AMTV News: Russia Deploys Warships to Syria

Topher Morrison

PurpleSerf.com

This is AMTV News, I’m your host Topher Morrison.  Today is Wednesday July 11^th 2012.

If it bleeds it leads…

Russian Warships to Maneuver Near Syria

New York Times

Bashar al-Assad looks like he has a new pitbull.  Protecting its last ally in the Middle East, but most importantly its access to the Mediterranean Russia is sending a flotilla of 11 Russian warships, capable of c arrying hundreds of marines to dock in the ancient port of Tartus.  It is a clear message to the region and the US backing rebel forces in Syria.  Washington is predictably mum, but with poker faces aplenty is it call or check?

Next…

Obama EO Grants Authority to Seize Private Communication Facilities

Electronic Privacy Information Center

Obama has done what the people’s congress could not last year because of public protest.  His order grants new powers to the Department of Homeland Security, most importantly, the power to seize private facilities when necessary, effectively shutting down or limiting civilian communications.  Reasoning Washington needs “at all times and under all circumstances to carry out its most critical and time sensitive missions.” Seems like a one-way street.

Here’s something interesting…

Like 3D?  Imagine 6!

Before It’s News

In the latest from the people who found God in a subatomic particle, the Higgs Boson, comes a new experiment called ATLAS.  The megaminds at CERN using their Large Hydron Collider believe they can view three more dimensions beyond what humans can perceive.  Major surpises are yet on the horizon and possibly even more questions.

Next…

Lone Star State Top Pick for Business

CNBC

On the heels of news that every state with a Republican governor saw reductions in unemployment, Texas is lauded as the best state in America to do business in.  Receiving high marks in CNBC’s grading rubric for infrastructure, tech and innovation, the third lowest cost of living, access to capital all while recovering from a severe economic slump last year.  Get er done!

This is getting ridiculous…

Pentagon Considers Awarding Medals to Drone Pilots

Glenn Greenwald

The military’s gamers, sorry… drone pilots might wear flight suits to work, but they don’t need them.  Spying on weddings, sorry… children…err enemy combatants thousands of miles away from harm sipping on Monster is hardly valorous so why is the Pentagon glorifying ridding a joystick?  Want to award our fearless flyers?  How about a new Nintendo Wii and call it a day?

This is going to get weird…

The Islamist Pyramid Scheme

Washington Times

That’s right the Arab Spring may have just been a plan to install a pyramid scheme that is to say – destroy the Great Pyramids of Giza.  Recent islamist electoral victories throughout the region have spurred the less than reasonable to accomplish what Amr bin al-As, Egypt’s Muslim conqueror, could not in 640 AD.  This week alone 16 ancient mausoleums were ransacked in Mali, viral video showed the Taliban stoning women again and who doesn’t remember the 1,500-year-old Buddah they razed in 2001?  Time to guard the wonders of the world.

Catch my latest choice headlines on AMTV News Monday – Friday at AMTV Media and catch our in depth commentary and analysis of stories like these at GreeneWave.com part of the AMTV network.

AMTV News: UN Arms Treaty, China Slowdown, Syrian Show of Force

Topher Morrison

AMTV News

This is AMTV News, I’m your host Topher Morrison.  Today is Monday July 9^th 2012.

Americans Up in Arms Over UN Treaty

Forbes & The New American

Meet the latest bright idea to walk out of New York, the UN’s “Small Arms Treaty.”  Flanked by humanitarian rhetoric this internationalist effort is aimed at one thing, ensure the monopoly of violence stays with the governments of the world – hardly a demographic with a respectable human rights record.

The Obama administration has thrown its full support behind the treaty and therefore to subordinate the Constitution’s 2^nd Amendment guarantee and with it the police powers of the sovereign s tates:  The treaty is said to impose:

-       tougher licensing laws

-       confiscation and destruction of weapons deemed in violation

-       elimination of semi-automatics referred to prejudicially as “assault weapons”

All this backed by the same administration that signed off on the biggest weapons deal in the history of the planet to that bastion of civil rights – Saudi Arabia.  July 27^th is the deadline for the treaty, any surprise it’s right before Congress’ August recess?

Would-be Terrorist Caught at Olympic Park

London Telegraph

For months the chatter about London has been of terror plots.  To be sure, the Olympic grounds will be protected by the largest peacetime security operation ever seen  in Britain.   The heightened attention has nabbed a 24-year-old ex con rumored to have fought with Somali Al Qaeda affiliate al-Shahaab last week ending a flurry of 14 terror-related arrests across Britain – all based purely on suspicion.  In a nation fearing extremists around every corner, even within it own police ranks and boasting a camera on every lamppost expect more arrests as the opening ceremonies approach and due process is eroded.

Syria’s Show of Force

Associated Press

“Naval forces conducted an operational live fire excersise on Saturday.”  Launching missiles from sea and coast, helicopters and missile boats the Syrian government displayed its ability to repel foreign aggression.

Western nations have been beckoned to intervene on behalf of opposition forces who claim over 14,000 deaths since the start of the uprising, but Syria’s powerful network of allegiances stretches from Tehran to Beijing impeding political efforts at subduing Bashar al-Assad’s embattled regime and western efforts to overthrow it.  Foreign intelligence services, however, are supporting a shadowy network of insurgents steadily encroaching on Damascus threatening further escalation of violence as pro-Assad forces scramble to survive.

Chinese Demand Slows, Reflecting Global Trend

Reuters

China's consumer and producer prices eased more than expected in June, inflation data on Monday showed, signaling falling demand for goods from the world's second-biggest economy.  The economy overall is seeing its slowest full year of growth since 2002 – albeit at a 9.2 percent clip.  Falling prices indicate not just declining input prices, but declining demand from foreign customers reflecting a weakening global economy.

Monsanto’s Full Court Press

Activist Post

Genetically modified organisms (GMO) have been linked to infertility, weight gain, organ dysfunction and the desctruction of the environment.  Nearly 20 states are considering “Right to Know” legislation, forcing producers to label food containing GMOs and prohibiting false representation as “natural” or “naturally made” from appearing on such products.   Monsanto and Dow ally StopCostlyFoodLabeling.com launched a campaign claiming malicious costs and warning of a legion of trial lawyers taking advantage of the system.  Both claims are handily debunked, Americans have the right to know what they’re eating.

Catch our in depth commentary and analysis of stories like these at GreeneWave.com and PurpleSerf.com part of the AMTV network.

Newt is Right, Time to Shoot The Moon!

 

            Newt Gingrich’s bold new idea, recently revealed at a stump speech in Florida, of seeding the Moon with American astro-colonists is actually not all that crazy.  What is crazy is asking taxpayers to continue to spearhead space exploration for another 53 years; on this point he is as usual – wrong.

In last night’s Jacksonville debate, former Governor Mitt Romney seemed to agree, I know Ron Paul does.  Romney, however, merely saw a golden opportunity to mock Newt for his outlandish idea and to weigh in on it as a former businessman:

“If I had a business executive come to me and say I want to spend a few hundred billion dollars to put a colony on the moon, I’d say: ‘You’re fired!’” Romney boasted.

Only one problem, there are a lot of businessmen whom disagree with the former Bain Capital CEO.  Evidently Romney doesn’t know mitt about interstellar business.

Sir Walter Branson founder of Virgin galactic has kind of a knack for creating value and he sees a lot of it in space.  For example, Branson just completed the world’s first international spaceport in New Mexico and will soon shuttle wealthy space enthusiasts into low earth orbit. 

Virgin Galactic isn’t the only celestial startup, Bigelow Aerospace of North Las Vegas, Nevada aims to create orbiting luxury hotels and SpaceX has developed one of the first operational private space capsules called the Dragon.  For a surprising list of private space companies and their ideas for the future look, here.

            Newt’s reason for bringing up a moon base makes a lot of sense.  Evidently Florida’s Space Coast, a community heavily reliant on high tech spending, is hurting more than the rest of the country, treading water at 12% unemployment.  While I’m not necessarily a fan of some of Planet Newt’s ideas namely his love affair with geoengineering, what he refers to as “cheap” market-based approaches to anthropogenic climate change, he might be getting warm on this one.

            It is time to emancipate the U.S. from the U.N. “Space Treaty” we signed in 1967 in the midst of the Cold War and explore the final frontier!  Why can’t start colonizing the moon under a “northwest ordinance” and reignite the idea of manifest destiny?  Why can’t the moon be our 51^st state?  Are we to extend the same concept to the entire cosmos?  Do we have to become One World before we step off this rock?  If we wait there is a lot to lose.

            Gingrich wrote a pretty straightforward book a few years back: Drill Here, Drill Now.  In that vein Newt is for once consistent, a Moon base would be a colossal job creator.  NASA, however, probably shouldn’t build it even though they’re in talks with Russia for a joint venture to do so.  If Florida’s Space Coast want’s jobs they’ll find it in companies like Shackelton Energy Co. which seeks to extricate fuels like plutonium-238 and helium-3 by transforming the moon into a interstellar gas station.  Gingrich should write another book after he loses the election: Drill There, Drill Soon.

            Barack Obama deserves some kudos too.  Although Obama receives his due ration of ridicule I would like to thank him for ending the space shuttle program as it was because he highlighted for Americans the fact we don’t need government to be inventive, curious, or passionate when it comes to space travel.  When everyone was afraid we’d be hitch hiking on Russian and Chinese ships I said Goodbye NASA, Hello Space Age.  Finally the monkey is off our back.  Private companies might not be in it “For the Benefit of All” as goes the NASA motto, but their work will benefit all.

How Drug War Dinosaurs & Traffic Jams Kill Our Economy II

Topher Morrison

PurpleSerf.com

Read PART I of this series here.

PART II

Image Source: Documentary Film: American Drug War

The Drug War Dinosaur

            The argument that the Drug War is a colossal failure was won long ago albeit Washington and many of our local politicians have paid little notice.  To them it is a handy campaign slogan “Keeping Our Kids Safe” and “Our Streets Clean” but the levels of drug use in America has grown relatively unabated since 1960. 

The War on Drugs is a waste of national and local resources, it has created the largest most unproductive and corruptive black market the world has ever known, militarized our local police, slowly eroded respect for civil liberties, and has led to incalculable innocent deaths.

            From the coca farmer in Colombia to the Drug Czar in Washington D.C. this has to be one of the biggest examples of market distortion available.   There are nearly 11,000 DEA agents, 4500 ATF agents and almost 650,000 police and sheriff patrol officers obliged to enforce national drug laws to the tune of $15 billion annually. 

Likewise inner city gang members and suburban drug peddlers instead of creating value, merely loiter, cause trouble and distribute in their local communities. Similar to the relationship between a jailer and inmate, both of these groups do nothing for the economy.

            Because of the illicit drug market and its false scarcity the black market has invaded the inner cities and provided those willing to take a little risk the opportunity to make money merely by providing a substance that would otherwise be available at your local drug store or smoke shop.  It is often a part time job, but many times is a full time occupation and with it comes violent gangs because it is not protected as legitimate property by authorities.  Simple economics.

            If we legalized the current spectrum of illicit drugs as they many of them were prior to 1930 while drug abuse would still remain a public health concern, the international black market, wholly dependent on American drug consumption, would grind to a halt as responsibilities for production, distribution and regulation would be absorbed by local and national pharmacies.  The boogey man would simply disappear and much like cigarette and alcohol addiction our local substance abuse infrastructure would step in as it does now.

The Military Industrial Entitlement Program

If you have yet to read my article on why I feel the Military Industrial Complex (MIC) is in fact one of our largest entitlement programs I’d suggest you do, but I’ll give you brief outline.  In 2012 it has become a $1.2 trillion program the largest of its kind in the world.

Similar to welfare, which breeds dependency and prevents many recipients from reentering the workforce our MIC prevents countries from seeking their own defense.  South Korea, Germany and Japan really have no reason to build up their own military apparatus even though they are wealthy and peaceful because we already do it for them and have for over 50 years.  We also currently offer our military training services and foreign aid to 75 smaller countries throughout the world.  Our MIC is their entitlement.  This is a massive distortion which enables our competitors to better compete against us.

The profligate spending we condone also subsidizes the industries here at home that would otherwise be producing innovations of peace rather than warfare and competing rather than waiting for a generous government contract.  When our government directs funds to Homeland Security and the Pentagon or to build a massive Cyber Security Center in Utah these are limited resources that could have been used to deepen our economy.

Nation of Bureaucrats and Managers not Creators

When you step back and take in the full breadth of our economy it’s easy to understand much of it isn’t accomplishing anything.  The sectors we have just covered are what we call living breathing distortions in the marketplace.  Imagine what these people could be creating or servicing if they weren’t telling us what to do, causing violence, creating boogey men or sitting in traffic?  Granted tax accountants hold our hand through the labyrinth that is the US tax code, but if it was simple we wouldn’t need this legion of tax coyotes.

Think about the reported unemployment rate, add the real unemployment rate, which includes underemployment (a growing problem created by diploma mills) and those who have given up looking for a job after 90 days.  Introduce everything we’ve just talked about and one begins to catch a glimpse of our anemic condition.  Most of our country isn’t creating or innovating anything, by virtue of their unemployment or the distortions created by government

50 Things I Hate About Romney: PART 1

Topher Morrison

PurpleSerf.com

I created this video just before Newt Gingrich rose in the polls and when he did I didn't feel it appropriate to release considering there was so much to knock him on.  Now that Romney has cemented his front runner position, at least for now, I thought we should take another look at his record.  This first part covers the economy.

If you like the video please "like" it "comment" and "share!"  There is 40 more things I hate about Mitt and there is a long primary coming!

How Drug War Dinosaurs & Traffic Jams Kill Our Economy

Topher Morrison

PurpleSerf.com

How Drug War Dinosaurs & Traffic Jams Kill Our Economy

PART I

Otomotive.net

            Everyone takes it for granted that the federal government is laden with redundancy and inefficiency.  It doesn’t surprise anyone it requires a mountain of paperwork to buy a paperclip, but rarely do many appreciate the other market distortions our lawmakers create in the private sector. A market distortion is simply something someone is doing that they would otherwise not being doing if it government weren't in the picture.  Ironically, even in the Great Recession, because of market distortions, there is a lot of fat to cut outside of the beltway.

The Tax Men and their Elves

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) there are over 1.6 million bookkeepers, accountants and auditors, one of the largest employment groups in the nation.  Now the personal business or corporate accountant is crucial to understanding the intricacies of a firm’s operations, sales, marketing, payroll, etc., but there are a quarter million people dedicated to tax examining, collecting and preparing alone! 

According to the Tax Foundation the IRS estimates Americans spend an aggregate 6.6 billion hours just preparing their taxes essentially taking us away from life – planning, creating, and spending.  This time is lost forever and every year it is a massive drag on the economy and our ability to compete and progress as a nation.  

We understand taxes are built into the everyday activities of large and small business and have a net effect on every decision made.  We also understand that once we buy a product or service those taxes contribute to the price we pay, but the questions now are what other products and services would be available and how much sooner might a new innovation be made if we could gain that lost time back?  It is no wonder Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 plan got so much attention.  It’s too bad his ladies did too.

The Jailbirds and the Bird Watchers

            The United States, home of the free, is ironically home of the highest incarcerated population on Earth.  Widely known fact, little attention.  According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (USBJS) in 2010 there were nearly 2.3 million incarcerated and the BLS reported over ½ million correctional officers and supervisory personnel, the USBJS puts them at nearly 800,000.  In either case we literally have 3 million people staring at each other.

            If that were it things would be bad enough, but we also have – brace yourself – nearly 5 million people on probation or parole and nearly 90 thousand probation and “correctional treatment specialists” making sure they’re playing by the rules.  With 1 in 2 returning to jail or prison it is hard to see the effectiveness of this system.  

            How many years are lost on minimum sentencing, three strike and drug laws for both the prisoner and the watchman are next to incalculable.  The financials are a different story with America spending a little more than $74 billion per year on corrections as of 2007, however, the most alarming trend is the federalization of correctional financing.  Year after year local and state governments are spending less keeping people in jail, while Uncle Sam picks up the tab.

Driven Apart – Bumper by Bumper

    Transportation policy is probably the last thing on Americans’ minds, but it is the first thing on every mind at 5pm.  In 2000 the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI) estimated that the 75 largest metropolitan areas experienced 3.6 billion vehicle-hours of delay resulting in 5.7 billion gallons in wasted fuel and 67.5 billion dollars is lost productivity or about 0.7% of the nation’s GDP. 

It has since not improved according to a recent Reason.com poll which reports a majority of Americans believe traffic has become worse over the last 5 years and most believe it will continue to get worse over the next five years.  Moreover, most Americans feel their local infrastructure is in need of repair or in poor condition. 

The country’s infrastructure system has remained nearly unchanged since the Eisenhower era, which along with the 1960s saw the largest expansion in American roadways and along with it economic growth.  We have since been surpassed by China in miles of road.

Recently the TTI reported that since 1982 the amount of delay has worsened by 70% and that the average commuter must endure 34 hours of bumper love per year.  The TTI estimates the cost of congestion to be nearly $100 billion, rush hour is actually become 6 hours of not rushing anywhere and rush hours have found there way into other parts of the day including mid-day and overnight!

Unlike most of our economy our transportation system, with some justification is a public utility, but like other public works infrastructure suffers from the typical bureaucracy, glacial response to the needs of its citizens and political logjams.  According to the Rockefeller Foundation transportation is the 2^nd highest expenditure for the average American, why isn’t this receiving more attention?

       Unfortunately as I mentioned earlier this is the last thing on Americans’ minds and therefore the very last thing on our politician’s agendas.  Regrettably the connection between this and our economy is underappreciated and as the previous topics have shown this is just another barnacle on the hull of our stagnant economy.  A market driven transportation system paid for by the elimination of certain gasoline taxes could do wonders in decentralizing and modernizing this ailing sector.

 NEXT: How the Drug War Dinosaurs and The Military Industrial Entitlement Program drag down our economy.

Ancient Knowledge of Money: Sound Money and Forgiving Debt

Washington's Blog
7/16/11

We Have Forgotten What the Ancient Sumerians and Babylonians, the Early Jews and Christians, the Founding Fathers and Even Napolean Bonaparte Knew About Money

Mike "Mish" Shedlock has repeatedly pointed out that we have reached "peak credit" - and there will not in our lifetimes be as much credit as we saw from 2000-2008.

I noted last year:

Michael Hudson is a highly-regarded economist. He is a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, who has advised the U.S., Canadian, Mexican and Latvian governments as well as the United Nations Institute for Training and Research. He is a former Wall Street economist at Chase Manhattan Bank who also helped establish the world’s first sovereign debt fund.

Hudson says that - in every country and throughout history - debt always grows exponentially, while the economy always grows as an S-curve.

Moreover, Hudson says that the ancient Sumerians and Babylonians knew that debts had to be periodically forgiven, because the amount of debts will always surpass the size of the real economy.

For example, Hudson noted in 2004:

“Mesopotamian economic thought c. 2000 BC rested on a more realistic mathematical foundation than does today’s orthodoxy. At least the Babylonians appear to have recognized that over time the debt overhead became more and more intrusive as it tended to exceed the ability to pay, culminating in a concentration of property ownership in the hands of creditors.”

***

Babylonians recognized that while debts grew exponentially, the rest of the economy (what today is called the “real” economy) grows less rapidly. Today’s economists have not come to terms with this problem with such clarity. Instead of a conceptual view that calls for a strong ruler or state to maintain equity and to restore economic balance when it is disturbed, today’s general equilibrium models reflect the play of supply and demand in debt-free economies that do not tend to polarize or to generate other structural problems.

Read more of this intriguing article at Washington’s Blog.

Number One? 20 Not So Good Categories That The United States Leads The World In

The Economic Collapse
July 5, 2011

Image Source: DeviantART by Lee Roberts

(artwork not part of original article)

If you do not believe that America is in bad shape, just read the list below.  The following are 20 not so good categories that the United States leads the world in....

#1 The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world and the largest total prison population on the entire globe.

#2 According to NationMaster.com, the United States has the highest percentage of obese people in the world.

#3 The United States has the highest divorce rate on the globe by a wide margin.

#4 The United States is tied with the U.K. for the most hours of television watch per person each week.

#5 The United States has the highest rate of illegal drug use on the entire planet.

#6 There are more car thefts in the United States each year than anywhere else in the world by far.

#7 There are more reported rapes in the United States each year than anywhere else in the world.

#8 There are more reported murders in the United States each year than anywhere else in the world.

#9 There are more total crimes in the United States each year than anywhere else in the world.

#10 The United States also has more police officers than anywhere else in the world.

#11 The United States spends much more on health care as a percentage of GDP than any other nation on the face of the earth.

#12 The United States has more people on pharmaceutical drugs than any other country on the planet.

#13 The percentage of women taking antidepressants in America is higher than in any other country in the world.

#14 Americans have more student loan debt than anyone else in the world.

#15 More pornography is created in the United States than anywhere else on the entire globe. 89 percent is made in the U.S.A. and only 11 percent is made in the rest of the world.

#16 The United States has the largest trade deficit in the world every single year.  Between December 2000 and December 2010, the United States ran a total trade deficit of 6.1 trillion dollars with the rest of the world, and the U.S. has had a negative trade balance every single year since 1976.

#17 The United States spends 7 times more on the military than any other nation on the planet does.  In fact, U.S. military spending is greater than the military spending of China, Russia, Japan, India, and the rest of NATO combined.

#18 The United States has far more foreign military bases than any other country does.

#19 The United States has the most complicated tax system in the entire world.

#20 The U.S. has accumulated the biggest national debt that the world has ever seen and it is rapidly getting worse.  Right now, U.S. government debt is expanding at a rate of $40,000 per second.

For the rest of this commentary visit The Economic Collapse.

Corporate Tax Cuts Won’t Work, Really?

Topher Morrison

PurpleSerf.com

President Obama’s advisors apparently think a corporate tax cut will make America more competitive, which makes me wonder where these guys have been, but Marshall Auerback writing for the Daily Beast yesterday disagrees:

“[Cutting the corporate tax rate] represents a fundamentally flawed approach. Why? Because corporate tax cuts represent a supply side response to a problem that is fundamentally one of poor aggregate demand.”

Auerback argues that should the corporate tax rate be cut or abolished that it would not necessarily result in cutting unemployment.  He reasons:

“…Given that [the] prevailing historically high profit margins and high profit rates already in place have done little to reduce unemployment.”

It may seem succinct and professorial to juxtapose words like "supply side" and "poor aggregate demand", however, reality is a little more complicated.  Auerback doesn't address the reason for the disparity between profits and unemployment and therefore prevents his audience from appreciating a crucial facet of the business cycle.  


When growth is robust and our economy is at full sail people are fully employed and profits are solid.  When the seas start to rise and a storm hits the sails are trimmed to maintain the ship, its heading and hopefully its speed.  In the same manner our businesses shed employees, but this doesn't preclude them from maintaining their goals and earning a profit, quite the contrary.  According to the New York Times late last year:

“…Companies have been able to make more with less — as well as the fact that some of the profits of American companies come from abroad.  Economic conditions in the United States may still be sluggish, but many emerging markets like India and China are expanding rapidly.”

This efficiency evolution is a natural result of the increase in productive technologies and strategies developed during the preceding economic booms. This is the case subsequent to many economic expansions and why we see abundant profit while unemployment rises. Look at previous downturns in the economy over the last 60 years corporate profits have been measured and you will discover this tendency.  


Companies discard antiquated business models and modes of production and while the latter obviously involves an unfortunate human element it is a necessary result of the natural respiration and life cycle of an economy.   Even when profits are high, in other words, even when the ship may actually improve its speed, the situation remains precarious until the economic turbulence subsides and the captain is able to establish his bearings in order to again set full sail. 

I don't care to unduly dehumanize the unemployment situation in this county (Auerback, as many others do, conservatively puts it at 9.1% while it is in many instances appropriately measured at well over 20%), however, the moral, economic, and fiscal dimensions of the corporate income tax, in and of itself, don't involve me covering the necessities of the American public to increase their savings rate or to increase their ability to adapt new skill sets – both of which would greatly mitigate the adverse affects posed by these predictable and periodic episodes all economies face.

When anyone says the word “corporation” is it not reasonable to assume most who hear it think: “multinational”, “special interest”, “robber baron”, “profit hungry”, “greed”, “bankster”, and all the other negative connotations our society has imbued upon the term?  In reality, corporations are simply put, a vehicle to deliver goods and services and to reap  profits.  The profits or the monetized success of the corporation are subsequently handed over to some entity be it government, shareholders, partners, employees, suppliers, or some combination thereof.  The blog Spellchek laid it all out in March:

“Let’s remember exactly who pays corporate taxes in America. You do. The consumer. Corporate taxes are simply a portion of the cost structure that goes into pricing a product or service. Corporations do not pay these taxes. They are merely the middleman [sic] who collects the tax from the consumer and pays it to the government.”

Depending on classification corporations can be both large and small and take in profits across the spectrum and most often these companies don’t exceed the boundaries of the state in which they are incorporated.  Corporations as such are hardly parallel to GE, Google, Exxon-Mobil, or Microsoft whom regularly skirt American tax law and as Auerback aptly states “do not pay anywhere near the current prevailing marginal rate.”  These corporations do not benefit from swanky K Street lobbyists, hordes of savvy accountants, or the elephantine loopholes both help to create and more often than not these corporations reside nowhere near Wall Street.

As far as preventing mega corporations from, as Auerback puts it: “buy[ing] back shares, issu[ing] a special dividend, or initiat[ing] a merger to get their stock price up pronto”, why should we?  That’s what corporations do and that is what they are supposed to do!  No doubt that megabanks like Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, and Goldman Sachs and the aforementioned mega-multinationals are in aggregate devoid of conscience, but they are systems designed to be that way.  They are as much a function in our economy as they are on a math exam.  You may get mad at Microsoft Word for auto correcting (as I am right now) or at Donkey Kong for freezing at the final board (should you ever get there), but it is ultimately the system's design.  Taxation of this corporate system merely hurts everyone in the economy and opens the floodgates of corruption.

As Megan McCardel of The Atlantic explains the corporate income tax merely reduces wages, as corporations cannot offer larger salaries and benefits let alone more jobs.  The tax promotes risky debt financing and wastes corporate dollars better spent on any number of things other than lobbyists and accountants.  It is a double tax, first levied on the entity (further depressing wages, jobs, investment, savings, etc.) and then on employees incomes and shareholder's dividends. 


Do you get it!? These are the necessary results of the corporate tax.  Sure, lifting it won’t necessarily bring back jobs tomorrow, but our corporate income tax, the second highest in the world next to that slug Japan, is preventing us from attracting a legion of foreign direct investment (FDI) and preventing corporations from functioning as massive consumers on the macroeconomic level.  


The biggest benefit we all will derive from abolishing the corporate income tax, however, is incorporeal - the abundance of respect we will discover for our form of government when the line of lobbyists preventing us from visiting with our elected representatives disappears.

To be fair, however, Auerback does echo some great ideas to boost employment and I don't care to bury that part of his opinion, namely: “cut all marginal tax rates significantly” and “embrace a suspension [of] a full payroll tax holiday for every employer AND employee in the nation.”  Albeit, a holiday is just that, a temporary solution, we’re all hopefully looking for long-term results.

Visualize a world with low corporate income taxes:

Dubai

Hong Kong

Malaysia