As I do more often than not, I agree with jyl.

The problem isn't the companies - they're doing what they're supposed to, which is maximizing profit in the interest of their shareholders.

The problem isn't even taxes (although it certainly drives the companies to predictably move operations off shore)

The problem is overspending, which creates the "need" for those taxes.

Laffer curve anyone? Hmm? Where's dippy and darsic and corgie and webby and the rest of the tax-and-spend apologists to claim that taxes somehow don't discourage business growth?

When spending is cut, taxes will go down (edit: they SHOULD go down, but only will if the public demands it relentlessly). When taxes go down, business confidence in the environment created will increase. When business confidence increases, hiring will resume. When hiring resumes, people will have more money. When people have more money, they will spend more of it. When people spend more, tax receipts will increase.

This ain't rocket science guys.

Government needs to realize that the best way to increase their tax receipts and stem budget gaps is by collecting a LITTLE from EVERYONE, not a LOT from a FEW. Make your money off of volume.

To put it another way, I'd rather get a dollar from everyone than a million dollars from one... I'd have far more $$$ that way - and the "one" wouldn't be so pi$$ed off that they'd be trying to fight me kicking and screaming or sue me into oblivion over it. Nobody misses a dollar. Anyone misses a million dollars - it's worth fighting over I don't care who you are.

Of course the real underlying problem is that government is in the business of appeasement, not in the business of equality. If they really were proponents of equality, tax burden would be shared as well as benefits. Neither is.

Grand slam out-of-the park home run! Somehow it's gotten WAY out of whack over the past couple/three decades imo...

Yeah, great post, John. I agree with you.

It's why for me, it's hard to feel warm and fuzzy about investing in the stock market. You're feeding a beast that doesn't give a damn about the average Joe. That's capitalism.

It also gives pause about diversifying outside the US dollar, investing in precious metals, and taking bets on other nations. In essence, by hedging yourself, you're diminishing the strength of the US, its currency, and its ability to thrive.

As far as titling ATVs goes, Tim, you didn't expect the teet to keep refilling on its own, did ya? The tax bill compromise that went through the House last night is confirmation that we like to borrow and spend. I think we will run out of 'borrow' before we run out of 'spend.' When the politicians reach that point, guess who's wallet they will want to 'borrow?'

Given John's post, would you say that the low capital gains tax rewards financial investment over U.S.-based business growth with a higher corporate tax rate?

In other words, is the system gamed, in your opinion, to push jobs overseas?

Short term financial gain over long-term financial stability?

A company that doesn't do what it takes to stay in business goes out of business. The problem is our Government has setup a system to take profits from companies and the people who excel.

Our taxation system puts the cost of government INTO our products, which makes them uncompetative. We need to change how we tax. We need to stop giving incentives to companies, and simply let them compete on their merits.

Lobbyists.

Lobbyists write legislation.

Lobbyists fund political campaigns.

Government only does what they are paid to do by Lobbyists.

Lobbyists have set up a system for the benefit of their clients, Corporate America.

So Shaun, how do you fix the problem?

Some say you don't, that money = free speech and Corporations have = rights as Citizens guaranteed by The Constitution, which in effect, becomes a death sentence for the United States as more and more money leaves the country in search of higher profits and stock value, the Upper Class grows, the Middle Class shrinks, the Lower Class grows and we evolve into a service-based economy.

Some say term limits, but that only strengthens the Executive Branch and makes even easier prey for Lobbyists guaranteeing jobs after terms are up in exchange for favorable legislation.

Here's where I and the kooky Ralph Nader types disagree.

They think the problem is corporatism.

I don't. I see the problem as government - trying to profiteer FROM corporatism even though they do nothing other than ride on the success of corporations' coat-tails.

The accomplishments made by corporations are huge and numerous. The accomplishments made by government are relatively small and few. Some notable exceptions (Manhattan Project, winning WW2, space program, etc.) but they're the exception rather than the rule.

I don't know if I fall into your Nader camp, but I just respectfully disagree. I spent the first half of my career in mega-banking (left as an AVP), beginning with the deregulation of the mid-80s and the latter half with big Tobacco. I detested both (still do) the whole time. I challenge you to name a SINGLE positive accomplishment by either over the last 25 years. Don't get me started on the damages they've done. BTW, each industry OWNS DC...both parties :(.

I know this doesn't make you feel any better, but several of them existed 100 years ago. Taxes on all kinds of things have been levied and rescinded and gone up and down ever since the US became a nation.

I've often wondered how to 'decentify' hard/soft/lobby money by taxing the crap out of it.

You are allowed to give a politician $50. Everything above and beyond that is taxed at 95%. PACs, etc get taxed at some ridiculous rate, etc. Let the IRS go after that industry. pot meet kettle.

Spencer Bachus is the new republican chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. He doesn't even pretend to work for American citizens. He stated: ''In Washington, the view is that the banks are to be regulated, and my view is that Washington and the regulators are there to serve the banks.''
That should make you feel better.

wow, just wow. The problem is how we tax and too much spending and we're AGAIN talking about "fixing" something by taxing it.

wow...

I just got the first registration renewal notice for my F-150 pick-em-up. This is a truck that I paid around $25k for just under a year ago.
Drumroll.................... just under $600. For 1 year of vehicle registration.

That's for the people who are freezing their nuts off back east, just to let them know the grass always isn't greener. Kalifornia sux.

I think the problem is congress. If a company, or an individual can lobby for tax exemptions and get them, who exactly is the whore here? Last year, the LA Dodgers had zero tax liability. I find that incredible.

Looking at Techweenie's link, a lot of those 25 largest companies paid pretty significant taxes on their profits.

GE was always a "special" case. One of the guys I worked with years ago explained to me that GE was really a bank (GE Capital) but kept the manufacturing around so they could keep the better accounting rules. None of that would surprise me. Everytime we had a regime change in Schenectigrad, the first thing claimed was the previous regime "cooked the books". Which was probably true. They all did.

Rule #1 - You will make your numbers
Rule #2 - You will not break the law to make your numbers
Rule #3 - If you cannot make your numbers, see rule #1. You can do it by ignoring rule #2, but only if you don't get caught.
Rule #4 - If you get caught breaking rule #2, we will hang you out to dry
Rule #5 - See rule #1

+1000

Corporation's relationship to humans reminds me of the Morlocks and Elois in The Time Machine. They throw us some goodies and keep us around so they can feed off of us.
Human's ability to control corporations has been damaged by the SCOTUS rule that the right to free speech that the founding fathers guaranteed for living breathing US citizens also applies to non-citizen, non-human corporations. The do-do we're in just got deeper.

Wow!!!!! I thought Ohio's was high, but a $600 registration fee is just ridiciulous. Ohio recently started charging a penalty for registering late, so now if I have to think long and hard about which of my old cars to keep registered each year. It is bad enough that the insurance company charges a sizable amount for liability insurance only on each (I can understand the per vehicle charge for collision, as the insurance company would have to cover the loss of each car, but liability should be the same whether I am splitting my daily driving between one car or twenty).

I'll bet the guy who makes $10 a year misses his dollar a lot more than the guy who makes $100 misses his. For that matter, assuming life's necessities cost everybody the same, I'll bet the guy who makes $10 a year misses his dollar a lot more than the guy who makes $100 would miss $50.

The accomplishments made by the insurance industry are huge and numerous :).

...move along!

I once asked an agent about that. The explanation was so ridiculous I don't think he even believed it. You are right, of course, there is NO WAY it makes sense.

Of course. Ask Willie Sutton.

Strange how some people believe that business' give worse deals than the govt. ...most politicians are nothing more than a business into themselves. ...working the system for personal gain.

The politician whines about how he's really really trying to make your life better (as he takes money from EVERYONE, w/ no tangible return). Whereas the business gets cut-off quickly, if not providing something of value in return.

Chew on this local "backdoor tax/fee" we are most likely getting to fund our public transit system.

There is a significant backstory about how long ago, the local utility company agreed to own and run a public transit system here for 100 years in exchange for being the only utility company in the city limits. A coupla decades ago, many of the buses began looking pretty ragged, there were lots of breakdowns, the routes weren't efficient, etc. so they whined about it to our ******* mayor and city council.

They let the utility company buy out of their contract for $100 million (or some ridiculously inadequate amount), while smarter, more conservative council members pointed out it was a crime to let them off that easily. The city went and bought all new buses, and now, a few years later with the downturn in the economy, they claim they're "underfunded."

There was a referendum on the ballot in Nov. for an increase in local sales taxes to cover it, but it got voted down.
__________________
City Council Picks Your Pocket for Christmas
BY KEVIN FISHER

On the first day of Christmas, City Council gave to me, a new and illegitimate fee …
On the second day of Christmas, City Council gave to me, weakness and duplicity …
On the third day of Christmas, City Council gave to me, higher bills from SCE&G …

This is fun and I could go on for all 12 verses, but let’s focus on the serious points made in just the three listed above.

With its backdoor move to fund the bus system by increasing your power bill (yes, you read that correctly), Columbia City Council has shown yet again that it is neither a fiscally serious nor politically honorable public body.

The people of Richland County spoke on Nov. 2, rejecting the proposed sales tax increase to fund the bus system (and simultaneously create a $750 million unallocated piggybank for local politicos to play with for the next 25 years, perhaps funding road projects, perhaps doing lord knows what with as the players and the politics change over time).

When it came to the fundamental issue of providing a new revenue source for the bus system, backers of the sales tax plan showed poor political judgment in trying to force taxpayers to swat a fly with a sledgehammer. They asked voters to approve more than five times as much money as was needed for the bus system, sinking the plan even in a heavily Democratic, pro-tax, pro-subsidy county.

Indeed, with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Vincent Sheehen carrying Richland County with 67 percent of the vote, the proposed sales tax increase could garner only 49 percent support. While a woefully uninformed local media reported on how surprising it was that the sales tax came so close to passing, it is in fact stunning that it did not win easily given the voter demographics of Richland County.

The difference between Sheheen’s vote and that in favor of the sales tax means that more than 20,000 Democrats and left-leaning independents in Richland County voted against the sales tax hike. The outcome was a wonderful affirmation that you can’t fool all of the people all of the time — or even a majority of them.

But the will of the people is merely an inconvenience to Columbia City Council. Tax increase for transit rejected at the ballot box? So what, we’ll just add it on to your electric bill. Is this legitimate? Who cares, it’s legal. Or at least it is until someone challenges it in court, and that will never happen. Or even if it does, it would be tied up in court for years and in the meantime we can force SCE&G to add this fee to their bills, collect it for us from their customers and turn it over to the family, er, the city, to fund other operations. You know, like the Corleone business model applied to municipal government.

If City Council can do this — arbitrarily increase your power bill for whatever it wishes, with the increase having no relation whatsoever to providing electric and gas service — what might be next? One shudders to think.

Of course, rejecting this scheme would require City Council to apply principle, logic and common sense to the proposal. So naturally, it’s going to pass. In fact, every effort is being made to pass it in the political dark-of-night.

In a matter of 48 hours, the plan was hatched and brought before Council for initial approval — during the week before Christmas. A required public hearing is set for Dec. 28 — during the week after Christmas.

The timing is no accident; rather, it’s a clever ploy (if that’s what you consider clever) to pick your pocket while voters are busy and distracted during the Christmas holidays.

On the fourth day of Christmas, City Council gave to me, a government run incompetently.

Couldn’t resist one more. Merry Christmas to all!

http://www.free-times.com/index.php?cat=11012501074601536&ShowArticle_ID=122 41512102371367

Hey Tim, should I bring up the taxes you pay (road taxes) on the fuel for the ATV's that never make it on the road? You should be refunded this (as should you get a refund on the mogas you use in any airplane) but thats never going to happen!

sorry, Bubbles, I was out skiing the backcountry

but let's git sumthin' straight: I've never claimed that tax & spend, or over taxation is wonderful. What I do not do, is whine about the taxes I pay on the internet. What I do think is that taxes need to be equitably apportioned, and that govt. services have to be paid for.

I am also not a fan of the Laffer curve - it is almost entirely unsupported by reality; in fact, IIRC, jyl has posted on that exact issue.


but this thread is all over the map - try to get back to ATVs or at least hidden taxes (user fees, licensing...) people

ha ha
in washington you dont need insurance to ride a motorcycle on the street...just pay the tab fee to the state and have the appropriate endorsements and off you go...