If you have a farm or a small business, would you like to pass it on to your children when you die? Well, unless Congress does something, it is going to become much, much harder to do that starting next year. Right now, there is a 5 million dollar estate tax exemption and anything above that is taxed at 35 percent. But on January 1st, the exemption will go down to 1 million dollars and the tax rate will go up to 55 percent. A lot of liberals are very excited about this, because they believe ... (more)
When societies grow opulent life becomes more precious to the living. People have a good reason to want to live longer lives as more of the promises of Paradise become Earthly. As a result, the ever growing body of evidence of the harmful effects of tobacco products to human health has, not surprisingly, been met with alarm. Cigarettes, the most common tobacco product, have been discovered to not only cause harm to the direct user, but also to bystanders, as a result of so-called second-hand smo... (more)
"Half of the nation’s 40 biggest publicly traded corporate spenders have announced plans to curtail capital expenditures this year or next." This is The Wall Street Journal further confirming the mounting evidence that the presidential election did not cure what is fundamentally sick.
The supposed recovery of the last two years is the least convincing in anyone's living memory. Domestic investment has only recently returned to 2005 levels and business lending trends suggest that i... (more)
See Skyscraper Index: "The Skyscraper Index is a concept put forward in January 1999 by Andrew Lawrence, research director at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, which showed that the world's tallest buildings have risen on the eve of economic downturns."
J. Paul Robinson, chairman of Purdue University’s faculty senate, strode through the halls of a 10- story concrete-and-glass administrative tower.
“I have no idea what these people do,” said Robinson, waving his hand across a row of offices, his voice rising.
The 59-year-old professor of biomedical engineering is leading a faculty revolt against bureaucratic bloat at the public university in Indiana. In the past decade, the number of administrative employees jumped ... (more)
President Obama promotes the myth that everyone must go to college. That if you don't go, your life will be ruined -- that you will end up waiting tables, or trapped in some other mundane occupation. The truth is, even with a college degree, you may still end up waiting tables, you'll just begin your "career" four or five years later, tens of thousands of dollars in... (more)
As the northeastern United States continues to recover from Hurricane Sandy, we hear the usual outcry against individuals and companies who dare to charge market prices for goods such as gasoline. The normal market response of rising prices in the wake of a natural disaster and resulting supply disruptions is redefined as "price gouging." The government claims that price gouging is the charging of ruinous or exploitative prices for goods in short supply in the wake of a disaster and is a hei... (more)
Now that President Obama has been re-elected, the media is finally free to focus on something besides the clueless undecided voters in Ohio, Florida, and Colorado. The brightest and shiniest object that has attracted its attention is the "fiscal cliff" that we are expected to drive over at the end of the year unless Congress and the President can agree to turn the wheel or apply the brakes.
Fresh from his victory, the President took time today to let the nat... (more)
The victory by Barack Obama on election night has resulted in a huge wave of firings and layoffs all over America. A large number of businesses seem to have suddenly shifted into panic mode. The number of layoff announcements that we have seen in the last 48 hours has been absolutely shocking. So why is this happening? Well, the truth is that the federal government is absolutely suffocating small businesses all over America with rules, regulations and taxes. If you have never tried to run a... (more)
Trish Regan and Adam Johnson do their best to hold themselves together in this sublime rant by 'Gloom, Boom & Doom's Marc Faber on Bloomberg TV as he sees Obama's re-election as "very negative for the economy". From his view that the market should be down at least 20% - and maybe 50%, to the implied ignorance of both of the candidates, he believes fervently that the "standards of living of people in the western hemisphere will continue to decline." Faber views Obama's re-electio... (more)
Barack Obama may consider introducing a tax on carbon emissions to help cut the U.S. budget deficit after winning a second term as president, according to HSBC Holdings Plc.
A tax starting at $20 a metric ton of carbon dioxide equivalent and rising at about 6 percent a year could raise $154 billion by 2021, Nick Robins, an analyst at the bank in London, said today in an e-mailed research note, citing Congressional Research Service estimates. “Applied to the Congressional Budget Of... (more)
In order to exercise control over the population, governments throughout history have made people dependent on government largess. A government can make an increasing number of people dependent on its generosity by providing more and more benefits to a larger and larger share of the population.
Because of these “freebies,” people will go along with the g... (more)
In a new article for the San Francisco Chronicle, Berkley economist Brad Delong bemoans over the state of income equality in the U.S. economy. In typical leftist fashion, he complains that wealth disparity in the U.S. hasn't been as high as it is today since the Gilded Age (1870-1929). The large gap between the haves and have nots has created an economy where less people are "happy."
In the wake of superstorm Sandy, thousands are hiring contractors to help fix their homes, but TODAY national investigative correspondent Jeff Rossen reports that unlicensed contractors are roaming these hard-hit areas and preying on vulnerable homeowners.
... (more)
Contrary to what politicians such as Romney, Gary Johnson, Obama and Chris Christie would say, it's during emergencies when you need liberty the most. (Thanks to "Baldy" Harper for that insight.) Here's an object lesson. New York has a silly law making it illegal to raise prices during an emergency. It's almost beside the point that the law itself is unintelligible.
The effect of the law is to dissuade firms such as gas stations from raising prices durin... (more)
In a natural disaster like Hurricane Sandy, the only thing people should fear more than the storm is the government's response.
Let us count the ways.
Mandatory evacuations presume that politicians know the risks better than property owners themselves. That can't possibly be true. In an information age, we all have access to the same data. Especially these days. We should be able to make our own risk assessments, coming and going from our property as we choose. ... (more)
