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The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

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Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#131

Post by dragonwriter »

deadmetheny wrote: post #118
cowkingdeluxe wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many ways to negatively affect election integrity, both illegal and legal. For example, in Georgia, US, one of the candidates himself blocked 53,000 voter registrations just 3 weeks before the election. The demographics of the 53,000 is 70% black. https://www.npr.org/2018/10/13/657109536/georgia-puts-53-000... Gerrymandering, strict voter id laws (e.g. requiring drivers license but removing all but one DMV…

The USA is one of the few countries in the world that doesn't require an ID to vote. I'm continually astounded by the fact that people consider that having some sort of identification, which most functioning adults ought to have anyway, is some sort of horrifying oppression.

> The USA is one of the few countries in the world that doesn't require an ID to vote.

It's also one of the few that doesn't have compulsory universal uniform national (or even state) ID. Oddly, the same faction that is up in arms about voter ID is also dedicated to avoiding compulsory national/state ID.

If we had compulsory universal ID with the supportive policies necessary to avoid that becoming an unreasonable burden on the poor, or selected political groups or racial minorities, voter ID would be a non-problem. As it is, it's a problematic mechanism which is publicly sold as solving something which is a non-problem to all evidence, and has on multiple occasions been privately admitted by it's backers (and subsequentlt revealed) to be actually motivated by partisan interest and racial animus, in both cases being about keeping disfavored eligible voters from voting.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#132

Post by AnthonyMouse »

tptacek wrote: post #128
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still kind of the same thing. Suppose you open a car dealership that gives every person who buys a car a share of the dealership. The next thing you know that dealership has the best service and the lowest prices and makes no profits, because all the owners are also customers and they care less about getting a $10 dividend than about service quality and price. So then the argument is they're under-charging thems…

I don't see it that way, since they could have simply organized the company the ordinary way, with a services company that owned multiple funds, and avoided these tax implications: the "transfers" we'd be talking about would still be happening , but they would be untaxable.

But that's irrelevant if you're not giving this defunct historical market value to the transfers. The only thing taxable is the difference between what they charge and the market value. The rate they charge is available to the general public -- it should be the new market value.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#133

Post by AnthonyMouse »

leetcrew wrote: post #119
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> i would argue that if taxes are so onerous as to support a black market for a legal good, the taxes are probably much too high. Nah, when something has large negative externalities you set the tax to the point of mostly discouraging it. That'll be pretty high. It's supposed to be. > in addition to being an absurd tax from the get-go (in my opinion), it is also quite regressive, since poor people are significantly m…

> Nah, when something has large negative externalities you set the tax to the point of mostly discouraging it. That'll be pretty high. It's supposed to be. you really think each pack of cigs does $5.35 worth of damage to people other than the smoker?

When their insurance premiums or taxes go up to have to cover a million dollars in claims when you get cancer or other long-term chronic health conditions, yes.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#134

Post by tptacek »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #132
tptacek wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see it that way, since they could have simply organized the company the ordinary way, with a services company that owned multiple funds, and avoided these tax implications: the "transfers" we'd be talking about would still be happening , but they would be untaxable.

But that's irrelevant if you're not giving this defunct historical market value to the transfers. The only thing taxable is the difference between what they charge and the market value. The rate they charge is available to the general public -- it should be the new market value.

I'm not sure we're clear on what's happening. The transactions we're talking about are only transactions due to a consumer-protective structure Vanguard adopted. Fidelity also provides IT services to its funds (for instance), and won't provide IT services to anyone else in the market, but because it owns the funds, there's no taxable transaction occurring.

If Vanguard's tax filings are actually non-compliant, we should change the laws immediately.

There's a Matt Levine piece on this somewhere, it's worth finding and reading.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#136

Post by nothrabannosir »

justtopost wrote: post #127
nothrabannosir wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been meaning to read this book, is it actually good? Is it reliable, or are the contents controversial?

Why are those mutually exclusive in your mind?

Controversial means i have to do a lot of research to determine whence the controversy and which side to trust, if any. (Which I don’t have the domain knowledge nor time for.)

Lack thereof, many people agreeing on the contents, is a sign that you can read the book and (sort of) trust it.

Nothing guarantees nothing, cogito ergo sum and all that, but it’s a good heuristic.

“In my mind,” of course ;)

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#137

Post by ArchTypical »

dragonwriter wrote: post #130
ArchTypical wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because it can be used to disenfranchise voters. So can knives. > When Alabama enacted voter ID, it simultaneously shut down DMV offices in counties with the most potential black voters. Most of these problems are now mitigated by years of not needing ID. Now we have voter registration mailouts and such. Don't just throw away a good idea because of past abuse. We strive to be better. Giving up is regressive.

> Don't just throw away a good idea because of past abuse. The specific (Alabama) “past abuse” referred to by the grandparent was in 2011-2015, not some distant time where there has been intervening radical change in the political culture that would render it irrelevant. > Don't just throw away a good idea The whole idea was voter suppression. There is no good idea associated with Voter ID laws in the United States.…

> The whole idea was voter suppression.

The whole idea was for some people.

> There is no good idea associated with Voter ID laws in the United States

I disagree. Voting accountability is treated seriously in every state I've resided.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#138

Post by jsoc815 »

nothrabannosir wrote: post #33
drb91 wrote: post #6

Obligatory Chickenshit Club reference: https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Chickenshit_Club.ht...

I've been meaning to read this book, is it actually good? Is it reliable, or are the contents controversial?

> is it actually good?

While it may be, I found it difficult to get into. I felt like I was reading a long rant that was peppered w/ interesting facts here and there. I put it down years ago with the intent to try again. I've not gotten back to it yet.

A book I recommend that does touch on the S&L scandal is Lying for Money (Dan Davies). The Outlaw Bank (Beaty & Gwynne) was also an awesome read.

As for the greater topic of white collar crime, it's a key ingredient of the cake, forever to be baked in. My professional advise to folks is simply to be aware of that and act accordingly. Can't say much more than that on the matter.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#139

Post by scotty79 »

EADGBE wrote: post #123
scotty79 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Main "election integrity" issue is that you have just two parties to choose from. And that's very close to one.

It's also twice as many choices as one, too.

Twice is just two times more which doesn't sound too impressive either.

Re: The U.S. Needs to Crack Down on White-Collar Crime

#140

Post by jjeaff »

scotty79 wrote: post #113
jjeaff wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While there have recently been some issues with some elections in the US, we definitely don't have an "election integrity" issue. There is very little evidence that any elections in the US have been affected by fraud by any significant amount.

Main "election integrity" issue is that you have just two parties to choose from. And that's very close to one.

You can freely join either party and vote for leadership and primary candidates in those parties.
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