[Rancid]

This bill stinks worst than my worst fart.

[The Immortal Goon]

The Republicans tried to show how well this worked with the Kansas Economic Miracle. We finally got to use a state as a great laboratory for the republic.

The results were an embarrassing failure that the Republicans themselves had to stop trying before everything was destroyed.

...But maybe if we try the same thing at a national level, just maybe, it will do the opposite of what it has accomplished in every single other instance of the philosophy being used.

It's worth a shot as long as Trump and a couple of swamp-buddies get a discount on the broken backs of everyone else.

[Foxfyre]

Well that is not true.

The republicans love high deficits because it gives them ammunition to go after Social Security and Medicare as well as other entitlement programs/

Sure they do. That's why the only balanced budget and zero deficit we have seen in this century was via a Republican controlled Congress. The President vetoed their measures two or three times before public opinion finally spurred him to sign them and the results are now history.

[addem]

Then you're opposed to the child payment/benefit, universal state education &/or subsidised private education (even for poor students that win scholarships) etc?

I do tend to advocate for minimal government. However, equalizing education in order to have a free and fair market for labor is different.

[addem]

What you claim seems unsubstantiated. Yes, more people became insured under Obamacare because more people became eligible for medicaid and the mandate forced people to buy insurance or pay a tax penalty. Obamacare took tax money from other programs, like defense, to subsidize the Insurance companies, but in time even those subsidies were not enough to keep many of the insurance companies in the plan. Therefore, the cost of insurance began rising with less competition among the insurance companies. Some people in the middle class were priced out and dropped their coverage in favor of paying the lesser tax penalty.

Welfare and medicaid is also institutionalizing laziness and irresponsibility.

It seems to me we agree: People got healthcare because they would rather do that than pay the penalty. That is in fact the substance of my post, and therefore it's substantiated.

As for what Obamacare effectively did for shifting money from defense to insurance firms, that's beside the (current) point, and we can agree or disagree about it at a different point. For now I'd rather get to the bottom of whether repealing the mandate would or would not decrease the number of insured. The preponderance of evidence suggests the number of insured would go down--I'd estimate the probability at about 80%. Most of the smart people I've heard estimate these sorts of things seem to think the probability is higher, but I tend to be conservative in my confidence.

If you hold the contrary view, I'd need to see more and better reasons, and I'd also like to see what your confidence is. It's good to revisit these things after the events have taken place, and see how often you get your confident predictions right.

Please give details on the story about insurance companies leaving the markets and prices increasing due to lack of competition. In particular, it's good to know which companies you have in mind, when they left, and which markets they were in. Then we can try to do an autopsy on exactly why they left.

Welfare and Medicaid may or may not instutionalize laziness--that's a distraction from the current topic, so I won't worry about it here.

[addem]

What the CBO does not take in account, what the pro tax people do not take into account, is the change in BEHAVIOR of people who are affected positively or negatively by tax policy. This is something the fiscally conservative people understand very well. If you want to increase something--spending, investment, business expansion, entrepreneurship, innovation, hiring, etc.--tax it less. If you want to decrease something, tax it more.

A million people paying low taxes will pretty much always produce more in tax revenue than will a hundred people paying high taxes, most especially when those high taxes encourage sheltering money from the tax man and/or putting the money at risk that provides opportunity for there to be many more taxpayers being created at any level.

How do you know that the CBO did not incorporate this factor into their analysis? It is not a foregone conclusion that, if they had, they would get different results from those that they have--in fact, it is entirely possible that they researched that factor thoroughly and the result they published included its effects. The effect may be small or large--how do you know the size of the effect? Precisely what do you estimate to be the size of increased productivity, how do you measure it, what will the precise increase in per-capital income, and how will it balance with the precise loss due to a lower tax rate? What tests have you conducted, or if you've used observational data, what was your standard error, sample size, how did you control for confounding variables, and have your results been published in reputable, peer-reviewed journals, and reproduced by other independent and credentialed studies?

As a conservative and a business owner, I understand the effect that taxes have on spending. As a person with good statistics training, I can also spot bad arguments.

[Hindsite]

It seems to me we agree: People got healthcare because they would rather do that than pay the penalty. That is in fact the substance of my post, and therefore it's substantiated.

Not really, because paying the penalty was a lot cheaper than paying the high cost of Obamacare. So many chose to pay the penalty.

As for what Obamacare effectively did for shifting money from defense to insurance firms, that's beside the (current) point, and we can agree or disagree about it at a different point. For now I'd rather get to the bottom of whether repealing the mandate would or would not decrease the number of insured.

I did not say otherwise, because that would help get rid of Obamacare.

Please give details on the story about insurance companies leaving the markets and prices increasing due to lack of competition.

“Our individual Commercial products lost nearly $700 million between 2014 and 2016, and are projected to lose more than $200 million in 2017 despite a significant reduction in membership,” the company said in a statement. “Those losses are the result of marketplace structural issues that have led to co-op failures and carrier exits, and subsequent risk pool deterioration.”

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/08 ... place.html

[Foxfyre]

How do you know that the CBO did not incorporate this factor into their analysis? It is not a foregone conclusion that, if they had, they would get different results from those that they have--in fact, it is entirely possible that they researched that factor thoroughly and the result they published included its effects. The effect may be small or large--how do you know the size of the effect? Precisely what do you estimate to be the size of increased productivity, how do you measure it, what will the precise increase in per-capital income, and how will it balance with the precise loss due to a lower tax rate? What tests have you conducted, or if you've used observational data, what was your standard error, sample size, how did you control for confounding variables, and have your results been published in reputable, peer-reviewed journals, and reproduced by other independent and credentialed studies?

As a conservative and a business owner, I understand the effect that taxes have on spending. As a person with good statistics training, I can also spot bad arguments.

I know it because they don't do that. They never have. They do their analysis based on the figures given to them and based on the situation as it exists now. And that explains why they are so often wrong.

[Rugoz]

I know it because they don't do that. They never have. They do their analysis based on the figures given to them and based on the situation as it exists now. And that explains why they are so often wrong.

Here you go:

https://www.jct.gov/publications.html?f ... wn&id=5045

[Foxfyre]

Here you go:

https://www.jct.gov/publications.html?f ... wn&id=5045

And this has to do with how the CBO marks up a bill how?

[Rugoz]

And this has to do with how the CBO marks up a bill how?

You wanted an estimate including behavioral effects, you have it.

How about a thank you.

[skinster]

For anyone who wants to read this article, I recommend clicking the link below rather than my copy and paste job because it looks fucked like this.

Media Downplay Class Warfare as ‘GOP Victory’
The fallacy of “neutral,” “both sides” journalism rings loud and clear in corporate media reporting on the Republican Party’s tax plan. The GOP bill, passed by the Senate in the early hours of December 2 and described by major media outlets as a “tax cut,” is in reality an explicit handout to large companies and the ultra-rich that will actually increase taxes on working-class Americans.

But under the cover of a shallow understanding of “balance,” corporate media have internalized the outlandish idea that it is “partisan,” and thus not “neutral,” to acknowledge the undeniably destructive effects of particular political policies. These inconvenient facts are hence not emphasized in news reporting, and cannot be presented alone without being “balanced” with an opposing perspective—even if that contrary view is demonstrably false.

In the case of the GOP legislation, which will slash the corporate tax rate and add some $1.4 trillion to the national debt, the deception took a variety of forms.

The primary distortion, as noted, was portraying the Senate GOP bill as a massive “tax break.” Headlines and reports spoke of “tax cuts” and “tax breaks” vaguely, without indicating that the breaks were not for Americans as a whole, but rather for corporations and the rich.

Reuters (12/2/17): “Senate Approves Major Tax Cuts in Victory for Trump”
New York Times (12/2/17): “Few Hurdles Left, GOP Is Confident Tax Cuts Will Be Signed This Month”
USA Today (12/2/17): “Senate Passes Huge Tax Cuts After Last-Minute Changes; Conference With House Next”

By way of contrast, HuffPost (12/2/17) provided an apt corrective to the vagueness: “Senate Passes Massive Tax Cuts for the Rich in Middle of the Night.” While The Atlantic (12/2/17) had a euphemistic main headline—”Senate Republicans Pass Their Tax Cuts”—the subhead clarified: “The bill slashes corporate tax rates, but millions of middle-class families could face tax increases under the $1.47 trillion bill.”

The Intercept (12/1/17) stressed further, “The GOP Plan Is the Biggest Tax Increase in American History, by Far.” After noting that the bill includes some $6 trillion in tax reductions, largely for corporations and households with annual incomes above $400,000 (i.e. the 1 Percent), reporter Ryan Grim pointed out:

[The bill] gets referred to as only a $1.5 trillion cut because it raises $4.5 trillion in taxes elsewhere. But the key question is who gets a tax hike and who gets a tax cut. Put simply, the bulk of the tax cut is going toward the rich, while the tax increases go to everybody else.

The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a nonpartisan think tank, reported that, “The lowest-earning three-fifths of Americans would pay more on average in federal taxes, while the top 40 percent on average would receive a tax cut,” with the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans receiving an average cut of more than $9,000.

The Institute added, “The legislation is described as tax reform but would cut hundreds of billions of dollars in healthcare spending.” The AARP similarly warned that the Senate GOP bill would trigger up to $25 billion in cuts to Medicare.

It would also add at least $1 trillion to the US federal deficit, according to Congress’ own Joint Committee on Taxation. The nonpartisan Penn Wharton Budget Model estimate is even higher, at an additional $1.4 trillion in government debt. This will no doubt be used to justify massive cuts in social spending, including Social Security and Medicare, which leading Republicans like House Speaker Paul Ryan and Sen. Marco Rubio are already promising to go after.

In other words, the Republican tax-deal-for-the-1-percent is nothing short of class war: The working class will lose even more of the little wealth that it has, and the capitalist class will reap all the benefits. The legislation even includes a tax break for owners of private jets, along with banks and oil companies.

Many reports did highlight some of these deleterious impacts of the tax plan in the body of the story, but they buried the lead. And the majority of Americans do not read past the headline.

Depicting a Working-Class Disaster as a ‘Victory’
Another way corporate media whitewashed the undeniably destructive effects of the Republican tax plan is by portraying it primarily as a “victory” for Trump and the GOP:

Washington Post (12/2/17): “Senate GOP Tax Bill Passes in Major Victory for Trump, Republicans”
BBC (12/2/17): “Tax Bill: Trump Victory as Senate Backs Tax Overhaul”
AOL (12/2/17): “Trump Wins First Major Legislative Victory of Presidency as Senate Passes Republicans’ Tax Reform Bill”
Guardian (12/4/17): “Markets Rally After Trump’s Tax Victory”

It’s striking how little this presentation—from “mainstream” media, supposedly critical of Trump—diverged from that of right-wing outlets that openly support Trump and the GOP, such as Fox News (“Trump Takes Victory Lap After Senate Passes Tax Bill, Calls It ‘Largest Tax Decrease…by Far,'” 12/2/17).

The contradiction was highlighted in a SFGate report (12/2/17) with a headline focused on political gamesmanship—”Senate Narrowly Passes GOP Tax Overhaul Bill in Major Victory for Trump”—but a lead that acknowledged the losses for regular people:

Securing a desperately sought legislative victory for the Trump presidency, the Senate approved a $1.5 trillion tax overhaul Saturday morning that provides massive tax cuts to large corporations and wealthy individuals but could lead to higher tax bills for millions of Californians.

So why not headline the bill’s impact on the vast majority of people? Why showcase the Trump victory angle?

ABC News (12/4/17) likewise exhibited these contradictions within one broadcast. In a segment titled “Tax Bill Seen as Victory by Trump, GOP,” the host said, “Right now the bill is pretty unpopular,” without explaining why or providing any further information.

“This is a big legislative win, the most significant one for the Trump administration thus far, and this is something to take home to your constituents,” declared ABC analyst Meghan McCain. The daughter of neoconservative Sen. John McCain even referred to the Republican Party as “we.”

It was not until further in the segment that ABC analyst Matthew Dowd noted, “Seventy percent of the benefits of this tax bill go to the very wealthy, the top 1 or 2 percent of the country.” Refuting the title of the segment, Dowd added:

This may be a legislative victory, but it’s not a political victory. It’s an unpopular bill, the most unpopular tax bill ever passed, pushed by an unpopular president, passed by an unpopular Congress.

More and More Euphemisms
The ubiquitous term “tax reform” (e.g., CNN, 12/2/17; The Hill, 12/4/17; Politico, 12/5/17; CNBC, 12/5/17) has a misleadingly benevolent connotation—who doesn’t like reform?—so long as media don’t ask who benefits and who is harmed. Likewise other headline language, such as “tax overhaul” or “revision,” that fails to reflect the different impacts of Republicans’ plan:

Reuters (12/2/17): “US Senate Approves Republicans’ Tax Overhaul”
CBS (12/2/17): “Tax Bill: Senate Passes Sweeping Tax Overhaul in Early Morning Vote”
Wall Street Journal (12/2/17): “Senate Passes Sweeping Revision of US Tax Code”

With euphemisms like “mixed bag” and “mixed blessings,” several outlets seemed to gesture weakly toward the massive assault on working-class Americans. Reuters (12/2/17) reported that the “sweeping tax overhaul” will move “Republicans and President Donald Trump a major step closer to their goal of slashing taxes for businesses and the rich while offering everyday Americans a mixed bag of changes.” The Washington Post (12/2/17) noted the bill “bestows extensive benefits on corporate America and the wealthy while delivering mixed blessings to everybody else.”

That “everybody else” is reduced to a subordinate clause perfectly represents how corporate media’s pretense of “balance” barely veils their reflexive positioning on the side of the rich.
https://fair.org/home/media-gop-tax-bil ... fare-rich/

[Hindsite]

For anyone who wants to read this article, I recommend clicking the link below rather than my copy and paste job because it looks fucked like this.

Not much of a balance there with all those fake news outlets. It will be good for me, that is what I count on. HalleluYah

[Godstud]

People who call all the news fake, are fake people who only believe propaganda and their own confirmation bias, so keep it up.

[Drlee]

People who call all the news fake, are fake people who only believe propaganda and their own confirmation bias, so keep it up

True. And some of them are simply not intelligent enough to sort it out.

[Hindsite]

People who call all the news fake, are fake people who only believe propaganda and their own confirmation bias, so keep it up.

I am not calling FOX News fake. Praise the Lord.

[SpecialOlympian]

I posted this in another thread but it's worth sharing here.

As you guys know I work at an investment firm. My boss had a conference call with a sitting US Senator recently and sent out a mass email.

One of the rules they were considering, since they have to keep the tax bill budget neutral, was a rule called FIFO. It stands for First In First Out. That means that when you sell a stock, such as GE, you don't get to choose which stock you sell. If you bought 100 shares of GE every five years over the past 15 you would have three lots of stock. Any sale would have to come from the earliest purchase, which would be very likely to have the lowest cost basis (price at time of purchase). That difference between purchase price and sale price (along with how long you held it, there is a difference between long and short term gains) is how capital gains taxes are calculated.

This wouldn't affect the average working person with a 401k since capital gains tax does not apply to IRAs/401ks.

They're probably going to scrap the FIFO rule. Don't worry though, your state tax deductions are totally going to evaporate to compensate for this. What a wonderful bill that punishes the poor, I could not be more excited! I am so hard right now thinking about the pain this bill will inflict on them. My dick could cut diamonds right now.

[Hindsite]

This wouldn't affect the average working person with a 401k since capital gains tax does not apply to IRAs/401ks.

They're probably going to scrap the FIFO rule. Don't worry though, your state tax deductions are totally going to evaporate to compensate for this. What a wonderful bill that punishes the poor, I could not be more excited! I am so hard right now thinking about the pain this bill will inflict on them. My dick could cut diamonds right now.

The poor do not have IRAs/401ks.

[Drlee]

That bill is still not finished yet. There will be more of these wonderful gems before we are through. The American people, normally pretty clueless about economics on a good day hasn't even figured out yet that this increased standard deduction masks a massive tax increase for anyone with more than two kids.

[Hindsite]

That bill is still not finished yet. There will be more of these wonderful gems before we are through. The American people, normally pretty clueless about economics on a good day hasn't even figured out yet that this increased standard deduction masks a massive tax increase for anyone with more than two kids.

That is because it doesn't.