"John R. Carroll" wrote:

Earnings growth and real wage increases.
Primarily the latter.
Partner government with the private sector and get going on the following:

1) 100 new, modern nuclear electrical generating facilities.
2) 100 new solar and wind powered electrical generating facilities.
3) An energy grid to distribute that power both regionally and locally.
4) A three dollar per gallon phased tax on gasoline pumped into passenger
vehicles.
5) Upgrade the countries Interstate HWY system and repair or replace every
defective under and overpass/bridge and tunnel.
6) Real reform of the banking and financial system. Shut down or break up
the 10 largest by having them value their assets at the current market and
declaring them insolvent. You'd need a resolution authority to do that.
7) Basic health care on a universal basis with more comprehensive coverage
through private coverage.


Right now, in a recession, increasing taxes would be a very bad move.

Increasing taxes is nuts. We need to increase revenue by increasing the
earnings pool that the taxes come from.
That is going to take investment.


I was with you on 1,2,3. My 45 mile commute would kill me with a 3 dollar gas tax unless
EV's were economic and had range.

I'm still trying to figure out how when I'm driving down an interstate near chicago, I
have to pay road tolls. Was it a federal highway at birth?

Banking, there needs to be a ratio between savings and loans so depositors don't get raped
for loaning the banks money.

7 is a bit more rational than some ideas going around. I am a compasionate conservative.


Wes

"John R. Carroll" wrote:

Earnings growth and real wage increases.
Primarily the latter.
snip

As the government at all levels has switched to personal income,
residential real estate, personal property and sales taxes for an
ever increasing fraction of their income as the corporations
avoid/evade taxes and move their facilities to other countries
this is becoming increasingly critical.

It is a well know maxim of hunting that if you want to hunt
ducks, you must go where the ducks are. This means that for
increased revenues the government must go at the corporations and
high net worth individuals as these are the only ones with any
money/disposible income.

One suggestion is to establish a steeply graduated income tax
structure with the brackets set as (sub)multiples of the previous
years median taxable income. Thus low wage individuals would pay
only nominal/minimal taxes [the general principal is that
everybody pays something, even if only a nominal amount], while
the lucky individuals receiving many multiples of the median
income would pay very high taxes.

The benefit here is that as the high wage earners in management
cut wages and benefits for their employees to maximize corporate
profit [and their bonuses] they are also raising their own income
taxes.

Another suggestion is to remove the salary cap for social
security. As currently structured this is a very highly
regressive tax and with much higher effective rates for low- and
moderate- income individuals.

A third suggestion is the introduction of graduated residential
real estate prices, with the brackets based on the median home
value. All home owners should pay something, but people that
insist on owning ostentatious estates with considerable acreage
should pay a higher tax rate. Gated communities should have a
special surcharge.


Unka George (George McDuffee)
...............................
The past is a foreign country;
they do things differently there.
L. P. Hartley (1895-1972), British author.
The Go-Between, Prologue (1953).