PILOT SPIN
Spin Zone => Spin Zone => Topic started by: bflynn on June 29, 2017, 08:14:37 PM
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Or will they pull out a deal at the last second?
I've spent some time thinking about this. I've heard "Oh, the people of Illinois love all these programs" and yet...there isn't money to pay for them all. So why don't they raise taxes? Well, because if they do, they'll probably start losing money as they slide down the back side of the Laffer curve. What I hear from that is that the people of Illinois WHO ACTUALLY PAY FOR THE PROGRAMS do not love paying for them and don't value them, because if they did, it would be trivial to raise taxes and raise the revenue. Heck, if the people wanted these programs, they would be sending in extra to make sure they were funded.
Point #2 - the government cannot force the people to pay. Oh, they can raise taxes and collect money, but they can't force people to stay and actually pay.
#3 Should the legislators be voting for these programs? It's a weird twist, but in this case, they really cannot follow what "most" people want, which is that the government give away free money. Even if they want to, the money isn't there and they can't spend what they don't have.
#4 - can the people actually be so ignorant that they don't understand what is happening? Regrettably, yes. Ultimately I think this whole mess is a product of our failed education system. Because the general population does not understand this, all they want is more "free" money. They literally don't understand where the money comes from and they don't care. They just want theirs.
There's a lot more to this - but it's late and I have to work in the morning.
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There's a lot more to this - but it's late and I have to work in the morning.
And pay taxes on the income.
I have to work in the morning AND the afternoon!
;D
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I don't want a Fed Illinois bailout. Let them live with their mismanagement, and vote buying. If the bailout happens then California will be next. Then NY, and other liberal/progressive states will follow. WE will pay for all their CORRUPTION. No thanks!!! >:(
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I don't want a Fed Illinois bailout. Let them live with their mismanagement, and vote buying. If the bailout happens then California will be next. Then NY, and other liberal/progressive states will follow. WE will pay for all their CORRUPTION. No thanks!!! >:(
"Too big to fail". Remember that line?
The republican establishment is bought and paid for. Get ready to see the creative way the rest of the country will be paying to bail out Illinois.
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I have not heard anyone talk about a bailout. Today is seems unlikely that they will make a spending deal and they will enter a period where the Comptroller has been ordered by the courts to spend the majority of cash they have to pay creditors.
The simple bottom line is that the state is limited to how much revenue it can bring in. They have champagne tastes on a beer budget. I think a majority agree that spending must be cut, but they can't agree on what. Therefore, like the Obamacare repeal, they can't even agree on what they agree on. Yet another example of government by children...
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I have not heard anyone talk about a bailout. Today is seems unlikely that they will make a spending deal and they will enter a period where the Comptroller has been ordered by the courts to spend the majority of cash they have to pay creditors.
The simple bottom line is that the state is limited to how much revenue it can bring in. They have champagne tastes on a beer budget. I think a majority agree that spending must be cut, but they can't agree on what. Therefore, like the Obamacare repeal, they can't even agree on what they agree on. Yet another example of government by children...
You haven't heard talk of a bailout yet, because of the shit storm it will create. Like I said earlier, look for a clever tactic to be conjured up to start funneling money into that shithole of a state.
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But another reason for the growing wariness of investors toward Illinois debt emanates from developments in Puerto Rico, which asked for and received legislation from the federal government to assist with its debt burden.
The recent budget put together by the island’s government-—with the blessing of the congressionally appointed Fiscal Oversight Board—revealed that the commonwealth’s plan to reform its finances is to simply stiff its bondholders. The island’s pensioners are largely held harmless and all other expenditures actually increase.
While bondholders fear—and Illinois’ pensioners would presumably welcome—a similar resolution should Illinois go bust, the more important precedent established by Puerto Rico is that when the federal government gets involved, the state’s constitution will get tossed aside. And that should worry both pensioners and taxpayers.
There has been a lot of speculation that Illinois will look to the Feds for debt relief. I believe some of the state politicians are talking about it but I can't find the article.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/will-illinois-need-a-federal-bailout/article/2008648
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There has been a lot of speculation that Illinois will look to the Feds for debt relief. I believe some of the state politicians are talking about it but I can't find the article.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/will-illinois-need-a-federal-bailout/article/2008648
Fuck 'em. If the residents of that state want all kinds of social programs, let them figure out how to pay for it themselves.
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Illinois is a microcosm for everything wrong with liberal democrat control of any government.
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Fuck 'em. If the residents of that state want all kinds of social programs, let them figure out how to pay for it themselves.
The problem is that paying for something yourself is anathema to the concept of social program in the first place. Getting someone else to pay for it is the whole idea, and you keep going up the chain if need be, all the way to the point where the biggest sovereign is printing up worthless paper while your economy collapses. Yay socialism.
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The problem is that paying for something yourself is anathema to the concept of social program in the first place. Getting someone else to pay for it is the whole idea, and you keep going up the chain if need be, all the way to the point where the biggest sovereign is printing up worthless paper while your economy collapses. Yay socialism.
I thought, during the eight long years of Obama we were reliving 1930's Germany.
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I thought, during the eight long years of Obama we were reliving 1930's Germany.
That's where the congressmen, representing their own states, should grow a backbone and say NO! Of course what they will do, is cut a deal in exchange for a similar deal or pork for their own state. Conniving bastards all.
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Don't like what's going on in Illinois? That will be the rest of America soon. We're bleeding red ink every year, the debt is a GDP and growing, the interest will soon be the biggest bill the Fed pays. Illinois, Puerto Rico, the United States. All the same thing. Politicians kick the can instead of making hard choices.
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Don't like what's going on in Illinois? That will be the rest of America soon. We're bleeding red ink every year, the debt is a GDP and growing, the interest will soon be the biggest bill the Fed pays. Illinois, Puerto Rico, the United States. All the same thing. Politicians kick the can instead of making hard choices.
Michael,
We're all quite aware of what Bush and Obama have done to the our debt in the U.S. We damn sure are not in favor of borrowing more worthless money to bail out Illinois because they can't make the hard choices. Their pension fund in under funded to the tune of $250B+ alone.
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https://www.illinoispolicy.org/reports/pensions-101-understanding-illinois-massive-government-worker-pension-crisis/
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This is all caused by government paying their workers way above market wages, benefits, and pensions. Often these public sector workers retire, get a pension, and healthcare for life, then get another government job, retire from that and get a second pension. Pensions should be abolished like the private sector did decades ago, and replaced with 401K programs like everyone else has.
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This is all caused by government paying their workers way above market wages, benefits, and pensions. Often these public sector workers retire, get a pension, and healthcare for life, then get another government job, retire from that and get a second pension. Pensions should be abolished like the private sector did decades ago, and replaced with 401K programs like everyone else has.
My BIL spent 26 years in the Navy and retired then spent some number of years in the State Department at Passport offices and retired again.
A lot of municipal jobs are 20-25 years and retire with good pensions and benefits.
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I lived in Illinois for the first 33 years of my life. The shit hole state is a victim of the Chicago Machine. Michael Madigan has fooled many Republican governors, and it looks like the current governor is next.
My brother still lives there, and feels entirely helpless to change things besides and will soon be moving.
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Don't like what's going on in Illinois? That will be the rest of America soon. We're bleeding red ink every year, the debt is a GDP and growing, the interest will soon be the biggest bill the Fed pays. Illinois, Puerto Rico, the United States. All the same thing. Politicians kick the can instead of making hard choices.
Excellent, so you're on board for the Article V Convention of States to proposed a balanced budget amendment to the US Constitution? Welcome aboard.
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Steingar is against public debt but in favor of the brutally stupid spending on useless degree brought to you by the federal taxpayers.
And he wants draconian taxation to punish success and self reliance to use to fight make believe global warming.
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https://www.illinoispolicy.org/reports/pensions-101-understanding-illinois-massive-government-worker-pension-crisis/
This is good, but slightly misleading: "Government workers who earn generous pension benefits have done nothing wrong. They’ve benefited from labor negotiations that have led to lucrative compensation packages."
Unions were given a choice, you can have a pay raise now or no pay raise and a better pension later. They (management / government) loved the second choice and pushed it since it was no money out of their pocket right now. Unions also loved it since they are not stupid. So both parties happily kicked the can down the road. Now the pensioners are retiring and demanding what was promised to them. OOPS! No money. So sorry.
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draconian taxation to punish success and self reliance
Taxation will never be draconian. It has been proven over and over again that when you remove the incentives to be successful, people will stop doing it. All "draconian" taxation can do is remove rich people from the equation.
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Taxation will never be draconian. It has been proven over and over again that when you remove the incentives to be successful, people will stop doing it. All "draconian" taxation can do is remove rich people from the equation.
You have got to be kidding me. It is already draconian. When the total tax burden some of us pay approach, or even eclipse 50% then I would not only call that draconian, but akin to indentured servitude.
Fed Income Tax
State Income Tax
Local Income Tax
Sales Tax
Property, and Real Estate Taxes
Gasoline, and other fuel and energy taxes
Utility taxes
Occupational Privilege Tax
Obamacare Tax
The list goes on an on. Look at your cell phone bill, and other bills. There are taxes, and government driven "fees" on everything.
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Taxation will never be draconian. It has been proven over and over again that when you remove the incentives to be successful, people will stop doing it. All "draconian" taxation can do is remove rich people from the equation.
What happens once they remove all the rich people?
They will raise taxes on everybody else that still has a job. Except there will be very few job, so the taxes will eventually have to become draconian.
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Taxation will never be draconian. It has been proven over and over again that when you remove the incentives to be successful, people will stop doing it. All "draconian" taxation can do is remove rich people from the equation.
I agree with Anthony except I think it's well over 60% now. You are right that it removes the incentives to be successful but not sure what you mean by it removes rich people from the equation. Do you mean they move their money overseas to avoid the tax?
And you are right it has been proven over and over that draconian taxation is the eventual death of an economy, but those who promote it don't care. They still do it for the votes. I'm not really following your logic here.
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All of these teases we pay yet the government can't take care of the infrastructure. They build it and think it will just last forever without maintenance. When it is ready to collapse we suddenly care about it and turn it into a crisis.
Such a failure of government on a grand scale.
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This is all caused by government paying their workers way above market wages, benefits, and pensions. Often these public sector workers retire [at age 45] , get a pension [padded by "overtime" the last few years], and [family] healthcare for life, then get another [no show] government job, retire from that and get a second pension [double dipping]. Pensions should be abolished like the private sector did decades ago, and replaced with 401K programs like everyone else has.
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All of these teases we pay yet the government can't take care of the infrastructure. They build it and think it will just last forever without maintenance.
That used to drive me INSANE when I worked for the school system. They'd get the voters to approve big building bonds and build these schools with all sorts of new features like computer labs, then dump the things on the county regular property tax budget to upkeep and maintain. Did they inform the voters "Oh by the way, we'll be jacking up your regular property tax on top of this, indefinitely, to cover all the maintenance these new buildings are going to require."? Of course not, and it was never enough. I saw fancy new computer labs go without software upgrades, hardware repair, etc. a couple years down the road and I saw a lot of waste because of this. It was very sad.
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http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/06/illinois_dems_submit_another_fantasy_budget_amid_talk_of_federal_bailout.html
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The people of the state of Illinois would be best suited if the state simply went under and ceased to exist as a state. The census bureau could then divide the population into other states and let America move on without them.
Then when California and New York,a long with Mass. go the same route we will have a road map for how to proceed. Then Chuck-you Schumer and Elizabeth Warren can try and win senate seats in a larger land mass with more potential for fraud and vote buying schemes on the part of the party of fraud.
IF a state can't continue to fund itself, it needs to go away, just like the old USSR.
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Using the Democrat's Open Border login, why do we have states at all? If they don't want Federal Borders to mean anything why should states exist at all? Why should the U.S. even be a sovereign country? We should just be a big, open territory with stuff contained in it.
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Using the Democrat's Open Border login, why do we have states at all? If they don't want Federal Borders to mean anything why should states exist at all? Why should the U.S. even be a sovereign country? We should just be a big, open territory with stuff contained in it.
I believe the no-borders progressives have some sort of utopian idea that humanity is one big happy family, despite reality firmly demonstrating otherwise. It's such an enigma, how progressives talk about how great nature is, yet seem to have such a blind spot about how natural it is for man to be territorial.
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I believe the no-borders progressives have some sort of utopian idea that humanity is one big happy family, despite reality firmly demonstrating otherwise. It's such an enigma, how progressives talk about how great nature is, yet seem to have such a blind spot about how natural it is for man to be territorial.
Plenty of Libertarians are open-border proponents.
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Plenty of Libertarians are open-border proponents.
But...but...but.....
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But...but...but.....
But nothing. Free immigration is a more Libertarian idea than Liberal. It is often regarded as one of their core concepts. Rich from POA did some writing on his open borders ideas that I wish I could still access.
PS - I'm not a proponent. Not familiar enough yet with the idea to believe that it's a good idea.
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But nothing. Free immigration is a more Libertarian idea than Liberal. It is often regarded as one of their core concepts. Rich from POA did some writing on his open borders ideas that I wish I could still access.
I don't know many Libertarians that advocate for open borders, however that does not mean some do. To me Open Borders means that you do not want a sovereign nation, no national defense, etc. I don't get it.
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Plenty of Libertarians are open-border proponents.
Yes. First of all there are libertarians and then there are libertarians, almost opposing definitions of one another.
But I'll start with myself. I am more a libertarian than anything else. Being such, as a young idealist, I was always pro open trade. It's best for the consumer to have the most choices, this leads to the natural settlement of prices on the intersection of the demand/supply curve to make everyone win-win.
It is also best to allow unfettered immigration. (Again, libertarian theory.) If you think of it like air filling a vacuum, when there is a market need for employees, or for more private enterprise because of a growing population and thriving economy, and there are places in the world where there is an overpopulation and no work opportunities, humans will migrate to the locations needing more humans. This eases the pressure on the sending side and it fills the needs on the receiving side. All well and good, right? Pure libertarian philosophy, believing in minimal rule from above and maximum freedom of the individual, suggests no borders is the ideal condition that leads to maximum happiness for all.
Well like all purist ideas, this doesn't work so well in the real world. Take trade with China for an example. Because of completely different political, regulatory and monetary landscapes, instead of benefiting everyone, it has become a complete disaster for the U.S. and a pretty good thing for China, and a very unbalanced thing overall. The prices cannot settle on the demand/supply curve to make a win-win for all, because the curve is corrupted by these differences. There is not a level playing field, and this is the problem with ideals. (They often assume things not real.)
The same with immigration, it is a mix of good and bad, it is not, as a purist libertarian might argue, always a total good thing to allow individuals to move and live where ever they want. You can never have a utopia and that includes a libertarian utopia. If you believe open borders leads to the best overall result, you must assume everyone else holds your ideal of libertarian freedom. But they don't. For example, if your open borders allows a lot of fundamentalist Muslims in, they'll eventually vote in Sharia law, and where are your libertarian liberties now?
Natural law trumps all, including libertarian, or any other, political philosophy. And natural law leads humans to invade and destroy; cultural destruction by immigration counts as that. So I have come to see that this given group of humans (the U.S.) must protect and defend itself from anything that will transform us away from whatever it is that makes us the most free and prosperous nation in the world.
This does not mean I am against immigration. It means I am against illegal, uncontrolled, excessive immigration from groups who will not assimilate and adapt the values that make us what we are.
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But nothing. Free immigration is a more Libertarian idea than Liberal. It is often regarded as one of their core concepts.
Yup that is true.
I don't know many Libertarians that advocate for open borders, however that does not mean some do. To me Open Borders means that you do not want a sovereign nation, no national defense, etc. I don't get it.
Also true. As I explained in my big post. Libertarians who are not starry eyed idealists modify their position to fit the real world.
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That used to drive me INSANE when I worked for the school system. They'd get the voters to approve big building bonds and build these schools with all sorts of new features like computer labs, then dump the things on the county regular property tax budget to upkeep and maintain. Did they inform the voters "Oh by the way, we'll be jacking up your regular property tax on top of this, indefinitely, to cover all the maintenance these new buildings are going to require."? Of course not, and it was never enough. I saw fancy new computer labs go without software upgrades, hardware repair, etc. a couple years down the road and I saw a lot of waste because of this. It was very sad.
Its worse than that. In Wisconsin school districts have been having bonding referendums that include normal, recurring operation costs, in addition to the debt service costs. Scott Walker is working to rein that in, but up to this point it has been conservative talk radio in SE Wisconsin that has had to educate people on what is included in these referendums, and a surprising number of them have properly failed. Of course the school districts come back to the well with another referendum the next cycle, albeit with better marketing to hide the true nature of what these things are funding.
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Its worse than that. In Wisconsin school districts have been having bonding referendums that include normal, recurring operation costs, in addition to the debt service costs. Scott Walker is working to rein that in, but up to this point it has been conservative talk radio in SE Wisconsin that has had to educate people on what is included in these referendums, and a surprising number of them have properly failed. Of course the school districts come back to the well with another referendum the next cycle, albeit with better marketing to hide the true nature of what these things are funding.
And behind it all is compulsery education plus population growth. Kids must attend school whether they want to or not, whether they have the intellectual capacity for it or not, whether their family really needs extra income they could be earning or not (moot anyway since we now deprive teens of jobs).
School systems are mandated to provide these projects. I saw it from the inside, the struggle to fund it all. The whole concept of "free" public education not just for those who wish it but for everyone is fundamentally unsustainable. Add on that are all the unfunded mandates and bullshit program creep. We have to add classes on "character development" we have to add expensive additional wings because of such vagaries as "we can't have the kindergarten next to the fifth grade because the big kids bully the little ones." We have to build expensive car pickup loops separated from the bus loop because nobody walks to school anymore and we can't have the buses and cars mixing. We can't have cheaper two story buildings because you can't be requiring little kids to walk up and down stairs (!!!!) so you have to buy more land and have a bigger foorptint and on and on and on. The "program designers" and the state education board directing it all from the back seat had no real concept of staying within budget, that was our job in the construction department. I don't know how many times I sat in meetings repeating "that will put us over budget" and got "but we really need this" from the programmer who then went and got approval from the department head and I will leave off speculating what went on behind that closed door. Of course the money had to come from somewhere. Usually it came from downgrading the actual building hence the ugly institutional look, narrow hallways, cheaper materials.
And that's all before you even get to maintaining it for 50 years. Repairs and maintenance for the cheaper initial construction- kick the can down the road. No wonder the taxpayers are being sucked dry. No connection at all between those paying for it and those deciding how much to fluff up the projects. And if the voters vote NO to the bonds? Then their property tax will be jacked up multiple times higher sooner because they voted down borrowing the money, because the school HAS to be built because of compulsory education plus population growth.