By Steve Thompson
An editorial in the Chico News & Review this week seems to applaud Senator Darrell Steinberg for pushing more taxes at the local level, and for putting pressure on California businesses in the process. In the eyes of the left, it seems, business is always the enemy.
That’s really too bad, because what they refuse to see, no matter how many times we repeat it, is that business is the lifeblood of this state. Take a long look at any government spending program you fancy. Look at our schools, our police and fire departments, even our public parks. It’s all funded by private sector taxes.
Sure, those who work in government pay taxes too, but government spending is not sustainable without outside money. If you don’t believe me put 100 government employees on an island and see if they can pay their own wages out of the taxes they collect. It doesn’t work. It takes private sector jobs to support those employees. Unfortunately at today’s rates of higher paid public sector workers, it takes A LOT of private sector workers to sustain them.
About the best private sector job any economy can ask for is manufacturing. People who make things take raw materials and turn it into something of value. They create wealth. They support as many as 3 other service industry jobs with the income they bring to a community. California has been especially harsh in running manufacturing out of our state. Why? Because every few years new elected officials come in and arbitrarily raise the bar of regulations. Mostly to prove to constituents that they are “doing something” or that they care about clean water, air, etc. But once you’ve passed the point of water or air so clean that it’s beyond what even nature itself could produce, you’ve raised the cost to industry and suddenly no one can afford it.
We’ve reached the point in California where the air we breathe is no longer free. Whether you think this is too strong a statement or not, Californians live under more government control than just about anyone in the country. You can call it utopia, but to me it’s just plain old fashioned tyranny. It may seem great for a while, with public employees raking in tons of cash and high retirements, but it won’t last. It’s not sustainable.
Eventually the businesses that support our public sector will either leave to other states, or they will dry up and die under the heavy burden. Business owners who once had a dream in their heart will close their doors and look for a good government job. I guess that’s cause for celebration from those who are anti-business, but it’s the most short-sighted celebration I can think of. Kind of like dancing on your own grave.
Steve, Good Call on this one.
Business is the once Golden Goose that laid the Golden Eggs to feed the overhead that is State Government.
But the State has had its foot on the throat of the Goose so hard, for so long that per capita Egg output fell.
Now they think that they can choke the Goose a little harder, shake the Goose, and that Egg production will magically rise.
Au contraire.
Or, my old refrain:
http://www.norcalblogs.com/bored/refrain.php
Speaking of the CNR Looking at their last two editions What are they going to do for content after Measure A ?
Let me put this to you.
If corporate America insists on sitting on all this cash, because there is no martket, or expanding market, for its goods and services … why shouldn’t we tax a fair porttion of it from them, employ people on public works, and create an expanding market … along with the public works.
Makes sense to me.
I read that ten times the number of businesses opened last year in California than in Texas.
If California is so hard to do business in, why then are we getting ten times the number of businesses?
Something is not correct, here.
Libby I can think of two reasons.
1. that money is personal property and tax has been paid on it…it’s not the governments piggy bank.
2. The problem isn’t money; it is irresponsible management and spending of tax revenues.
Yiour idea would just kick the can down the road for another day and it wouldn’t help the economy. The problem will not go away by taking (STEALING) what isn’t righfully ours (collectively). You wouldn’t do this with your own finances and you certainly wouldn’t treat an irresponsible child this way unless you want him to turn into a whining, dependent, lazy, little monster!
The solution is so simple. Create clear, simplified regulations. Write tax law that is simple; simple laws inspire compliance. Tax at a reasonable competitive rate. Do that and you create an atmosphere that gives the goose confidence that laying eggs will be worth the trouble. He will put his money, his creativity and his persona;l energy behind building and growing business. This will result in jobs a bunch creating a broad tax base and a future that is not as threatened by boom and bust. It will also cause revenues to flow to government but that government cannot treat the peoples money like a personal bank account. They have a responsibility to use tax dollars wisely to the best effect. We should be able to measure a value or return for our tax dollars.
You didn’t say what kind of business is being created. But if we assume what you say is true there could be several explanations.
The jobs being created are green jobs or tech jobs that our government has supported and encouraged with grants (public money not private investment).
People that can’t find a job might be trying to start a business out of desperation (standing on shakey ground in this economy). These guys (I know 2 personally) are taking a huge chance; they could easily lose their shirts and be out of business in a year.
A lot of business has already moved to Texas or other states. A slow down now wouldn’t be surprising.
And finally, a number of new businesses may have opened but if the number of businesses going out of business is greater that would be a moot point.
Also, if the jobs being created are just green jobs and research jobs that doesn’t help much. We need broad based recovery so all kinds of jobs are available.
I did find this article that tries hard to put a positive spin on the California economy:
http://www.healthycal.org/californias-business-climate-how-bad-is-it.html
As Steve has pointed out the manufacturing industry, wealth creators, isn’t even mentioned. Hostility toward this sector has really done a lot of damage.
—Libby: “….why shouldn’t we tax a fair porttion of it from them…”
“Them” is “us”.
And among the MOST demanding of “returns on investment” are retirement funds such as CalPERS.
http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/stories/2010/04/05/daily15.html
—Libby:”… employ people on public works, and create an expanding market …”
You can not expand our economy solely on Government spending. Particularly deficit spending. Keynesian economics run amok, again.
Those theories are believed to have deepened and extended the Great Depression, and only offer some limited bits of help with our current economic predicament.
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/FDR-s-Policies-Prolonged-Depression-5409.aspx
I totally agree Mark, very well said. (Jack)
Libby: At least one part of corporate America won’t be sitting on their cash. Check this out: Our banks have held on to as much of this repo’d property as they could for just about as long as they could. They’ve been hoping for the recovery to get going that B.O. promised. Then they could start selling assets and minimize their losses.
They are now out of time and home prices have continued to fall. Banks across America, both big and small, don’t see any reason to hold on any longer. They are forced to dump these foreclosed houses and land for whatever they can get. This is going to create a huge glut on the market and you know that home prices are going to drop a whole lot more now!
The banks gambled they could do better by holding them for awhile and they were wrong. This was the worst case scenario that everyone in real estate feared and now its beginning to happen.
Since California had the most inflated real estate prices they are going to be hit the worst.
You know what this means Libby?
It means more tax revenue shortfalls for city, county and state coffers. The next round of layoffs and very possibly a double dip recession will soon follow. We haven’t seen the worst of this recession by a long shot and we can thank Obama and the Democrats for a good portion of this misery. For sure in California we blame Dems because they run everything! They are in control from top to bottom and that’s why this state has a lousy credit rating, we’re flat broke and we suffering under the highest tax rate in the nation at the same time we have the highest paid state workers.
Butte County is preparing for more layoffs because they simply don’t have the money, can Chico be that much different? I doubt it.
It take about 13-14 people working at an average paying job and paying their fair share of income tax to subsidize just one person one welfare. Imagine what the impact is on the same working people if we suddenly added one million illegals taking from the same system.
There is just so much to say on this, where to begin.
Libby: “Let me put this to YOU.”
If you feel justified in taking the earnings from businesses to give to those who have less, than Im justified in taking from you what youve earned if you have more than I do. Right? Where is the difference? There is none. That business owner, to become successful, started his/her business after years of working harder than any hourly employee could ever imagine doing and used money they either earned and/or borrowed and paid interest on.
How big or small the business is makes no difference. They ALL had to start the same way and if share holders are now a part of the business they paid for the stock and are vested as much as the mom and pop corner store.
Government jobs do not generate a profit. (Well, most dont, some IRS and a few others are the exception.) Dont know what the ratio would be for the number of private sector jobs needed to support one public sector job, but lets say its 20 to 1. (Its probably more.)
With over 9% of our approximate 300 million population that means around 30 million people are looking for jobs. If the real number of those unemployed were actually counted Ive heard the figure would be closer to 16-20%. Do the math. Where is the money supposed to come from with so many out of work? The rich? There are not enough mega rich to make up the difference. We need jobs for the middle and low wage earners and lots of them. NOW! Not in another two years.
Washington DC is the ONLY place in the US where the housing market is on the increase. Gee, why? How about all of the new federal employees that have been hired the past two years. And with Obamacare there will be another 75,000 federal IRS agents needed to help run it. That number may be a little high now that the 1099 form has been removed, but how many more private sector jobs is it going to take to support them?
We need jobs, but we need private sector jobs first and foremost before a single public sector job is filled. That makes sense to me.
“1. that money is personal property and tax has been paid on it…it’s not the governments piggy bank.”
It is income, and income is taxed by the fed, and we, through our elected representatives, can determine the rate of said tax. It is well documented that through some the the Clinton and all of the Bush administrations, Corporate America has not held up its end … it should be required to recommence.
“The problem will not go away by taking (STEALING) what isn’t righfully ours (collectively).”
I’m sorry, but this is a very childish and selfish characterization of a splendid advance in human civilization: the voluntary collection of individual resources toward a commonly acknowledged good, i.e., democratic government. At this point, I wouldn’t mind seeing the Ryan Budget go into effect, so you can watch the social disintegration up close … and finally come to realize … oh, I give up.
We’ll let Toby or whoever it was disband the CDC … and I hope the mutant e coli gets him.
“You can not expand our economy solely on Government spending. Particularly deficit spending.”
Did I say that? What I hear is that Corporate America needs a nudge. And if we nudged, it might not work, the variables are huge.
What if us consumers have REALLY learned our lesson, and, after the fed has “stimulated” employment numbers, we still refuse to spend money, especially money we don’t actually have? What kind of economy will we have?
“It take about 13-14 people working at an average paying job and paying their fair share of income tax to subsidize just one person one welfare. Imagine what the impact is on the same working people if we suddenly added one million illegals taking from the same system.”
When are you going to stop asserting that illegals don’t work? That they don’t pay taxes? Their rent pays property taxes, and the purchase of groceries generates sales taxes.
It doesn’t matter how many times you repeat this … and you do, repeatedly, repeat it … it’s still a lie.
And I’m not saying that low-wage workers don’t cost the state. They do. Mostly reimbursements for uninsured health care. But your willful disregard for facts is not conducive to productive discussion.
“Government jobs do not generate a profit.”
Depends how you define profit. You offer me the choice between $1000 cash or clean water to drink, guess which one I’m going for.
This is what it’s coming to, people.
You offer me the choice between $1000 cash or clean water to drink, and I’ll take your $1000, buy a $100 water filter and invest the $900. In 20 years I’ll still have clean water and I’ll have a pot full of cash. What will you have then, more taxes?
Dear sweet loveable liberal Libby, you honestly think that out of the 15 million or so illegals that are here, and all their children they bring or are born here, (the fastest growing segment of our society), that we couldn’t find 1 million that are drawing some sort of welfare? Ha! Now that’s just plain silly and that tells us you haven’t been doing your homework.
One of the big draws for illegals has been our medical system,. The children born to illegals in our first class hospitals who are without insurance and have no intention of paying has cost us billions! It’s estimated that it costs the American head of household around $1200 per year to pay for illegals receiving aide here. ABC and Fox both came up with similar estimates based on immigration studies. We are losing about 100-113 billion a year thanks to illegals. Arizona is a lightly populated state and they track these welfare costs very closely and in AZ alone they lose 2.5 billion a year! Do you have any idea what the cost is in California for just keeping these illegal citizens in our prisons? Check it out for yourself will ya? Don’t believe anything we say, you get those facts from State or Federal sources so you will believe them. When you see how much we blow on illegals it should open your eyes a tad, that is IF you bother to check and personally I don’t think you will. History says you will only believe what you want to believe – facts are an unnecessary element.
Libby if you are going challenge us and our conservative thinking you are going to have to come up with more than we’re all liars.
Peggy that was well said, but I doubt you will reach Libby. However, there are many more people who are not so attached to a political ideology that will relate and understand. Thank you!
I just want to make it clear that I believe Libby is a good hearted person. She brings to the table views that are very representative of the liberal left and that’s important to understanding. But, she is so invested in her opinions its almost impossible for her to see the other side. That doesn’t mean we don’t care about her and appreciate her contrarian views. So thanks again for trying to help her understand Peggy, and to that I say….good luck! lol
If she’ll give me her address I’ll go over and pick up the check for the difference.
Loved hearing the state of Michigan was stopping the administrative cost on collecting union dues through payroll deductions. This would mean union members would have to write a check every month and mail it to their union hall.
Every state should do this, not only for the cost savings but for the awareness it would generate to every union member writing the check. Seeing their money going out with their own hand, instead of being just a deducted number among many from the gross salary on a pay stub makes it real.
Yes, we can move now from unfactual to ignorant.
“You offer me the choice between $1000 cash or clean water to drink, and I’ll take your $1000, buy a $100 water filter ….”
Dude, that ain’t gonna get the e coli out of your water.
You and Sarah have a lot in common: hubris and ignorance … a deadly combination.
In response to factual from ignorant: The three stage home water filter will remove or dissolve Organics, Chlorine, Pesticides/Insecticides, Metal Particulates, Algae, Fungus, Giardia, Cryptospordium, and E. coli Bacteria. Price $79.99 to $99.95
Libby, why would you assume that any number of inexpensive home water filters wouldn’t filter out e-coli? lol
I know, I know…. you were just in a hurry to make your point. It’s alright, we understand, you gotta shoot from the hip and hope something sticks. Its this darn hubris and ignorance Libs, you need to settle back and do some research before you go on the attack.
Or you can do what anyone who lives in an isolated area in the mountains must do nearly every spring:
http://www.mass.gov/dep/water/drinking/boilfaq.htm
A note about E. coli bacteria: E. coli is a sub-group of the fecal coliform bacteria group. There are many strains of E. coli, most of which are harmless, but some strains can cause illness…Boiling or treating contaminated drinking water with a disinfectant destroys all forms of E. coli, including O157:H7.
I would have thought our bicycle riding, “crafting” friend Libby would have known about this old fashioned method for ensuring the drinking water is clean.
(Man that Sarah sure does threaten.) It tells you what a false sense of superiority will do to the mind.
Third time the charm … e coli bacteria don’t get removed, dissolved or filtered … it has to be killed by poison … like chlorine. I’ll trust you to dose yerselves.
The rest of us are keeping the government … i.e., a passel of scientists smarter than us, and paid by us, to keep up on all the latest poop, … in the water cleaning business.
“The children born to illegals in our first class hospitals who are without insurance and have no intention of paying has cost us billions! It’s estimated that it costs the American head of household around $1200 per year to pay for illegals receiving aide here.”
Didn’t I say that reimbursement of uninsured medical care was the chief cost to the state of low wage workers? That’s legal and illegal, Peggy. Try hard to get your head around that … without the “billions” which is hyperbole.
I’m trying to get you to see past this fixation with “illegals” which is, I’m sorry, prejudiced and racist, and a decidedly lower brain function, and used against you by the “powers” to keep you distracted from real issues, like, why should a sprained wrist cost anybody $850!
Two x-rays and a splint! $850.00!
They tell me that this is the medical establishment trying to make up unreimbursed costs … but I’m not so sure. $175 of it went to the primary care doc that authorized the second x-ray. And her office was plastered with notices of health insurance companies she will not deal with, cause they won’t reimburse her.
So now who’s not paying up? It’s more than a poor citizen can cope with, I’m telling you.
But repeating the drivel fed you by the MSM is not discussion, and not making progress.
Libby: “it has to be killed by poison…”
No! Boiling water also KILLS the little critters.
However, the information was only offered because you insisted that we could not get along without those scientists…which is BUNK! We can if we are forced to and if youliberals continue to think you can expand government to unsustainable levels we will all have to.
“The rest of us are keeping the government … i.e., a passel of scientists smarter than us, and paid by us, to keep up on all the latest poop, … in the water cleaning business.”
If you believe they don’t use filters and chemicals you’re nuts…or ignorant.
I prefer our modern system as well and we can afford it when our tax money is well managed and our citizens are educated and supported to be contributing members rather than dependent, needy and a net drain.
“…real issues, like, why should a sprained wrist cost anybody $850!”
It shouldn’t…and wouldn’t except that some brainiac back in the thirties decided government paying for all kinds of services would be a good thing. Some other brainiac in the sixties decided to expand on the idea and the costs just kept rising. The market for $30.00 sprains disappeared as all treatments were melted into one big entitlement pot. Every doctor and every clinic has to hire many more people just to do the paperwork. Government likewise has layers of bureaucracy! IT ALL COSTS EXTRA!
Gone is the little clinic that gets by and knows patients will sometimes take a long time to pay. Gone too are the majority of responsible citizens who can be counted on to pay their bills. Use your noodle Libby.
“And her office was plastered with notices of health insurance companies she will not deal with, cause they won’t reimburse her.”
Like Medicade and Medicare? They aren’t paying what it costs for services. The government expects those insurance companies, and people without insurance, to make up for what they don’t pay.
You want costs to come down? Get the government out of health care. Put the responsibility back in the hands of patients to deal with doctors, insurance companies, and hospitals directly.
“It shouldn’t…and wouldn’t except that some brainiac back in the thirties decided government paying for all kinds of services would be a good thing. Some other brainiac in the sixties decided to expand on the idea and the costs just kept rising.”
But why should they? You are still on autopilot … still refusing to think about it.
What I’ve read is that, initially, it did work. Kaiser, my test case, worked beautifully from its inception in 1945 through the 70s’, and then the shit hit the fan.
And I know that one of the reasons is that Kaiser’s doctors lost control of the organization, or rather, that some of Kaiser’s doctors went and got themselves ideologically corrupted … with MBAs … and commenced to focus on manipulating capital, rather than innovating health care. And along came the Asian money market crash of the mid-80s … and it was all up.
Capitalism is fine for some areas of economic life, but it’s got no place in the delivery of health care.
And that is why a sprained wrist now costs $850.
***
“Like Medicade and Medicare? They aren’t paying what it costs for services. The government expects those insurance companies, and people without insurance, to make up for what they don’t pay.”
Does this make sense to anybody else? The notices were for outfits like Healthnet.
Healthnet reimburses Medicare costs? This don’t make no sense.
Libby, the next time you want to attack a quote from me try making sure its my quote. The below statement was actually made by Post Script and not me.
“The children born to illegals in our first class hospitals who are without insurance and have no intention of paying has cost us billions! It’s estimated that it costs the American head of household around $1200 per year to pay for illegals receiving aide here.”
Didn’t I say that reimbursement of uninsured medical care was the chief cost to the state of low wage workers? That’s legal and illegal, Peggy. Try hard to get your head around that … without the “billions” which is hyperbole.
That being said, I have to say I do agree with you on medical reimbursements from insurance companies to providers is way below what is reasonable. But, I do not believe it is an illegal only issue. It is caused, in part, by the overwhelming number of individuals, legal citizens too, that have not paid anything for their health care. They have been told that health care is their constitution right, and they believe it. So, with a clear conscience they just walk away expecting the money gods from fantasy land to pay for it. It is time for the 30 year old Virginias of this world to grow up and realize there is NO Santa Claus.
A girl friend of mine back in the 1970s had her child at the county hospital. In the 1980s she discovered she had a lien placed against her home for the hospital and doctors bills, and interest.. If they are not doing this any more they should be and if they are Id like to know.
Most people would not think about walking out of a store with a baby stroller without paying for it, how can people walk out of a hospital with a child thinking they dont have to pay for the care received? You can not tell me that everyone from Germany, France, Canada, etc., believe they can come here and receive free care. When I went to Europe I had to carry a letter showing proof of my medical care provider.
While I would love to pay for every person needing health care, sadly I cant afford it. My solution to the problem would be to set up health care similar to auto, life and home insurance. Let the free market competition have a chance by taking away the state boundaries. If I can now find the policy I want to insure my home and car in Florida why cant I do the same with my health care. Also, believe torte reform should be set up similar to Workers Comp. attorney fee restrictions, which I believe is 12%.
So Libby, thats whats going on in my head. And if it seems like trivial “hyperbole” I suggest you mentally move out of your fantasy land into the real world. Life as an adult can be hard at times, but it is so much better than living as a child depending on, Mommy and Daddy.
Libby, Here is an article I hope you find of interest.
=======
What Paul Ryan’s Critics Don’t Know About Health Economics
A premium-support system would create the right incentives for cost cutting without putting undue burdens on seniors.
By Alain Enthoven June 3, 2011
(Mr. Enthoven, a health economist who helped to design the premium-support concept 30 years ago, is a professor emeritus at the Graduate School of Business at Stanford.)
“Health care in America is extremely wasteful. A 2005 report by the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine found that 30-40 cents of every dollar spent on health care are spent on costs associated with “overuse, underuse, misuse, duplication, system failures, unnecessary repetition, poor communication, and inefficiency.” Medicare is especially vulnerable to waste, fraud and abuse.
No amount of price cutting or central-government dictates will mitigate these problems. Their cure requires detailed local knowledge, incentives and fundamental organizational change so that curing them is in the interest of providers and patients.
At the root of the waste and excess is Medicare’s open-ended fee-for-service system, which pays health-care providers for doing more and more costly services, whether or not they’re in the patients’ best interests. Last year’s health-care reform legislation acknowledged that fundamental change is needed from the traditional fee-for-service model to a system in which doctors and hospitals team up to offer coordinated care and are held accountable for per-capita cost and quality. Hospitals and suppliers may participate in this Shared Savings Program by creating or joining an Accountable Care Organization (ACO).”
Rest of the article attached.
http://budget.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=245001
At the root of the waste and excess is Medicare’s open-ended fee-for-service system, ….”
And which, Obama-care explicitly addresses … if you care to inquire.