191–200 of 253 posts
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But most of the money is spent on research and high tech manufacturing. Those are not easy fields to find private employment for.
Are you kidding me? You are saying in the current market, there's no demand for highly skilled and educated R&D employees?
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What are you talking about? figure 2 is a share of total tax total revenues by source. Figure 1 shows that Us total tax percentage of GDP is lower than every OECD nation out there with the only lower total tax share in the nations of Korea, Ireland, Chile and Mexico. The figure 2 breakdown also does not distinguish between taxes on Income + "profits", and capital gains and corporate taxes where the wealthy accrue sig…
Go read it again. The only reason the US is lower on a GDP basis is that the US does not have a VAT on goods and services (which as you know, hurts the poor much more than the rich). i.e. the US taxes the wealthy much more than virtually any other country.
If the wealthy are the most taxed in the US, how is it what inequality of both income and wealth is massively skyrocketing in the US?
The choice is raising taxes, reducing spending elsewhere, or demanding workers give up the pensions they were promised. Somehow I doubt anyone is going to agree to pay more in taxes to cover pensions in their state or city. After all, why should the government keep its promises (especially if it means we have to pay for it)?
If I paid for WSJ and this is the low quality journalism I got I'd be peeved. This article barely touches on how it got to be so bad. Excuse me but no - a single paragraph stating the obvious 'benefits promised were too rich' doesn't cover it. How is it possible that a solvency ratio can drop from 100% to 75% in 18 years? This doesn't just happen because eh seemingly every pension administrator just decided. How much…
One reason is that many places changed the actuarial tables. Average life expectancy is higher than it was, driven by improvements in outcomes and more women at work. Another is that monetary policy has made fixed income securities a low yield investment. Funds need to diversify and add risk. Another reason is that folks writing these things assume workers work a full career. The reality today is that many government…
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The flip-side of collective bargaining is collective responsibility, I'm afraid. The federal government saw this coming 30 years ago, moved to a hybrid, mostly-defined-contribution system and (surprise!) is doing fine. Most state and municipal unions fought to keep their defined-benefit plans and now are going to suffer for it.
Huh? As of 2012 "[t]he vast majority of full-time civilian federal workers receive roughly half of their retirement compensation through their defined-benefit pension plans (the rest comes from Social Security)." ( https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/private-vs-public-defi... ) That National Review hit piece notwithstanding, in truth defined benefit plans are, technically speaking, the most efficient form of deferr…
No insurance company would sell an annuity for as little as what governments claim they cost. And anytime you get a big pot of money, there will be corruption and cheating.
The most efficient retirement plan is having multiple successful children who are raised to take care of their parents.
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Like it or not these pensions are already legal obligations of state and local governments. Yell about or at the unions all you want, but if these obligations are not met, get ready for lawsuits and negative consequences for municipal credit ratings. Would you rather pay somewhat higher taxes now to cover pension obligations, or significantly higher taxes later because of the higher muni bond rates your state will ha…
Good luck keeping the highest end of you tax base around to cover the shortfalls.
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> Why in the ever loving fuck are you blaming the _workers_ for this shortsightedness instead of the government organizations who are about to fuck those people over when they're 70? Well, we are the ones paying those people's pensions, in the form of taxes, so we're the ones fucking ourselves over if they got too sweet of a deal right? I am personally not going to get 50-100% of my maximum salary as guaranteed compe…
> Well, we are the ones paying those people's pensions, in the form of taxes, so we're the ones fucking ourselves over if they got too sweet of a deal right? And how does this square with this being a democracy ? Or to put it another way: you're also (indirectly, but ...) the ones promising sweet pensions to these people if they would just work. And they worked. Now you want to revoke your part of the bargain ? Furth…
So I think this argument actually works against you.
First, nothing can bind future generations. They can always change whatever they want to. In the United States, a future congress can revoke, alter or amend any law passed by a previous congress. So if you want your pensions to be secured, the benefits cannot be guaranteed by faith in future governments!
In this sense, a defined contribution plan is more secure than a defined benefit plan. This is because a defined contribution plan belongs to the recipient as soon as the funds are allocated - even if a future government changes the rules, the money that's already in your 401K is yours!
Consider the alternative - are you saying that future generations are always bound to the decisions of past generations, even though they may not even have been alive or of voting age? If a law is fair and benefits society, that future generation will respect it because it benefits society. If that law is unfair to them they can and absolutely should change that law! How could it be otherwise? As a socialist this should utterly appall you. Do you believe that laws put into place by capitalists and large corporations constitute binding pacts between governments and their citizens, and that any future government that seeks to amend them towards a more equitable balance is now acting unfairly?
If the median income in a nation is $40K, but the median pension given by the state exceeds that income, then who is suffering unfairly if the pension is reduced to be more in line with what the average worker earns? How as a socialist could you justify a pensioner earning more than a productive active worker?
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Like it or not these pensions are already legal obligations of state and local governments. Yell about or at the unions all you want, but if these obligations are not met, get ready for lawsuits and negative consequences for municipal credit ratings. Would you rather pay somewhat higher taxes now to cover pension obligations, or significantly higher taxes later because of the higher muni bond rates your state will ha…
The guarantees - constitutional in some states - are what will cause the problem to be bigger. When you can't resolve unsustainable debt without bankruptcy, then you will go bankrupt and credit rating be damned. Detroit, Chicago, Illinois are just warm ups for the big battles over the next few decades.
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Care to enlighten us pension finance non-experts on what the article misses?
Laws were changed to intentionally weaken pension funds and then articles like this are funded to further destabilize trust in them. Another way of saying it: rich people were unhappy they have to pay taxes.
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Good luck keeping the highest end of you tax base around to cover the shortfalls.
Maybe so, but wealthy people seem to like living in high-tax areas like NYC and SF, and I am pretty sure they also like having paved roads, functioning transit systems, and all the other things they would lose if the state had to find a way to meet its obligations without raising taxes. Things are not yet hopeless and if we had politicians who did their jobs and demonstrated competent leadership we could sort out thi…
This feels like the crux of the problem, but we've got the politicians we voted for. I'm starting to wonder if its even possible for the average person to vote in the long-term interests of their community against their own short-term interest. Some will... but the majority?