$100's a barrel

[snafu]

This is some serious stuff. It's not if but when.

 

Our economy is shot. We've bet the kitchen sink on a war (that I felt just). And it's all falls back to black gold.

 

We're all addicted! So dont' be pointing any fingers!

 

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21713574/

 

 

The outrage many Democrats expressed back then over high energy prices has been tempered by the fact that their party now controls Congress, making finger pointing more difficult.

 

I thought it was Bushes fault.

 

 

 

 

 

There's no more excuses. You can't keep blaming the oil companies forever. Our oil here in Prudhoe Bay is two thirds depleted already. And they want to put more taxes on it.

 

Were coming into a new age people.

 

We didn't start the fire

It was always burning

Since the world's been turning - Billy Joel

[hugo]

The inflation adjusted price for oil is quite close to the 1980 price. I wish healthcare costs were the same. Our only impending crisis is the government created 70 trillion dollar unfunded medicaind obligations. The Europeans , Chinks and Japs are in a similar boat.

[Jhony5]

I see gas theft to become an epidemic. Gas stations are becoming almost exclusively pre-pay. So I see a trend about to start involving theft from citizens. Right in their driveway or in a parking lot.

 

 

http://www.nacsonline.com/NR/exeres/0000615ekahlbkkqgboantrc/GenUseWithOneCallOut_Resource.asp?NRMODE=Published&NRORIGINALURL=%2fNACS%2fResource%2fPRToolkit%2fFactSheets%2fprtk_fact_gastheft%2ehtm&NRNODEGUID=%7bE0DBFB92-5CA8-40DA-A035-B75AE3476A90%7d&NRQUERYTERMINATOR=1&cookie%5Ftest=1

The increase in gasoline theft is directly related to price increases, as opposed to high prices. Theft generally increases every time prices increase.

 

http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=148&sid=1281244

 

 

Apparently locking gas caps are selling at record levels.

 

It seems strange to me that we've relied on the internal combustion gasoline engine for a century. Think of all the inventions and innovations that have occurred in the last 100 years, yet the internal combustion engine is virtually the same. We have cell phones the size of credit cards. Digital technology that allows for amazing invention. We sent robots to f cking Mars for Christ sakes. Yet here we are, still pouring fossil fuels into a mechanical menagerie of cogs and camshafts, igniting it like cavemen and spewing toxic carcinogens from the pipes at the rear of our primitive vehicles.

 

How is it that the internal combustion engine is a dinosaur in relativity to all other inventions and innovations? Yet a staple in our daily lives. Requiring that we feed it a precious and fast depleting remnant created over countless centuries by the process of decaying matter.

 

 

Why aren't we doing more? How can this be?

[wez]

We've made some big mistakes, and the worst thing to do is continue on that path to prove to ourselves or whoever that we didn't make mistakes..

 

We've set up our society this way and have no one to blame but ourselves. Around here, 60 miles N. of the Twin Cities, up until the housing bust and $3 gas, people were flocking farther and farther from the city core, and their jobs, to buy cheaper land and houses, driving up prices and local workers right out the door. Now they're bawling about gas prices and property taxes..

 

We got big problems when teachers and cops can't afford a modest home. They make more than most people.. I guess I take solace in the fact that the worse things get, the quicker we'll get better... It's more than just oil, houses, and the economy.. It's people fighting to hold on to some illusionary power passed down from generation to generation..You know, it wouldn't work if we all quit believing it, and stopped participating. I'm hoping this election sees the end of this regime of the democrat/republican scam, phucking up the world, hopefully not, beyond repair. Make the people think they're getting a "choice", then put em in debt, send em to work, and watch us pretend we're God..

 

Are we safer? Prolly closer to a nuclear holocaust than at any time in history.. Why are we so afraid to live? "We" the people? Our government is out of control and the dog needs to start wagging the tail instead of the tail wagging the dog.. If I disappear for treason, will someone take care of my cat for me? All he needs is love and food.. just like me.

[wez]

The inflation adjusted price for oil is quite close to the 1980 price. I wish healthcare costs were the same. Our only impending crisis is the government created 70 trillion dollar unfunded medicaind obligations. The Europeans , Chinks and Japs are in a similar boat.

 

We got a lot more problems than that.. Good God, most of the young people I go to school with are already tens of thousands in debt before they'll ever graduate. The jobs they need to pay that back, buy a house, and start a family are not there... We cannot continue in this manner.. our way of life is a losing game in the long run..

[atlantic]

We got a lot more problems than that.. Good God, most of the young people I go to school with are already tens of thousands in debt before they'll ever graduate. The jobs they need to pay that back, buy a house, and start a family are not there... We cannot continue in this manner.. our way of life is a losing game in the long run..

I've seen that alot too. Seems the most reliable jobs are now medical or military, some communications. I know so many people with degrees who are working at Target and Wal-mart what's up with that?

[wez]

I've seen that alot too. Seems the most reliable jobs are now medical or military, some communications. I know so many people with degrees who are working at Target and Wal-mart what's up with that?

 

 

Trickle down economics.. or is it trickle up? Who knows, Reagan's dead and left us with a legacy of debt and huge government... least we had a surplus when Clinton was pres...Which soon disappeared when Reagan's VP's son took over... Seems we also like our monarchy's...

[hugo]

I've seen that alot too. Seems the most reliable jobs are now medical or military, some communications. I know so many people with degrees who are working at Target and Wal-mart what's up with that?

 

 

It is because any idiot can get a college degree nowadays.

[hugo]

In an 1875 Scientific America it was predicted that major US cities would be knee deep in horse manure by 1950 unless something drastic was done. In the mid 70's both Time and Newsweek printed articles concerning the threat of a new ice age. Pardon me if I ignore the chicken littles of today.

[wez]

Pardon me if I ignore the chicken littles of today.

 

...thought Nero as he fiddled while his empire burned.

 

Hahahahahaha

[hugo]

Gasoline Prices in Perspective

by Jerry Taylor and Peter Van Doren

 

Jerry Taylor and Peter Van Doren are senior fellows. Peter Van Doren is also editor of Regulation magazine.

 

PRINT PAGE E-MAIL PAGE TEXT SIZE America appears to be in a state of wild-eyed panic about the rising price of gasoline. Talk radio hosts and T.V. populists apparently think that mass riots are imminent and that whole cities will burn unless politicians do something to save America from the long, dark economic night that is descending upon us.

 

In truth, gasoline prices today are taking less of a bite from our pocketbooks than has been the norm since World War II.

 

For instance, let's look at 1955, a year most of us associate with big cars, big engines, and cheap fuel ? automotive glory days, as it were. Gasoline sold for 29 cents per gallon. But one dollar in 1955 was worth more than one dollar today. If we were using today's dollars, gasoline would have cost $1.76 per gallon in 1955.

 

Gasoline now costs around $3.00, so we are worse off than in 1955, right? No. Because we were poorer in 1955 than we are today, $1.76 then had a bigger impact on the pocketbook (that is, it represented a larger fraction of income) than $1.76 today. If we adjust gasoline prices not only for inflation but also changes in disposable per capita income (defined as income minus taxes), gasoline today would have to cost $5.17 per gallon to have the same impact as 29 cents in 1955.

 

Let's pick another year we associate with low gasoline prices ? 1972, the year before the Arab oil embargo. Gasoline was selling at 36 cents per gallon. Adjusted for inflation, however, the price was actually $1.36 in today's currency. Adjust again for changes in disposable per capita income and the price would have to be $2.66 per gallon to have equivalent impact today.

 

Were we better off then when we rolled into the filling station in 1972 than we are today? No, because our cars get 60 to 70 percent better mileage today than in 1972 (22.4 miles per gallon versus 13.5 miles per gallon). That more than offsets the 10.5 percent increase in gas prices adjusted for change in inflation and income from then to now.

 

Now let's look at 1981, the year Ronald Reagan took office. Gasoline sold for $1.38 that year, the equivalent of $2.74 in today's currency. Adjusting for the change in disposable per capita income, prices would have to be $4.30 today to have an equivalent impact.

 

There are probably three reasons that gasoline prices appear so high to us today. First, many don't fully appreciate the long run effect that inflation has on prices. Second, many don't appreciate how much our incomes have increased relative to prices. Finally, we still remember 1998 very well, the year in which we encountered the lowest gasoline prices since 1949. Gasoline in 1998 sold for $1.03 per gallon, the equivalent of $1.21 in today's currency. Adjusting for growth in per capita income yields a price of $1.35 per gallon in today's terms. Today's price is more than double that and people resent the increase over the last several years, in part, because they think that 1998 prices were normal. But they were not.

 

Now let's put the recent price increase in terms of real outlays. The average household is spending $136 more on gasoline every month than it was in 1998 and $114 per month more than it were spending in 2002. But, believe it or not, real (inflation-adjusted) disposable income per household has increased even faster than have pump prices; by $800 a month since 1998 and $279 a month since 2002.

 

Accordingly, Americans are still, on average, economically ahead of the game.

 

No one likes high gasoline prices. But they are not as bad as most people think. Keep that in mind the next time some politician or media populist starts handing out the pitchforks.

[wez]

I could give a crap about oil and gas prices... it's what people the world over are gonna do for it that's the problem..

 

Just be glad you aint 20 or younger teach...

[wez]

Teach, would you deny the worlds wealth is being concentrated into fewer and fewer hands?

 

 

 

Would you deny that there is more people in debt in the world than at any other point in history?

 

 

 

Would you deny that doesn't bode well for the future of most young people?

 

 

 

So, in conclusion, any government crap on inflation or GDP or growing wealth of a nation means jack squat and somehow covers up the fact that the standard of living for the "middle class" has gone downhill in this country for the last 30 years..

I don't think so.. I'm old enough to know better...

[snafu]

OK I get the "disposable per capita income" formula. It sounds like other factors could contribute to the influx in the past. But higher energy cost directly contributes to inflation. As it stands our energy is non-renewable. So I don't believe we can accept the trend of the past. The disposable per capita income could drop down into the depression era.

[hugo]

Teach, would you deny the worlds wealth is being concentrated into fewer and fewer hands?

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, I sure would. Economic booms (thanks to downsizing the role of government)_ in India and China have created wealth in many more hands and given the American consumer lower prices.

 

The Truth About the Top 1%

by Alan Reynolds

 

 

PRINT PAGE E-MAIL PAGE TEXT SIZE

Key legislators and presidential hopefuls in the Democratic Party have proposed raising the top two tax rates. They're also suggesting extra surtaxes for war, for alleviating the Alternative Minimum Tax, for Social Security, and for subsidizing compulsory health insurance. Barack Obama and John Edwards advocate taxing capital gains at 28%; Hillary Clinton favors taxing dividends at the surtaxed income-tax rates.

 

The argument for these proposals has nothing to do with the impact of higher tax rates on incentives and the economy. It is all about "fairness" -- defined as reducing the top 1%'s share of income.

 

This political exercise invariably begins by citing dubious statistics about pretax incomes among the top 1% (1.3 million tax returns) as an excuse for raising tax rates on the top 5%, among others. Echoing speeches from Sen. Clinton, Business Week recently exclaimed, "According to new Internal Revenue Service data announced last week, income inequality in the U.S. is at its worst since the 1920s (before the Great Depression). The top percentile of wealthy Americans earned 21.2% of all income in 2005, up from 19% in 2004."

 

Alan Reynolds is a senior fellow and author of Income and Wealth (Greenwood Press 2006).

 

More by Alan ReynoldsThese statistics are extremely misleading.

 

First of all, the figures do not describe the top percentile's share of "all income," but that group's share of "adjusted" gross income (AGI) reported on individual tax returns. For one thing, thousands of professionals and business owners who used to report most of their income under the corporate tax responded to lower individual income-tax rates after 1986 and 2003 by reporting more income under the individual tax as partnerships, LLCs and Sub-S corporations.

 

Peter Merrill of PricewaterhouseCoopers found that "since the Tax Reform Act of 1986 . . . the share of business income earned through pass-through entities has increased by 75% from 29% in 1987 to 52% in 2004." Business profits accounted for just 11.1% of the income reported by the top 1% in 1986, according to economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, but that business share leaped to 21.2% by 1988 and to 29.1% in 2005.

 

It is this bookkeeping shift, moving business income from the corporate to the individual tax, not CEO pay, which raised the top 1%'s share on individual tax returns. Income reported on W2 forms -- salaries, bonuses and exercised stock options -- accounted for only 57.2% of total income among the top 1% in 2005, down from 63% in 2000 and 65.7% in 1986. Real compensation among the top 1% actually fell 7% from 2000 to 2005.

 

Turning to the denominator of this ratio ("all income"), a huge portion of middle and lower income is no longer reported on tax returns. A larger and larger share of middle-class investment income is now accumulating outside of AGI because it is inside IRA, 401(k) and 529 savings plans.

 

The CBO reckons the top 1% accounted for more than 59% of all capital gains, interest, dividends and rent reported on individual tax returns by 2004. Yet estimates of the share of national wealth of the top 1% range from 21%-33%.

 

If the top 1% own 21%-33% of all capital, how could they be collecting 59% of the income from capital? They can't and they aren't. The top 1% is simply reporting a rising share of capital income because those with more modest incomes are keeping a rising share of their capital income unreported -- in IRA, 401(k) and 529 accounts. Millions also shrink their "adjusted" incomes by subtracting contributions to IRAs unavailable to the rich.

 

Another huge swath of middle and lower income is excluded because AGI includes only the taxable portion of Social Security benefits and totally misses most other transfer payments such as Medicaid, food stamps and the Earned Income Credit. The Canberra Group, an international group of experts on income statistics brought together from 1996-2000 by the OECD, World Bank, U.N. and others, insisted household income must include everything that "increases the recipients' potential to consume or save." Government transfers amounted to $1.5 trillion in 2005 -- more than the total income of the top 1% in the basic Piketty and Saez estimates ($1.2 trillion).

 

As a result of such huge omissions, and tax avoidance, the AGI of $7.5 trillion in 2005 was $3.7 trillion smaller than pretax personal income (personal income was $10.3 trillion in 2005, after subtracting $875 billion of payroll taxes). Anyone suggesting AGI is a more accurate measure than personal income is obliged to argue that GDP in 2005 was exaggerated by 29.4%.

 

Estimated income shares from the IRS or Messrs. Piketty and Saez are not about income per household, but income per tax return. That matters because the top fifth of households average two salaries per tax return. The Census Bureau reports that the top fifth accounted for 26.8% of all full-time works last year while the bottom fifth accounted for just 5.7%. In fact, 64.5% of the households in the bottom fifth had nobody working, not even part time for a few weeks. When labor economists discuss income inequality, they habitually switch to speculating about skill-based differences in hourly wages, totally ignoring differences in hours worked.

 

Third, the latest IRS figures are not comparable with those of 1986, much less with 1929, because the definition of AGI changes with changes in tax law. Such estimates differ greatly, with the IRS saying the top 1% received only 11.3% of income in 1986 (because AGI then excluded 60% of capital gains) while Messrs. Piketty and Saez put that year's figure at 13.1% and the CBO says it was 14%.

 

The IRS figures only go back to 1986, so the Business Week comparison with the 1920s is invalid. The new figure is from the IRS but the old one is from Messrs. Piketty and Saez. Their recent estimates are also not comparable to their prewar estimates. Before 1944, their figures were obtained by dividing top income shares by 80% of personal income. Their estimates for 2005 were obtained by dividing top incomes by the $6.8 trillion left on tax returns after excluding even taxable transfer payments.

 

If total income for 2005 was defined as it was for 1928, then the share of the top 1% would have dropped to 13.3% in 2005, compared with 19.8% in 1928. Besides, as Messrs. Piketty and Saez explained, "our long-run series are generally confined to top income and wealth shares and contain little information about bottom segments of the distribution."

 

A fundamental problem with all tax-based income data involves "taxable income elasticity." Numerous studies, some by Mr. Saez, show that the amount of top income reported on individual tax returns is highly sensitive to changes in marginal tax rates on individual income, corporate income and capital gains. After the tax on dividends was reduced in 2003, for example, top-bracket investors held more dividend-paying stocks in taxable accounts (rather than in nontaxable accounts) and fewer tax-exempt bonds.

 

When the top tax on capital gains was cut in 1997 and 2003, investors reacted by trading stocks more frequently and realizing more capital gains in taxable accounts. In the Piketty-Saez data, capital gains accounted for only 10.8% of the top 1%'s income from 1987 to 1996, when the capital gains tax was 28%. By contrast, capital gains accounted for 16.9% of the top 1%'s reported income from 1997 through 2002, when the tax was down to 20%.

 

Even if estimates of the top 1%'s income share were not so sensitive to changes in tax rates, they would still tell us nothing about what happened to incomes among the other 99%. The top 1%'s share always falls in recessions, even aside from capital gains. But that certainly doesn't mean recessions raise everyone else's income.

 

"It is a disputed question," wrote Messrs. Piketty and Saez, "whether the surge in reported top incomes has been caused by the reduction in taxation at the top through behavioral responses." In fact, their data clearly suggest that higher tax rates on top incomes, dividends and capital gains would sharply reduce top incomes, dividends and capital gains reported on individual tax returns. Such behavioral responses would have little impact on actual income or wealth at the top, while nonetheless leaving middle-income taxpayers stuck with a much larger share of the tax burden.

[hugo]

We got a lot more problems than that.. Good God, most of the young people I go to school with are already tens of thousands in debt before they'll ever graduate. The jobs they need to pay that back, buy a house, and start a family are not there... We cannot continue in this manner.. our way of life is a losing game in the long run..

 

Maybe those lazy young s should work and go to school both.

 

Since 1950, the average new house has increased by 1,247 sq. ft. Meanwhile, the average household has shrunk by 1 person.

 

The Unabomber’s legal defense team cited the size of his shack—10’ x 12’—to buttress his insanity plea.

 

In 1950, 1 in 100 homes had 2.5 baths or more. Today, 1 in 2 do.

[wez]

Yep, I sure would. Economic booms (thanks to downsizing the role of government)_ in India and China have created wealth in many more hands and given the American consumer lower prices.

 

You mean all those owners of companies that moved jobs into slave and child labor to save money from places like America?

 

 

 

The Truth About the Top 1%

by Alan Reynolds

 

 

PRINT PAGE E-MAIL PAGE TEXT SIZE

Key legislators and presidential hopefuls in the Democratic Party have proposed raising the top two tax rates. They're also suggesting extra surtaxes for war, for alleviating the Alternative Minimum Tax, for Social Security, and for subsidizing compulsory health insurance. Barack Obama and John Edwards advocate taxing capital gains at 28%; Hillary Clinton favors taxing dividends at the surtaxed income-tax rates.

 

The argument for these proposals has nothing to do with the impact of higher tax rates on incentives and the economy. It is all about "fairness" -- defined as reducing the top 1%'s share of income.

 

This political exercise invariably begins by citing dubious statistics about pretax incomes among the top 1% (1.3 million tax returns) as an excuse for raising tax rates on the top 5%, among others. Echoing speeches from Sen. Clinton, Business Week recently exclaimed, "According to new Internal Revenue Service data announced last week, income inequality in the U.S. is at its worst since the 1920s (before the Great Depression). The top percentile of wealthy Americans earned 21.2% of all income in 2005, up from 19% in 2004."

 

Alan Reynolds is a senior fellow and author of Income and Wealth (Greenwood Press 2006).

 

More by Alan ReynoldsThese statistics are extremely misleading.

 

First of all, the figures do not describe the top percentile's share of "all income," but that group's share of "adjusted" gross income (AGI) reported on individual tax returns. For one thing, thousands of professionals and business owners who used to report most of their income under the corporate tax responded to lower individual income-tax rates after 1986 and 2003 by reporting more income under the individual tax as partnerships, LLCs and Sub-S corporations.

 

Peter Merrill of PricewaterhouseCoopers found that "since the Tax Reform Act of 1986 . . . the share of business income earned through pass-through entities has increased by 75% from 29% in 1987 to 52% in 2004." Business profits accounted for just 11.1% of the income reported by the top 1% in 1986, according to economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, but that business share leaped to 21.2% by 1988 and to 29.1% in 2005.

 

It is this bookkeeping shift, moving business income from the corporate to the individual tax, not CEO pay, which raised the top 1%'s share on individual tax returns. Income reported on W2 forms -- salaries, bonuses and exercised stock options -- accounted for only 57.2% of total income among the top 1% in 2005, down from 63% in 2000 and 65.7% in 1986. Real compensation among the top 1% actually fell 7% from 2000 to 2005.

 

Turning to the denominator of this ratio ("all income"), a huge portion of middle and lower income is no longer reported on tax returns. A larger and larger share of middle-class investment income is now accumulating outside of AGI because it is inside IRA, 401(k) and 529 savings plans.

 

The CBO reckons the top 1% accounted for more than 59% of all capital gains, interest, dividends and rent reported on individual tax returns by 2004. Yet estimates of the share of national wealth of the top 1% range from 21%-33%.

 

If the top 1% own 21%-33% of all capital, how could they be collecting 59% of the income from capital? They can't and they aren't. The top 1% is simply reporting a rising share of capital income because those with more modest incomes are keeping a rising share of their capital income unreported -- in IRA, 401(k) and 529 accounts. Millions also shrink their "adjusted" incomes by subtracting contributions to IRAs unavailable to the rich.

 

Another huge swath of middle and lower income is excluded because AGI includes only the taxable portion of Social Security benefits and totally misses most other transfer payments such as Medicaid, food stamps and the Earned Income Credit. The Canberra Group, an international group of experts on income statistics brought together from 1996-2000 by the OECD, World Bank, U.N. and others, insisted household income must include everything that "increases the recipients' potential to consume or save." Government transfers amounted to $1.5 trillion in 2005 -- more than the total income of the top 1% in the basic Piketty and Saez estimates ($1.2 trillion).

 

As a result of such huge omissions, and tax avoidance, the AGI of $7.5 trillion in 2005 was $3.7 trillion smaller than pretax personal income (personal income was $10.3 trillion in 2005, after subtracting $875 billion of payroll taxes). Anyone suggesting AGI is a more accurate measure than personal income is obliged to argue that GDP in 2005 was exaggerated by 29.4%.

 

Estimated income shares from the IRS or Messrs. Piketty and Saez are not about income per household, but income per tax return. That matters because the top fifth of households average two salaries per tax return. The Census Bureau reports that the top fifth accounted for 26.8% of all full-time works last year while the bottom fifth accounted for just 5.7%. In fact, 64.5% of the households in the bottom fifth had nobody working, not even part time for a few weeks. When labor economists discuss income inequality, they habitually switch to speculating about skill-based differences in hourly wages, totally ignoring differences in hours worked.

 

Third, the latest IRS figures are not comparable with those of 1986, much less with 1929, because the definition of AGI changes with changes in tax law. Such estimates differ greatly, with the IRS saying the top 1% received only 11.3% of income in 1986 (because AGI then excluded 60% of capital gains) while Messrs. Piketty and Saez put that year's figure at 13.1% and the CBO says it was 14%.

 

The IRS figures only go back to 1986, so the Business Week comparison with the 1920s is invalid. The new figure is from the IRS but the old one is from Messrs. Piketty and Saez. Their recent estimates are also not comparable to their prewar estimates. Before 1944, their figures were obtained by dividing top income shares by 80% of personal income. Their estimates for 2005 were obtained by dividing top incomes by the $6.8 trillion left on tax returns after excluding even taxable transfer payments.

 

If total income for 2005 was defined as it was for 1928, then the share of the top 1% would have dropped to 13.3% in 2005, compared with 19.8% in 1928. Besides, as Messrs. Piketty and Saez explained, "our long-run series are generally confined to top income and wealth shares and contain little information about bottom segments of the distribution."

 

A fundamental problem with all tax-based income data involves "taxable income elasticity." Numerous studies, some by Mr. Saez, show that the amount of top income reported on individual tax returns is highly sensitive to changes in marginal tax rates on individual income, corporate income and capital gains. After the tax on dividends was reduced in 2003, for example, top-bracket investors held more dividend-paying stocks in taxable accounts (rather than in nontaxable accounts) and fewer tax-exempt bonds.

 

When the top tax on capital gains was cut in 1997 and 2003, investors reacted by trading stocks more frequently and realizing more capital gains in taxable accounts. In the Piketty-Saez data, capital gains accounted for only 10.8% of the top 1%'s income from 1987 to 1996, when the capital gains tax was 28%. By contrast, capital gains accounted for 16.9% of the top 1%'s reported income from 1997 through 2002, when the tax was down to 20%.

 

Even if estimates of the top 1%'s income share were not so sensitive to changes in tax rates, they would still tell us nothing about what happened to incomes among the other 99%. The top 1%'s share always falls in recessions, even aside from capital gains. But that certainly doesn't mean recessions raise everyone else's income.

 

"It is a disputed question," wrote Messrs. Piketty and Saez, "whether the surge in reported top incomes has been caused by the reduction in taxation at the top through behavioral responses." In fact, their data clearly suggest that higher tax rates on top incomes, dividends and capital gains would sharply reduce top incomes, dividends and capital gains reported on individual tax returns. Such behavioral responses would have little impact on actual income or wealth at the top, while nonetheless leaving middle-income taxpayers stuck with a much larger share of the tax burden.

 

 

Alan Reynolds is a dumbass.

[wez]

Since 1950, the average new house has increased by 1,247 sq. ft. Meanwhile, the average household has shrunk by 1 person.

 

The Unabomber’s legal defense team cited the size of his shack—10’ x 12’—to buttress his insanity plea.

 

In 1950, 1 in 100 homes had 2.5 baths or more. Today, 1 in 2 do.

 

 

Do "things" bought on credit equate to higher quality of life? Not when the credit stops... like now.

[hugo]

You mean all those owners of companies that moved jobs into slave and child labor to save money from places like America?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Slaves and children need work too. If you are so unskilled you can be replaced by a child you deserve what you get.

 

http://www.miseryindex.us/indexbymonth.asp

[wez]

Slaves and children need work too. If you are so unskilled you can be replaced by a child you deserve what you get.

 

 

Hahahahahaha... Be glad if the day comes you don't have to compete with a slave..

 

 

http://www.miseryindex.us/indexbymonth.asp

 

 

Was that for the top 1%? Hahahahahahahahahaha

 

 

The day I trust statistics over my own perception is the day I die... or get dementia...

[hugo]

You mean all those owners of companies that moved jobs into slave and child labor to save money from places like America?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Slaves and children need work too. If you are so unskilled you can be replaced by a child you deserve what you get.

 

http://www.miseryindex.us/indexbymonth.asp

[hugo]

Hahahahahaha... Be glad if the day comes you don't have to compete with a slave..

 

 

 

 

 

Was that for the top 1%? Hahahahahahahahahaha

 

 

The day I trust statistics over my own perception is the day I die... or get dementia...

 

 

I am already a slave from Jan 1 to May every year. Y'all keep bitching about every little problem I am sure our politicians in Washington will be glad to extend my yearly period of slavery.

[wez]

I am already a slave from Jan 1 to May every year. Y'all keep bitching about every little problem I am sure our politicians in Washington will be glad to extend my yearly period of slavery.

 

Least you admit it.... And you know they will.

 

 

[ATTACH]8.IPB[/ATTACH]

 

 

Hmmm.. that chart only goes to 2002... wonder what the last 5 years look like... Lemme guess.

 

Well, it hit 9 trillion, so it's off that chart.. nice

 

Maybe you're a slave for 365 days and just don't know it, teach...

[hugo]

The Truth on Trade

by Daniel T. Griswold

 

 

PRINT PAGE E-MAIL PAGE TEXT SIZE

President Bush urged Congress yesterday to pass four pending trade agreements, telling a White House audience that open markets boost economic growth, raise standards of living by creating higher-paying jobs and deliver more choice and better prices for consumers. Despite claims to the contrary by populist opponents of trade expansion, the president has the facts and decades of experience on his side.

 

Critics of trade counter that real wages have stagnated while the middle class has been squeezed by a loss of jobs to low-wage competitors such as China and Mexico. Democrats in Congress point to those anxieties to justify their opposition to any meaningful trade-expanding legislation ? including pending free trade accords with South Korea and Colombia and renewal of presidential trade-promotion authority.

 

Like so many assumptions about trade, the belief that more global competition has somehow lowered the living standards of the average American worker and family is just a myth.

 

Daniel Griswold directs the Cato Institute's Center for Trade Policy Studies and authored the new study, "Trading Up: How Expanding Trade Has Delivered Better Jobs and Higher Living Standards for American Workers," available at freetrade.org.

 

More by Daniel T. GriswoldThe critics have it all wrong: The middle class isn't disappearing ? it's moving up.

 

The Census reports that the share of U.S. households earning $35,000 to $75,000 a year (in '06 dollars) ? roughly, the middle class ? has indeed shrunk slightly over the last decade, from 34 percent to 33 percent. But so, too, has the share earning less than $35,000 ? from 40 percent to 37 percent.

 

It's the share of households earning more than $75,000 that's jumped ? from 26 percent to 30 percent.

 

Trade has helped America transform itself into a middle-class service economy. Yes, the country's lost a net 3.3 million manufacturing jobs in the past decade ? but it's added a net 11.6 million jobs in service and other sectors where average wages are higher than in manufacturing. Most of these new jobs are in better-paying categories, like professional and business services, finance and education and health services.

 

Trade and globalization have also helped bolster the balance sheets of American households by delivering higher incomes, lower interest rates and wider investment opportunities. From 1995 to 2004, the real median net worth of U.S. households jumped by 31 percent, boosted by rising home values and stock prices. (Even with the recent housing slump, average home values remain more than 2.5 times what they were a decade ago, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller index.)

 

Despite frequently heard worries, American families are not "drowning in debt." Yes, total household debt has risen in the past decade ? but total assets have risen in value even faster.

 

On average, U.S. households spent 14.4 percent of their income on debt payments in 2004, not much different from the 14.1 percent they spent in 1995. The bulk of what we've borrowed hasn't paid for groceries or big-screen TVs but for housing ? which, again, has appreciated strongly in the last decade.

 

Like so many assumptions floating around about trade, the belief that more global competition has somehow lowered the living standards of the average worker and family is just a myth. In fact, trade has delivered lower prices, higher worker compensation and an upwardly mobile middle class.

 

The critics have it all wrong: The middle class isn't disappearing ? it's moving up.

Critics of trade repeat as a mantra that real wages have been stagnant since the 1970s. But the data on real wages exclude benefits ? which have been rising as a share of worker compensation. Those data also rely on a cost-of-living index that has systematically overstated inflation and thus understated real income gains.

 

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the average real hourly compensation earned by Americans has actually grown by 22 percent during the past decade ? even as trade and other measures of globalization have grown rapidly.

 

Trade has brought us lower prices on a broad range of goods ? from fruits and vegetables to consumer electronics and automobiles ? stretching the paychecks of U.S. workers.

 

Household incomes have also been rising. When they point to a small decline in median household income compared to 2000, opponents of trade are cherry-picking their numbers. That year was the frothy peak of a decade-long expansion. Use 1996 ? the comparable point in the previous business cycle ? as the baseline, and you see a 6 percent rise in median income.

 

Convincing Americans that we are worse off than we were in years past has become a popular line of attack against globalization and trade expansion. But trade has played an important part in the positive story of long-term gains in hourly compensation, household income and net wealth.

 

To promote further progress for U.S. workers and their families, Congress and the administration should work together to pursue policies that expand the freedom of Americans to participate in global markets.

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Misery index

 

1976-01 14.62

1976-02 13.99

1976-03 13.67

1976-04 13.75

1976-05 13.60

1976-06 13.57

1976-07 13.15

1976-08 13.51

1976-09 13.09

1976-10 13.16

1976-11 12.68

1976-12 12.66

1977-01 12.72 Carter

1977-02 13.51

1977-03 13.84

1977-04 14.15

1977-05 13.73

1977-06 14.07

1977-07 13.73

1977-08 13.62

1977-09 13.40

1977-10 13.19

1977-11 13.52

1977-12 13.10

2006-01 8.69

2006-02 8.40

2006-03 8.06

2006-04 8.25

2006-05 8.77

2006-06 8.92

2006-07 8.95

2006-08 8.52

2006-09 6.66

2006-10 5.71

2006-11 6.47

2006-12 7.04

2007-01 6.68

2007-02 6.92

2007-03 7.18

2007-04 7.07

2007-05 7.19

2007-06 7.19

2007-07 6.96

2007-08 6.57

2007-09 7.46

 

30 years ago really sucked.

 

More good news. Millions of American homebuyers are going to find purchasing a home cheaper this year.