Trump: Cut Corporate Welfare First

The reason the left is horrified by Donald Trump is they know he will cut welfare. Hence the rock-throwing fear and loathing.  For my part I agree, cut every dime of all welfare, but don't cut a dime of personal welfare until every dime of corporate welfare is cut.  When all corporate welfare is cut, there won't be any need for personal welfare, and what tragic circumstances emerge for any given individuals,  true charity can handle that.

The left knows there is no personal welfare without the warfare state, for where else can you get the credit to fund people voluntarily unemployed?  (I realize there are no jobs, but there is plenty of work to do.) To its credit, the left carved out an income stream for itself from the warfare state, for ostensible good, but it is all just rent-seeking.

Trump made his foreign policy speech last week.  Here is a summary:

Billions of dollars in “defense” spending are tied up in NATO contracts: the power and prestige of Washington’s foreign policy “experts” are inextricably linked to maintaining the Atlanticist bridge that binds us to our free-riding European client states. And now the candidate most likely to win the GOP presidential nomination is threatening to take it all away from them. No wonder they hate his guts and will do anything to stop him.

OK, so first cut welfare payments to Europe.  And that is just the thing... if you cut any of the warfare/welfare state sinecures, you threaten them all. That is why no government program ever ends, they just get new names and new people.  If a Pres. Trump cuts Belgium off, then all the people in Belgium making fabulous USA-funded salaries saying nice things about USA war-machine and nasty things about Putin will go back to selling snake oil and people of some probity will begin to get heard.

And it is not just in the provinces. This is a replay of Kennedy's "best and brightest" gambit that got derailed by the deep state:

That is why I will also look for talented experts with new approaches, and practical ideas, rather than surrounding myself with those who have perfect resumes but very little to brag about except responsibility for a long history of failed policies and continued losses at war.

But wait, Trump also said:

We will spend what we need to rebuild our military. It is the cheapest investment we can make. We will develop, build and purchase the best equipment known to mankind. Our military dominance must be unquestioned.

But we will look for savings and spend our money wisely. In this time of mounting debt, not one dollar can be wasted.

 Yes, and earlier Trump said at once "China's good, I make a lot of Money with China" and "China is cheating."  So which is it?  Well, the the Chinese leaders hear the first sentence, the unemployed Americans hear the second.  "Rebuild" - "cheapest".  "develop" - "savings".  OK, which is it?  Both? Wipe out the politically-motivated "defense" array now in place and replace it with the most fearsome array at 20% of the cost today?  And if any foreigners want in, they can lease systems from us with their own cash, not our credit?


A Trump quote:

We should seek common ground based on shared interests. Russia, for instance, has also seen the horror of Islamic terrorism.

I believe an easing of tensions and improved relations with Russia – from a position of strength – is possible.

(No kidding, since USA has been the bully to which only Putin has stood up...) I've said here countless times if we pull out of the Middle East tomorrow, China will move in.  Let them. They have a far greater Islamic extremist problem than we do, and it is smack dab in the middle of China's hopes and dreams for the future: reopen the Silk Road between London and Beijing.  Let them be the hegemon, and we trade.

Whereas the USA has to move massive resources to pick a fight where people once loved us, China has the problem on its front lawn now that is has put its address on the West Side of the Country instead of the East.

Again:  USA needs to announce we are pulling out all assets (on whatever workable timetable... say 90 days) worldwide to within the bounds of Cape Wrangell, Alaska to West Quoddy Head, Maine and anyone messing with us on the way out gets nuked.  Talk about refugee crisis, processing all those unemployed (and probably unemployable) Americans coming home would pale all other refugee crises. But it is work we need to do.

When both democrats and republicans loved NAFTA, that was all I needed to hear back in '90.  It has been a disaster.  When both democrats and republicans hate Trump, well, what more do we need to hear?  Anything else only confirms if he is not stopped, good things might happen.

Trump says:

Although not in government service, I was totally against the War in Iraq, saying for many years that it would destabilize the Middle East. Sadly, I was correct, ...

Fact is, I think most Americans were against it.  We vote for peace, get war.  We vote no bailouts, get bailouts.  We vote no taxpayer-funded domed stadiums, we get them good and hard.  25 years ago Perot was talking about "government coming at people, instead of for people."  In spite of being smeared by the usual suspects, he picked up 20% of the vote (and got Clinton elected).  Today Trump and Sanders represent the vast majority of Americans who are sick of being treated like Syrian refugees.  Doesn't feel nice, does it?

Am I pro-Trump?  Ahem, I am an anarchist.  I think the state needs to be dissolved, for there is not a single function of government, of democracy, or a republic, that cannot be better provisioned by the market and charity.  And don't tell me defense is an exception, I was just examining in a museum last week the original wholesale letters of marque written by President Madison to defend USA.  And don't say that was early 1800s, because it was American farmers who defeated the most powerful military in the world back then and do it today: Vietnamese, Iraqi, Afghani, you name it, farmers all, have defeated the USA playing the king.

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Retire and Die

You think Bismarck knew this?

The team found that those who worked a year longer than the group that retired had an 11 percent lower risk of death.And interestingly enough, those termed unhealthy who also worked another year longer had a nine percent lower mortality risk.This data proves that working a year longer had positive impact on the study participants' mortality rate regardless of their health status.'The healthy group is generally more advantaged in terms of education, wealth, health behaviors and lifestyle, but taking all of those issues into account, the pattern still remained,' said Robert Stawski, senior author of the paper and associate professor.

That is only one study.  There would have to be more studies to see if others got the same results for anything to be proven.  But it does not contradict an essential point, self-employment is about lifestyle, and with the right work and lifestyle, you never retire.

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Taxing the Rich: Let's Make a Deal

Good to see corporations are paying less and less in taxes over the last 40 years, since corporations cannot actually pay any taxes, as I have noted before, their customers ultimately do.

But we keep hearing to top 1% (it's actually 2.7%) pay over 50% of USA Fed taxes. 

In 2014, people with adjusted gross income, or AGI, above $250,000 paid just over half (51.6%) of all individual income taxes, though they accounted for only 2.7% of all returns filed, according to our analysis of preliminary IRS data. Their average tax rate (total taxes paid divided by cumulative AGI) was 25.7%. By contrast, people with incomes of less than $50,000 accounted for 62.3% of all individual returns filed, but they paid just 5.7% of total taxes. Their average tax rate was 4.3%.

I wonder if the 5.7% collected is worth the cost of processing the 62.3% of all returns filed?  Or is this third world stuff of costing more to collect than is gained?

But back to that 2.7%, them's the facts narrowly stated, but those same people are also the greatest welfare queens, getting far more in benefits than they pay in taxes.  The whole 2.7% pay 51% is a sham.  The easiest to spot is the Third Undersecretary for Humourous Gaits who earns $250,000 in DC and "pays taxes" (with 100% of his pay contributed by taxpayers) and gets a handsome pension as well.

When the Alaska Airline folk make stupendous sums buying Virgin Airlines with malcredit two things are happening at once.  Branson is bailing out of a game that is now over: borrow malcredit and mulct fabulous wealth from the income stream.  Alaska Air is making a play to get too big to fail.  It might work since Delta and United have such onerous legacy pensions that need busting, the powers that be may go with that outcome.

The reason not everyone is borrowing malcredit is they know the crash will be soon.  Debt does not reduce even though prices and income does.  To have $100 million in debt but not the revenue from investments of the 100 mil to make even negative interest rate principal payments, then it's bankruptcy, and there goes all the beautiful personal pension plans.  Whereas no one cared 8 years ago, the politics are different now, "the people" may demand a 99% tax on pensions above the first $36,000 in pension income.

Here is a rehearsal of an absurd idea again...

All told, individual income taxes accounted for a little less than half (47.4%) of government revenue, a share that’s been roughly constant since World War II. The federal government collected $1.54 trillion from individual income taxes in fiscal 2015, making it the national government’s single-biggest revenue source. (Other sources of federal revenue include corporate income taxes, the payroll taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare, excise taxes such as those on gasoline and cigarettes, estate taxes, customs duties and payments from the Federal Reserve.) Until the 1940s, when the income tax was expanded to help fund the war effort, generally only the very wealthy paid it.

As if...  corporations cannot pay taxes.  Their customers do.  So consumers pay all taxes, no matter how they are disguised.

We have a system where people are forced to pay for the guy who refuses to work.  In making such payments, the taxpayer of course nets less, and thus is forced to live next door to the guy who will not work, because the taxes paid keep the taxpayer poor.  That's fair. Isn't it?

There is a solution to this, let's make a deal.  Takeaway all the welfare payments to those in the top 2.7%.  Then watch what happens.  The false economy will fall, there will be a renaissance in business, the tax burden will spread, and the 2.7% will have nothing to complain about, or brag about, or whatever it is when they say they pay 51% of the taxes.

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Germans Welcome Chinese Investment

Here is a German whose opinions on the European economy are highly rated.  I was interested becuase of the topic of SMEs, small and medium enterprises.  Quotes the article:

Simon, 69, believes this trend will continue thanks to Germany's many hidden champions, a term he coined to describe relatively unknown SMEs that are the backbone of a nation's economy and have for many years sustained Germany's leading position in exports.

What he calls "hidden champions" I call "under the radar." He then goes on to define these SMEs as less than Euro 5 billion in sales.  Sigh....  not my bailiwick.  But I read on, and this:

Simon acknowledges there is concern in Germany about more Chinese investment pouring into the country, but says: "When General Motors took over Opel in 1929, or Ford built a huge automobile plant in Cologne in 1930, people said we would be dominated and conquered by the Americans, and that we would be a colony of the US. But it turned out to be nonsense. The same is now true for Chinese acquisitions."

Is he kidding?  Did we, the USA not conquer and dominate his country, within less than a dozen years of those investments?  And not a metaphorical conquering, but real bombs, bullets, soldiers, rape, pillaging and all that?  Do we not still occupy their lands with our military bases, to this day?  Very odd argument for him to make.

As I teach in Silicon valley among other places, over the years I've had plenty of Apple engineers in my classes with whom I chat outside of class.  I make the point to sell in USA items made overseas must be designed in USA by USA designers to be acceptable in USA.  Of course, the factory with its expertise will always recommend changes based on their know-how, improvements in material and design, or process engineering. That is only natural. The Apple engineers trace the percent of work done by China and UsA engineers from say 90 - 10 back in the 90s to 50/50 the last time I checked a few years ago.  What happened?  The Chinese have plenty of people who graduated from the same USA schools as the USA engineers: MIT, Cal Tech, Stanford, etc...  and they are now contributing (so virtually USA design.)  Another point was made... when Apple switched state of the art composite materials, the Chinese learned that, then moved ahead on their own and now there are materials that Apple USA would be hard pressed to try to copy.

Simon says this:

He believes Chinese investment can bring advantages for both sides and refutes the notion that Chinese companies are simply trying to extract know-how from Germany to transfer to China.
"To a large degree, that's impossible because a very large part of the knowledge resides in the employees. I meet German companies all the time and they tell me their know-how is not in the patterns, not in the written or digital documentation, but it is in the skills of their employees, not only the engineers and scientists, but also the workers."

So I don't think so.  The Chinese are exquisite copiers, and they are copying USA's immigration policy of bringing in outsiders for flair.

The Chinese are using credit to buy up German companies, just as USA industry did buying up USA companies. This ends badly.  The GErmans should know better than anyone.

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Nordstrom Needs to Close 25% of its Stores?

In specialty we need to compete on design, not on price.  the upscale retailers to whom we sell are our brand.  Whether that happens to be Gumps or Nordstrom or Saks, we don't care.  We just sell to whoever is thriving out there.

So to achieve the sales per square foot they had ten years ago, Nordstrom has to close 25% of its stores. Ho hum, we discovered Nordstrom when we were looking for customers, as we did all our other customers.  If Nordstrom actually disappears, we'll find whom the market elects as their replacement.

So the article by Mish is not of much interest, except this line from the report:

Many retailers say they make less money selling goods online than they do in their physical stores. 

 Exactly!  Anyone who thinks marketing online is a viable means of developing business is delusional.  Online retailing will crash with the coming bust, although at around only 6% of all USA retail, it does not have far to fall.

If you want to start up a viable business, a website is a minor aspect.

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Airbus Builds Jets In USA to Get ExIm Loans?

Boeing tells us they could not compete without taxpayer bailouts in the form of taxpayers on the hook for the credit given to foreign companies to buy Boeing jets.

There must be something to the utter dependence on the hegemon, and not the market, for viability, since Airbus is now making jets in USA with a hope to get in on state-welfare too:

An Airbus spokesman stated: “If we were to sell a Mobile-assembled aircraft to an international carrier, it could be eligible for some level of Exim financing.” Chairman Export-Import Bank, Fred Hochberg said: “If an Airbus plane from Mobile had 50% US content, we’d finance 50%.”

Splendid.  Now we are importing welfare queens to add to our costs.  Say we sell a Boeing jet for $300 million.  Whatever the profit margin is,  the costs are not justified in the selling price.  If we had competition in jets, the price would prolly be 2/3rds that at most.  But because Boeing is a welfare queen on taxpayer support, we pay too much for too much.  And now Airbus wants in on it too.

Cut every cent of every welfare program in the USA.  But do not cut one cent of personal welfare until every cent of corporate welfare is gone.  If so, by then, there would be no one left on welfare, because there would be an economic renaissance in USA.

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Concern: White Male Suicide Increase

Let's look at the numbers:

Middle-aged white people now account for a third of all suicides in the U.S., a new government report shows.
Suicide is the nation's 10th leading cause of death, and the overall rate rose 24 percent in 15 years, according to the report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Suicides have long been most common among white people — particularly older white males. But most striking in the new report is the growth in whites ages 45 to 64.

Hmmmm...  so they are checking out instead of facing the economic policies of the USA.  Not word on the other races, perhaps it is of little interest to Fox News.  It is of interest to those who post on such article, for they are preoccupied with denigrating people of African-ancestry.

Sounds like a problem of white entitlement, and maybe white privilege is nonsense.

At any rate, who has not considered suicide in his life?  Everyone does, but few go through with it.  It takes quite a bit to do so/  Is they problem they false dilemma?  Have they considered channeling their suffering (passion - from the Greek: to suffer) into creativity, and making the pain pay?

It's a thought.  Don't ice yourself and weird out your relations, start a business.

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BlockChainHeads

What odd thinkers these bitcoin/blockchain people be...  now comes one who tells us world peace it at hand because IBM is behind blockchain.  I am not making this up:

This vision and guidance leading the way, how might IBM, and its collaborators on blockchain, use blockchain technology to further peace through world trade via itsHyperledger Project with the Linux Foundation? First and foremost, to be realistic, by serving its clients. How might blockchain help this?
Thus far in the blockchain experiment, we’ve seen use cases for how it can be used. As the strongest use case so far, Bitcoin represents a formidable example of how trade and finance can be streamlined, and the unbanked banked.

This excitement for blockchain is in the deluded minds of false economy denizens.  I've been in int'l trade for over forty years.  I ask again, what is the problem are they trying to solve?  Do ebay sellers  imagine they'll get rich if they can just get blockchain to reach Mbuti tribesmen? Who needs to be able to reach so far with so much security (even if the false claims of security are true?)

Organic, true economy world trade, takes a dozen or so suppliers and a couple thousand customers, and  with that you are too small to steal from but you can live like a king.

I guess blockchain is a consolation for those who missed out on the Trekkie comicom craze.  A delusional fantasy to pursue instead of being productive.

Does it concern blockchainheads that IBM is going under?  Uncle Sam is refunding IBM a cool billion because it has revenue declines 16 quarters in a row. And so they are trying to get with it...  they'll hold blockchain conventions.  Now.  What to wear?

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