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but I do expect at least average, or better said progress
we are average in the percent of GDP that we spend...but we are NOT average in the results, we are WAY BELOW average
yet we haven't gotten rid of poverty, we don't have anything like universal healthcare..so while our spending is "average" is the percent of GDP. our outcome is dismal, so no its NOT unreasonable to say we have little to show for spending 30% of our GDP (last I checked our GDP is about 20t..so 29% of that is nearly 6 trillion that we spend on social programs (all levels of government), and for 6 trillion ANNUALLY we do have little to show for it.
Why would you expect even average in the Neoliberal Era?
After more than 5 decades?
An example:
Congress in 2004 approved a repatriation tax holiday that brought back $312 billion in overseas profits.
Most of the money was used not for economic growth but to give cash back to shareholders.
In the 2004 case, 9,700 companies were eligible to take part in a tax holiday that would bring the overseas cash back at a rate of 5.25 percent, well below the 35 percent rate for profits earned abroad.
… In the 2005-06 time frame, Pfizer, which repatriated $37 billion, slashed 10,000 jobs. Merck, which brought back $15.9 billion, cut 7,000 jobs, and HP pared its employment rolls by 14,500 after repatriating $14.5 billion.
Why would you expect even average in the Neoliberal Era?
After more than 5 decades?
An example:
Congress in 2004 approved a repatriation tax holiday that brought back $312 billion in overseas profits.
Most of the money was used not for economic growth but to give cash back to shareholders.
In the 2004 case, 9,700 companies were eligible to take part in a tax holiday that would bring the overseas cash back at a rate of 5.25 percent, well below the 35 percent rate for profits earned abroad.
… In the 2005-06 time frame, Pfizer, which repatriated $37 billion, slashed 10,000 jobs. Merck, which brought back $15.9 billion, cut 7,000 jobs, and HP pared its employment rolls by 14,500 after repatriating $14.5 billion.
perhaps Congress should do a better job tying corporate tax benefits to wages paid.
perhaps Congress should do a better job tying corporate tax benefits to wages paid.
Perhaps if everyone did not believe in magic, i.e. ‘everyone acting in their own self-interest will magically produce desired outcomes for everyone’.
In that example, the corporations were acting in their own self-interest by shifting profits overseas, acting in their own self-interest when they brought it back, & acting in their own self-interest by laying off workers.
Everyone was either happy or comfortably numb.
So happy & so comfortably numb, it was made part of the American Jobs Creation Act.
A market economy is an economic system in which individuals own most of the resources - land, labor, and capital - and control their use through voluntary decisions made in the marketplace. It is a system in which the government plays a small role. In this type of economy, two forces - self-interest and competition - play a very important role. The role of self interest and competition was described by economist Adam Smith over 200 years ago and still serves as foundational to our understanding of how market economies function.
Taxing unrealized gains. Turn that over in your head a few times and consider what that does to the investment economy of the United States, and indirectly, the entire world.
If you are picturing a mushroom cloud over our economy, then you're close to the devastation that would wreak.
That's the point.
People don't realize that the "it's only for billionaires" excuse is just how they get their foot in the door. Once the precedent has been set, they can ratchet the limits down until anyone who owns a home or even a car is having to sell their assets to pay their taxes, and there's zero doubt in my mind that that's exactly what they'll do.
The mushroom cloud is coming, whether they get an unrealized gains tax through, or not. That would certainly speed things up, though.
Perhaps if everyone did not believe in magic, i.e. ‘everyone acting in their own self-interest will magically produce desired outcomes for everyone’.
In that example, the corporations were acting in their own self-interest by shifting profits overseas, acting in their own self-interest when they brought it back, & acting in their own self-interest by laying off workers.
Everyone was either happy or comfortably numb.
So happy & so comfortably numb, it was made part of the American Jobs Creation Act.
1. Corporations shifted profits overseas to avoid overbearing taxes.
2. They brought it back because taxes were cut and it was cheaper to bring it back
3. Corporations lay off workers when they can't afford them or don't have anything for them to do. Unlike the Government, corporations can't afford to waste money keeping people on the payroll to do nothing.
Everyone acting in their own self-interest DOES produce desired outcomes across the board.
As long as the Government doesn't screw it all up.
And it sure as hell produces better outcomes than some incompetent bureaucrat centrally planning everything.
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