $1,000 bonus will pay for a lot of people's Christmas and if someone is convinced that's not the case there are plenty of charities like Toys for Tots and the Salvation Army to which they can contribute their money.

For whatever the ultimate motivation, a lot of employees are immediately benefiting from the passage of the tax reform bill and I can practically guarantee more companies will follow suit. We can trade analysis of the plan all day long but by the mid-term elections, the vast majority of Americans will know whether they paying more or less to the government or taking more or less home in pay. If the critics of the bill are correct, this round of bonuses and pay raises will probably not be enough to stave off a negative voting result for the GOP. In the meantime, the workers will enjoy them, and the fanatics will question and condemn them.