Incentives.

The 2010 census has shown that people are leaving states with high income tax rates and settling in states with low income tax rates. Low-tax states will gain seats, high-tax states will lose them | Washington Examiner. Eight states are projected to gain at least one congressional seat under reapportionment following the 2010 Census: Texas [...]

Taxing.

How much is too much? When the “carrot” of earning lots of money becomes the “stick” that beats you to death with taxes, what’s a young entrepreneur to do? Does she work hard, innovate and pioneer? Or does she reconsider? How is America better if she reconsiders? Why are we incentivizing that reconsideration? Consider: Newly [...]

Hide the ball.

There’s a trick play in baseball where the first baseman pretends to throw the ball back to the pitcher after a pickoff attempt, but instead, he actually holds on to it. He hides it in his glove. The idea is to get the runner on first to bite on the ruse and wander off the [...]

Gobbledegook.

Had to read this headline twice. Obama seeks fiscal responsibility mantle He’s seeking it now? I mean, it’s nice, if it’s true, but I can’ t believe that this is about anything except Obama trying to cover his ass after his MASSIVE outlay of irresponsible spending contained in the “stimulus” package. Let’s see what you [...]

You don’t say.

NEW YORK Reuters – Vice President Joe Biden acknowledged on Tuesday that some waste is inevitable in the spending of a $787 billion economic stimulus package, in a characteristically blunt assessment. “We know some of this money is going to be wasted,” Biden said during a roundtable discussion in New York with business leaders aimed [...]

Act now!

We’ve all seen the infomercials. The hucksters claiming that their extra special product “won’t last” or that their “supplies are limited” They tell us that their offer is only available “for a limited time” and as an extra incentive to get us to open our wallets, tell us that the “first 100 callers” get a [...]

Unintended consequences, Exhibit one million and one.

One of Maryland’s budget-balancing tactics – asking millionaires to pay more money to the state – appears to be backfiring as the number of the highest-earning taxpayers dwindles with the flagging economy. A year ago, Maryland became one of the first states in the nation to create a higher tax bracket for millionaires as part [...]

Colossal waste.

In early January, 2 members of President Elect Obama’s economic team, Christina Romer and Jared Bernstein, published what Team Obama was billing as their plan for economic recovery. You can find the full text of the document here. In it, we were shown how unprecedented massive government spending was to be our ticket out of [...]

Bleeding a stone.

Megan McCardle from The Atlantic, on why Obama’s unprecedented spending plans will simply run out of gas. So far, Obama’s only proposal for dealing with the funding shortage is a tax increase on high earners, leaving “95% of working families” untouched. But the math doesn’t work. In 2006, the latest year for which data are [...]

Denial.

Matt Kibbe, in yesterday’s reasononline, on how the Left is trying to  make sense of the Tea Party Movement: Some tried to diminish the tea parties as misguided tax protests. In reality, the protestors demonstrated a sophisticated understanding of economics that went well beyond objections to higher tax rates. You can’t spend money you don’t [...]

When and how it all went sour.

Tom Blumer at PJTV presents some interesting research of the economic collapse which began last summer and has resulted in record low federal tax receipts as entrepreneurs, business owners and individuals scrambled for shelter from the coming Obama storm: April 2008 saw an all-time record for federal tax collections of over $400 billion, largely buoyed [...]

Why is this so hard?

OK. Imagine you own a business. Your object of course is to produce lots of quality stuff that people want to buy at prices that will permit you to make a profit. This profit will permit you to keep making these things, and keep selling them to people who want to buy them. If you [...]

Susan Roesgen.

In case you haven’t seen this yet, please take a look now because my blood is boiling and I can’t hold it in anymore: Lots going on here so let’s take them one by one. First, isn’t she supposed to be a reporter? For any of you holding out hope that CNN (substitute MSNBC, NBC, [...]

Did you know your taxes are helping Harry Reid get re-elected?

In Burton Folsom’s book, New Deal or Raw Deal?, he describes in great detail how during the Depression, FDR increased government “relief” spending in election years, especially in so-called “swing states” which offered him the greatest return on his “investment”. Left to suffer were heavily Democratic states which were always assured in November, but which [...]

“The more the plans fail, the more the planners plan.”

Here’s Ronald Reagan speaking at the RNC in 1964. The target of his wrath at the time was LBJ’s “Great Society”, but it’s essentially the same enemy we’re battling today. Vast, sprawling, government. His comments on Social Security, welfare, freedom and individualism are timeless and so crucially relevant today. “The trouble with our Liberal friends [...]

Taxes are disincentives to growth? What?

The latest from Liberal tub-o-goo Alec Baldwin on the prospect of the repeal of NYC’s 30% tax breaks to Hollywood production companies: “I’m telling you right now,” Mr. Baldwin declared, “if these tax breaks are not reinstated into the budget, film production in this town is going to collapse, and television is going to collapse [...]

Brave new world.

Of course we all realize by now that it’s in Obama’s best interests to have the economy sink as low as possible because it will permit him to unleash even more of his radical ideas under cover of “EMERGENCY ACTION!”…and we all know that the government must ACT and act BOLDLY in an emergency, right? [...]

There will be blood.

Here’s a chart from Obama’s budget that we all should take some time to consider: Obama finds something wrong with the top 1% of earners making nearly 25% of all income. You may hear that spoken at a cocktail party too over the course of the next few months. To which you should all reply—-and? [...]

A National Crisis?

What do you make of the fact that 50% of all home foreclosures last year happened in only 35 United States counties clustered in about 7 States?   Does it make you wonder whether this is a National Crisis or not? It sure makes me feel that way. Eventually, the responsible people of this country [...]

But does he practice Santeria?

With all those hundreds of billions, you’d at least think he’d have a coherent answer to these types of questions: WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama said he could not assure Americans the recession-mired U.S. economy would start growing again later this year, The New York Times said on Saturday. “I don’t know that anyone has that [...]

Rockin’ and a-rollin’, splishin’ and a-splashin’.

So have you heard about the Tea Party phenomenon that’s been sweeping the nation? Maybe “sweeping” is too “American Bandstand” for you, but there’s definitely a movement afoot in towns and cities across the nation to protest the abominable government spending programs enacted recently by the Obama administration. Here’s a Foxnews report: And here’s CNBC’s [...]

Which little piggy went to market?

Fascinating analysis. Ever hear of Intrade.com? If not, you should go check it out. It’s a “prediction market” site that permits you to buy and sell shares of whether an event is likely to happen. For example, there is a “bet” you can make right now on the site on whether a Democratic candidate will [...]

Stay the Course?

Obama urges us to remain calm. WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Barack Obama expressed confidence on Tuesday that his economic reforms would work and said U.S. stocks were potentially a good buy even as he forecast a long road to economic recovery. “I’m absolutely confident that credit is going to be flowing again, that businesses [...]

No confidence.

Here’s what the Dow has done since the date the stimulus passed: Sure, lots of things affect how the stock market reacts. I’ve got a challenge for you. Explain to me in terms that do not mention the stimulus, why the market has gone down this drastically since that date. Better yet, leaving out fear [...]

Hidden taxes.

Think you aren’t being taxed enough by the Obama administration? Seems like he was thinking the same thing! We’re about to be charged more for our wireless services as he attempts to extort billions from the telecom industry in the form of new licensing fees. Faced with a whopping $1.7 trillion deficit, President Obama is [...]