Monday, October 31, 2011
Immigration -- Illegal, of course....
As a relatively independent observer of American politics and immigration policies in that I am certainly as American as anyone else in this nation and I'm not personally affected by how many immigrants, legal or otherwise, this nation has, I feel quite free to express my unbiased opinion on this subject. I should mention that my ancestors were here well over one hundred years before the United States became a nation since they arrived here in the mid 1600's when we were yet an English colony.
Over the couple of centuries our nation has existed, there have been many influxes of immigrants, legal and otherwise to help create the nation we now have. Peoples from all over the world, blacks from Africa, usually against their will, Chinese who helped build our western railroads, Germans and Russian Jews, and many other peoples, especially the Irish in the 1850's who were starving after they lost their potato crops in Ireland and the English didn't attempt to help them. And then there were the indigenous folks called Indians who were incessantly forced at gun point west by American settlers who proclaimed that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian"! I heard this as a child in Montana where I lived across the river from a reservation, so we're not talking about ancient history!
We fought wars with Spain and then with Mexico to gain even more land, and even [reluctantly after three refusals] allowed the nation of Texas to join our confederacy of states. But we had nothing but disdain and contempt for the Indians of those lands we had acquired.
So when they cross the Mexican border because they are so impoverished in Mexico, despite their willingness to work hard at very menial jobs, we call them 'illegal immigrants' regardless of the fact that these lands which we stole from them were originally their homelands!
So, of course, we can pass all sorts of laws which justify their illegality, but we can't do so without proving to ourselves and the rest of the world that we are a merciless, greedy people who are only interested in our own welfare at everyone else's expense! ....after all, we are Americans and are certainly better than anyone else! I'm sure the folks in Rome thought the same as they put Christians in the ring with the lions.
So, finally, there was this article in US News and World Report which prompted my reflections above.
A Divided Country
By Kira Zalan [US News and World Report, 10-28-11]
For the second year in a row, a record number of illegal immigrants, nearly 400,000, have been deported by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The Obama administration credits the expansion of its Secure Communities program, a law enforcement information-sharing tool. The Warren Institute at the University of California–Berkeley School of Law used government data obtained through the Freedom of Information Act to analyze recent immigration enforcement statistics. The report’s lead author and director of immigration policy at the Warren Institute, Aarti Kohli, recently spoke with U.S. News about its findings, which include evidence of racial profiling, lack of due process in deportations, and the social implications of these trends.
What was the catalyst for this report?
Immigration enforcement programs in the interior of the United States have increased exponentially in the past decade. And we feel like these programs are understudied. There’s very little academic research on how they work, what the impacts are.
What did you find?
One of the most disturbing findings was that U.S. citizens were being arrested under the [Secure Communities] program. Approximately 3,600 U.S. citizens have been apprehended by ICE. We also found that almost 40 percent of the people identified for deportation programs have a U.S. citizen family member, either a spouse or a child.
Why is that important?
This is a really disturbing finding. Anecdotally, you hear a lot about family separations. I think for society at large it’s important to understand what are the future consequences of having these divided families. You report that a majority of those deported don’t have access to counsel. Is that legal? It is legal and what we call into question is not the legality of it but whether that comports with our system of justice and fairness. It’s very problematic that these people are being deported without due process of law.
Did you find evidence of racial profiling?
What we found was that Latinos are highly overrepresented in our samples. There have been other community groups who have raised this issue that perhaps some police are engaging in pretextual arrests because they know, once I get this person to the jail there will be an immigration check. So if an officer is interested in engaging in racial profiling, or targeting “illegals,” then this is a tool for that person.
What’s the problem with racial profiling?
We have more than 40 million lawfully residing Latinos in this country and they have dispersed demographically So you have new communities who have been exposed to a lot of rhetoric about immigration but may not understand all the realities and that a fair number of Latinos are actually lawfully residing here.
Is immigration politicized?
The reality is we have approximately 11 million undocumented people living in this country. Eighty percent of these people entered before the year 2000. Undocumented immigrants are an easy population for some politicians to demonize, but the reality is many of them have been and continue to be members of our society and have roots here.
Does this affect President Obama’s popularity among Latino voters?
I think the high number of deportations and this targeting of individuals at the local level is a real issue for the Latino community. There are a lot of questions about this strategy and its efficacy. So I think it’s a real issue for the administration.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
First look at US pay data, it’s awful
I think this information should be presented to every American citizen who is not illiterate nor ultra wealthy. This is our nation and what happens to it is our responsibility! However, we can not rule properly unless we know the truth about our economy and our livelihood and the welfare of our families.
David Johnston has provided the stark facts of our economy posted by our government which most of us can easily understand -- and without 30-second political promos! Those of us willing to read this just might change our minds about things in the 2012 elections... for your sake, not mine.
David Johnston has provided the stark facts of our economy posted by our government which most of us can easily understand -- and without 30-second political promos! Those of us willing to read this just might change our minds about things in the 2012 elections... for your sake, not mine.
Anyone who wants to understand the enduring nature of Occupy Wall Street and similar protests across the country need only look at the first official data on 2010 paychecks, which the U.S. government posted on the Internet on Wednesday.
The figures from payroll taxes reported to the Social Security Administration on jobs and pay are, in a word, awful.
These are important and powerful figures. Maybe the reason the government does not announce their release — and so far I am the only journalist who writes about them each year — is the data show how the United States smolders while Washington fiddles.
There were fewer jobs and they paid less last year, except at the very top where, the number of people making more than $1 million increased by 20 percent over 2009.
The median paycheck — half made more, half less — fell again in 2010, down 1.2 percent to $26,364. That works out to $507 a week, the lowest level, after adjusting for inflation, since 1999.
The number of Americans with any work fell again last year, down by more than a half million from 2009 to less than 150.4 million.
More significantly, the number of people with any work has fallen by 5.2 million since 2007, when the worst recession since the Great Depression began, with a massive taxpayer bailout of Wall Street following in late 2008.
This means 3.3 percent of people who had a job in 2007, or one in every3330, went all of 2010 without earning a dollar. (Update: the original version of this column used the wrong ratio.)
In addition to the 5.2 million people who no longer have any work add roughly 4.5 million people who, due to population growth, would normally join the workforce in three years and you have close to 10 million workers who did not find even an hour of paid work in 2010.
SIX TRILLION DOLLARS
These figures come from the Medicare tax database at the Social Security Administration, which processes every W-2 wage form. All wages, salaries, bonuses, independent contractor net income and other compensation for services subject to the Medicare tax are added up to the penny.
In 2010 total wages and salaries came to $6,009,831,055,912.11.
That’s a bit more than $6 trillion. Adjusted for inflation, that is less than each of the previous four years and almost identical to 2005, when the U.S. population was 4.2 percent smaller.
While median pay — the halfway point on the salary ladder declined, average pay rose because of continuing increases at the top. Average pay was $39,959 last year, up $46 — or less than a buck a week — compared with 2009. Average pay peaked in 2007 at $40,764, which is $15 a week more than average weekly wage income in 2010.
The number of workers making $1 million or more rose to almost 94,000 from 78,000 in 2009. However, that was still below some earlier years, including 2007, when more than 110,000 workers made more than $1 million each.
At the very top, the number of workers making more than $50 million rose in 2010 to 81, up from 72 the year before. But average pay in this group declined $4.5 million to $79.6 million.
What these figures tell us is that there was a reason voters responded in the fall of 2010 to the Republican promise that if given control of Congress they would focus on one thing: jobs.
But while Republicans were swept into the majority in the House of Representatives, that promise has been ignored.
Not only has no jobs bill been enacted since January, but the House will not even bring up for a vote the jobs bill sponsored by President Obama. His bill is far from perfect, but where is the promised Republican legislation to get people back to work?
Instead of jobs, the focus on Capitol Hill is on tax cuts for corporations with untaxed profits held offshore, on continuing the temporary Bush administration tax cuts — especially for those making $1 million or more – and on cutting federal spending, which mean destroying more jobs in the short run.
At the same time, nonfinancial companies are sitting on more than $2 trillion of cash — nearly $7,000 per American — with no place to invest it profitably. This money cannot even be invested to earn the rate of inflation.
All this capital is sitting on the sidelines waiting for profitable opportunities to be invested, which will not and cannot happen until more people have jobs and wages rise, creating increased demand for goods and services.
More of the same approach we have had for most of the last three decades and all of the last ten years is not going to increase demand, create more jobs or enable overall prosperity. In the long run, continuing current policies will make even the richest among us less well off than they would be in a robust economy with government policies that foster job creation and the capital investment that grows from increased demand.
On top of this are the societal problems caused by something the United States has never experienced before, except during the Depression — chronic, long-term unemployment.
Having millions who want work go years without a single day on a payroll is more than just a waste of talent and time. It also can change social attitudes about work and not for the better.
The data show why protests like Occupy Wall Street have so quickly gained momentum around the country, as people who cannot find work try to focus the federal government on creating jobs and dealing with the banking sector that many demonstrators blame for the lack of jobs.
Will official Washington look at the numbers and change course? Or do voters need to change their elected representatives if they want to put America back on a path to widespread prosperity?
(Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh)
The figures from payroll taxes reported to the Social Security Administration on jobs and pay are, in a word, awful.
These are important and powerful figures. Maybe the reason the government does not announce their release — and so far I am the only journalist who writes about them each year — is the data show how the United States smolders while Washington fiddles.
There were fewer jobs and they paid less last year, except at the very top where, the number of people making more than $1 million increased by 20 percent over 2009.
The median paycheck — half made more, half less — fell again in 2010, down 1.2 percent to $26,364. That works out to $507 a week, the lowest level, after adjusting for inflation, since 1999.
The number of Americans with any work fell again last year, down by more than a half million from 2009 to less than 150.4 million.
More significantly, the number of people with any work has fallen by 5.2 million since 2007, when the worst recession since the Great Depression began, with a massive taxpayer bailout of Wall Street following in late 2008.
This means 3.3 percent of people who had a job in 2007, or one in every
In addition to the 5.2 million people who no longer have any work add roughly 4.5 million people who, due to population growth, would normally join the workforce in three years and you have close to 10 million workers who did not find even an hour of paid work in 2010.
SIX TRILLION DOLLARS
These figures come from the Medicare tax database at the Social Security Administration, which processes every W-2 wage form. All wages, salaries, bonuses, independent contractor net income and other compensation for services subject to the Medicare tax are added up to the penny.
In 2010 total wages and salaries came to $6,009,831,055,912.11.
That’s a bit more than $6 trillion. Adjusted for inflation, that is less than each of the previous four years and almost identical to 2005, when the U.S. population was 4.2 percent smaller.
While median pay — the halfway point on the salary ladder declined, average pay rose because of continuing increases at the top. Average pay was $39,959 last year, up $46 — or less than a buck a week — compared with 2009. Average pay peaked in 2007 at $40,764, which is $15 a week more than average weekly wage income in 2010.
The number of workers making $1 million or more rose to almost 94,000 from 78,000 in 2009. However, that was still below some earlier years, including 2007, when more than 110,000 workers made more than $1 million each.
At the very top, the number of workers making more than $50 million rose in 2010 to 81, up from 72 the year before. But average pay in this group declined $4.5 million to $79.6 million.
What these figures tell us is that there was a reason voters responded in the fall of 2010 to the Republican promise that if given control of Congress they would focus on one thing: jobs.
But while Republicans were swept into the majority in the House of Representatives, that promise has been ignored.
Not only has no jobs bill been enacted since January, but the House will not even bring up for a vote the jobs bill sponsored by President Obama. His bill is far from perfect, but where is the promised Republican legislation to get people back to work?
Instead of jobs, the focus on Capitol Hill is on tax cuts for corporations with untaxed profits held offshore, on continuing the temporary Bush administration tax cuts — especially for those making $1 million or more – and on cutting federal spending, which mean destroying more jobs in the short run.
At the same time, nonfinancial companies are sitting on more than $2 trillion of cash — nearly $7,000 per American — with no place to invest it profitably. This money cannot even be invested to earn the rate of inflation.
All this capital is sitting on the sidelines waiting for profitable opportunities to be invested, which will not and cannot happen until more people have jobs and wages rise, creating increased demand for goods and services.
More of the same approach we have had for most of the last three decades and all of the last ten years is not going to increase demand, create more jobs or enable overall prosperity. In the long run, continuing current policies will make even the richest among us less well off than they would be in a robust economy with government policies that foster job creation and the capital investment that grows from increased demand.
On top of this are the societal problems caused by something the United States has never experienced before, except during the Depression — chronic, long-term unemployment.
Having millions who want work go years without a single day on a payroll is more than just a waste of talent and time. It also can change social attitudes about work and not for the better.
The data show why protests like Occupy Wall Street have so quickly gained momentum around the country, as people who cannot find work try to focus the federal government on creating jobs and dealing with the banking sector that many demonstrators blame for the lack of jobs.
Will official Washington look at the numbers and change course? Or do voters need to change their elected representatives if they want to put America back on a path to widespread prosperity?
(Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh)
COMMENT
See all comments (76) | Add comment
Capitalism is not dead-only a fool/communist would make this claim! People need incentives to work, take risks/innovate or they’ll just pick the lowest fruit/take the path of least resistance and the rest will get stuck with the bill and resent it-ask Europe and see all of history! Capitalism is far from perfect and is broken bad, but it’s still the best model on planet earth!
Posted by DrJJJJ | Report as abusive
Tax repatriation
By David Cay Johnston
The author is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.
The practice of favoring big corporations seems likely to take a costly leap forward soon, if Congress passes an $80 billion tax holiday for a handful of U.S. multinational corporations with untaxed profits overseas.
Sponsors of legislation to grant the holiday, which is gaining support in Congress, say it would encourage these companies to repatriate their profits, giving an infusion of cash to the sluggish U.S. economy that will create jobs.
But this ignores the negative impact on the losers: the other 99 percent of corporations who are not eligible for such a deal. Then there are the legions of workers likely to be pink-slipped, and taxpayers generally, who will have to make up the shortfall with more taxes and fewer services.
There are smarter ways to deal with the $1.4 trillion of U.S. profits sitting offshore and avoiding the U.S. corporate income tax. We’ll get to those solutions. But first, here are some facts on how the system works.
Companies license the rights to pharmaceuticals, software and other intellectual property to offshore subsidiaries, or they engage in cost-sharing arrangements with these offshore units.
The subsidiaries then charge the U.S. parent royalties and other fees, which the parent can count as tax-deductible expenses in the United States. And the subsidiaries take their profits in entities known as “tax nothings,” so-called because they are invisible to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service. So long as the profits are indefinitely reinvested offshore, no tax is due. The problem arises when the companies want to bring the profits back to the United States. That is where a tax holiday comes in.
PFIZER TOP OF LIST IN ’04
When Congress passed a similar tax holiday in 2004, the biggest beneficiary was drug manufacturing giant Pfizer Inc , according to a report to Congress by the IRS in June 2008. Pfizer brought back $37 billion and saved $11 billion in taxes.
Since then, the company has piled up another $42.5 billion in untaxed profits overseas, its disclosure statement at the end of last year showed.
Pfizer is among several companies lobbying Congress for another holiday for untaxed offshore profits. It and other firms want an 85 percent tax rate discount. Under the bill before Congress — offered by senators John McCain, a Republican, and Kay Hagan, a Democrat — the discount would be 75 percent.
Are our politicians unaware that the biggest businesses, and the wealthiest business owners, already bear lighter tax burdens than those who make less?
Business owners who make more than $5 million from all sources pay lower median and average tax rates than those who make as little as $350,000, a new study by the Congressional Research Service shows.
Congress listens most to those who lobby and make campaign donations, so the other 99 percent of corporations and business owners, like the 99 percent of taxpayers, tend to get the burden, not the benefit, of tax favors.
BRONZE PLATES
Nearly 2,500 years ago, the Romans stopped the rich and powerful from twisting the law for their own benefit by publishing the Twelve Tables, bronze plates that set forth a host of laws. It had taken the illiterate Roman plebeians, the ancient 99 percent, two centuries of demonstrations to get the laws in writing.
Today’s 99 percent can read, but tax law is so difficult to decipher that it may as well be written in Latin.
And, as the tax holiday bill shows, the ancient problem of the rich twisting the law for their own benefit endures.
I cannot fathom any legitimate reason to reward companies for using tax havens to delay the payment of taxes.
Doing so would be unfair to every purely domestic U.S. company, which cannot take advantage of this proposed act of favoritism, and to every individual taxpayer.
Then there’s the issue of jobs. In 2004, Congress gave 843 companies an 85 percent tax break on untaxed profits parked offshore. Republican Sen. John Ensign said that law, called the American Jobs Creation Act, would create 660,000 jobs.
Instead, many companies destroyed jobs. Pfizer shed 48,000 workers between the end of 2003 and the end of 2009, its annual reports show.
Asked to comment, Pfizer said it could not quantify the effect of the 2004 law, not least because of its acquisition of Pharmacia, the maker of arthritis drug Celebrex, the year before. “Given the number of significant events occurring during this period, including changes to the healthcare industry landscape, Pfizer’s acquisition of Pharmacia, and the economic downturn, it is not possible to say with any certainty the number of jobs created or lost,” Pfizer said in a statement.
Overall, the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal think tank, estimated that 600,000 jobs were destroyed by the 2004 law. Other studies show more than 100,000 jobs lost.
Democratic Senator Carl Levin, who chairs the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, released a report last week saying there is “no evidence that the previous repatriation tax giveaway put Americans to work, and substantial evidence that it instead grew executive paychecks, propped up stock prices, and drew more money and jobs offshore.”
OFFSHORE TAX PENALTY?
There is a smarter approach, one that would help with the United States‘ economic and fiscal woes:
Congress should impose a 50 percent tax on untaxed offshore profits earned in 2010 and earlier, unless they are repatriated by Dec. 31. Companies that repatriate would pay the standard 35 percent corporate income tax rate. If companies do nothing, which is unlikely, the measure would raise about $700 billion, slashing the deficit this fiscal year by 63 percent.
Second, Congress should require that, to escape the 50 percent tax, any repatriated profits be immediately paid out as dividends — on top of any existing dividends paid in 2011. Not all dividends would be taxed immediately, because many shares are held in pension funds and endowments. But the flow of cash would help the economy because, after all, the tax holiday sponsors say a flood of cash from overseas is just what the economy needs.
The author is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.
The practice of favoring big corporations seems likely to take a costly leap forward soon, if Congress passes an $80 billion tax holiday for a handful of U.S. multinational corporations with untaxed profits overseas.
Sponsors of legislation to grant the holiday, which is gaining support in Congress, say it would encourage these companies to repatriate their profits, giving an infusion of cash to the sluggish U.S. economy that will create jobs.
But this ignores the negative impact on the losers: the other 99 percent of corporations who are not eligible for such a deal. Then there are the legions of workers likely to be pink-slipped, and taxpayers generally, who will have to make up the shortfall with more taxes and fewer services.
There are smarter ways to deal with the $1.4 trillion of U.S. profits sitting offshore and avoiding the U.S. corporate income tax. We’ll get to those solutions. But first, here are some facts on how the system works.
Companies license the rights to pharmaceuticals, software and other intellectual property to offshore subsidiaries, or they engage in cost-sharing arrangements with these offshore units.
The subsidiaries then charge the U.S. parent royalties and other fees, which the parent can count as tax-deductible expenses in the United States. And the subsidiaries take their profits in entities known as “tax nothings,” so-called because they are invisible to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service. So long as the profits are indefinitely reinvested offshore, no tax is due. The problem arises when the companies want to bring the profits back to the United States. That is where a tax holiday comes in.
PFIZER TOP OF LIST IN ’04
When Congress passed a similar tax holiday in 2004, the biggest beneficiary was drug manufacturing giant Pfizer Inc , according to a report to Congress by the IRS in June 2008. Pfizer brought back $37 billion and saved $11 billion in taxes.
Since then, the company has piled up another $42.5 billion in untaxed profits overseas, its disclosure statement at the end of last year showed.
Pfizer is among several companies lobbying Congress for another holiday for untaxed offshore profits. It and other firms want an 85 percent tax rate discount. Under the bill before Congress — offered by senators John McCain, a Republican, and Kay Hagan, a Democrat — the discount would be 75 percent.
Are our politicians unaware that the biggest businesses, and the wealthiest business owners, already bear lighter tax burdens than those who make less?
Business owners who make more than $5 million from all sources pay lower median and average tax rates than those who make as little as $350,000, a new study by the Congressional Research Service shows.
Congress listens most to those who lobby and make campaign donations, so the other 99 percent of corporations and business owners, like the 99 percent of taxpayers, tend to get the burden, not the benefit, of tax favors.
BRONZE PLATES
Nearly 2,500 years ago, the Romans stopped the rich and powerful from twisting the law for their own benefit by publishing the Twelve Tables, bronze plates that set forth a host of laws. It had taken the illiterate Roman plebeians, the ancient 99 percent, two centuries of demonstrations to get the laws in writing.
Today’s 99 percent can read, but tax law is so difficult to decipher that it may as well be written in Latin.
And, as the tax holiday bill shows, the ancient problem of the rich twisting the law for their own benefit endures.
I cannot fathom any legitimate reason to reward companies for using tax havens to delay the payment of taxes.
Doing so would be unfair to every purely domestic U.S. company, which cannot take advantage of this proposed act of favoritism, and to every individual taxpayer.
Then there’s the issue of jobs. In 2004, Congress gave 843 companies an 85 percent tax break on untaxed profits parked offshore. Republican Sen. John Ensign said that law, called the American Jobs Creation Act, would create 660,000 jobs.
Instead, many companies destroyed jobs. Pfizer shed 48,000 workers between the end of 2003 and the end of 2009, its annual reports show.
Asked to comment, Pfizer said it could not quantify the effect of the 2004 law, not least because of its acquisition of Pharmacia, the maker of arthritis drug Celebrex, the year before. “Given the number of significant events occurring during this period, including changes to the healthcare industry landscape, Pfizer’s acquisition of Pharmacia, and the economic downturn, it is not possible to say with any certainty the number of jobs created or lost,” Pfizer said in a statement.
Overall, the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal think tank, estimated that 600,000 jobs were destroyed by the 2004 law. Other studies show more than 100,000 jobs lost.
Democratic Senator Carl Levin, who chairs the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, released a report last week saying there is “no evidence that the previous repatriation tax giveaway put Americans to work, and substantial evidence that it instead grew executive paychecks, propped up stock prices, and drew more money and jobs offshore.”
OFFSHORE TAX PENALTY?
There is a smarter approach, one that would help with the United States‘ economic and fiscal woes:
Congress should impose a 50 percent tax on untaxed offshore profits earned in 2010 and earlier, unless they are repatriated by Dec. 31. Companies that repatriate would pay the standard 35 percent corporate income tax rate. If companies do nothing, which is unlikely, the measure would raise about $700 billion, slashing the deficit this fiscal year by 63 percent.
Second, Congress should require that, to escape the 50 percent tax, any repatriated profits be immediately paid out as dividends — on top of any existing dividends paid in 2011. Not all dividends would be taxed immediately, because many shares are held in pension funds and endowments. But the flow of cash would help the economy because, after all, the tax holiday sponsors say a flood of cash from overseas is just what the economy needs.
COMMENT
Ugh! As soon as someone mentions offshore assets, people get hysterical and come up with ludicrous proposals to force corporations to bring the money home and subject profits that were already subject to foreign tax, to a separate batch of dividend taxes. Ridiculous moves like this will only encourage corporations to redomicile elsewhere. Even though offshore tax havens are notoriously high cost places to conduct actual business, if policymakers push hard enough, it might just become economical to move whole corporate headquarters abroad.
The whole discussion assumes that all international corporate tax planning involves shifting profits to a mailbox beside a sandy beach in a low-rate tax haven. While I don’t deny that some of that does happen (and should be audited heavily), a lot of international corporate tax planning revolves around more mundane concerns, like how to fund a business’s international operations.
As a general principle, tax should only be paid on income once, in the jurisdiction in which it is earned when it is earned. America subjects income that was earned abroad, regardless of whether it was active business income, or passive investment income, to full taxation when the corporation seeks to repatriate it. Double tax is the real injustice, and the reason why corporations continue to defer repatriation.
At the very least, America should allow corporations to claim credits for previously paid foreign tax against the repatriation taxes. Better still would be to allow profit legitimately earned through active business operations to return tax free.
The whole discussion assumes that all international corporate tax planning involves shifting profits to a mailbox beside a sandy beach in a low-rate tax haven. While I don’t deny that some of that does happen (and should be audited heavily), a lot of international corporate tax planning revolves around more mundane concerns, like how to fund a business’s international operations.
As a general principle, tax should only be paid on income once, in the jurisdiction in which it is earned when it is earned. America subjects income that was earned abroad, regardless of whether it was active business income, or passive investment income, to full taxation when the corporation seeks to repatriate it. Double tax is the real injustice, and the reason why corporations continue to defer repatriation.
At the very least, America should allow corporations to claim credits for previously paid foreign tax against the repatriation taxes. Better still would be to allow profit legitimately earned through active business operations to return tax free.
Posted by pheebel_wimpe | Report as abusive
Pipeline profiteering
By David Cay Johnston
The opinions expressed are his own.
Last year a fourth of the nation’s oil pipelines earned excessive profits, at up to seven times the rates allowed these regulated monopolies, according to an explosive analysis prepared by a former general counsel for the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
R. Gordon Gooch, the former counsel, alleges in his Oct. 3 study, for instance, that Sunoco’s Mid-Valley Pipeline, which carries crude oil from Texas to Michigan, earned a 55 percent return on assets. That is seven times its authorized profit margin, based on a calculation derived from an accounting report the company filed with FERC.
Three other regulated monopoly pipelines earned more than 40 percent on their assets, while another three earned more than 30 percent, an examination of their FERC filings by Reuters shows.
To put that level of profitability into context, overall nonfinancial businesses earned a 6.7 percent after-tax profit on their assets last year, the latest Bureau of Economic Affairs report shows.
In a competitive market, profits are unlimited except for the discipline of competition. Because there is no market to discipline monopolies, Congress created FERC, which sets prices, known as rates, for pipelines and some other energy monopolies.
FERC is supposed to balance the interests of customers and owners, making sure customers are charged only “just and reasonable” rates and that owners earn “just and reasonable” profits on top of recovering actual costs.
‘JUST AND REASONABLE’
The test of whether that standard is met is revealed each year on a document, filed to FERC under oath, known as Page 700. Line 9 shows how much it cost a pipeline to provide service, including a generous allowance for taxes and its profit. Line 10 shows actual revenues.
The two lines ideally should match, except for minor timing differences. When they do, it indicates the “just and reasonable” standard has been met. If Line 10 is larger, it shows extra profits.
Last year, 47 of the nation’s 175 regulated monopoly oil pipelines reported significantly larger figures on Line 10 than Line 9, as Gooch details in his analysis.
Gooch submitted his findings as part of a FERC rulemaking procedure. He was FERC general counsel from 1969 to 1972. Then he enjoyed a long career as a litigator in pipeline rate cases on behalf of oil companies, known as shippers, who pay pipeline companies to transport their liquids, crude and refined.
Having covered these issues for four decades, I think Gooch’s position here is solid as can be.
The rulemaking at issue would affect how costs are calculated on annual Form 6 reports, of which Page 700 is the most significant part.
“If this rulemaking is adopted as is,” Gooch wrote, “there will be no effect on the unlawful revenues, no risk to the public utilities at all. In fact, their ability to collect unlawful excess profits with impunity may be enhanced.”
FERC spokesperson Mary O’Driscoll said that since Gooch’s analysis was filed in a rulemaking proceeding, the commission will respond in the proceeding. She said, “The commission is not going to speak outside of the proceeding.”
None of the five FERC commissioners responded to my telephone calls to their offices. Only Sunoco Logistics, controlling owner of Mid-Valley Pipeline, returned my calls.
‘APPROVED BY FERC’
The key defense to the excess profits charge is shown in what Sunoco Logistics told me. Spokesman Joe McGinn said its rates “are approved by FERC and follow all FERC rules and guidelines.”
And that is the scandal. Not just that companies are earning excess profits, but that FERC seems to look the other way and enable this.
Gooch argues that the rulemaking proceeding he commented on in his analysis would institutionalize excess rates and make it difficult for a court to stop oil pipeline owners from collecting more profit than is lawful.
Retired now, Gooch has become a full-time reformer trying to stop what he sees as rules designed to destroy the “just and reasonable” tenet of utility regulation.
The issues here are not academic. Unless controlled, monopolies can cause massive economic damage. Excess profits amount to a tax on the public for private gain.
Utilities have been promoting the theory of deregulation because they know it lets them, as monopolists, escape the rigors of both regulation and competition.
Consumers bear the burden of these excess profits every time they pump gasoline or fly in a jetliner.
Accounting reports show that oil pipeline profiteering has gone on for years under administrations of both parties.
FERC is a small federal agency whose decisions exert a broad impact on the economy, yet it gets little news coverage. Commissioners and key staff come from, and go back to, the energy industries they regulate.
FERC’s budget is financed not with taxes, but fees paid by the energy industries.
On the “just and reasonable” standard, a controlling decision by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in 1984 instructed FERC that “not even a little unlawfulness is to be tolerated.”
Yet in 2005 FERC granted the SFPP pipeline a rate hike nine times greater than its increased costs, Gooch wrote.
THE OCTOPUS
The SFPP pipeline is a corporate descendant of the railroad monopolies that caused California so much economic damage a little more than a century ago that they were known as The Octopus.
Despite the easy-to-spot evidence of profits that are far in excess of authorized rates, earlier this year the commissioners gave all 175 pipelines the freedom to raise rates by 6.8 percent per year compounded for the next five years.
Sunoco’s Mid-Valley Pipeline was entitled to a profit of $3.9 million in 2010, but comparing the two lines shows an actual profit seven times that large, more than $27 million.
The latest annual pipeline rate hike was approved in a way that makes consumer challenges virtually impossible.
A general rate case would open every pipeline expense, including taxes and profits, to scrutiny. The commissioners avoided that by granting an indexed rate increase to all pipelines with no proof of higher costs required.
This latest index rate increase will generate $3.4 billion more in excess profits over the next five years, Gooch calculated.
Gooch said he filed his analysis because he believes that if the excess profits were brought to the commission’s attention they would have to stop the profiteering.
He said FERC has failed to “redress years of toleration of unlawful conduct by some oil pipelines.”
By filing his report, he said, “it does not seem likely that any commissioner, past or present, would turn a blind eye to unlawful excess profits of some public utilities if the results of the annual report filings had been called to their attention.”
Here are a few of the questions Gooch’s report raises:
What is the point of filing accounting reports, especially under oath, if their contents are ignored?
Why would a government agency help monopolies whose rates it sets earn more than just and reasonable profit margins?
Why have President Obama (and before him Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton) appointed commissioners closely allied with the energy industry instead of consumer advocates?
Why has Congress not investigated FERC?
There are many more questions. This column will be pursuing answers about how FERC not only ignores, but actively helps, monopoly pipelines gouge the public. (Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh)
This column first appeared on Thomson Reuters News & Insight.
The opinions expressed are his own.
Last year a fourth of the nation’s oil pipelines earned excessive profits, at up to seven times the rates allowed these regulated monopolies, according to an explosive analysis prepared by a former general counsel for the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
R. Gordon Gooch, the former counsel, alleges in his Oct. 3 study, for instance, that Sunoco’s Mid-Valley Pipeline, which carries crude oil from Texas to Michigan, earned a 55 percent return on assets. That is seven times its authorized profit margin, based on a calculation derived from an accounting report the company filed with FERC.
Three other regulated monopoly pipelines earned more than 40 percent on their assets, while another three earned more than 30 percent, an examination of their FERC filings by Reuters shows.
To put that level of profitability into context, overall nonfinancial businesses earned a 6.7 percent after-tax profit on their assets last year, the latest Bureau of Economic Affairs report shows.
In a competitive market, profits are unlimited except for the discipline of competition. Because there is no market to discipline monopolies, Congress created FERC, which sets prices, known as rates, for pipelines and some other energy monopolies.
FERC is supposed to balance the interests of customers and owners, making sure customers are charged only “just and reasonable” rates and that owners earn “just and reasonable” profits on top of recovering actual costs.
‘JUST AND REASONABLE’
The test of whether that standard is met is revealed each year on a document, filed to FERC under oath, known as Page 700. Line 9 shows how much it cost a pipeline to provide service, including a generous allowance for taxes and its profit. Line 10 shows actual revenues.
The two lines ideally should match, except for minor timing differences. When they do, it indicates the “just and reasonable” standard has been met. If Line 10 is larger, it shows extra profits.
Last year, 47 of the nation’s 175 regulated monopoly oil pipelines reported significantly larger figures on Line 10 than Line 9, as Gooch details in his analysis.
Gooch submitted his findings as part of a FERC rulemaking procedure. He was FERC general counsel from 1969 to 1972. Then he enjoyed a long career as a litigator in pipeline rate cases on behalf of oil companies, known as shippers, who pay pipeline companies to transport their liquids, crude and refined.
Having covered these issues for four decades, I think Gooch’s position here is solid as can be.
The rulemaking at issue would affect how costs are calculated on annual Form 6 reports, of which Page 700 is the most significant part.
“If this rulemaking is adopted as is,” Gooch wrote, “there will be no effect on the unlawful revenues, no risk to the public utilities at all. In fact, their ability to collect unlawful excess profits with impunity may be enhanced.”
FERC spokesperson Mary O’Driscoll said that since Gooch’s analysis was filed in a rulemaking proceeding, the commission will respond in the proceeding. She said, “The commission is not going to speak outside of the proceeding.”
None of the five FERC commissioners responded to my telephone calls to their offices. Only Sunoco Logistics, controlling owner of Mid-Valley Pipeline, returned my calls.
‘APPROVED BY FERC’
The key defense to the excess profits charge is shown in what Sunoco Logistics told me. Spokesman Joe McGinn said its rates “are approved by FERC and follow all FERC rules and guidelines.”
And that is the scandal. Not just that companies are earning excess profits, but that FERC seems to look the other way and enable this.
Gooch argues that the rulemaking proceeding he commented on in his analysis would institutionalize excess rates and make it difficult for a court to stop oil pipeline owners from collecting more profit than is lawful.
Retired now, Gooch has become a full-time reformer trying to stop what he sees as rules designed to destroy the “just and reasonable” tenet of utility regulation.
The issues here are not academic. Unless controlled, monopolies can cause massive economic damage. Excess profits amount to a tax on the public for private gain.
Utilities have been promoting the theory of deregulation because they know it lets them, as monopolists, escape the rigors of both regulation and competition.
Consumers bear the burden of these excess profits every time they pump gasoline or fly in a jetliner.
Accounting reports show that oil pipeline profiteering has gone on for years under administrations of both parties.
FERC is a small federal agency whose decisions exert a broad impact on the economy, yet it gets little news coverage. Commissioners and key staff come from, and go back to, the energy industries they regulate.
FERC’s budget is financed not with taxes, but fees paid by the energy industries.
On the “just and reasonable” standard, a controlling decision by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in 1984 instructed FERC that “not even a little unlawfulness is to be tolerated.”
Yet in 2005 FERC granted the SFPP pipeline a rate hike nine times greater than its increased costs, Gooch wrote.
THE OCTOPUS
The SFPP pipeline is a corporate descendant of the railroad monopolies that caused California so much economic damage a little more than a century ago that they were known as The Octopus.
Despite the easy-to-spot evidence of profits that are far in excess of authorized rates, earlier this year the commissioners gave all 175 pipelines the freedom to raise rates by 6.8 percent per year compounded for the next five years.
Sunoco’s Mid-Valley Pipeline was entitled to a profit of $3.9 million in 2010, but comparing the two lines shows an actual profit seven times that large, more than $27 million.
The latest annual pipeline rate hike was approved in a way that makes consumer challenges virtually impossible.
A general rate case would open every pipeline expense, including taxes and profits, to scrutiny. The commissioners avoided that by granting an indexed rate increase to all pipelines with no proof of higher costs required.
This latest index rate increase will generate $3.4 billion more in excess profits over the next five years, Gooch calculated.
Gooch said he filed his analysis because he believes that if the excess profits were brought to the commission’s attention they would have to stop the profiteering.
He said FERC has failed to “redress years of toleration of unlawful conduct by some oil pipelines.”
By filing his report, he said, “it does not seem likely that any commissioner, past or present, would turn a blind eye to unlawful excess profits of some public utilities if the results of the annual report filings had been called to their attention.”
Here are a few of the questions Gooch’s report raises:
What is the point of filing accounting reports, especially under oath, if their contents are ignored?
Why would a government agency help monopolies whose rates it sets earn more than just and reasonable profit margins?
Why have President Obama (and before him Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton) appointed commissioners closely allied with the energy industry instead of consumer advocates?
Why has Congress not investigated FERC?
There are many more questions. This column will be pursuing answers about how FERC not only ignores, but actively helps, monopoly pipelines gouge the public. (Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh)
This column first appeared on Thomson Reuters News & Insight.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Q&A: Norman Lear -- Not Good Times in Politics
By Kira Zalan
Television has long been used to push social agendas, and Norman Lear, a television writer and producer, addressed the social and political issues of the day in his 1970s sitcoms, including All in the Family, Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons, and Good Times. Concerned by what he saw as the rise of the “Christian right” influence on American society and politics, in 1981 Lear launched an organization called People for the American Way. The progressive advocacy group just celebrated 30 years. Lear, who is turning 90 next year, recently spoke with U.S. News about the changes he’s seen in American politics, why Hollywood tends to be liberal, and the projects he is working on now. Excerpts:
Is America divided today?
More divided. And more divided along the same lines that concerned me 30 years ago.
Can you be more specific?
Religion in the public square. More of it now than existed then. I was amused at first with Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. What I was seeing on TV, the proliferation of evangelicals and so forth. And as I saw more and more the mix of politics and religion, I became far more concerned.
Why were you concerned?
Well, it’s not my understanding of what the Constitution and the Bill of Rights do. There is a wall of separation. This is not a Christian nation, this is a nation open to all religions. Now that’s my understanding of the Constitution. That is why I flew 52 missions in World War II.
So you used media to challenge the evangelicals?
I did what I knew to do best, which is do a couple of TV spots and use the media I knew. And the first TV spot had a working guy simply telling the camera that he and his wife and his kids just sitting around the kitchen table argue all the time about politics and they all have different views. And here come ministers on TV and radio, and even in the mail, and telling them they’re good Christians or bad ones, depending on their political point of view. Anyway, he winds up saying, there’s got to be something wrong when anyone tells you, even if it’s a minister, that you are a good or a bad Christian depending on your political point of view. And then the last thing he says is, “That’s not the American way.” And so People for the American Way came out.
What is your single biggest victory?
It isn’t the biggest victory, but one that occurred to me was defeating Robert Bork as a nominee [by President Reagan] to the Supreme Court. And what makes me laugh is that he was chosen by Governor [Mitt] Romney to be the head of his judicial committee. So it is funny, all these years later.
What is your take on the GOP presidential candidates?
I have a long correspondence with President Reagan, totally in disagreement, on the same subject, by the way—the religious right occupying too much space in the White House, coming and going too easily in the White House, and the influence I was concerned about on him. But we maintained a civility that resulted in a friendship. So you asked me in the beginning what I miss most 30 years later? That degree of civility. I will say too that in 1982, I did a twohour special on ABC called “I Love Liberty,” and it was devised to take the flag and the Bible back, for all of us. It doesn’t just belong to the Christian right, it belongs to all of us. And I had Barry Goldwater and Jane Fonda on the same stage, and President Ford and Lady Bird Johnson were my co-chairs. So it’s possible in our country to have a degree of civility that allows you to be bitter enemies politically but respectful. I mean you can disagree totally on political issues and still maintain a relationship of respect.
What is the most urgent challenge today?
I would say helping people understand that this country thrives when it hears from its citizens, whether they’re agreeing or protesting, when they are participating, and when they are unfettered by religious doctrines that insist that they can’t vote their conscience this way or that because it isn’t agreeable to the church.
What’s your take on the Occupy Wall Street protests?
I take them very seriously. That’s an awful lot of people around the world distressed. Attention must be paid. I very much value the fact that it exists because people are expressing themselves. And isn’t that what we’re supposed to be about?
What is their message?
The message coming through for me is “we are distressed.” I mean, do we have to explain to you we’re not working, our homes are being foreclosed? You know, come on, how much do we have to tell you?
Which TV shows today push the social envelope?
I think South Park does a great job. As does Family Guy. It’s amazing, it’s the animated shows that seem to be doing 90 percent of that in comedy.
Is Hollywood a liberal town?
I think writers, directors, producers, people who are holding up a mirror to, or looking into the nature of people, or humans as a species, tend to be liberal, tend to be progressive. Look, I think of myself as a bleeding-heart conservative. You know, you will not screw with my Bill of Rights and my Constitution. I’m conservative on these issues. But do I care about the next guy and the people that don’t have equal opportunity? Call me a bleeding heart. But Democrats per se do not represent what I feel today. I’m much more a bleeding heart in that sense and much more conservative in the other sense.
Have Democrats moved too much to the center?
Yeah, I think the center is bullshit. The center is: I don’t want to tell you who I am. Most people think that America is too ideologically divided today. I don’t think there’s a Democratic Party that’s proud of saying, “I’m on the left.” Like that’s a nasty word. And we’ve begun to believe that it is nasty. And “progressive” and “liberal.” The far right has done a very good job of forcing Democrats to abandon who they are.
How are these labels seen today?
We’re made to believe that they’re bad words. Now aligned in the public mind with a socialist. And a liberal is far from a socialist. Or maybe they’re not far from a socialist, but what the hell is bad about a socialist? It’s another way of thinking. That’s what we’re supposed to be all about, just another way of thinking.
How has President Obama done?
I had hoped he would help us look in the mirror, all of us, and see our own humanity. And help us understand that the lust for power, greed, you know, all of that is part of our human nature. So is transcendence. We are born with the capacity for both.
What is your organization up to today?
There are three things about it that couldn’t excite me more. Right Wing Watch, they’re on the Internet, a great publication. Another is Young Elected Officials. There are over 700, close to 800, young mayors, councilmen, a fabulous network of progressive, idealistic young people. And then there’s Young People For, they’re all in high school and college. And I take great hope from what’s happening with them.
7 U.S.NEWS WEEKLY | October 21, 2011 | www.usnews.com/subscribe
Television has long been used to push social agendas, and Norman Lear, a television writer and producer, addressed the social and political issues of the day in his 1970s sitcoms, including All in the Family, Sanford and Son, The Jeffersons, and Good Times. Concerned by what he saw as the rise of the “Christian right” influence on American society and politics, in 1981 Lear launched an organization called People for the American Way. The progressive advocacy group just celebrated 30 years. Lear, who is turning 90 next year, recently spoke with U.S. News about the changes he’s seen in American politics, why Hollywood tends to be liberal, and the projects he is working on now. Excerpts:
Is America divided today?
More divided. And more divided along the same lines that concerned me 30 years ago.
Can you be more specific?
Religion in the public square. More of it now than existed then. I was amused at first with Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. What I was seeing on TV, the proliferation of evangelicals and so forth. And as I saw more and more the mix of politics and religion, I became far more concerned.
Why were you concerned?
Well, it’s not my understanding of what the Constitution and the Bill of Rights do. There is a wall of separation. This is not a Christian nation, this is a nation open to all religions. Now that’s my understanding of the Constitution. That is why I flew 52 missions in World War II.
So you used media to challenge the evangelicals?
I did what I knew to do best, which is do a couple of TV spots and use the media I knew. And the first TV spot had a working guy simply telling the camera that he and his wife and his kids just sitting around the kitchen table argue all the time about politics and they all have different views. And here come ministers on TV and radio, and even in the mail, and telling them they’re good Christians or bad ones, depending on their political point of view. Anyway, he winds up saying, there’s got to be something wrong when anyone tells you, even if it’s a minister, that you are a good or a bad Christian depending on your political point of view. And then the last thing he says is, “That’s not the American way.” And so People for the American Way came out.
What is your single biggest victory?
It isn’t the biggest victory, but one that occurred to me was defeating Robert Bork as a nominee [by President Reagan] to the Supreme Court. And what makes me laugh is that he was chosen by Governor [Mitt] Romney to be the head of his judicial committee. So it is funny, all these years later.
What is your take on the GOP presidential candidates?
I have a long correspondence with President Reagan, totally in disagreement, on the same subject, by the way—the religious right occupying too much space in the White House, coming and going too easily in the White House, and the influence I was concerned about on him. But we maintained a civility that resulted in a friendship. So you asked me in the beginning what I miss most 30 years later? That degree of civility. I will say too that in 1982, I did a twohour special on ABC called “I Love Liberty,” and it was devised to take the flag and the Bible back, for all of us. It doesn’t just belong to the Christian right, it belongs to all of us. And I had Barry Goldwater and Jane Fonda on the same stage, and President Ford and Lady Bird Johnson were my co-chairs. So it’s possible in our country to have a degree of civility that allows you to be bitter enemies politically but respectful. I mean you can disagree totally on political issues and still maintain a relationship of respect.
What is the most urgent challenge today?
I would say helping people understand that this country thrives when it hears from its citizens, whether they’re agreeing or protesting, when they are participating, and when they are unfettered by religious doctrines that insist that they can’t vote their conscience this way or that because it isn’t agreeable to the church.
What’s your take on the Occupy Wall Street protests?
I take them very seriously. That’s an awful lot of people around the world distressed. Attention must be paid. I very much value the fact that it exists because people are expressing themselves. And isn’t that what we’re supposed to be about?
What is their message?
The message coming through for me is “we are distressed.” I mean, do we have to explain to you we’re not working, our homes are being foreclosed? You know, come on, how much do we have to tell you?
Which TV shows today push the social envelope?
I think South Park does a great job. As does Family Guy. It’s amazing, it’s the animated shows that seem to be doing 90 percent of that in comedy.
Is Hollywood a liberal town?
I think writers, directors, producers, people who are holding up a mirror to, or looking into the nature of people, or humans as a species, tend to be liberal, tend to be progressive. Look, I think of myself as a bleeding-heart conservative. You know, you will not screw with my Bill of Rights and my Constitution. I’m conservative on these issues. But do I care about the next guy and the people that don’t have equal opportunity? Call me a bleeding heart. But Democrats per se do not represent what I feel today. I’m much more a bleeding heart in that sense and much more conservative in the other sense.
Have Democrats moved too much to the center?
Yeah, I think the center is bullshit. The center is: I don’t want to tell you who I am. Most people think that America is too ideologically divided today. I don’t think there’s a Democratic Party that’s proud of saying, “I’m on the left.” Like that’s a nasty word. And we’ve begun to believe that it is nasty. And “progressive” and “liberal.” The far right has done a very good job of forcing Democrats to abandon who they are.
How are these labels seen today?
We’re made to believe that they’re bad words. Now aligned in the public mind with a socialist. And a liberal is far from a socialist. Or maybe they’re not far from a socialist, but what the hell is bad about a socialist? It’s another way of thinking. That’s what we’re supposed to be all about, just another way of thinking.
How has President Obama done?
I had hoped he would help us look in the mirror, all of us, and see our own humanity. And help us understand that the lust for power, greed, you know, all of that is part of our human nature. So is transcendence. We are born with the capacity for both.
What is your organization up to today?
There are three things about it that couldn’t excite me more. Right Wing Watch, they’re on the Internet, a great publication. Another is Young Elected Officials. There are over 700, close to 800, young mayors, councilmen, a fabulous network of progressive, idealistic young people. And then there’s Young People For, they’re all in high school and college. And I take great hope from what’s happening with them.
7 U.S.NEWS WEEKLY | October 21, 2011 | www.usnews.com/subscribe
Monday, October 17, 2011
Items of Interest This day
UN: Population to hit 7 billion by end October
The global population will hit 7 billion on Oct. 31 and hit 8 billion by 2025, the United Nations Population Fund says. The increasing population is driving spikes in energy and food prices, and highlights the need for family-planning services for more than 200 million women worldwide. The Globe and Mail (Toronto) (10/17)
Bangladesh struggles to improve sanitation
Public campaigns that promote the use of toilets as a component of a modern lifestyle and highlight the health benefits of proper hygiene are needed to help improve sanitation in Bangladesh, according to water and sanitation experts. Nearly half of the Bangladeshi population still lives in areas without proper sanitation. IRINNews.org (10/14)
Research finds that trees improve crop yields in Africa
Research finds that crop yields in Africa could be increased by planting trees that improve the quality of soil, as well as "climate proof" agricultural land by acting as conduits to bring water to surface root systems, like those of crops. BBC (10/15)
It’s called the "Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey", (snip-it)
It is a relatively new report that was started by the Labor Department in late 2000. Its latest report showed approximately 3.2 million job openings in July in the United States, about the same number as June. The total number of openings is up about 1.1 million jobs from July 2009, but it’s still short of the 4.4 million openings reported in December 2007........
..........But employers say they’re having trouble finding applicants who fit the requirements for open positions. In a recent survey by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, 40 percent of the members of the Inc. 500 (a group of the fastest-growing companies in the country) reported that the biggest impediment to growing their companies was finding qualified people. “That clearly speaks to the skills gap that exists,” says Thom Ruhe, director of entrepreneurship for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation....... [engineers, scientists, AI technicians, etc.]
.......Many of the unemployed get left behind in today’s leaner, more educated economy. “There’s a clear bifurcation between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots,’” he says. “You have large parts of the population that just aren’t employable.”
Thoughts and Facts on Uranium Mining in Northern Arizona
When most people hear the words 'nuclear energy', they usually think of nuclear weapons and nuclear power stations. These are in fact what most uranium is used for, in about equal amounts. Uranium has other uses, which however require only a tiny amount of the world's uranium. Some of these uses can be substituted for by less harmful products.
So the real question about uranium mining is whether we need more atomic bombs or nuclear energy plants. Of course the answer is two-fold.
1. We certainly don't need any more nuclear weapons anywhere in this world -- including, and especially, those nations who do not yet have "the bomb". (I remember very clearly as a parent in the bomb-shelter era of the cold war)
2. The second answer is less clear. Nuclear power plants which are spread out over the world do a marvelous job of providing energy but it seems the problems in Japan certainly show how vulnerable a community can be when something which "has never happened before", actually happens. Many communities are having second thoughts about nuclear power. Most certainly, more extensive safeguards are required.
Colorado is considered to have the third largest uranium reserves of any US state, behind Wyoming and New Mexico. Obviously, Arizona is not a leading source of Uranium in the United States... and indeed, the price has fluctuated over the years when discoveries are found in other parts of the world and mines are closed and reopened depending on market prices.
The primary problem with uranium mining is the contamination of water sources, rivers, streams, lakes, and underground aquifers. In 2005 the Navajo Nation declared a moratorium on uranium mining on the reservation, for environmental and health reasons.
"Uranium mining caused many Native Americans and animals to become sick. Some problems were that there were a limited amount of water located on the reservation, so locals would have to travel long distances for water. The Mines would leave contaminated waters unattended and would not even put up fences to prevent anyone from passing through. So the native(s) would bring their livestock and gather water at the contaminated area. This caused mutations between the animals and the Native People.[Note: this last statement has not been verified - it is hearsay - but most certainly probable.]
Three former uranium mill sites in Colorado are currently United States Environmental Protection Agency National Priorities List [Superfund] sites: ...and let us not forget that the taxpayers pay for Superfund projects!
1. Denver Radium Site, Denver
Lincoln Park, adjacent to the Cotter Corporation uranium mill at Canon City in Fremont County. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is supervising cleanup of waste from previous operations. The mill still has a license to process uranium ore.
2.Uravan Uranium Project, at the now-abandoned town of Uravan, in Montrose County.
3. In addition, there are 15 Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action (UMTRA) sites in the state, under the purview of the United States Department of Energy. Eight of the sites are former uranium ore mills, and seven are engineered permanent disposal sites for the mill tailings.
Uranium was discovered in the Orphan copper mine near the south rim of the Grand Canyon in 1950. The mine has been private property since 1906, and is today completely surrounded by Grand Canyon National Park. The discovery led to the finding of uranium in other collapse breccia pipes in northern Arizona. The breccia pipes were formed when overlying rocks collapsed into caverns formed in the Mississippian Redwall Limestone. The pipes are typically 300 feet (91 m) in diameter, and may extend up to 3,000 feet (910 m) vertically.
There are currently no producing uranium mines in Arizona. Denison Mines plans to begin mining its Arizona One mine in 2007. The deposit is in a breccia pipe on the Colorado Plateau of northern Arizona. In March of 2011, the State of Arizona issued air and water permits to Denison which would allow uranium mining to resume at three locations north of the Grand Canyon, subject to federal approval.
On May 3, 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) notified Denison Mines Corp. that its Arizona 1 mine, located 35 miles from Fredonia (north rim of the Grand Canyon), Arizona, has been issued a Finding of Violation (FOV) for emissions that violate the Clean Air Act.
In July 2009 Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced a two-year ban on new mining on federal land in an area of approximately 1 million acres (4,000 km2) surrounding Grand Canyon National Park. Although the ban is on all mining, the main effect is on exploration and development of breccia-pipe uranium deposits. Those claims on which commercial mineral deposits have already been discovered are exempt from the ban. During the two-year ban the Department of the Interior will study a proposed 20-year ban on new mining in the area.
Since the resurgence of uranium mining in the area, mining company officials have continuously assured the public that mistakes made in the past would not be repeated. This notice of violation from the EPA signals that uranium executives may talk a good game about changes in the industry’s approach to mining but, in fact, it’s business as usual.
So the real question about uranium mining is whether we need more atomic bombs or nuclear energy plants. Of course the answer is two-fold.
1. We certainly don't need any more nuclear weapons anywhere in this world -- including, and especially, those nations who do not yet have "the bomb". (I remember very clearly as a parent in the bomb-shelter era of the cold war)
2. The second answer is less clear. Nuclear power plants which are spread out over the world do a marvelous job of providing energy but it seems the problems in Japan certainly show how vulnerable a community can be when something which "has never happened before", actually happens. Many communities are having second thoughts about nuclear power. Most certainly, more extensive safeguards are required.
Colorado is considered to have the third largest uranium reserves of any US state, behind Wyoming and New Mexico. Obviously, Arizona is not a leading source of Uranium in the United States... and indeed, the price has fluctuated over the years when discoveries are found in other parts of the world and mines are closed and reopened depending on market prices.
The primary problem with uranium mining is the contamination of water sources, rivers, streams, lakes, and underground aquifers. In 2005 the Navajo Nation declared a moratorium on uranium mining on the reservation, for environmental and health reasons.
"Uranium mining caused many Native Americans and animals to become sick. Some problems were that there were a limited amount of water located on the reservation, so locals would have to travel long distances for water. The Mines would leave contaminated waters unattended and would not even put up fences to prevent anyone from passing through. So the native(s) would bring their livestock and gather water at the contaminated area. This caused mutations between the animals and the Native People.[Note: this last statement has not been verified - it is hearsay - but most certainly probable.]
Three former uranium mill sites in Colorado are currently United States Environmental Protection Agency National Priorities List [Superfund] sites: ...and let us not forget that the taxpayers pay for Superfund projects!
1. Denver Radium Site, Denver
Lincoln Park, adjacent to the Cotter Corporation uranium mill at Canon City in Fremont County. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is supervising cleanup of waste from previous operations. The mill still has a license to process uranium ore.
2.Uravan Uranium Project, at the now-abandoned town of Uravan, in Montrose County.
3. In addition, there are 15 Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action (UMTRA) sites in the state, under the purview of the United States Department of Energy. Eight of the sites are former uranium ore mills, and seven are engineered permanent disposal sites for the mill tailings.
Uranium was discovered in the Orphan copper mine near the south rim of the Grand Canyon in 1950. The mine has been private property since 1906, and is today completely surrounded by Grand Canyon National Park. The discovery led to the finding of uranium in other collapse breccia pipes in northern Arizona. The breccia pipes were formed when overlying rocks collapsed into caverns formed in the Mississippian Redwall Limestone. The pipes are typically 300 feet (91 m) in diameter, and may extend up to 3,000 feet (910 m) vertically.
There are currently no producing uranium mines in Arizona. Denison Mines plans to begin mining its Arizona One mine in 2007. The deposit is in a breccia pipe on the Colorado Plateau of northern Arizona. In March of 2011, the State of Arizona issued air and water permits to Denison which would allow uranium mining to resume at three locations north of the Grand Canyon, subject to federal approval.
On May 3, 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) notified Denison Mines Corp. that its Arizona 1 mine, located 35 miles from Fredonia (north rim of the Grand Canyon), Arizona, has been issued a Finding of Violation (FOV) for emissions that violate the Clean Air Act.
In July 2009 Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced a two-year ban on new mining on federal land in an area of approximately 1 million acres (4,000 km2) surrounding Grand Canyon National Park. Although the ban is on all mining, the main effect is on exploration and development of breccia-pipe uranium deposits. Those claims on which commercial mineral deposits have already been discovered are exempt from the ban. During the two-year ban the Department of the Interior will study a proposed 20-year ban on new mining in the area.
Since the resurgence of uranium mining in the area, mining company officials have continuously assured the public that mistakes made in the past would not be repeated. This notice of violation from the EPA signals that uranium executives may talk a good game about changes in the industry’s approach to mining but, in fact, it’s business as usual.
Saturday, October 08, 2011
Thoughts on our future as a nation and the "Tea Party"
I guess that I'm a bit slow but I finally realized what the Tea Party is all about and why I oppose it's attitudes and motives so much.
I read the following paragraph in the news: "The bill also upset some tea-party activists, who want Republicans to abandon the effort to take E-Verify to a national level. Some lawmakers believe that states should be free to enact their own E-Verify laws, to ease concerns over the federal government imposing on states’ jurisdictions."
It is the old argument of state's rights vs federal law and jurisdiction. I'm well aware of the rather unclear 10th Amendment in our Bill of Rights ratified on December 15, 1791. It states the Constitution's principle of federalism by providing that "powers not granted to the federal government nor prohibited to the states by the Constitution are reserved, respectively, to the states or the people".
My problem with this amendment is that in 1861 we fought a very prolonged and bloody Civil War over just that amendment! The Confederacy donated about 260,000 men to settle their side of the argument and actually leave our nation while the U.S. Government [North] donated 364,511 men to "preserve our nation" intact. So, over 646,000 Americans gave their lives to settle this question! It was exactly 150 years ago that there was such a huge loss of life - more than in any other war in American history except for WWII!
The question was and is, should we be a single sovereign nation or should we be a confederation of 50 independent nations (similar to the colonies who first authorized our Constitution)? The federal government won the war and the states were rendered secondary or subservient to the central government.
The problem with war - as with almost any argument, no one ever really wins in the long run. Southerners knew they lost the battles, but they still believed in their cause and maintained that someday "the South would rise again!" The Tea Party is just one of many attempts to reinsert state's rights into legislation both at state levels but especially within the federal government through elected representatives who are more interested in the welfare of their own states than they are in the elephant in the room, the federal government - or the American people who are represented by the government!
Now, I understand that people want to have local control of their communities, counties and states. The federal government certainly can't micro manage every little hamlet in this expansive country.... The Civil war didn't eliminate local governments but they did pass universal laws which all communities and states have to live under. Such laws are more important today than they were one hundred years ago because our population has more than doubled and more importantly has become much more mobile. Americans need to live under a universal set of primary laws regardless of where they may chose to live. They needn't have to have passports nor feel they are entering a foreign country if they move from one state to another. True some laws may differ, but they are usually minor.
It does happen that a state may pass laws contrary to national interests, but they usually are redacted. A good example is when a number of years ago California outlawed cable television allowing only free TV captured via antenna or 'rabbit ears'! Think about it! The fear at the time was that cable TV would eliminate free TV!
We are indeed a single unified nation because many of the facilities we use are national such as our highway system and electrical grid. Laws regarding our ecology, mining, oil and gas production and distribution including pipelines, etc. would founder in a system of fifty nation-states. Can you imagine fifty versions of Social Security or Medicare such that if a retiree were to move to a different state, he/she would lose coverage? For example, California would be overcrowded with elderly retirees wherein Arizona who profits from retired Californians would lose this lucrative source of income and business?
Thus, I maintain that our nation comes first. The drives and ambitions of the individual states comes second, just as the prosperity of the individual is completely dependent upon the largesse of the society wherein he lives. If it is a repressive society, he can not succeed. It is the society which nurtures success and allows the individual to thrive.
Thus, I'm certain that if the Tea Party has its way and resumes control of our government with a like-minded president, our nation is in for a very gloomy period of reflection on what we did wrong and what ever happened to the good life we used to have.
I read the following paragraph in the news: "The bill also upset some tea-party activists, who want Republicans to abandon the effort to take E-Verify to a national level. Some lawmakers believe that states should be free to enact their own E-Verify laws, to ease concerns over the federal government imposing on states’ jurisdictions."
It is the old argument of state's rights vs federal law and jurisdiction. I'm well aware of the rather unclear 10th Amendment in our Bill of Rights ratified on December 15, 1791. It states the Constitution's principle of federalism by providing that "powers not granted to the federal government nor prohibited to the states by the Constitution are reserved, respectively, to the states or the people".
My problem with this amendment is that in 1861 we fought a very prolonged and bloody Civil War over just that amendment! The Confederacy donated about 260,000 men to settle their side of the argument and actually leave our nation while the U.S. Government [North] donated 364,511 men to "preserve our nation" intact. So, over 646,000 Americans gave their lives to settle this question! It was exactly 150 years ago that there was such a huge loss of life - more than in any other war in American history except for WWII!
The question was and is, should we be a single sovereign nation or should we be a confederation of 50 independent nations (similar to the colonies who first authorized our Constitution)? The federal government won the war and the states were rendered secondary or subservient to the central government.
The problem with war - as with almost any argument, no one ever really wins in the long run. Southerners knew they lost the battles, but they still believed in their cause and maintained that someday "the South would rise again!" The Tea Party is just one of many attempts to reinsert state's rights into legislation both at state levels but especially within the federal government through elected representatives who are more interested in the welfare of their own states than they are in the elephant in the room, the federal government - or the American people who are represented by the government!
Now, I understand that people want to have local control of their communities, counties and states. The federal government certainly can't micro manage every little hamlet in this expansive country.... The Civil war didn't eliminate local governments but they did pass universal laws which all communities and states have to live under. Such laws are more important today than they were one hundred years ago because our population has more than doubled and more importantly has become much more mobile. Americans need to live under a universal set of primary laws regardless of where they may chose to live. They needn't have to have passports nor feel they are entering a foreign country if they move from one state to another. True some laws may differ, but they are usually minor.
It does happen that a state may pass laws contrary to national interests, but they usually are redacted. A good example is when a number of years ago California outlawed cable television allowing only free TV captured via antenna or 'rabbit ears'! Think about it! The fear at the time was that cable TV would eliminate free TV!
We are indeed a single unified nation because many of the facilities we use are national such as our highway system and electrical grid. Laws regarding our ecology, mining, oil and gas production and distribution including pipelines, etc. would founder in a system of fifty nation-states. Can you imagine fifty versions of Social Security or Medicare such that if a retiree were to move to a different state, he/she would lose coverage? For example, California would be overcrowded with elderly retirees wherein Arizona who profits from retired Californians would lose this lucrative source of income and business?
Thus, I maintain that our nation comes first. The drives and ambitions of the individual states comes second, just as the prosperity of the individual is completely dependent upon the largesse of the society wherein he lives. If it is a repressive society, he can not succeed. It is the society which nurtures success and allows the individual to thrive.
Thus, I'm certain that if the Tea Party has its way and resumes control of our government with a like-minded president, our nation is in for a very gloomy period of reflection on what we did wrong and what ever happened to the good life we used to have.
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