OK this is kind of embarrassing, or is it?

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

I know I'm just an ignorant southen white male US citizen  with all kinds of 'privilieges'. And 'my kind' is supposed to mock tutt-tutt such facts, while internally going all "well, yeah...and? Free Market/overreaching hand of regulation/masturabing Randian Supermen"

ETA: I decided to strike that sentence. Must have been some bad yogurt for breakfast.


So what were the tax breaks? And what were they supposed to do that would help the unemployed in the US if the tax break ended? Why was such a tax enacted in the first place? How can conservatives possibly excuse such a tax, when the result is less job opportunities with large corporations?

Partisan snarkery aside, what was the rationale for the blockage, when we desperately need revenue? My opinion is that these three factss are not necessarily interlinked only coincidentially matched up in number randomness, but blocking a tax break (which means an exemption to an exising tax structure) tied to jobs loss in the US is not good no matter how you look at it.

Hopefully the repsonders can help piece together this puzzle with information so we can see a more clear picture of the reality verses the hyperbole.

Comments

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

Something to do with "trickle down" is my only guess. I've heard that someone companies are finding out the hard way that the money that is saved overseas mostly stays in their respective countries. I can't for the life of me repeat what I heard verbatim but all I know is that outsourcing has been one of the biggest contributing factors to the recession. People, skilled educated people, are seeing their jobs move elsewhere. It's happened to my own little brother, who's an excellent IT but is having so much trouble getting another job after L3 laid him off. Does anyone know how freaking angry that makes me?

BTW, I really don't see how this post warrants a privilege check, why the defensiveness? O.o

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

BTW, I really don't see how this post warrants a privilege check, why the defensiveness?

Guilt, I guess. According to 'demographics' I should be a full out Tea Bagger. So technically, I'm a traitor, according to 'them'. And those on the other side of the fence are often dismissive of my points because of my gender, race and economic position.

I guess people can't even talk about the far right without somehow bringing up the Patriarchy or racism (sigh)

[paft.livejournal.com]

rd: And those on the other side of the fence are often dismissive of my points because of my gender, race and economic position.

What gender, race, and economic position are you that prompts that reaction?

I've seen no dearth of white male liberals or progressives.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

It's OK to be a middle aged white guy and not be a tea-bagger. Those uncomfortable feelings of class guilt just come from having a conscience not utterly stamped out by American Exceptionalism and the various tropes of sublimated other-hate.

Guilt is a completely legitimate emotion that spurs us to necessary action, in the same way that pain protects us from leaving our hands on a hot stove. People who have completely insulated themselves from guilt with politically constructed blinders are simply missing a useful functioning sense, in the same way that those who suffer congenital analgesia are. Both conditions can lead to terrible self-damage.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

Trickle down? Does that have something to do with golden showers?

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

You know what? I wish kind of it was :p

[dwer.livejournal.com]

not entirely sure what you're getting at here.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

1. Do you agree or disagree that these three facts are interrelated? If you do, why? I disagree.

2. By what rationale could such a tax break be enacted, that could be sold as something better for the country than no tax break?

3. your confusion confirms my opening comment LOL

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Partisan snarkery aside, what was the rationale for the blockage, when we desperately need revenue?

First, the issue is not one of revenue, but of spending. TARP and stimulus should have been temporary, one-time costs, but the budgets have not decreased following those expenditures. In a recession, you're likely to incur some debt - our problem is not a lack of revenue right now with the budgets and spending being put forward.

Second, when we already have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world, and when we're unique about clawing back overseas profit when it returns to our shore, the idea that we should "end tax breaks" for what are global entities misses the point and only serves to come across as even more anti-business as a result.

You'd think that if the problem is with layoffs and outsourcing, you'd work to lower the cost of doing business, thus incentivizing companies to keep jobs here and maybe even hire more, as opposed to increasing those costs and inviting companies to move even more of those jobs away.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

I see what you mean, but you are taking a view that profit is a finite and limited thing. That is, if you don't compete with the overseas industries, you will go out of business.

I think the problem is more with imports than cheaper labor. Let China make plates for China. Tariffs keep the rich at bay. What does it matter to you if they only make $30 billion, instead of $31 Billion, if it means 10,000 ordinary joes can feed their families?

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Loopholes and other special treatment for different kinds of businesses mean that businesses pay an effective rate of only 29.2% of their income, which puts the United States below the average of 31.9% among other major economies, according to analysis by the Treasury Department.

And the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the multinational group that tracks global economic growth, estimates the United States collects less corporate tax relative to the overall economy than almost any other country in the world.

[chron-job.livejournal.com]

> TARP and stimulus should have been temporary, one-time costs, but the budgets have not decreased
> following those expenditures.

If we accept orthodox Keynesian economics, since there is still a recession, there still needs to be stimulative public spending. The time to cut back is during a boom, like, say, the early -mid 2000's, when Bush acted utterly anti-Keynesian and decreased taxes and increased public spending.

> our problem is not a lack of revenue right now with the budgets and spending being put forward.

Our problem IS a lack of revenue, if you a) consider debt a problem, and b) consider current spending necessary. I know you reject b, but lets be clear on your assumptions in such sweeping statements.

> when we already have the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world,

Emphasis added. We have a high rate, and yet we obtain less revenue per corporate dollar earned than most of the industrialized countries we compare ourselves to socially. Obviously rate is only part of the equation, since our over incentivising of finance revenue leads to structures where Corporations can easily shelter their profit by redefining it as a profit from investment, rather than traditional profit from sales or services.

> the idea that we should "end tax breaks" for what are global entities misses the point and only serves to
> come across as even more anti-business as a result.

I have no fear of "coming across as anti-business" This is essentially a tone argument meant to quell dissent in absence of a responding argument. Businesses are pragmatic and will go where they can make a buck, no matter how much I hurt their feelings. They can make a buck here, so they will stay here in some way or fashion, under rules that we set so that the buck making isn't onerous. Further reducing the "cost of doing business" (i.e. labor costs and regulations that protect labor and citizens) during a time of record corporate profits just further enables the wealth vacuum that is the modern predatory global corporation.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

I like your idea of lower the cost of doing business. One good way to do that would be to place the burden of health care costs onto the backs of the employees. That sounds like a plan!

[korean-guy-01.livejournal.com]

If we need more revenue, then let's get the IRS out of the way and incorporate a Flat Tax.

[korean-guy-01.livejournal.com]

*Fair Tax

[dwer.livejournal.com]

no, we need MORE revenue, not less.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

You can't tax wages on the unemployed, if they don't have any income.

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

Taxing flats is a great way to promote the sale of heels.

[musicpsych.livejournal.com]

ignorant southen white male US citizen with all kinds of 'privilieges'.

Was that someone here, or in a different community? Just wondering... I've stopped going to other communities where people bully and blame white men for all of their problems, and cite their own lack of "privilege" as something that gives them credibility. I hope this community doesn't go down that same route.

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

I had answered this earlier. Form of guilt. According to my herd I "should" think "this" but instead I think "that".

No one in this community has because I choose more carefully what communities I put myself 'out there' for unwarranted attacks.

blackfolk, sf_drama, ONTD, conservatism...each of those places has sharpies lurking under stairwells, attacking out of nowhere, often cross-community.

One of the reasons this is my No 1 interacting community on LJ: there are simply too many international members to all have any one groupthink.

[spaz-own-joo.livejournal.com]

Middle class straight white dude here. Hey, bro. So, uh, why "privilege" in scarequotes?

Are you hoping this is a community where people don't think privilege is a thing? You won't find that to be the case I'm afraid.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

ignorant southen white male US citizen with all kinds of 'privilieges'

And a French-spelling elitist, at that!

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

It's supply-side economics vs demand-side economics. They incorrectly believe that supply comes first, when demand actually comes first.

[mikeyxw.livejournal.com]

The link to US jobs is really BS. The tax break in question is the one that exempts US companies from paying taxes on their profits from overseas operations until they repatriate the money. This has nothing to do with where the stuff is made, so these aren't "tax breaks" on stuff built in factories which have moved to China or Mexico or other places but "tax breaks" on stuff sold in China or Mexico or other places. If Lucient Technologies builds some stuff in California that is sold in Mexico, they will get this "tax break" until the money is brought back to the US even if they don't have any manufacturing facilities in Mexico. If GM builds a factory in China and sells those cars in the US, the money is earned by the US subsidiary and therefore this "tax break" doesn't apply. This has to do with where stuff is sold, not where it's made.

If this exemption goes away, it will very likely impact the overseas sales by US companies and their subsidiaries, they will either have to raise their prices or lower their profits. Neither will translate into increasing domestic employment. It would raise some revenue but it would make US companies less competitive internationally. My take is that this is something the democrats really aren't in favor of this change. It seems to come up a few months before every presidential election as another way to beat up the other side.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

This is good info. How do you propose we increase the incentive to sell domestically?