Category: politics

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The Real Reasons The Social Security Trust is in Trouble

The reality of capitalism, whatever its strengths, is that it can be brutal on individuals. Our history is marred by mistreatment, exploitation, and abuse by companies against their workers and communities. These abuses are as well-documented as they are disturbing.

Early last century, companies writ large discharged workers when they became too old to continue working, after years of paying wages that were barely adequate for daily expenses. It was not a question of employees being disciplined and saving for retirement; they simply weren’t paid enough to be able to save. Old age or poor health often meant poverty so acute that suffering was assured, and the end of life soon followed.

The Answer: Social Safety Nets in The New Deal

During the 1920s and 1930s, the voices of the people were being heard in Washington, D.C. The efforts resulted in the New Deal and included the creation of the Social Security Administration. At that time, people’s well-being was finally put first.

“Among our objectives I place the security of the men, women and children of the Nation first.”

Franklin Delano Roosevelt – June 8, 1934 [1]

The premise of the Social Security System is straightforward: create a Social Security Trust  (the Trust) funded by payroll contributions, split between employees and employers, to provide for people during retirement.  It was not intended to be a mechanism for getting rich. It was to ensure people could retire without the threat of poverty.

In 1977, the US implemented an automatic increase in the salary cap to which Social Security taxes, or FICA, would apply. [2] In 1983, the Greenspan Commission reworked the SS system to ensure the trust could remain healthy. [3] The basic underpinnings of the plan were:

  1. The wage pool remains about 65% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) [4]
  2. Social Security tax /FICA covers 90% of the wage pool [3]
  3. Wage distribution remains steady, so the cap covers 90% ongoing [3]

At the time, roughly 6% of workers were paid wages that rose above the wage cap. [3]

It is also important to note that health insurance benefits, which are part of the wage pool but not subject to FICA taxes, were about < 3% of the wage pool. [5] 

Note on GDP: the GDP is the total value of goods and services produced within a country. Think of it as the country’s collective revenue or sales. The growth in GDP is a combination of increased productivity (i.e., workers produce $ 1,000 of goods per hour in one year, and then $1,050 the next; the productivity increase was 5%). There are components to productivity growth, but that’s the basic idea. The other component is inflation. That averages about 3.7% per year over 50 years. [6]

The Dismantling of our SSA Underpinnings

We are being told by Social Security Administration Commissioner Frank Bisignano and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator Mehmet Oz, the current administration, as well as companies and many wealthy people, that the SS Trust Fund is running out of money because too many people are reaching retirement age. Their solutions are to tell us to work more years and accept fewer benefits. Their solutions ignore the underlying reasons the Trust is having trouble.

The primary factors in the erosion of trust involve the transfer of wealth from the workers in the wage pool to the wealthier people in the country. This isn’t a left-wing mantra. It’s math. It also has implications beyond SS.

The Proportional Decline of the Wage Pool

When the Greenspan Commission developed the new framework for keeping the Trust funded, a key assumption was that the Wage Pool would continue to be 65%-68% of the GDP. In other words, the share of the country’s income split between companies and workers would follow its historical pattern. That did not happen.

Wage Pool Declined 14% Relative to GDP

  • 1975, it was 65% of GDP. [4]
  • 2026, it was 56% of GDP. [4]

As workers became more productive and the GDP grew, companies increased profits at a much faster rate than wages.  By 2024, the Wage Pool was down to 56% of GDP. [4] 

More of Wage Pool Consumed by Higher Earners

The Commission’s projections assumed the Wage Pool split would remain stable, allowing automatic caps to maintain 90% coverage of wages. That did not happen.

Social Security Tax Cap Coverage Drops 8.8%

  • 1983, it covered 90% of wages [3]
  • 2024, it covered 82% of wages [3]

By 2024, the FICA wage cap coverage fell to 82%. [3] This happened because higher-income earners saw their wages increase at a faster rate than those of the general working population. We did not see a proportional increase in the number of workers who were raised above the cap.

SS Tax covers less of the wage pool

In 1983, 6% of workers had salaries above the pay cap. In 2024, that percentage was the same. [3] 6% have wages above the cap, and 94% have wages below the cap.  The FICA coverage dropped from 90% to 82% because wages were disproportionately funneled to high-income employees.

This had a material impact on the Trust. If a worker earns $50,000 a year and receives a 10% wage increase, the full $5,000 increase is subject to FICA taxes and helps fund the Trust.  If an employee earns $1,000,000 and receives a 10% wage increase, none of the $100,000 increase is taxed. 

Because the wealthier got disproportionately wealthier, there was a very real negative impact on the Trust.

The Health Insurance Impact

Unlike every other country, employer-sponsored health insurance is part of the US wage pool. But since the insurance premiums are excluded from FICA, money spent on health insurance does not contribute to the Trust. Over the past 50 years, this has negatively impacted the Trust balance.

A relative 100%+ Growth in Health Insurance

  • In 1975, untaxed Premiums were <3% of the Wage Pool [5]
  • In 2024, untaxed Premiums were ~7% of the Wage Pool [5]

 

Health insurance premiums in 1975 accounted for less than 3% of the wage pool. [5] The cost of health care rose faster than the GDP (of which it is a part). As a result, health insurance premiums accounted for about 7% of the Wage Pool in 2024. [5]  That is an additional 4% of the Wage Pool no longer contributing to the Trust.

The Trust Could Be Fully Funded & FICA Tax Lower

The Trust funding deficit is about $41B per year. [7] There are several ways to view the three key factors and to address their impact on the Trust funding deficit. 

If our experience had matched all the assumptions of the Greenspan Commission, the Trust would be flush. I’ll show the math for these, but here is what was planned that didn’t happen.

If:

  • The wage pool had kept pace with GDP, FICA tax revenue would be + $190B/year; [8]
  • The tax cap covered 90% of wages, FICA tax revenue would be + $115B/year; [8]
  • The Health Care Ins was still 2.7%, FICA tax revenue would be + $50B/year. [8]

If all three remained in the same ratios as 1983, the combined impact would be +$387B / year. [8]

How Much GDP would have to stay in wages to fund the Trust?

With Health Insurance Premiums held at 7% of the Wage Pool and the tax cap still covering only 82%, the Wage Pool’s share of GD would need to be only 58% vs the current 56%. [8] 

This would bring the labor from $16.2T to $16.8T, generating an additional $42B to fully fund the Trust.

So, instead of cutting labor share from 65% of GDP down to 56%, if it were 58%, our SS Trust would be fully funded.

Mechanisms Behind the Shift

I am not going too deep into the elements that encouraged the shift. Part of it is the cultural acceptance of the wealthy’s edict and changes to the legal standing of companies and organizations per rulings of the Supreme Court in the 1970’s.

  • SCOTUS 1976 ruling: Money equals speech – opened the path to unlimited political spending. [9]
  • SCOTUS 1978 ruling: Corporations have the same speech rights as individuals. [10] 
  • Top marginal tax rate cut from 91% (1960) to 28% (1986), now 37% [11]
  • Union membership collapsed from 35% to < 10% [12]
  • Financialization: stock market became the dominant wealth engine
  • Globalization compressed middle-class wages

The first two points opened the door for corporations, organizations, and very wealthy individuals to influence politicians and legislation in ways average individuals cannot. The changes we’ve seen over the last 50 years have been much more favorable for the upper class and large companies. This is a direct result of their influence on our representatives.

Flexibility for Funding the Social Security Trust

While I looked at GDP as a source of funding for the Trust, the fact is there is plenty of money in the economy to fund the Social Security program.  It’s a question of the willingness of those with power and wealth to do so. The fact is, the SS Trust could be easily funded with a $29T GDP. [13] We are talking about $41B.  

When the upper class tells you that you are the problem because you don’t work enough, don’t accept it. They are the problem. They made these decisions, diverted GDP, increased their wages, and detracted from the Trust. 

 

Sources

[1] Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library. Franklin D. Roosevelt, message to Congress on the objectives and accomplishments of the administration, June 8, 1934. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library & Museum. https://www.fdrlibrary.org/documents

[2] SSA, Legislative History of Social Security. Social Security Administration. “Automatic Increases in the Contribution and Benefit Base — Legislative History.” 1972 Social Security Amendments introduced automatic annual indexing of the taxable earnings base, first applied in 1975. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/cola/AWI.html

[3] SSA Policy Brief 2011-02 (Whitman & Shoffner). Social Security Administration. Policy Brief No. 2011-02, “The Evolution of Social Security’s Taxable Maximum,” September 2011. Source for the 1983 Greenspan Commission target of 90% covered-earnings coverage, the drift to ~82% today, the persistence of ~6% of workers earning above the cap, and the cap-to-average-wage-ratio history. https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/policybriefs/pb2011-02.html

[4] McKinsey Global Institute / BLS labor share. McKinsey Global Institute, “A New Look at the Declining Labor Share of Income in the United States,” May 2019; cross-referenced with the Bureau of Labor Statistics non-farm business sector labor share series. Labor’s share of GDP fell from ~65% in the mid-1970s to ~56% in 2024. https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/employment-and-growth/a-new-look-at-the-declining-labor-share-of-income-in-the-united-states

[5] BEA NIPA via FRED (health insurance share of compensation). Bureau of Economic Analysis, National Income and Product Accounts. FRED series B4923C1A027NBEA (Employer Contributions for Group Health Insurance) as a share of A033RC1A027NBEA (Compensation of Employees). Health share of compensation: 2.7% in 1975; 6.7% in 2024. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/B4923C1A027NBEA

[6] BLS CPI-U, 50-year average inflation. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). Compound annual inflation rate from 1975 through 2024 is approximately 3.8% per year. https://www.bls.gov/cpi/

[7] 2024 OASDI Trustees Report. Social Security & Medicare Boards of Trustees, 2024 Annual Report of the OASDI Trustees. The Trust ran a cash-flow deficit of approximately $41 billion in 2023; the trust fund is projected to be depleted in 2034. https://www.ssa.gov/oact/tr/2024/

[8] Section VI math worksheet (2026-07-03). Author’s calculation. Each counterfactual holds all other channels at current values and rolls a single factor back to its 1975/1983 pattern; results are calibrated so the reconstructed 2024 baseline matches actual OASDI payroll-tax receipts (~$1.18T per the 2024 Trustees Report). Underlying inputs from BEA NIPA, SSA Policy Brief 2011-02, and the 2024 Trustees Report.

[9] Buckley v. Valeo (1976). Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1 (1976). The Supreme Court struck down mandatory limits on independent political expenditures on First Amendment grounds, establishing the money-as-speech doctrine that opened the way to later expansions such as Citizens United (2010). https://www.oyez.org/cases/1975/75-436

[10] First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978). First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti, 435 U.S. 765 (1978). The Supreme Court held that corporations have First Amendment speech rights in the context of political spending on ballot initiatives, extending the free-speech protections of natural persons to corporate entities. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1977/76-1172

[11] Tax Policy Center historical marginal rates. Tax Policy Center, “Historical Highest Marginal Income Tax Rates.” Top federal marginal rate: 91% (1954–1963), 70% (1971), 50% (1982), 28% (1988), 39.6% (1993), 35% (2003), 37% (2018–present). https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/statistics/historical-highest-marginal-income-tax-rates

[12] BLS union membership series. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Union Members Summary,” annual releases; historical series compiled by unionstats.com (Hirsch & Macpherson). Combined public+private union density peaked near 34.8% in 1954 and had fallen to ~10.0% by 2023. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm

[13] BEA GDP (2024). Bureau of Economic Analysis, National Income and Product Accounts, Table 1.1.5. Nominal U.S. GDP in 2024 was approximately $29.0 trillion. https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gross-domestic-product

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Minneapolis shooting in a broader perspective

The body cam footage from the ICE agent doesn’t change the underlying issue in this shooting.

As I mentioned in the original post, this may be intentional or it may be because of bad training. 

The character of the person shot, Good, is not the issue. When I voiced concern about the shooting, it was not because of some “left” narrative that she is such an upstanding person. 

As I try to do but sometimes fail, I focus on what happened, not necessarily to whom it happened.

I mentioned training in the original post for a reason. Law enforcement is hard as hell. I could never do it. Aside from the everyday difficulty, dealing in life and death situations is beyond my character to handle. Among other things, good cops are a mix of integrity, fortitude, and training.

Training is what allows a good cop the best chance to act in a way that aligns with their integrity. In tense situations, the best intention will fall apart without it.

As for Minneapolis, I am going to approach this from the video/tactical perspective first and then touch on my philosophy about governments.

First Video

What I saw in the first video was the officer approaching the car from the front passenger side, crossing over to the front driver’s side of the car. The driver backed up, the front wheels turned to the right (away from the officers) and then started to proceed. As this happened, the officer on the front driver’s side drew his sidearm and fired as the car moved.

Second Video

In the second video, I saw(from the officer’s perspective) the officer in a verbal exchange with the passenger(this was not apparent on the first video). The passenger got into the car as it backed up and as the officer crossed over to the front driver’s side of the car. Then I saw the driver turn the steering wheel to the right, away from the officers and start to move forward and contact the officer with the driver’s fender – more a sound than a visual –  (“clipped” the office is how I’ve heard it described), at which point  the officer’s camera dropped.

There are two things that jump out at me about this situation.

First:

There are various considerations around when there is a use of force, and why that situation arose. 

As late as 2025, SCOTUS has ruled that the immediate situation alone (car moving toward an officer) cannot be the only determinant in whether deadly force is allowable, what is called the ‘moment-of-threat” rule cannot be applied. Rather the totality of the situation must be considered. 

One of the factors the courts look at in totality is if the officer using deadly force created or significantly contributed to the situation that posed the threat. “Officer-created-jeapardy” does not justify use of deadly force. 

This is one of the reasons I mentioned training.  

There are a lot of training sources for law enforcement. But, common among them, and in particular at the federal level, are tactics around safety and de-escalation. Among these: Don’t place yourself in front of a vehicle (this is “officer-created-jeapardy”);  if possible, step out of the way of a moving vehicle (de-escalation); don’t fire at a moving vehicle (there are cases in which the vehicle posed a threat to the public, thus allowing force). 

Assessing and reacting to a situation like this, for the average person, is nearly impossible. But, officers aren’t supposed to be average. Their training is supposed to make them far better than average. 

You may not like the rules around use of force, but they are there, and until changed, we should expect them to be followed.

Second:

The timing of the firing was after the officer was “clipped” and while the driver was trying to flee.  He wasn’t firing to prevent contact. There was no threat of additional contact.

We can disagree about the intention of the driver; but the timing of the shots was after the contact and while the vehicle was moving away. 

Based on both videos, I will contend that the contact was unintentional, and was clearly not life-threatening. But, with adrenalin and literally no time to assess, an officer in the moment may not be able to realize that. This is why training is so important.

My perspective on Government.

The government and its agents hold all the power. 

We have a Constitution that is supposed to provide guardrails in the use of that power. The Constitution guides the making of our laws by Congress, and the courts assess if those laws and the implementation of those laws, abide by it and the amendments to it. The Executive branch implements the laws and is the only branch that has the capacity to “take action,” or have a direct impact on the citizens through its various agencies.

For 250 years, we have operated on the honor system. If the leaders in government decide not to abide by the rules, there is little the citizens can do about it. When Congress passes a law, or the courts make a ruling, the Executive branch is supposed to abide by these. But there is no mechanism to ensure that it does. Up to now (for the most part and with a few exceptions), administrations have honored this approach.

Over the past year, the administration has openly defied the laws passed by Congress and the rulings of the courts. I have posted on this ad nauseum on FB, with specific examples of violation of court rulings and Constitutional amendments. The President openly states that his only limit is his own morality. From this perspective, the rule of law no longer exists.

So, when a situation like Minneapolis arises, we have to ask the question, “Is this a training issue, or is there a strategy behind these escalations?” 

This is beyond me and my personal interest. I am old enough that I may not live long into the repercussions of this administration’s disregard for the rule of law. I do, however, seriously question if my descendants will live in a free America.

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Private Equity’s Real Strategy

The theory behind capitalism and free markets is the better allocation of resources based on supply and demand. It can be rough and painful at times, but with proper guardrails, it has worked well for us.

The key to the social benefit of capitalism is that it is balanced with regulations. It is hard to argue, given our history, that unregulated capitalism is good for society. From horrid working conditions of the early 20th century, to mass poisoning and pollution through the mid to late 20th and continuing (Superfund Sites now), to the financial abuse (mortgage industry meltdown that took the global economy with it), and a host of other one-offs, there is no shortage of examples of unregulated or even illegal activity in unfettered capitalism to demonstrate the harm it can do.

Over the past couple of decades, a new threat to our societal good has emerged. In some sectors, it is a nuisance; in others, it is outright dangerous.

Private Equity companies can help businesses. They can provide an exit for owners, a consolidation option in a diminishing market, or a source of capital and expertise for quick growth for struggling companies. Generally, the PEs find undervalued private companies (or companies to bring private), resource them and then sell them with a relatively quick turnaround.

This is good for society… at least I think it is. But things have gone sideways.

The annoying part is when the PEs buy up many small private companies in a sector within a geography, then reduce service and increase prices. When the PEs do vertical integrations, they also force business through other companies in their portfolio that you would not work with otherwise.

We see this with veterinary services in our area. Prices are going up, and service has been much less. This is annoying and I’d rather not have to deal with it. But, if a Vet wants to sell their practice to a PE so they can retire, who am I to stop them?

Unfortunately, it does stop at just being annoying. It is getting abusive in physical, financial, and societal ways.

PEs have been abusing laws designed to manage risk and protect those who take it. They purchase a company, drain the cash, drive up debt, sell off valuable assets, and then declare bankruptcy, leaving suppliers, customers, and other stakeholders with receivables that will never be seen.

This isn’t a case of a bad strategy, poor execution, or a poorly run business. The strategy is perfectly sound, well executed, and has absolutely nothing to do with running a business well.

Private Equity:

  • The PE firms have every intention of taking on services without paying for them.
  • The PE firms have every intention of acquiring revenue for services with no intent to deliver.
  • The PE firms have every intention of maxing out lines of credit with no intention to repay.

In this strategy, the Private Equity firms add no value to the economy or society. Their goal is to extract, even steal is an appropriate verb, money with the sole purpose of funding their next theft for even greater returns.

In any industry, this abuse of the system should be illegal; it is fraud that has been legalized through the inaction of our legislators to regulate. At the very least, they should be excluded from bankruptcy protections.

One of the challenges is that, through the creation of legal entities, individuals responsible for this fraud are not culpable. You simply can not find a venue to go after them. So, while patients at nursing homes suffer real physical and emotional harm because of these PE strategies, there is no recourse.

There is an effort to prevent PE firms from continuing this financial abuse, which leads to real harm. This effort is focused on the healthcare industry. While the argument for consolidation is that it will create efficiency and reduce costs, the experience is the opposite. This is particularly true with PE companies.

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Social Programs vs Socialism and The Political Lies

We have a funny confusion in our country. People vote as if the President controls the economy. We hear candidates make promises to reopen the coal mines, keep family farms open, lower the price of gas, and on and on. While they have no control over these things, we vote as if they do.

A (mostly) Free Market Economy

We have a “free” economy.  The government does not control it. At best, the Fed can implement monetary policies that mitigate the swings. But, in a free economy, the markets dictate the price of gas, the demand for coal (yes, government regs impact demand, but at a policy level, not a control level), and the struggles of family farms are exacerbated by corporate mega farming.

The US does have subsidies to help specific industries. There are farm subsidies, energy subsidies, and so on. These help individual businesses (usually big businesses). They do not control the economy.

In fact, these programs are an admission that the government doesn’t control the economy. If it did, subsidies would not be the primary mode of helping sectors; we’d simply redirect the economic efforts.

If a President could control the economy or significantly affect it through normal governmental operations, that would be Socialism.

We have a free market economy (mostly.) It swings, and as it does, people get hurt. To help, we have social programs.

Having Social programs to mitigate the pain of a free economy is not Socialism; it’s compassion.

The irony of our recent election

For many decades, regions of our country have been suffering. Textile workers, miners, farmers, and manufacturing have all been hit by globalization. Our government has done little to help them truly. In part because the real answers are complex.

Instead, we elected the Candidate who said, “I’ll fix it,” and “Only I can fix it.”

He can’t. For decades, we’ve heard this and nothing.

What makes it ironic is that one of the things the government can do is expand social programs to aid people in transition. It’s not a fast answer. It’s not easy. It’s not simple.

It would take multiple administrations of consistent policies (see how Germany managed the demise of its coal mining industry), people willing to accept the reality (rather than a hollow promise), and a country willing to help its citizens.

Why is it ironic? Because the same party that is elected to “solve” the problems is a champion of reducing social programs and demonizes them as “socialism.”

The only tool they could use is not (and should not be) available to do what they promise is Socialism. And yet they demonize social programs that they could use, incorrectly labeling them as Socialism.

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Brexit – the empty bucket

Brexit
 
A bunch of guys (politicians looking for an edge) got together and decided to convince the British populous that all their problems could be blamed on someone else… the “them.” And, if they simply pushed “them” out of their lives, everything would be great.
 
But, along the way, they forgot to mention all the things the “them” were doing for the populous.
 
And, another but, they didn’t actually have a plan to replace the “them” once they were kicked out.
 
The populous, moved forward by stump speeches, catchy slogans, and empty promises of a universally better life, agreed. They told the “them” to go screw off.
 
What did the bunch of guys do?
 
They sh!t their collective pants. “We won? The populous bought this crap? What do we do now?”
 
What they did was quit. Figuratively and literally, they, to a last, just quit.
 
Theresa May was left holding the bucket of emptiness trying to fill it with stuff that just doesn’t exist.
 
There are no simple answers to happiness or a better life. Most certainly the answer is not “them”.
 
 
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Pork industry safety to be more self-regulated

The current administration is shifting the responsibility in the pork industry for food safety from the regulators to the companies.

The Obama administration made a similar move with poultry.

There is an interesting difference between the American perspective and the European perspective.

In the US, policies tend to be a “wait and see” if the industry will do “it”, whatever “it” is (be safe in this case).

In Europe, policies assume companies won’t “do it,” and enforce more regulations, or take action.

In Europe, before drugs or new foods are approved, they have to be proven safe. This is a burden on the companies.

In the US, drugs or new foods are more likely to be approved with lower/no safety standard and then pulled once proven to be dangerous. In other words, people have to get sick or die before the burden shifts to the company.

As a general mindset, the recent events with the Boeing 737 Max are a good example. The rest of the World grounded the plane immediately (nearly) until it could be proven safe (still hasn’t). The US waited as long as it could, until pressure was too much, to ground the plane.

As a priority, the US wanted to lessen the burden on the company where Europe wanted to protect the people.

In the US, we assume:
1) That companies have the same rights as people
2) That companies operate with a conscience and they won’t hurt people (perhaps because they are run by people?)
3) That business growth is the most important thing

With this as a premise, it is easier to accept a loose regulatory environment.

Unfortunately, history shows that companies are willing to literally kill people to expand profit. From the dawn of the industrial age to today, this holds true.

– Slaughterhouses in Chicago ca 1900
– Railroads importing and abusing immigrants 1850-1900
– Mills in the Northeast and East.
– Mines throughout the Southeast, even today
– Superfund sites across the country (residential areas too polluted and now abandoned). 1950-1970s
– Koch bothers pipelines blowing up and killing people
– Firestone 1996-2001, hiding defective tire issue (270 dead)
– Enron shutting down access to electricity in CA to drive up prices.
– Mortgage companies knowingly writing fraudulent loans and literally initiating a worldwide economic meltdown.
– Epipen hiking the price of life-saving drug 5x with no cost-basis, just profit.
– Pharma increases the price of insulin for greater profit.
– Boeing wanting to keep planes in the air despite knowing there was a lethal problem, even after a crash and many reports of problems.

These are just a few that I am aware of. Some were cases of people deliberately planning or covering up. Others were done in the name of profit over people.

Perhaps the pork & poultry industries will do a fine job self-regulating the quality and balancing profits w/ safety. Unfortunately, we won’t know until people get sick or die. Our own history shows us that we’re likely heading for trouble.

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Europe passes online copyright rules, benefiting large publishers (they think)

Venture Beat published this article about the liability of linking to publisher content (or anyone’s really).
 
Two issues with the law
According to the new EU rules, which must be adopted by EU countries by 2021, sites must pay publishers to publish excerpts of their content.
 
Okay… not sure how much constitutes an excerpt. But, I get the notion. These are their words, creative property. If you can’t come up with your own words, then you shouldn’t take someone else’s (? even if you attribute it?).
 
But, here is the real kicker…
No Linking Without Payment
They have to pay them to even LINK TO THE CONTENT.
 
Under the copyright rules, as explained in the article, this very post that you are reading violates the new EU rules even if I don’t have images and the article title included, the very hyperlink above makes it a violation.
 
If this same content appears on Facebook,  I am not to be held liable. Facebook (or any other platform) holds the liability. 
 
Neutering the Internet
Google’s search platform is rendered as one huge copyright violation, as are virtually every social media platform or other search engines.
 
This law is akin to removing all the highways from the continent, disabling GPS, illegalizing printed maps, and then telling people to find their way to… anywhere.
 
Left as is, this law essentially means you will only find content that you already know exists and where it is. It kills the sharing of ideas in any broad sense. 
The Beneficiaries
One of the proponents says this says the rules modernize the internet. I am not sure how that conclusion fits. This ruling effectively negates the very core function of the internet and does so in the name of large publishers who simply could not keep up with the changing times.
I also wonder how shortsighted this is. Do the proponents/publishers believe Google or Bing users will simply come directly to their sites to find content?  If they dismiss the traffic driven by social media and search platforms as trivial, then why is the rule even necessary?
If this rule is not overturned, the biggest proponents will likely be the biggest sufferers in the short term.
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The Economy: The best thing the president can do is stay out of the way.

In the image, there are
– 3 ways of looking at unemployment
– The GDP
– Federal Budget Deficit

Since 2010, things have been improving.
The trend line from Obama through Trump term to date is steady.
The only difference so far is the deficit.

While the budget deficit can be, and is, drastically affected by the administration at the time (along with Congress), the economy does not follow nice, neat 4 year increments.

The presidents are neither to blame nor to be credited with the economy in any short period of time.

It is us, the American people who are responsible for the economy.

The best thing the president can do is stay out of the way.

BTW, the stock market is a terrible metric for our economic health. If it were a good metric, we would not see the bubbles or rallies and inexplicable big drops. The market is a speculators world and goes up and down accordingly.

economy

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Administration changes formual for drug payments. Its not enough.

The Government, despite being the largest payer for meds, does not negotiate price. We simply agree to pay the average going rate in the U.S.

We passed laws that prevent the Government from negotiating drug prices in Medicare and Medicaid. Guess who pushed that law?

Since the U.S. has the highest drug prices in the world, the Gov pays a lot (we pay a lot).

The Trump administration says it plans to change how Medicare pays for some expensive drugs to bring the costs more in line with the prices paid in Europe. This is a good first step.

But, we are only factoring in their costs, not trying to meet or beat it. For a country that says “we always win”, this sounds like we’re giving up pretty easily.

This has been going on for decades now; Rep and Dem administrations and Legislatures. The drug companies got their law, and “our” representatives seem fine with it. Yes, they complain about drug prices, but they don’t take the very simple step of overturning the 2003 law (or at least part of it) and allow the biggest payer of drug prescriptions to use its power to lower the cost.

“For decades, other countries have rigged the system so that American patients are charged much more,” President Trump said Thursday

While the president says other countries “rigged the system” (in his tendency to play the victim), the reality is that the U.S. removed itself from the equation a long time ago.

The proposed changes are small but more than we’ve done before. I only hope it leads to someone taking up the next step of letting the government negotiate the cost of the drugs for which we all pay.

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My issues with the GOP tax plans are twofold

1) we knowingly grow the deficit, even eagerly do so under the two plans.

2) individuals are being sold a lie re individual tax cuts for them. They will phase out.

The cuts for corporations and for pass-through income (S-Corps, one of the income drivers for very wealthy people) remain.

As for lower taxes on companies benefiting people…

They aren’t investing because they have more cash. We’ve seen this with prior cuts as well as with the cash buildup following the crisis.

With these lower corporate tax rates, we need to stop the revenue transfer that takes place. (create a “license” agreement to use a product name in your Ireland division. Then “license” the name and rights to sell related products to the US division for absurd fees that literally shift all profit to Ireland). These are tactics openly discussed during earning calls.

If we say we should simply match the international average tax for corporations, then we also need to look at matching the relative expenditures of these countries’ governments as well.

Military budgets – we spend 8-10 times that of any European country and 4+ times that of China (the next largest military budget).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget

There are only 3 countries that spend more per capita on the military than us. Israel and Saudi Arabia (for understandable and similar reasons), and Singapore (an outlier that is baffling).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures


While the US has the highest cost per capita in healthcare, the government’s share of that is not nearly the highest (as a percent and in absolute dollars). We are lower than some and right in line with most developed nations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita

Social Spending (basically helping people), we ranked about 20th relative to domestic GDP.

The United States doesn’t even make it into the top 10 for infrastructure expenditure per capita. The overall state of infrastructure didn’t even rank in the top 15 of nations.

https://gizmodo.com/heres-how-much-americas-infrastructure-is-worth-compar-1739382781

https://aneconomicsense.org/2014/07/28/americas-underinvestment-in-public-infrastructure/


I’m not a “tax them till it hurts” guy. I just have an issue with cutting revenue and not cutting expenses at all.

If we can implement a simplified tax code that says everyone pay x% and still afford to run the country, that’d be great.  However, I can handle 15 – 20 % tax, someone making $25k a year may not be able to handle that and still put a roof over their head, get clothing and food. I don’t know what to do about that end of it because you then start getting into deductions again.

The $1T average is a bit misleading.

We ran a surplus at the end of the 90s into the Bush Admin.

Then we had tax cuts and initiated a war in Iraq.

Then we had the financial meltdown.

The 1.3 – 1.4T deficits for a few of those years were widely believed by economists and those on both side of the aisle as necessary to prevent a complete collapse of the economy.

 

Year    Def     Debt Chg  %GDP   Reason

1998 ($69) $113  (0.8%) LTCM crisis

1999 ($126) $130  (1.3%) Glass-Steagall repealed

2000 ($236) $18  (2.3%) Surplus.

2001 ($128) $133  (1.2%) 9/11 attacks. EGTRRA

2002 $158 $421   1.4% War on Terror.

2003 $378 $555   3.2% JGTRRA

2004 $413 $596   3.3%

2005 $318 $554   2.4% Katrina. Bankruptcy Act.

2006 $248 $574   1.8% Bernanke chairs Fed.

2007 $161 $501   1.1% Iraq War cost

2008 $459 $1,017   3.1% Bank bailout. QE.

2009 $1,413 $1,632   9.8% Stimulus Act

2010 $1,294 $1,905   8.6% Obama tax cuts. ACA. Simpson-Bowles.

2011 $1,300 $1,229   8.3% Debt crisis.

2012 $1,087 $1,276   6.7% Fiscal cliff.

2013 $679 $672   4.1% Sequester. Government shutdown.

2014 $485 $1,086   2.8% Debt ceiling.

2015 $438 $327   2.4% Defense = $736.4 b.

2016  $585 $1,423   3.1% Defense = $767.3 b.

2017 $666 $672   3.4%

It’s one thing to get hit with a crisis. It’s another to plan a deficit.