Obamacare, Corporate Profits, and Economic Laws

Daily Bewilderment at the Left

“It is amazing that people who think we cannot afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, and medication somehow think that we can afford to pay for doctors, hospitals, medication and a government bureaucracy to administer it.” ~ Thomas Sowell

Some conversation and a post by Libertarian Republican as well as news about Sweden trying to pass a law to reduce CEO pay got me thinking (at 3am in the morning, aaargh!). I pointed out to Mark that when a corporation is taxed more… in order to stay competitive, they a) either raise the cost of what they sell to soak up the rising taxes against them, or b) cut fat (jobs, outsource, etc), or c) both.

The conversation focused around medical giant, Stryker, who has stated that due to the 2.3% medical device tax it will be forced to lay people off. In fact, the company has already tried to streamline its operations over the past few years in preperation for it:

….Executives for Stryker have placed the blame squarely on the coming tax ever since it gained more steam in Washington.

“Here we are, one of the greatest industries in the country, and we’re staring down on Jan. 1, 2013 and the addition of a 2.3 percent excise tax, while meanwhile on the other side all the discussion in Washington is about creating jobs,” Stryker President and CEO Stephen McMillian said during a national conference of medical device manufacturers in Washington, D.C. last September.

Positions within the company were eliminated altogether after the announcement and have since contracted out many of their current roster of employees to keep costs down, an employee with Stryker, who spoke to FoxNews.com under the condition of anonymity, said.

“They really trimmed the fat with the last layoffs in 2009 and the year after which is probably why we are finally on budget for the first time since 1999,” the employee added…. (Fox)

But in our conversation Mark said the following:

Sean, there are several other options you are ignoring that a corp has to manage increased expenses like taxes. This is what they call a False Dilemma; they could innovate, reduce CEO pay, etc. c) reduce profits and make less money for shareholders. Why didn’t you think of that? Are corporate profits sacred to you Sean?

To which I simply respond:

So, Mark, you are saying that someone you know who owns a business (I know many) will choose your option c? Please, ask a friend of yours who owns a business… especially shareholders who are mainly people with investment packages who have worked hard their whole lives and are looking forward to retiring or are retired (e.g., the older folk of our nation — my wife for instance has a 401K plan that invests partly in stock) if they would lower profits for themselves and their investors and shareholders (if a small business, the nest-egg they were or are planning on leaving their children and grandchildren). Why would they want to be in business, to be a great person? Profit motivates and allows the market (people) to choose what they want. If you have a centrally planned choice you end up with warehouses full of useless gadgets, like in the USSR.

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. Their very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be ‘cured’ against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.” ~ C. S. Lewis

Then a day or two after I posted the above, I read from Libertarian Republican (LR) a small piece about Sweden passing a law so intrusive that it will stymy and business sense left in that country. Here is part of the story:

 


The left has discovered that popular initiative can be used to advance some of their more wacky ideas. This November, they will vote on the so-called “1-to-12” initiative and at later date, not yet determined, on the so-called “basic income” initiative. Here in the United States, a comparable wackiness is initiatives to raise the minimum wage. 

On November 27, the Swiss will vote on an initiative to limit the compensation of any employee to twelve times the compensation of the lowest paid worker for the company. The argument is either that corporate executives aren’t worth what they’re paid or that it’s not fair. As to why corporate executives are singled out for this treatment, I don’t know. As compared to the elite performers in the entertainment industry and professional athletes, corporate executives are paid rather modestly. Here are some representative figures: Median average salaries of selected corporate executives in the U.S.:

⚑ Chief Executive Officer – $754,972 

⚑ Chief Operating Officer – $433,325 

⚑ Chief Financial Officer – $307,129 from Salary.com

Average salaries of major league sports players:

⚑ National Basketball Association – $5.15 million 

⚑ Major League Baseball – $3.31 million 

⚑ National Hockey League – $2.4 million 

⚑ National Football League – $1.9 million from Yahoo Sports

Without knowing the fine print of the Swiss proposal, it would seem to me rather easy to work around a 12-to-1 rule. Outsource work both at the top and the bottom. A financial institution would, for example, contract for janitorial services; and also would relocate its global headquarters to a bank haven, leaving only mezzanine-level managers in Switzerland. The funny thing about such a consequence (corporate headquarters moving out of Switzerland) is that Switzerland became wealthy being a bank haven. If the 12-to-1 initiative isn’t wacky enough, another initiative has just been approved (although a date has not yet been set). It is to guarantee every adult citizen and legal resident of the country an unconditional income of $33,600 per year.

…read more…


 

LR also notes that — supporting my past few days of listening to people calling into radio talk shows saying under the exchanges their out of pocket AND premium costs are up via “Covered California” — even those who do not support Republicans are coming to our side after seeing that their hard-earned money is being taken at even a higher percentage. Which, I think, officially will put many in California firmly over the 50% mark in money taken for taxes.

From the  San Jose Mercury News, Obamacare’s winners and losers in Bay Area:

People like Marilynn Gray-Raine. The 64-year-old Danville artist, who survived breast cancer, has purchased health insurance for herself for decades. She watched her Anthem Blue Cross monthly premiums rise from $317 in 2005 to $1,298 in 2013. But she found out last week from the Covered California site that her payments will drop to about $795 a month. 

But people with no pre-existing conditions like Vinson, a 60-year-old retired teacher, and Waschura, a 52-year-old self-employed engineer, are making up the difference. 

“I was laughing at Boehner — until the mail came today,” Waschura said, referring to House Speaker John Boehner, who is leading the Republican charge to defund Obamacare. “I really don’t like the Republican tactics, but at least now I can understand why they are so pissed about this. When you take $10,000 out of my family’s pocket each year, that’s otherwise disposable income or retirement savings that will not be going into our local economy.”

Lady Margaret Thatcher,  in a television interview for Thames TV This Week on February 5, 1976, said,

“…and Socialist governments traditionally do make a financial mess. They [socialists] always run out of other people’s money. It’s quite a characteristic of them.”

A government that can tell private persons how much they should make, what insurance coverage they must have, and which light bulbs you should use, is not a free-market, capitalist country. I make this point with a young man that is helping at work… who parroted something I am sure he heard either from his professor or fellow students who heard it from a professor — at any rate, I mentioned this in the post:

So if you have a professor who is harping on Capitalism, Bush, Republicans, Reagan, Newt, Ted Cruz, whomever…, you just need to point out that since  FDR’s “New Deal“ and Johnson’s “Great Societyall they are really criticizing is regulation and redistribution. Because we are far from a truly free-market.

Oh how the bell tolls. One would think compassion lays at the center of these peoples plans… but that is never the case:

It’s an Obama world, and pure evil IMO. An elderly couple who own and lived in their home for 40 years are kicked out of the home because the man-child Obama is throwing a tantrum and wants to punish Americans during the government shutdown. Obama gave orders to close down the federally-funded roads that lead to the home of Joyce Spencer (77-yr-old) and her husband Ralph (80). Joyce and Ralph were told to pack up Ralph’s walker and scooter—and leave their home.

Just imagine the compassion for our healthcare under these bureaucrats.

It is. It is an Obama world… get ready for more of this.

Common Sense Is Timeless

John C. Calhoun

“The necessary result, then, of the unequal fiscal action of the government is, to divide the community into two great classes; one consisting of those who, in reality, pay the taxes, and, of course, bear exclusively the burthen of supporting the government; and the other, of those who are the recipients of their proceeds, through disbursements, and who are, in fact, supported by the government; or, in fewer words, to divide it into tax-payers and tax-consumers.”

John C. Calhoun, Disquisition on Government, 1848 — Via The Other McCain

Obama Bragged About Bringing Down the Debt More Than Any Other Administration ~ Rick Santelli Explains the Washington `Shell Game`

  1. Still largest deficit compared to other admins;
  2. Lowered the most because he increased it the most;
  3. see “1”

Three Question Liberals NEVER ask:

  1. compared to what?
  2. at what cost?
  3. what hard-evidence do you have?

 

If Detroit is an example of small government-God Help Us All!!

God Help us All!!

If Detroit is an example of small government… God Help Us All!! Melissa Harris Perry forgets that Detroit has been run by unions and big government Democrats for over 5 decades, and was then bailed out and over-regulated by the current administration… how convenient.

As the Chicks on the Right mention…

….Meanwhile, back in Reality-Land, National Review’s writer Kevin Williamson gave us all the real picture of Detroit back in 2011, while it was on its path to bankruptcy, when he penned the following:

Detroit maintains 13,000 government workers but has 22,000 government retirees burrowed into the body politic, and their health-care subsidies alone account for nearly $200 million of the city’s budget. Pensions alone already account for a quarter of city spending; in three years, they will account for half. Pensions and city workers’ health-care subsidies account for $561 per year from every resident of Detroit, which has a very poor population — average monthly income of barely $1,200 before taxes, a fifth of the population in poverty, etc. The official unemployment rate is 30 percent; the real rate is much higher.

But never mind all that. The answer to EVERYTHING for MHP and all her little commie friends at MSNBC is government, government, government, dontchaknow.  If Detroit JUST would’ve had more GOVERNMENT and more spending….then it would’ve been fine, minions

Gay Patriot brought my attention to a failed prophecy of Obama’s wonderful handle on economics 101.

As Michael Barone reported yesterday in the Washington Examiner:

National Journal’s Major Garrett has an excellent column today looking back on President Obama’s 2011 Labor Day speech in Detroit. “This is a city that has been to heck and back,” Obama said then. “And while there are still a lot of challenges here, I see a city that’s coming back.” Noting that Obama cited the “advanced battery industry taking root here in Michigan,” Garrett points out that the battery firm in question, A123 Systems, received $249 million in Energy Department grants–and is now bankrupt. And of course so is the city of Detroit.

In matters economical, this man’s powers of prognostication aren’t particularly strong.

…read more…

Moonbat points out — of course — that the “official” numbers from the White House, even if true, are REAL BAD!

Barack Hussein Obama set out to be a transformative president. He has already succeeded. Presidential spokesliar Jay Carney recently credited the Regime with creating 7.2 million private sector jobs. Even if that preposterous boast were true, it would hardly put a dent in Obama’s legacy:

Since February of 2009, the first full month of Obama’s presidency, 9.5 million Americans have dropped out of the labor force. Nearly 90 million Americans are not working today!

That means that 1.3 Americans have dropped out of the labor force for every one job the administration claims to have created.

There are 15 million more Americans on food stamps today than when Obama assumed office. …

That means that more than two Americans have been added to the food stamp rolls for every one job the administration says it has created.

If we were to take how many jobs the Regime actually has created — limited mainly to the overstaffing of the largely useless federal bureaucracy — and subtract from it the number of jobs it has destroyed through ObamaCare and excessive taxation and regulation in general, the number of new jobs for which Obama deserves credit would be millions in the negative.

…read more…

Government Guarantee Limits Creativity and Information ~ George Gilder

Dennis Prager interviews George Gilder about his new book, “Knowledge and Power: The Information Theory of Capitalism and How it is Revolutionizing our World.” I found this small bit on Dodd-Frank interesting as it leads to government interference creating a business atmosphere that nets zero information — or — creativity, entrepreneurial investment, or new growth in small business.

`Rotting, Decaying, and Bankrupt!` ~ Detroit (Democrat Controlled Future)

Rotting, Decaying And Bankrupt – If You Want To See The Future Of America Just Look At Detroit,” Via Gay Patriot

1 – Detroit was once the fourth-largest city in the United States, and in 1960 Detroit had the highest per-capita income in the entire nation.

2 – Over the past 60 years, the population of Detroit has fallen by 63 percent.

3 – At this point, approximately 40 percent of all the streetlights in the city don’t work.

4 – Some ambulances in the city of Detroit have been used for so long that they have more than 250,000 miles on them.

5 – 210 of the 317 public parks in the city of Detroit have been permanently closed down.

6 – According to the New York Times, there are now approximately 70,000 abandoned buildings in Detroit.

7 – Approximately one-third of Detroit’s 140 square miles is either vacant or derelict.

8Less than half of the residents of Detroit over the age of 16 are working at this point.

9 – If you can believe it, 60 percent of all children in the city of Detroit are living in poverty.

10 – According to one very shocking report, 47 percent of the residents of Detroit are functionally illiterate.

11 – Today, police solve less than 10 percent of the crimes that are committed in Detroit.

12 – Ten years ago, there were approximately 5,000 police officers in the city of Detroit.  Today, there are only about 2,500 and another 100 are scheduled to be eliminated from the force soon.

13 – Due to budget cutbacks, most police stations in Detroit are now closed to the public for 16 hours a day.

14 – The murder rate in Detroit is 11 times higher than it is in New York City.

15 – Crime has gotten so bad in Detroit that even the police are telling people to “enter Detroit at your own risk“.

16 – Right now, the city of Detroit is facing $20 billion in debt and unfunded liabilities.  That breaks down to more than $25,000 per resident.

Job Creation Best from Free-Market or Government? plus, FDR vs the Constitution

Via Gay Patriot,

From Zero Hedge,

“Governments are good at creating work, but they are not good at creating value-generating jobs,” is the conclusion from this insightful 3-minute clip from Professor Steve Horwitz. Too often the jobs that politicians ‘create’ are simply to their own benefit. Critically, Horwitz explains that transitions (from agriculture to manufacturing to service to information for instance) are temporarily painful but relatively quickly re-allocated. If, however, politicians attempt to prevent this transition – to stall the free market’s signals – this will halt innovation, growth, and create more poverty (ring any bells). Creating meaningful valuable jobs (something we saw earlier today is not occurring) does not appear too complex – “the best job-creation program in human history is the free market and the entrepreneurship it generates” – it simply means our politicians must get out of the way.

Video description:

President Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal,” has long been credited with rescuing the nation from the Great Depression of the 1930’s. Lee Ohanian, Professor of Economics at UCLA, challenges this conventional wisdom in a provocative examination of FDR’s economic policies.

Growing Costs of Obama-Care

Via Gateway Pundit:

In March 2010 leading democrats and their lackeys in the state-run media were “just giddy” to report that they crunched some numbers and found the nationalized health care bill they were pushing would reduce the deficit by $138 billion.

It was a lie. Democrats knew it was a lie…

But, after several backroom deals they rammed the bill through Congress anyway.

Then in May of 2010 the CBO corrected the numbers and said Obamacare will cost taxpayers at least $115 billion more than promised. Democrats pulled a fast one on the American public.

Democrats promised that Obamacare would cost $940 billion when they rammed it through Congress. The actual cost has gone up with each revision.

The latest CBO estimate says ObamaTax will cost $2.6 billion nearly three times as much as Democrats predicted.

Despite these facts the Obama White House continues to mislead Americans on the cost of Obamacare… And the media allows them to get about with it.

Read More: http://tinyurl.com/c97mgde