Tax Reform and Charities

Posted on 8 August 2017 by eehines

Charities stand to lose billions in donations if Republicans advance their tax overhaul, prompting the nonprofits to carefully attempt to persuade lawmakers to reshape their plan.

As a result of a proposal to double the standard deduction and prevent people from deducting state and local taxes from federal taxable income, fewer taxpayers—5% instead of 30%—would have a financial incentive to itemize their deductions, including their charitable gifts, according to several estimates.

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Brexit and Taxing

Posted on 4 August 2017 by eehines

Great Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond has committed to the EU that, if he has anything to do with it, the Brits will remain, post-Brexit, a “socially responsible” nation with a taxing régime that will match the EU’s taxing régime. In other words, he’ll do his best to prevent Great Britain from attracting business by being a business-friendly, tax competitive nation. Like Ireland is, with its 15% tax rate.

The Wall Street Journal has characterized Hammond’s commitment to economic disarmament “a mistake for the ages.” I think the WSJ is mistaken.

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There’s a Hint

Posted on 11 July 2017 by eehines

This is the subhead on a Wall Street Journal article over the weekend:

New registrations of company’s vehicles dropped to zero from 2,939

This happened to Tesla’s electric car sales in Hong Kong, but it’s a lesson that’s universal.

Not a single newly purchased Tesla model was registered in Hong Kong in April, according to official data from the city’s Transportation Department analyzed by The Wall Street Journal.

The March sales figure was that 2,939, albeit the number is artificially high: it occurred after the subsidy’s end had been announced, but before the end was to take effect. The drop to zero, though, is not at all artificial.

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They’ve Been Called Out

Posted on 11 July 2017 by eehines

The Left is always on about the need to raise taxes, the need for folks (especially the rich, but in general, too) to pay more to government in order to get all the services government is supposed to provide.

Now they’ve been called out and their hypocrisy exposed empirically, at least in one nation that our own Left wants us to emulate.

Hammered by the opposition for slashing taxes and going on a spending spree with the country’s oil money, the center-right government [of Norway] has hit back with a bold proposal: voluntary contributions.

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General Reform

Posted on 9 June 2017 by eehines

25% of us don’t see doctors because that costs too much.

32% of older millennials (is there such a thing? Gad) skip the doctor. 13% of Americans don’t have any health coverage plan at all—paying the penalty is more valuable to them. Half of us don’t think we’ll have affordable health insurance much less Obamacare’s health coverage welfare.

This, together with today’s other post, just illustrates the fact that no single part of our economy—or of our Federal government—can effectively be treated in isolation: not Obamacare alone, not Federal spending alone (especially not by “cutting” through reducing the rate of growth in spending), not taxing alone, not debt handling alone.

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The Rich Are Out Of Money?

Posted on 6 June 2017 by eehines

They are in Connecticut, anyway, or at least out of trust in the State’s government regarding their money. Or the State is out of rich. Aetna, Inc, one of the giants of health and dental coverage that’s headquartered in Connecticut is looking hard at joining the exodus from the State, having grown tired of being the State’s tax piggy bank.

Governor Dannel Malloy (D) says he’ll match other states’ financial incentives—not exceed—if only Aetna will stay, but as The Wall Street Journal put it, “taxpayer money can’t buy fiscal certainty and a less destructive business climate.”

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Another Hypocrisy of the Left

Posted on 5 June 2017 by eehines

Among the tax reforms in the current plan before Congress is the elimination of the state and local tax payments as deductions from individuals’ Federal income tax returns. Who actually benefits from these deductions, though? Taxpayers in New York, California, and a couple of others. States dominated, for the most part, by the Progressive-Democratic Party. There’s an ox being gored.

Who else benefits from these deductions?

…88% of the benefits in 2014 flowed to taxpayers who earn more than $100,000, while 1% went to those who earn less than $50,000….

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Disingenuosity

Posted on 30 May 2017 by eehines

At the State level, more and more legislatures are succeeding in ceasing to send taxpayer money to Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood recently announced the shuttering of four of its 12 Iowa’s clinics in Iowa [sic] after the Hawkeye state’s Republican-led legislature voted earlier this year to cut funding to clinics that performed abortions. Also last week, the health care nonprofit announced it was closing its only clinic in Wyoming and three of its clinics in New Mexico in what it called a “realignment of resources.”

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Budget Cuts and Bribery

Posted on 21 May 2017 by eehines

…or budget cuts and coercion, depending on your perspective.

The president’s budget, due for release Tuesday, will spare the two largest drivers of future spending—Medicare and Social Security—leaving trillions in cuts from other programs. That includes discretionary spending cuts to education, housing, environment programs, and foreign aid already laid out by the administration, in addition to new proposed reductions to nondiscretionary spending like food stamps, Medicaid, and federal employee-benefit programs.

What’s going to be ignored in the inevitable hoo-raw over these allegedly terrible cuts to various aspects of our nation’s “safety” net is the truly terrible downside of those aspects.

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Foolish

Posted on 19 May 2017 by eehines

President Donald Trump is willing to talk to the Progressive-Democrats in Congress in order to achieve tax reform, and it might seem like a good idea. In the present situation, though, it’s a waste of time.

As the Trump administration reached across the aisle on tax reform for the first time Wednesday, Democrats communicated some requests of their own regarding the tax overhaul. Those requests included a middle class tax cut and that the overall bill not be part of a reconciliation package….

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