I have trying to think of a corporate tax plan that would make sense and be fair, as well as encourage corporations to live up to their good corporate citizenship responsibilities and moral obligations
Lets say you start out with a base tax rate for the purposes of this exercise of 50%. The same rate applies if you are fully domestic, multinational doing business in the US, or a mailbox in the Caymans
You get points for
1. Creating Jobs in the US
2. Investing in facilities in the US
3. Investing in capital equipment in the US
4. Increasing energy efficiency, reducing energy consumption
5. Implemeting quality and or safety programs
6. Worker education programs
7. providing health care benefits
8. Investing in US R&D
9. legitimate non denominational/non political charitable contributions
There is a Federal Reserve symposium in Jackson Hole and one, slammed the Fed.
The Fed listens to Wall Street and believes what it hears,'' Buiter said yesterday in a paper presented to the Fed's conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. ``This distortion into a partial and often highly distorted perception of reality is unhealthy and dangerous.
I don't think that the general public realizes how the impending collapse of Fannie and Freddie is a game-changer. Bear Stearns, Enron, IndyMac, those are all small potatoes in comparison to the massive size of the GSE's.
The inevitable failure of these institutions is so epic that when the epitaph of the American Empire is composed it will be Fannie and Freddie that are written large.
"If the U.S. government allows Fannie and Freddie to fail and international investors are not compensated adequately, the consequences will be catastrophic," Yu said in e-mailed answers to questions yesterday. "If it is not the end of the world, it is the end of the current international financial system."
An instapopulist post earlier in the day linked to an economic profile test. Like the 4-square political views tests that place libertarians at the top of the diamond, I felt that this economic profile test was biased to produce a result showing the you are a neo-liberal (of course, otherwise you'd be a heathen).
This is such a disservice to public discourse, and I would like to take the first step in putting together a similiar Economic populist test dealing with economic views.
Below you will find my preliminary suggestion of what it should look like.
Four square, double axes.
The idea is that there are two important elements of economic views.
The first question is whether public policy should center on the creation of economic wealth (i.e. the more money floating out there in the world the better) or social welfare (i.e. the relative distribution of wealth matters.)
You sure couldn't tell it by me. Hey, they call Populists vulgar in this article!
It's an interesting piece though, pointing out that with the financial sector crisis the free market has failed and how other emerging economies, the government is very much at the helm.
Here's the first couple of paragraphs as a teaser, click on the above link to read the whole article.
For the best part of three decades, policymakers in the developed world followed Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in seeking to roll back the frontiers of the state. The triple mantra of privatisation, liberalisation and deregulation held sway.
Mr Buffett, the celebrated "Sage of Omaha," believes that shareholders in the two mortgage companies look set to be wiped out as the pair attempt to raise more capital.
MI is still the home of the auto industry and dependent on them for its economic well being. From Gov. Granholm's state of the state:
... we will not concede the automotive industry to any other state or nation.
We are the state that put America on wheels – the state that put the “car” in NASCAR. There is no vision for Michigan’s new economy that does not include cars designed, engineered, and made in Michigan. The industry’s changing – but we in Michigan cannot – will not – abandon it. And we should not allow our government in Washington to abandon it either.
On the next episode of your corporate sponsored Democratic convention...soon to be revealed, the VP sweepstakes!
Who is the last survivor? Who will be the chosen one?
I don't know about anyone else but this absurd media hype suspense on the VP picks is like a bad version of Survivor show and ya know, don't worry, be happy, it's only the next possible Presidential administration. Ya know that thing called government supposedly going to manage the United States.
On that note, Public Citizen has a call to action on how the Democratic National Convention is a corporate pig fest, with millions in advertising, freebies and most importantly access to our supposed representatives.
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