IN JERRY’S WORLDBy David G Hanger
December 07, 2017 Ghert Abbott is spot-on with his commentary about Federal income tax policy, but he is also too polite. This is not tax reform. This is not even tax or economic policy. This is pure theft by some of the biggest pigs this world has ever produced. Reminder: The economy collapsed in 2008 because of insane Republican economic policies. Fact: The economy recovered dramatically when the citizens of this country fired that bunch of idiots. But that was not good enough for you, or you have no memory or ability to recollect at all. So now once again you are slobbering up the insane propaganda that when the rich pee on thee (trickle-down economics) everyone will go from rags to riches without even having to get up off their ass. P&E ratios (price to earnings) are at historical highs already, and what follows is also historically predictable. Economic collapse and major economic depression. Industrial-strength house-flipping also quickly leads to economic collapse. Scam artists like Mnuchin, now Secretary of the Treasury, made their fortunes by house-flipping subpar mortgagees. Selling a house for $200,000 that you bought Ghert Abbott is dead-wrong with his commentary about state income tax policy. The first thing that is wrong is that we are even talking about it, let alone actually considering it. Tax the oil industry or shut it down. They are making billions every year, and we are paying them hundreds of millions every year for doing so. The idea that any of us are obligated to keep Anchorage and Fairbanks afloat is so much crap. The oil boom in Alaska is over. Time for about a third of them to move to west and south Texas where most of the real action is going to be for the foreseeable future. Any state income tax has as its fundamental purpose financing the oil companies’ tax credits while sustaining the population of the Anchorage/Fairbanks corridor. I live one thousand miles away from any of that nonsense, and I just don’t care to finance oil companies or the deadheads in the Anchorage/Fairbanks corridor. Ghert Abbott actually thinks these new taxes will be earmarked for such things as education, but there is no chance of that happening. Sorry, Ghert, but you see so clearly how nuts, how cruel, how selfish, how dishonest, how corrupt, these Republican Federal tax proposals are, and you see clearly that Walker’s state tax proposals that ignore the state’s wealthy is beyond crass, so why don’t you get that bending over and being shafted by a bunch of oil companies and their hired minions (including “Oil Company” Walker) is not an acceptable public policy? “For the sake of the children” is hollow horse manure when the damned oil companies are stealing us blind to the tune of billions of dollars a year. Fire William Walker. Fire Byron Mallott. Fire Dan Ortiz. Fire Bert Stedman first. What a worthless individual respective this whole mess. And then fire all of the rest of them. This bunch of clowns is not even qualified to sweep anyone’s floors. Meanwhile, in Jerry’s world a dose of Reader’s Digest (acknowledged) combined with a heavy dose of Ayn Rand (unacknowledged) has you keeping what you earn, paying no taxes, and watching the mooches, the parasites, and the leeches, “perish as they should.” Jerry did it all by himself, and his frugality should be honored by not taxing any of his money; he worked for it, you know. So we have the one-way of our fundamentalist Christian non-brethren. Agree with me, or else. Believe as I do or bypass hell and head straight to non-existence in the world to come. And, oh by the way, your existence, your thought, your deeds, your opinions, nothing that you do in this world is of any consequence at all because you are not one of us, and thereby you should “perish as you should.” But Jerry, you did not enter naked into the world, and in the course of time establish the infrastructure, the markets, the transportation and communication networks, yea, even the plumbing. That was here already, improved upon over time to be sure, often by government employees that you do not want to support or pay. And that $8 an hour job you used to start your rise to fame and fortune had nothing to do with some employer’s need, had nothing to do with the streets his trucks drove on to deliver goods to his store, had nothing to do with the phone network that allowed the customers to shop and/or verify availability of what they want or need, and had absolutely nothing to do with the fact those people exist in a town or city because of the community’s existence as some sort of societal need. “Unearned income” definitionally, Jerry, refers primarily to income received from rents and royalties. It does not include capital gain income (or loss), another of several different types of income defined by the IRC Code under the auspices of the Tax Reform Act of 1986 (commonly referred to as TEFRA), and the type of income you specifically asserted should not be taxed (for no particularly logical reason at all) when you earn it. Tax on earnings presently includes a 15% load for payroll taxes (social security and medicare) plus income tax at variable rates from 10% up to 39.6% with a general average in the 15% to 25% range. So on earnings anyone pays anywhere from 30% to 40% out the door before you get your paycheck. (Employers do pay half of the payroll taxes, but self-employeds pay it all.) And you, Jerry, whine about paying a 10% to 15% tax on your capital gains. Back in 2008 the economic collapse was so bad that millions of ordinary citizens had their retirement accounts wiped out or at least severely diminished. I doubt in your frugality, Jerry, you had time to watch the 75-year olds on the corner singing for their supper after their finances had been wiped out. I doubt you spent any time observing the highway rest stops of America during that era where any number of families basically moved into rest stops because of the toilet facilities. And I know with certainty you have little awareness or experience with the beggars and the homeless who occupy the underpasses to this very day. So what happens to Jerry and his kid if: Jerry does not outlast his mother and kicks the bucket before this five-year old is out of grade school? No problem you say, but what if some odd chronic disease just wastes your big nest egg to nothing in a year or two? What if you lose it all in the 2019 crash? Apparently you choke on the notion of paying a soldier his due. He or she works for the government. So nothing for teachers, cops, firemen, ferry workers, soldiers, sailors, etc. Nothing for roads or infrastructure. Jerry did it all himself, by himself, needed none of the tools of society at large to do any of it. How many kids have you put through college, Jerry? How many kids have you had with some terrible ailment that costs you a fortune every month? Have you ever been a single mother with three children, earning on average 77% of what a man earns for equivalent work, trying to feed them? Your self-righteous arrogance is blind to the conditions of the real world, Jerry. Given your age you should know better. In Jerry’s world there is but one mantra. BE SELFISH. Then double- and triple-down. David G Hanger Editor's Note:
Received December 04, 2017 - Published December 07, 2017 Related Viewpoint:
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