Profits Are Not Evil

To say that the economic literacy of the American populace is practically non-existent would be stating the obvious. A weekly lesson from the nation’s premier economics professor, Walter E, Williams, would go a long way towards brightening the dim bulbs that are strewn across this great nation. In this essay, Dr. Williams explains what profits really represent, and why non-profit organizations shouldn’t be as revered as they are.

KMK

New Tax Guru Recording Finally Available

Blind Leading the Blind

One of my many hot button issues is the fact that our rulers in DC base all of their decisions on economic predictions made by complete idiots who use static analysis. As Tom Nugent points out in this interesting article, the predictions by the DC static analyzers are almost always so far off when compared to the real life results, that no sane person should believe a thing they say.

He points put the very real analysis (which many people think is a satire) they did about a decade ago, estimating huge windfalls of revenue for the Federal government if the top marginal tax rate were raised to 100%. That study actually predicted higher revenues in each subsequent year, as taxpayers made more money that would be forked over to the IRS.

A more practical dynamic analysis of such a tax rate would reveal that a 100% tax rate would result in very little actual dollars for DC because, unlike the space aliens who populate DC, those of us in the real world would just as soon do something else with our time than work our butts off to make money that we can’t keep.

Once again, that is the reason that Federal income tax revenues doubled after Ronald Reagan reduced the top marginal tax rate from 70% to 28%. People will take risks and work harder if they are allowed to keep more of the fruits of their labors. Contrary to the conventional wisdom promulgated by the media, the truth is that the deficit grew in the 1980s solely because Congress went on a wild spending binge, much like they are doing right now.

KMK

There Are Actually A Few Non-Communists In The DemonRat Party

The Arkansas Democrat has a good editorial today praising our Democrat Senator, Blanche Lambert Lincoln, for breaking from her party’s standard support of wealth confiscation and voting in favor of a permanent repeal of the estate tax. Unfortunately, there aren’t enough fair minded Democrats in the Senate to outweigh the fans of big government and Tom Daschole’s 60 vote rule for lowering taxes.

Link warning: The link to the editorial may not work for everyone. The Arkansas Democrat is one of the most difficult news sites on the web to link to stories, which is why I rarely discuss articles I read there.

KMK

Been There, Done That

It’s been over nine years since we made the big move from the San Francisco Bay Area to the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas. Stories like this, explaining that the Bay Area still has some of the worst traffic congestion in the country, reaffirm the wisdom of the move in my mind.

Having worked in several Bay Area cities, including San Francisco, Oakland, Fremont, San Ramon, Dublin and Santa Clara, and wasting countless hours in beep & creep traffic, all I can say is “been there, done that,” and feel gratitude for the current commute from one end of our main house to the other.

KMK

Who Supports Estate Tax?

Bruce Bartlett has a good piece on the super rich fat cats, such as Bill Gates, Sr., who are fighting to retain the estate tax, while most of the rest of us normal folks consider it to be evil. He explains why they would support something that theoretically should hurt them the most.

The super rich, such as America’s royal family, the Kennedys, have the money and resources to set up trusts and other mechanisms to exempt themselves from the estate tax. Joe Kennedy’s loot from his bootlegging & stock swindles has lasted for generations of non-productive spoiled rich kids due to his wise use of trusts to shield it from estate taxes.

Interestingly, Mr. Bartlett is still too squeamish to make the connection between supporters of government wealth confiscation and its heritage as part of the Communist Manifesto.

KMK

Multi-Level Scams

For decades, I have made many people mad by exposing the idiocy & illegality of several multi-level and pyramid schemes that were destined to implode, after making money only for the folks who got in early.

There is an interesting website devoted to just that topic, MLM WatchDog.

Interestingly, they have stories on two big pyramid scams that I wrote about over the past few years, warning everyone to stay away from.

The founders and many investors in the Global Prosperity Group scam are going to the slammer. My only question is why did it take the government so long to bust these guys? About five years ago, when some former clients became involved with it, and tried to lure me in, I did some investigation and wrote a lengthy piece on how it was blatantly illegal and destined for prosecution.

The Tax People was a group selling many of the same tax tips I have been writing & speaking about for decades, but in a multi-level pyramid fashion. These people are now heading to the slammer. You can see a short summary on the MLM WatchDog opening page, and a more lengthy expose on this page from another good alert site, Pyramid Scheme Alert.

KMK

Another Double Standard

By now, it’s well known that the supporters of the communistic estate tax in the U.S. Senate have prevailed in their efforts to keep it in place. How they accomplished this is utterly disgusting.

In 1993, when there was a bill to drastically increase taxes retroactively, the Senate vote was 50 to 50. It was passed due to Al Gore’s vote as the tie breaker.

When the recent bill to repeal the estate tax was voted on, it actually received 54 votes in favor and 44 against, with two Senators not voting. This was deemed not good enough to actually pass the law because the leader of the senate, Tom Daschole, mandated that it takes 60 votes to pass a law reducing taxes. Even a vote from Dick Cheney wouldn’t have helped. I hope this article is right, that those voting to retain the estate tax will be held accountable in November.

When it takes only 51 votes to raise taxes and 60 votes to cut them, things are clearly out of whack with our rulers in DC. If anything, it should be the other way around. As a bare minimum, the standards should be equal in both directions. This is why I have never believed any claim that a tax or fee is temporary. There is no such thing. Once is tax or fee is imposed, our masters make sure that it lasts forever.

KMK

Handy Tax Resource

TaxPlanet.com by Gary Klott is a very useful resource for tax info for individuals. It’s actually the kind of site I envisioned doing myself if I had more time and/or worker bees to assist me. I like it so much, I’ve even included a link to it in the section on the left of this page.

KMK