Read this. You’re smarter than I am: The authors here estimated (very roughly) that a 2% wealth tax limited to top 0.1% (net worth over ~$43 million) would raise $2.6 trillion over ten years, assuming a 15% avoidance rate and no other behavioral responses…. or… … a 2% wealth tax limited to top 1% (net worth over ~$10 million) would … Read More
Dow Now Lower Than January 1
This year, the Dow opened at 24,824. As of right now (3:52 pm) it is at 24,675. It is the end of October, and the Dow is down. Put another way, in Trump’s first full year as President, the Dow went down for the first time in eight years. And the DJIA is Trump’s metric about how the economy is doing. P.S. … Read More
Deficit Doves
Remember when Republicans cared about the deficit? No longer: The federal deficit hit $895 billion in the first 11 months of fiscal 2018, an increase of $222 billion, or 32 percent, over the same period the previous year, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The nonpartisan CBO reported that the central drivers of the increasing deficit were the Republican tax law … Read More
The Horrible Things The Trump Administration Is Doing That Are Unrelated To Scandals
Sometimes, you forget that these people are just plain evil: The Trump administration is moving to reverse Obama-era rules barring hunters on some public lands in Alaska from baiting brown bears with bacon and doughnuts and using spotlights to shoot mother black bears and cubs hibernating in their dens. The National Park Service issued a notice Monday of its intent … Read More
Mulvaney, The Head Of The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, Is The Wolf Guarding The Henhouse
The man is very Trumpian in his dealings: Mick Mulvaney, the interim director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, told banking industry executives on Tuesday that they should press lawmakers hard to pursue their agenda, and revealed that, as a congressman, he would meet only with lobbyists if they had contributed to his campaign. “We had a hierarchy in my office … Read More
The Wild West Of The West Wing
It is the first day of March 2018. I wrote a lot of posts yesterday, and I didn’t even it HALF of the things going on. The breaking news that would be major scandals in any other White House. It was insane. Here’s what happened JUST YESTERDAY: Hope Hicks — without question, the aide (family aside) with whom Trump is closest … Read More
Stocks Waaaay Down Again
After losing a record 1,175 points on Monday, the Dow tumbled 1,033 points more yesterday. It landed in a correction, a 10% decline from previous highs. The market turmoil follows a prolonged period of booming stock prices with virtually no sharp declines. Such a rapid rise is unusual, and market analysts long warned that a pullback was overdue. Today was another … Read More
The Dumbest Shutdown Ever
Most people slept through it, but yes, the United States government shutdown for several hours last night. Yesterday, in something of a throwback, the two parties struck a deal and came out with a bi-partisan spending bill. Great news, right? But Republican and libertarian Rand Paul had to make a point: Republicans no longer care about deficit spending. Rand wanted … Read More
CFPB Is All But Committing Malpractice
Equifax (EFX.N) said in September that hackers stole personal data it had collected on some 143 million Americans. Richard Cordray, then the CFPB director, authorized an investigation that month, said former officials familiar with the probe. But Cordray resigned in November and was replaced by Mulvaney, President Donald Trump’s budget chief, who was once quite vocal about eliminating the agency. … Read More
Volatile Dow
After plunging a few hundred points on Friday, the Dow dropped a record-breaking 1175 points yesterday. That the most points, but fortunately, the 4.6% drop was not the highest percentage-wise. All in all, 1 trillion dollars in net worth was lost. It probably was a correction, but it raised fresh anxieties among Americans who have seen their retirement savings and household … Read More
The Horrible Tax Bill Is GOP Gift To Themselves [UPDATE: Senate Votes Yes]
Literally: Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, inserted language into the final tax bill that would enrich three different constituencies: fossil fuel firms, Republicans’ major campaign donors and a handful of Cornyn’s GOP congressional colleagues including Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and two other Texas lawmakers in the House. Cornyn originally added the language in an amendment to the Senate bill at the … Read More
Repeal Trump Tax Cuts
Chait: Probably nothing has done more to erode Trump’s public standing than the consistently plutocratic cast of his domestic policy. The tax cut is the second-most-unpopular major piece of legislation in recorded history, behind only Trump’s other major domestic initiative, the health-care-repeal bill: Democrats have nothing to fear from making repeal of the Trump tax cuts for the rich a defining … Read More
This Is Not Just A Bad Tax Bill; This Is A Bill That Will Make America Worse In Many Ways
NY Times: The tax plan has been marketed by President Trump and Republican leaders as a straightforward if enormous rebate for the masses, a $1.5 trillion package of cuts to spur hiring and economic growth. But as the bill has been rushed through Congress with scant debate, its far broader ramifications have come into focus, revealing a catchall legislative creation that could reshape major … Read More
Meanwhile, Republicans Are Giving America Back To Wall Street
Republicans in the House of Representatives passed the Choice Act yesterday, a sweeping deregulation of the financial sector. It passed 233-186, with no Democratic support. One Republican, Walter Jones of North Carolina, voted no. This bill rolls back or weakens most of the protections put in place since the 2008 financial crisis through President Barack Obama’s Dodd-Frank Act. Though it … Read More
Too Big To Fail Banks Being Pressured
Great news: Federal Reserve officials strongly signaled they will toughen big-bank capital requirements even more than they have since the 2008 crisis, a move that will add to the pressure on the largest U.S. banks to consider shrinking. Fed governors Daniel Tarullo and Jerome Powell, in separate public comments on Thursday, said the Fed would require eight of the largest U.S. … Read More