The Right to Vote:
I believe that voting is both a
right and a responsibility.
I believe I have the right
to vote or not to vote.
I believe that when I vote,
I have a responsibility to understand who, and what it is I am voting for, or
against.
I believe the candidates
have a responsibility to earn my vote.
I believe that I have a
responsibility to give each candidate the opportunity to earn my vote.
I believe that if I always
vote based on party affiliation, I cheapen the value of my vote because I have
failed to force the candidates to earn my vote.
I believe that for national
elections, it is my responsibility to understand our nation's most important
issues.
I believe each candidate is
responsible for presenting their detailed plans on how they would address our
nation’s most important issues.
The “United” States:
I believe the United States is stronger when
Americans are united around common goals.
I believe candidates and
political parties should strive to unite all Americans around those common
goals.
I believe candidates and
political parties should never adopt strategies that pit one group of Americans
against another group for political gain.
I believe that dividing
Americans is never in our nation’s best interest.
I believe it is my
responsibility to reject those candidates who try to divide Americans.
National Economic Objective:
I believe the economic policies of
the United States
government can, and should be, guided by a single National Economic Objective.
I believe our federal
government’s National Economic Objective should be to enact polices that will:
“Continuously improve the standard of
living of ALL Americans”
I believe this National
Economic Objective will help:
- Unite our divided nation.
- Prevent our leaders from advancing proposals
that have been designed to divide our nation for political gain.
- Force our elected leaders to focus on our major
economic challenges.
I believe that today our
major economic challenges include:
- A regulatory environment that impedes the growth
of US based, profit funded, private sector jobs.
- A safety net system that is ill defined, poorly
managed, fraught with moral hazards and wastes far too many tax payer
dollars.
- A growing national debt that acts like a brake
on our economy.
- Senior Entitlement programs that are unsustainable
under current funding law and will accelerate the growth of our national
debt.
- A tax system that impedes economic growth by
forcing people and businesses to make sub optimal economic decisions.
- A federal government that is not motivated to be
good stewards of our tax dollars or our nation’s fiscal health.
- An education system that has failed to provide
our children with the skill sets they will need to succeed in a
technically advancing global economy.
Jobs:
I believe the best way to improve a
person’s standard of living as well as their sense of worth and well being is
through a job.
I believe that from an
economic standpoint there are two types of jobs.
- Profit Funded Jobs and
- Taxpayer Funded Jobs.
I believe from a national
economic standpoint, profit funded jobs are better at growing the economy and
in improving the standard of living for more people than are taxpayer funded
jobs.
I believe that taxpayer
funded jobs are better at redistributing income then they are at growing the
economy.
I believe that every job is
important to the person who holds that job but that US based, profit funded,
private sector jobs are the most valuable for the long term health of our
economy and are the most important type of job for achieving our national economic
objective.
I believe therefore, that
our federal government’s job policy should be to do everything within the
government’s authority to entice Americans and the rest of the global private
sector to create, fill and maintain permanent, full-time, US based, profit
funded, private sector jobs.
I believe the U.S. Job
Burden stands as the greatest obstacle preventing the growth of the U.S. based, profit funded jobs we
need.
What is the Job Burden?
I believe the Job Burden is…
The
collection of government regulations and other costs that are imposed on
for-profit businesses that do not add value to the goods and services those
businesses produce.
I believe that a core set of
regulations that protect people, nature, and our natural resources from the negligent
and unscrupulous acts of some will always be needed to “properly regulate” any
market based economy. But, far too often, our regulations do more to prevent
good people from doing good then they do in preventing bad people from doing
bad.
I believe that every nation
imposes its own Job Burden on its businesses but that the US Job Burden has
become the most expensive Job Burden in the world.
I believe the best way to
expand the U.S. job market
and improve the U.S.
economy is for Congress to systematically optimize or eliminate the U.S. Job
Burden.
I believe that until we
substantially reduce the U.S. Job Burden, the United States will continue to lose
jobs to other nations as those nations improve their product quality and
production efficiency while they reduce their Job Burdens.
I believe business taxes can
help explain the harm caused by the Job Burden.
I believe that economists
know that a business cannot pay taxes. Only people can pay taxes. All any
business can do is collect enough money from its customers when it sells them
goods and services to pay its expenses, including its taxes.
I believe it is the owners
and investors – through reduced returns; or employees – through reduced
compensation; or customers – through increased prices who actually pay for all
business taxes and the other Job Burden costs of a business.
I believe however, that
through globalization, the owners’ returns are protected because they can always
invest in improving markets overseas.
I believe that with the
advent of two earner households and an ever more generous safety net, the U.S. labor
supply has become more flexible (elastic). These demographic and policy changes
have made it less likely that employees will absorb the full cost of any Job
Burden increases.
I believe therefore, that it
is typically the US
customer - through increased prices, who actually pays for most of the U.S. Job
Burden.
I believe the Job Burden is
a tax that is hidden from the customer because it is buried in the price.
Customers have no idea how much they pay for the Job Burden.
I believe the Job Burden is
America’s most regressive tax and therefore hurts the poor more than any other
tax because; rich and poor pay the same amount of Job Burden tax when they
purchase the same product. The lower a person’s income, the greater is the
percentage of their income that they must expend to pay for the Job Burden tax
on basic necessities.
I believe that, depending on
the product, the Job Burden portion of US manufactured goods will range
from 15% to 40% of the purchase price.
I believe that any
politician who wants to improve the standard of living of the poor should start
with policies that reduce the Job Burden.
I believe I should support
those candidates with the best plan to reduce the Job Burden.
Congress and the Job Burden:
I believe a “properly regulated”
free-market, capitalist economy (Capitalism) has proven to be the greatest
economic engine for advancing the standard of living for more people than any
other economic system ever devised.
I believe that a business is
simply: people agreeing to pool their talents and resources to fill a want or
solve a problem that others are willing to pay more for than it costs to
provide.
I believe capitalism works
because, more than any other system, it aligns with human nature. We humans are
social animals who learn through trial and error. We are born with a desire to continuously
improve our standard of living; or as our Founding Fathers phrased it: “the
pursuit of happiness”. We achieve our
goals through a delicate balance between our natural instincts of cooperation
and competition. It is this self-serving and self-correcting “invisible hand”
that is shared by all of us that allows capitalism to succeed with a minimum
set of intervening rules and enforcement policies.
I believe that each
restriction we place on capitalism makes our economy less efficient.
I believe for-profit
businesses work, in part, because every business leader knows that their
primary job is their fiduciary responsibility to maximize the return on
investment for their owners.
I believe that business
leaders know they have a responsibility to consider all options, including
outsourcing, off shoring or relocating overseas in order to fulfill their
obligations to their owners.
I believe that If managers
fail to produce a competitive return on investment, the owners will either
change the management or move their investments.
I believe it is the
responsibility of our elected leaders to understand the fundamentals of Capitalism
and human nature and enact those policies that convince business leaders of
both foreign and domestic firms that their best business opportunities can be
found in the USA.
I believe that any elected
leader who labels US business leaders as un-American or un-patriotic for moving
their operations abroad is a demagogue trying to hide his or her own leadership
and legislative failures.
I believe that any elected
leader who does not understand the critical link between jobs and the Job
Burden is not qualified to legislate business taxes or business regulations.
I believe the real reason why
Congress taxes businesses is because they want the additional tax revenue but
they fear voter retribution. So, Congress deceives the voters by taxing US businesses,
which in turn must hide the tax from the customer-voters by imbedding it in the
price of the US
made goods and services sold. Only people pay taxes. Business must always pass
along their taxes to people.
I believe that Congress
succeeds in the business tax sham because our education system fails to teach
the linkage between business taxes, private sector jobs, and our economy.
I believe that if Congress
passed a law that required every sales receipt to include a line item for the
Job Burden cost of that product, Congress would stop taxing our businesses and
would be far more judicious with the business regulations they enact because
the voters would demand it.
I believe the Show the Job Burden Tax on the Receipt Act
would be one government regulation that businesses would support because once
the voters realized that the Job Burden of US manufactured goods could exceed
40% of the price, the people would force our elected leaders to become better
stewards of our economy.
I believe I should reject
those candidates who would add to the US Job Burden.
Government Labor Costs:
I believe that some of the biggest obstacles
to growing U.S.
based jobs are the business paid portions of the federal safety net. These
include:
- Payroll Tax: (Social Security, Medicare,
Unemployment).
- Health Insurance: (Premium Support and the
Affordable Care Act).
- Retirement funding: (Defined Benefits and
Defined Contributions).
- Minimum wage premium: (The amount above the free
market wage for that job in that location).
I believe these US Job
Burden costs are nothing more than government imposed labor costs that, unlike
corporate income taxes, must be paid whether a business makes a profit or not.
I believe that in 2014, the
U.S. Corporate Income Tax raised $321
billion in federal taxes while the Payroll Tax alone raised $1 trillion.
I believe these government imposed
labor costs increase the cost of U.S. labor by 15% to 30%.
I believe that any U.S. imposed
labor premium is anti-competitive in a global economy but that 30% is
unsustainable.
I believe that increasing
the cost of U.S. labor decreases
the demand for U.S.
labor.
I believe the easiest, most
effective and most obvious way for any U.S.
based employer to reduce their U.S.
government imposed labor costs is to reduce their U.S. based employees. Thanks Congress!
I believe the safety net
programs that Congress has funded through U.S. based jobs are important for
our national safety-net, but we should never expect or ever allow our
businesses to ever pay for any portion of our safety net programs. The cost to
our jobs and our economy is simply too great.
I believe there are much
better ways to pay for our safety net then with our jobs.
I believe I should reject
any candidate who is not committed to the elimination of all Government imposed
labor costs.
Senior Entitlements:
I believe that Senior Entitlements
is the group name given to the Social Security and Medicare programs.
I believe the escalating
costs and poor fiscal management of our senior entitlements must be addressed.
The longer we wait to fix the problems will only make the eventual solution
that much more harsh on our seniors and expensive for ourselves and our
children.
I believe our Senior
Entitlement programs are underfunded by over $40 trillion. If we hope to continue
paying the senior benefits that have been promised using the same pay-as-you-go
funding, we will have to tax our children and their children an additional $40
trillion over the next 75 years. This will slow their economy and weaken their
future.
I believe the Democrats want
to fix our Senior Entitlement deficits by increasing business paid, and
employee paid payroll taxes. In other words, Democrats want to add to the Job
Burden. This will do more harm than good to the long term health of our
economy.
I believe the Republicans
want to fix our Senior Entitlement deficits by reducing senior benefits. In
other words, Republicans want to penalize seniors for Congressional mismanagement
of taxpayer funds.
I believe the solutions
offered by either party will be so distasteful to the American voter that both
parties will continue to “kick the can down the road” until our collective
American can falls off the fiscal cliff.
I believe we need to convert
the way we finance our senior safety net from a fiscally inefficient
pay-as-you-go insurance model to a far more fiscally sound, growth oriented,
perpetually funded, lifetime capital investment model.
Imagine, you're a young
person with a newborn child on the way and you want to be responsible and help
fund your child’s retirement and you are asked to select one of these two
choices.
Pay-as-you-go:
Do nothing now. When your child
start’s working at age 20, she will Contribute 6.25% of her pay for 50 years to
help pay the Social Security benefits of those who are already retired. When
she retires at age 70, those who are still working will pay for her retirement.
Or
Lifetime Capital Investment:
You and all other current taxpayers
can make a one-time deposit of $750 in your child’s account and the federal
government will guarantee to pay the same benefits, with the same cost of
living increases for as long as she lives and she will never have a penny
deducted from her pay to pay for the retirement of someone elsein the plan.
I believe that before you
make your choice, you should consider the following facts.
- The historic average return of the U.S.
equity markets has been 10.4% per year.
- The worst 70 year period in U.S. equity
market history still managed a very respectable 9.86% annual return. In other
words, if you made a one time investment in U.S. equities at the beginning
of any 70 year period, the worst you would have done would still have
managed an average annual rate of return of 9.86%.
- Social Security began collecting taxes and
paying benefits in 1937.
I believe that had Social Security
invested $250 in the equivalent of a market index in 1937 for each US citizen
born, then 70 years later, in 2007, that one time investment would be able to
pay the same average benefits for the same expected lifetime with the same
projected cost of living increases as today’s Social Security system. There
would of course be four very important differences.
- The $20 trillion in unfunded Social Security
liabilities today would not exist.
- The $2.7 trillion in Special U.S. Treasury IOU’s
that U.S.
taxpayers owe to future Social Security beneficiaries would not exist.
- The $800 billion per year Payroll Tax for Social
Security that is used to redistribute income from workers to retirees
would not exist.
- The equity investment pool would have reached the
perpetual self-funding level of $8 trillion. It would be able to cover all
future benefits as well as eliminate the need for additional taxes to
cover new births.
I believe that a one-time
investment today of about $750 for each US citizen born, that grows at 10.4%
per year, would be able to pay the same projected, cost of living adjusted, average
Social Security benefits when those citizens retire at age 70.
I believe that replacing
Social Security and Medicare funding with lifelong investments in America
would place our nation on a glide path to eliminate our unfunded liabilities in
those programs.
I believe the taxpayer cost
to fund an Invest-in-America program for Social Security would be about $3 billion
per year. (4 million births X $750). And another $3 billion for Medicare.
I believe that $3 billion
per year is less than the amount of foreign aid we have provided to Egypt and Pakistan each of the last 20 years.
I believe that converting Social
Security and Medicare funding from a pay-as-you-go insurance program to a
Life-Time Invest in America
investment Plan would reduce program costs from over $1 trillion per year to
about $6 billion per year.
I believe that with just
this one change, we could, over time, reduce our federal safety net program
cost from $1.4 trillion, (46% of federal spending and 8% of GDP), to $395
billion or 2.3% of GDP.
I believe Congress should
develop an economically sensible tax policy to pay for our safety net programs
that does not harm our jobs, our economy, our poor, or our children’s future.
I believe I should support those
candidates who support Senior Entitlement reforms and the tax policy to support
it.
Taxes:
I believe that when discussing tax
reform, Congress should unite behind the battle cry - Start Over!
I believe the federal income
tax and payroll tax systems accounted for over 90% of the federal tax revenue
raised in 2014.
I believe that Congress
should be held accountable for the negative economic impacts of federal tax
policy.
I believe that if you want
less of something, you should tax it. If you still want less, tax it more. The
Payroll Tax is a $1 trillion a year tax on US based jobs. Do we really want
fewer jobs?
I believe that consumption
taxes would be the least economically harmful type of taxes.
I believe that because of
their history of abuse and over use, we the people should grant Congress far
less authority to favor and disfavor various groups and activities through the
tax code.
I believe we can help guide
our elected leaders to manage our economy more effectively and to fund and run
our safety net programs more efficiently if we replace the economically harmful
Income Tax and Payroll Tax systems with two new progressive consumption tax systems.
The Safety Net Tax - SNT:
The SNT is a retail consumption tax established
to pay for all federal safety net programs. The SNT would be based on the
FairTax. Progressivity would be achieved through a rebate, paid in advance, for
the tax paid at the poverty level, to those U.S.
citizens, living in the U.S.
and earning less than 1.5 times the poverty rate for a family of 4.
The Personal Income Tax system - PITS:
The PITS is a hybrid personal income
and personal consumption tax designed to pay for all federal expenditures that
are not covered by the SNT. The PITS would be based on the progressive Hall-Rabushka
Flat Rate Tax.
Comments:
I believe you could help improve
this creed if you wanted to. I hope you want to.
