Amazing, you think if the feds take $70, that $70 gets spent on what they supposedly took it for? Even if they did not siphon off for another pork project, the feds bureaucracy might get 50 cents on the dollar actually buying the service they stole the money for in the first place. The feds need to get out of health care.
1/6 of our economy is about to become more ripe for fraud, waste and abuse, all so an elected few can wield power.
Shameful.

 

I get it. The author believes in the power of income redistribution. That, of course, is not really an original idea. It has a long history of failure currently well illustrated by the financial collapse of Greece. The over-simplified claim that "rich people actually don't create the jobs" assumes that all rich people were born that way and hoard their money in deep bank vaults, only spending it to fund schemes specifically designed to screw the poor. To bring this thread even a little bit toward the cargo industry, I offer Fred Smith as a counter to the idea that rich people don't create jobs. But I would also offer Henry Blodget as a counter you might be more willing to accept. He's rich. And he creates jobs. And, even more significantly, he is perfectly free to donate a majority of his wealth toward handing out thousand dollar bills to the middle class people he doesn't employ, so that they can spend it in our economy, which according to his theory, should benefit him even more because people with enough cash to buy extra food and clothes should also have enough cash to buy his books on how to spend their extra cash.
Let me know when Henry believes enough in income redistribution that he jumps into it feet first and gives away his money to less fortunate people like me.

 

I bet this guy is a joy to fly with!*?

 

I suggest you read these two books. PBS may be the least of your concerns over the next ten years.

Hedrick Smith** Who Stole the American Dream?

Retirement Heist - Pension Fraud Book - Ellen Schultz

 

I know what you mean. However, there is some comparison- reflecting back on decades of military life, many of the junior enlisted came from just those communities. Some rose to a level of personal responsibility and some didn't. From a macro level I think the point is a $ value appropriated, emanating from tax revenue, is the same value upon appropriation -whether it's for snap or Corp welfare. The real issue is the downstream effect (resultant value) to the economy, & American citizens at large.

Perhaps or elected officials could derive legislation on who's worthy of "welfare". Unfortunately, k Street has an undue influence. The house of representatives action on the farm bill is a perfect example.

 

What's wrong with the math?

The company may not have deducted the proper amount from your checks...Otherwise, my figures would be correct. Your tax return will identify how much you actually owe.

 

And how much of that $850 went to saving lives and how much went to the government? So I guess Medicaid is a work of fiction?

 

Sorry if that article lead to a redistribution mindset -poor selection on my part in attempting to illustrate the point. The intent was to highlight the impact of aggregate "demand" (derived from consumer spending) as a stimulative effect on the economy & employment.

Relevant to the "welfare" issue- the vast majority of social welfare $ seem to get redeployed broadly into the economy (creating demand), whereas the corporate welfare does not.

Not judging if the recipients are "worthy", or advocating redistribution, but responding to your concern (what I'm getting for my tax $) being the resultant impact of how our tax $ are appropriated.

 

I would argue that a vast majority of social welfare dollars are handed out freely to its recipients with no expectation of any service in return, other than that they spend it. While on a very surface level, that sounds like an easy way of stimulating the economy, it completely ignores the cost of sustaining growing cultures of American citizens who have not surprisingly learned that they should expect something for doing nothing. To go back to the article, we are doing exactly what the author says doesn't work. Planting (or more accurately, throwing) seed into an inhospitable environment and expecting it to take root. Go into any urban or rural community where that practice has been in play for more than a generation and witness the result. There's no fertile, economic garden of Eden. There is an economic black hole of angry dependents, demanding the government "appropriate" even more money from people who work for a living to pay for the ever increasing expenses of sustaining a growing population of people who have learned not to work.
Meanwhile, guys like Blodget insist that the solution is to "appropriate" even more money from corporations and people in our culture who actually do produce something, in the hopes that at some point, the people who have learned the benefit of not working will somehow give enough of their free money back to feed economic growth. If that theory worked, it would have. At least once. In all the times in the last several centuries it has been tried.
Blodget must be really excited about what is currently going on in France. Let's sit back and watch how 75% tax rates on their richest citizens works. If Blodget is correct, France is entering a new dawn of economic prosperity. If he's wrong, he'll never admit it.

 

I assume you've read them. What actions have you personally taken based on the knowledge they provided you?