Taxes Archives - Page 22 of 34

How Hidden Fuel Taxes Are Increasing Your Gas Bill

June 4, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

Taxes on fuel can be pretty hefty, but they’re hard to notice if you’re not looking for them.

A Chevron gas station in Los Angeles was spotted charging over $8.00/gal for gasoline on Tuesday, a stark reminder of just how much fuel prices have risen across the country. Customers were unsurprisingly frustrated by the price, but felt there was little they could do to avoid it.

In a statement released to FOX11, Chevron defended the decision to set prices this high.

“In addition to the price of oil, other factors include the competitive conditions in the marketplace, the higher cost to produce gasoline to the specifications required by the California Air Resources Board, costs associated with fuel distribution, local, state and federal taxes, California carbon-compliance costs, recent inflationary pressures, and fixed costs of doing business that are often higher in California relative to other states (e.g., the cost of commercial real estate),” Chevron said.

There’s a lot in there, but one noteworthy piece is taxes. California has some of the highest gas taxes in the country, with total state taxes amounting to 68.15 cents per gallon. Throw in federal taxes on top of that, which total 18.4 cents per gallon, and you can see how it starts to add up.

Other states don’t have it quite as bad, but the taxes are still noticeable. The volume-weighted average of state taxes across the US is 38.69 cents per gallon. Add in the 18.4 cents per gallon from federal taxes, and you’re looking at total taxes of 57.09 cents per gallon on average (for comparison, gas retailers make about 10-15 cents per gallon in profits).

With taxes having such a significant influence on gas prices, some states have recently introduced gas tax “holidays” to help ease the pain at the pump. New York, for instance, is suspending its 16-cent-per-gallon motor fuel and sales tax from June through December. Connecticut suspended its 25-cent gas tax from the beginning of April through to the end of June, and Georgia suspended its 29.1-cent tax from mid-March to the end of May.

Now, it’s easy to think that suspending a 16-cent-per-gallon tax means that gas prices will go down by that amount overnight, but it’s not quite that simple. What the tax suspension actually does is lower the cost of production for gas producers like Chevron and Exxon (causing the supply curve to shift down). Now, this will almost certainly result in prices coming down due to competition, but the amount that prices go down depends on the relative elasticity of supply and demand. Put simply, some of the 16-cent break will go to consumers in the form of lower prices, but some of it will go to producers in the form of higher profits, and that breakdown will vary depending on the specific market factors in each context.

So, cutting gas taxes does bring gas prices down, but it’s highly unlikely that it will be cent-for-cent.

What’s curious about these gas tax cuts is how hard it is to notice them. Many drivers in these states likely had no idea these taxes had been suspended. Some perhaps didn’t even realize these taxes existed in the first place, or at least weren’t aware of how high they were.

The reason, of course, is that gas taxes are hidden in the price of fuel. For the most part, there’s no indication on your receipt about all the taxes that influenced the final price.

In theory, there’s nothing wrong with this. People can look up the taxes if they want. But psychologically, this makes a tremendous difference.

Think about your typical trip to the gas station. You notice the price, the company logo, and that’s about it. Thus, when prices go up and down, you naturally associate that with the gas market and the company. There’s no big sign pointing out the government interference that’s taking place behind the scenes.

Is it any wonder, then, that people are constantly blaming the gas companies for high prices? We hear so much about “corporate greed” and “price gouging” and the need for a “windfall profits tax,” and yet we hear so little about gas taxes. Why? Because you can’t protest what you can’t see. There’s hardly any visibility around these taxes, which is precisely why there’s hardly any pushback.

Consider, for a second, what would happen if every single gas bill pointed out the state and federal gas taxes associated with it. Imagine how people would react. In all likelihood, there would be a significant outcry imploring the government to reduce the taxes.

It makes you wonder if that’s why they made these taxes so invisible in the first place.

AUTHOR

Patrick Carroll

Patrick Carroll has a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Waterloo and is an Editorial Fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education.

RELATED ARTICLE: Democrats’ Garbage Gas-Price-Gouging Bill

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. This article was adapted from an issue of the FEE Daily email newsletter. Click here to sign up and get free-market news and analysis like this in your inbox every weekday.

High Gas Prices are Caused by Governments, Not Companies

June 3, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Energy, Environment, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Jihad Watch

When Governor Newsom and New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern met to announce a deal between the tiny country and the broken state, it was another example of California illegally enacting its own foreign policy. And a reminder of why California gas prices are so high.

The memorandum had California promising to be “carbon neutral” by 2045 and to promote the “environmental integrity of carbon pricing instruments”. California’s crooked carbon pricing schemes have become notorious for both their worthlessness and their corruption.

And California drivers are paying the price.

A report from Stillwater Associates last year found that California consumers were paying an extra $1.19 a gallon. This year the added costs include a 51 cent state excise tax, an 18 cent sales tax, 20 cents for Fuels Under the Cap, part of the state’s corrupt environmental cap and trade program and 17 cents for the Low Carbon Fuel Standard.

Californians are paying a $1.41 federal and state tax markup on $3 bucks of crude.

Or almost half.

Biden and other Democrats have blamed corporate profits, but the gas stations and suppliers are making a mere 33 cents a gallon or less than a third of the state’s added $1.08 in various taxes. Even the refiners are only making 72 cents. The biggest piece of the pie is coming from the taxes, many of them hidden, imposed by Democrats in the name of saving the planet.

While Newsom and Big Green describe some of these taxes as “allowances” and “credits” as part of a “marketplace”, they are really a corrupt scheme to force consumers to pay money to special interests and politically connected companies under the guise of “saving the planet”.

The Left now attacks Elon Musk, but California’s environmental regulations kept Tesla profitable. For example, in 2020, Tesla reported $428 million in sales from “regulatory credits” amounting to “four times Tesla’s $104 million of net profit for the quarter”. In the first quarter of 2021, Tesla sold $518 million in “credits” and Autoweek noted that it was making “more money selling credits and bitcoin than cars.” Credits are like bitcoins the government forces you to buy.

Regulatory credits are a corrupt environmental scam in which car makers who sell regular cars to ordinary people have to buy “credits” from electric car makers like Tesla, who sell to the rich, and then pass on the high costs on to working class and middle class car buyers.

The dirty truth about California’s electric car market is that it’s subsidized by people who can’t afford them. And the same situation applies to gas prices with their burden of green taxes.

Democrats sold the fuel taxes as penalties on polluters. They claimed that imposing them would “make the polluters pay”. Few Californians seemed to understand that by “polluters”, the Sacramento political establishment meant the single mother picking up her son from school, the supermarket cashier commuting to work, and everyone else who can’t afford a Tesla.

The California average gas price is now over $6 a gallon, compared to $4.60 for the rest of the country, because Democrats are making ordinary drivers, whom they call “polluters”, pay.

Gov. Newsom is touting his new deal with New Zealand, even though most California environmentalists have turned on the corrupt green scam that’s killing the state.

ProPublica, a leftist group, noted that, “California’s oil and gas industry actually rose 3.5% since cap and trade began.” While the idea that there’s anything wrong with carbon is an environmentalist hoax that props up corrupt green special interests, the Brown-Newsom green tax isn’t even coming close to accomplishing the stated goals that is the basis for those taxes.

A Bloomberg article last month began by arguing that, “California’s carbon market was supposed to be a model for the US, harnessing the power of capitalism to fight climate change in the world’s fifth-biggest economy. But nearly 10 years after ‘cap and trade’ began, there’s little proof the system has had much direct impact on curbing planet-warming pollutants.”

Before bitcoin, environmentalists created an imaginary “carbon currency” and a marketplace around it that forced ordinary consumers to fund corporate bribery of top Democrats. Some of the biggest companies in the country boast of going “carbon neutral” by 2030, 2045 or 2980, when what that actually means is that they’re buying “carbon offsets” and changing nothing.

The carbon scam has made the right sorts of people rich and everyone else much poorer.

California began trading “emissions” in the 90s with the Regional Clean Air Incentives Market (RECLAIM).A decade later, Anne Sholtz, an environmental law academic and emissions broker who helped set up the program, had been arrested by the EPA on wire fraud charges.

Sholtz had all but invented the modern electronic pollution marketplace. She met with Al Gore and gave plenty of interviews until she was arrested for trying to trade credits she didn’t have.

But can there be fraud when the whole thing is a scam?

Big Green created a massive industry based on trading indulgences from government environmental mandates. An industry now worth billions, is being touted to investors as having the potential to hit $100 billion or $200 billion or infinity by 2030. It’s an industry that, unlike those it’s using the government and leftist activists to shake down, is worth nothing, produces nothing, and exists purely as a rent-seeking parasite destroying American living standards.

Each company and investor joining the regulatory Ponzi scheme is now motivated to pressure governments, local and national, to impose more taxes and push more companies into the market so that those who got in earlier will steal more from those who come in later. This perverse socialist mockery of capitalism is depicted as “saving the planet” even though it has failed to do anything to move the dial even on the environmental hoax that justifies its existence.

And that is one reason why California’s gas prices are some of the highest in the nation.

But like vegans, legal shoplifting, and shopping bag bans, what starts in California, doesn’t stay there. Biden and Senate Democrats have tried to impose a national carbon tax on Americans.

Had Senator Manchin not rejected last year’s proposed carbon tax, the whole country would have been hit with a tax of at least another 18 cents per gallon. Senator Whitehouse’s proposal would have added about 14 cents a gallon, but would have increased “5 percent above inflation annually.” That kicker, also a part of California’s gas taxes, is what’s really making them rise.

And that’s just for starters.

The Obama administration was proposing a carbon tax that would have added over 40 cents per gallon. The EU’s $75 per ton carbon tax applied here would mean over 60 cents more per gallon. A former Carter adviser has proposed a tax that would be closer to 90 cents.

And it would only go up from there.

California is a cautionary tale that when environmentalists, leftists, and other Democrats claim that they want to “make polluters pay”, they mean you.

Driving by a Los Angeles gas station last week, I saw that the price was approaching 7 bucks.

They’re making us pay. Every single day.

AUTHOR

DANIEL GREENFIELD

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

When is enough to be enough?

May 31, 2022/in Commentary, DrRichSwier.com, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Save America Foundation

As the war in Ukraine continues, the world but especially America, seems to have bottomless pockets when it comes to sending aid to Ukraine. You all know my opinion on that war and if we should even be interfering. How much is enough? Should we continue? Should this money and weaponry be a loan to be repaid?

Here are my answers. My opinion. I say enough us enough. In fact too much. All of it should have been a loan to be paid back to the U.S. treasury filled with our tax money. To date $54B has been spent/given. With the normal corruption in those parts of the world I would hazard to say a fair bit of the cash has been filtered off.

QUESTION: How much has gone to the neo Nazi regiments and to strengthening them? (Azov Regiment, etc.)

When are we as a nation going to understand that we are no longer in a financial position to be the worlds policemen? Our national debt is to the point of being unable to be paid. Our nation is in trouble. Morally. Ethically. The left has done a phenomenal job of destroying almost everything we ever held dear. Law Enforcement is weak. Our beloved military is being destroyed from the inside by leftist politicians and leftist treasonous leadership. Our economy, despite assurances from this lying administration that fraudulently got itself into the White House, is in tatters. Our self worth as a nation has never been lower especially after the deliberate debacle of the Afghanistan withdrawal.

Nations mock us and our so called leadership. Who can blame them? Not me. Our leadership is disgusting. Our leadership is acting treasonously. Our leadership is far worse than just being mentally challenged. Our leaders are socialists. One World Nation proponents. Their hatred for America is clearer daily.

They are all fiddling in the swamplands of DC while America burns. Celebrating what they see as the demise of this nation as a shining light on a hill, a beacon for all other countries to follow. A land of freedom. Liberty. They are destroying it all.

And we allow it. Sadly we are sitting on our hands watching the demise. We fret about inflation which I believe is in the beginning of hyper-inflation. We fret about gas prices, air travel, food prices, shortages of baby formula. I could go on but when do we as a nation stand up to the tyrant in the WH? When will enough be enough? When will we say it has to stop?

Soon may be too late.

This upcoming mid term election may be the last chance we have to peacefully change the direction we are taking. To stop the demise. To put America first. To make America great again.

Failure to stop the rot here and now will I believe end up very badly for this nation. We risk losing all. Leaving nothing for our kids and grandkids.

Justice must be done. All corrupt politicians and treasonous military leadership and politically motivated leftist judges must be removed one way or another. For justice to be seen to be done we need imprisonment and executions. We need to be resolute in our mission to save this Constitutional Republic once and for all.

America is worth it. The world needs a strong and powerful America that they can look up to. A true world leader.

Biden Wants Taxpayers to Write a $10,000 Check to Every College Grad Making $300,000

May 30, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Education, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Jihad Watch

Criminal, but inevitable.

The Democrats have a sizable demographic of upper-class people with MAs and PhDs who account for both a disproportionate amount of student loan debt and primary activism. Call it the Elizabeth Warren demographic. Those people want a very big government handout that they’re calling “student loan forgiveness”.

Even Biden’s people realize that just having the government cover $1.75 trillion to its voter base might be a bit much, so they’re starting with $230 billion.

White House officials are currently planning to cancel $10,000 in student debt per borrower, after months of internal deliberations over how to structure loan forgiveness for tens of millions of Americans, three people with knowledge of the matter said.

President Biden had hoped to make the announcement as soon as this weekend at the University of Delaware commencement, the people said, but that timing has changed after the massacre Tuesday in Texas.

The White House’s latest plans called for limiting debt forgiveness to Americans who earned less than $150,000 in the previous year, or less than $300,000 for married couples filing jointly, two of the people said. It was unclear whether the administration will simultaneously require interest and payments to resume at the end of August, when the current pause is scheduled to lapse.

Quite a high-class problem.

A $10,000 check to the upper class while using a means test of $300,000 in a time when people are struggling to gas up their cars and buy food is really something.

Pouring in $230 billion into an economy that already suffers from out-of-control inflation means throwing oil on the fire. But Biden has clearly decided that the majority of Americans hate him, so all he can do is service his base. That means racial dog whistles for the lower part of it and subsidies for the upper portion of it.

Wiping out $10,000 of debt per borrower could cost roughly $230 billion, according to estimates by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan think tank. However, restarting payments for borrowers, which have been on hold since March 2020, would bring additional money into federal coffers. The think tank said in March that pausing payments had cost the federal government $100 billion and would run around $50 billion per year

This isn’t “forgiveness”, it’s stealing from social security, which is heading toward running out of money, to subsidize Elizabeth Warren’s base. It’s a giant middle finger to most of the country. Especially the working class.

And America.

On Feb 1, the New York Times ran an article warning that the national debt had topped $30 trillion for the first time, leaving us in so much debt that “the government would need to spend an amount larger than America’s entire annual economy in order to pay it off.”

The Social Security Trust Fund, sold to a generation that survived the Depression and witnessed the early stages of the disintegration of the family as a hedge against growing old in poverty, became just another flow of tax revenues that can’t and won’t be paid back once the unfunded bill fully comes due.

The doomsday clock for the Trust Fund moved up one year. The news that Old-Age and Survivors Insurance will now run out in 12 years was largely ignored in 2021. It’ll go on being ignored until the mandatory 20% cuts start kicking in. And then it’ll get even worse.

Medicaid’s hospital insurance will be out much sooner by 2026. That’s only four years away.

But sure, kill seniors and then write a $10K check to the grad students who took out loans they don’t want to pay back.

AUTHOR

DANIEL GREENFIELD

The UK’s Single-Payer Healthcare System Has Become a State Religion—and It’s Failing

May 30, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Healthcare, Politics, Science, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

The National Health Service has become a heavily bureaucratic and inefficient state monopoly.

The NHS (National Health Service) is known to be the closest thing to a state religion in the UK. During the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, households around the country clapped outside their front doors in order to thank the NHS for its service.

The British healthcare system is “our” NHS and is claimed to be one of the best things about the UK. However, in reality the collectivism which nationalized healthcare promotes denies individuals their autonomy and places their healthcare in the hands of the heavily bureaucratic and inefficient state monopoly.

Due to the almost theocratic attitude that the British public has of the NHS, criticism is highly frowned upon and NHS failures are often excused. One of the biggest excuses of NHS failure is the claim that it is underfunded. For one, this is not true as NHS spending has continued to increase, especially throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. However, this accusation leads to a bigger question for the collectivists: considering a general election is bound to happen every five years in the UK, why are you potentially putting healthcare in the hands of a party you believe will underfund it?

The political process is subject to mood swings and political parties have different focuses. Individuals are forced to pay however much the current government dictates. This means that during economic turmoil, a healthy household which is struggling to put food on the table will still have to pay national insurance, despite rarely using it. Individuals should have control over what is prioritized financially in their household. There’s no point having expensive subscriptions to services you don’t use when you need other services more. Under a free market system, if an individual’s financial situation is tough they would be able to choose cheaper healthcare insurance.

In addition, under a single-payer healthcare system, patients get what they’re given and do not have much choice over it.

For example, in the UK during the Covid pandemic, 25,000 patients were discharged from the hospital to care homes without testing or isolation arrangements. This contributed significantly to 20,000 people in care homes dying after testing positive between March and June 2020. It’s clear that care home patients were an afterthought when it came to the NHS’s Covid response. They were not treated as consumers which a business would attempt to appeal and cater to. Instead, the country’s elderly were treated as pawns in the NHS’s strategy to deal with the pandemic.

Furthermore, those who want better quality healthcare don’t have much choice unless they want to go private. If an elderly person wants better healthcare, they don’t have much control other than getting what the state decides they should receive. Under a free market system, they would be able to have more choice over their healthcare. However, even if the state does decide to spend more on healthcare, national insurance increases probably won’t specifically target the needs of the patient since national insurance is standardised to the taxpayer.

If an individual does want to pay for private healthcare, they still have to pay for national insurance on top of that. This means that private healthcare isn’t realistically accessible to working-class people, making them dependent on state healthcare which is extremely inefficient and uncomfortable for many in the UK. The NHS is not a safety net, but a trap for working-class Britons which they cannot escape if they find the quality of care inadequate.

With increases in waiting times, both for A&E and GP appointments, it seems that having a healthcare system that is “free to the point of use” is pointless if those who need it can’t use it due to being on endless waiting lists. Single-payer healthcare sacrifices choice for “free” healthcare. Instead, the UK should focus on affordable healthcare through the free market. This would provide patients with genuine choice, making the healthcare system more comfortable, accessible and efficient.

AUTHOR

Jess Gill

Jess Gill is a British libertarian content creator. She is the host of Reasoned UK where she makes daily videos on British politics through a libertarian perspective.

Do Not Sell Your Gas Vehicle Yet! Read: The Electric Vehicle Scam

May 23, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Energy, Environment, Politics, Science, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Dr. Rich Swier

We have written about the issues with all electric vehicles (EVs) and the current push to build 500,000 EV charging stations (EVSEs) by 2030 at a cost to taxpayers of $5billion.

America Out Loud published an article by Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris on January 15th, 2022 titled “The Electric Vehicle Scam.”

Here are the key points made by Dr. Lehr and Tom Harris:

The utility companies have thus far had little to say about the alarming cost projections to operate electric vehicles (EVs) or the increased rates that they will be required to charge their customers. It is not just the total amount of electricity required⏤but the transmission lines and fast charging capacity that must be built at existing filling stations.
In order to match the 2,000 cars that a typical filling station can service in a busy 12 hours, an EV charging station would require 600, 50-watt chargers at an estimated cost of $24 million and a supply of 30 megawatts of power from the grid. That is enough to power 20,000 homes.
The government of the United Kingdom is already starting to plan for power shortages caused by the charging of thousands of EVs. Starting in June 2022, the government will restrict the time of day you can charge your EV battery.
The average used EV will need a new battery before an owner can sell it, pricing them well above used internal combustion cars. The average age of an American car on the road is 12 years. A 12-year-old EV will be on its third battery. A Tesla battery typically costs $10,000 so there will not be many 12-year-old EVs on the road. Good luck trying to sell your used green fairy tale electric car!
Although the modern lithium-ion battery is four times better than the old lead-acid battery, gasoline holds 80 times the energy density. The great lithium battery in your cell phone weighs less than an ounce while the Tesla battery weighs 1,000 pounds. And what do we get for this huge cost and weight? We get a car that is far less convenient and less useful than cars powered by internal combustion engines.

Dr. Lehr and Tom Harris concluded:

The electric automobile will always be around in a niche market likely never exceeding 10% of the cars on the road. All automobile manufacturers are investing in their output and all will be disappointed in their sales. Perhaps they know this and will manufacture just what they know they can sell. This is certainly not what President Biden or California Governor Newsom are planning for. However, for as long as the present government is in power, they will be pushing the electric car as another means to run our lives. We have a chance to tell them exactly what we think of their expensive and dangerous plans when we go to the polls in November of 2022.

To make matters worse we recently received a link to a study on all electric vehicle (EV) charging stations (EVSEs) in the San Francisco Bay Area. The study was titled “Reliability of Open Public Electric Vehicle Direct Current Fast Chargers” done by David Rempel, Carleen Cullen, Mary Matteson Bryan and Gustavo Vianna Cezar from the Department of Bioengineering, University of California, Berkeley. The study found,

“the cable was too short to reach the EV inlet for 4.9% of the EVSEs and 22.7% of EVSEs that were non-functioning were unresponsive or unavailable screens, payment system failures, charge initiation failures, network failures, or broken connectors…This level of functionality appears to conflict with the 95 to 98% uptime reported by the EV service providers (EVSPs) who operate the EV charging stations.”

So, 27% of the EVSEs had serious enough issues that you could not charge your EV.

CLICK HERE TO READ: The Electric Vehicle Scam

In a January 11th, 2022 article titled “Ever Wonder Why Our Leftist Government is Intent on Putting Us in Electric Cars? Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris pointed out:

There is not now, nor ever will there be, sufficient electric power for us to travel hither and yon with battery-powered vehicles. So, who decides who gets what electricity will be available? Answer: your friendly liberal, “progressive,” leftist government who we, mistakenly or not, placed in power.

The electric vehicle (EV) is clearly one of the most hyped innovations of our lifetime. While our federal government and the state of California think that the internal combustion engine will soon end up in the dustbin of history, it just isn’t going to happen for a variety of reasons:

The most obvious is that the expense of EVs will not allow the average American to own one. The alternative will always be far cheaper and will transport you much farther.

EVs can never be produced in the numbers the government wants because of a lack of necessary rare earth minerals held hostage in China.

Availability of charging stations will never be adequate either. And the time required to recharge on a long trip will make you cancel any long trip.

The cost of a battery replacement will be a significant turn-off as well.

Read the full article.

About Dr. Jay Lehr and Tom Harris

Dr. Jay Lehr is a Senior Policy Analyst with the International Climate Science Coalition and former Science Director of The Heartland Institute. He is an internationally renowned scientist, author, and speaker who has testified before Congress on dozens of occasions on environmental issues and consulted with nearly every agency of the national government and many foreign countries. After graduating from Princeton University at the age of 20 with a degree in Geological Engineering, he received the nation’s first Ph.D. in Groundwater Hydrology from the University of Arizona. He later became executive director of the National Association of Groundwater Scientists and Engineers.

Tom Harris is Executive Director of the Ottawa, Canada-based International Climate Science Coalition, and a policy advisor to The Heartland Institute. He has 40 years experience as a mechanical engineer/project manager, science and technology communications professional, technical trainer, and S&T advisor to a former Opposition Senior Environment Critic in Canada’s Parliament.

Florida Has Record $20 Billion Budget Surplus

May 22, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Elections, Featured, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Geller Report

If only the rest of the country was governed like Florida. If only our POTUS was like Governor Ron DeSantis. #DeSantis2028!

And the evil party says: DeSantis is ‘creating havoc’ in Florida, Democratic candidate for governor

Demonic nuts.

By keeping the economy open, maintaining a low tax environment, and being fiscally responsible, Florida’s FY 21-22 surplus is the largest in state history — with more than $20 billion in reserves for a budget that is just a shade over $100 billion. pic.twitter.com/06BKdNaNdr

— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) May 20, 2022

DeSantis: Florida Has Record $20 Billion Budget Surplus

By 92.1 CTQ, May 21, 2022

Gov. Ron DeSantis in West Palm Beach on Friday announced that Florida’s unemployment rate in April was 3.0 percent. That’s down two-tenths of a percent from March and a 2.1 percent decline from last year.

Continuing with the positive economic news, he said that with about six weeks left in the fiscal year, the Sunshine State has a budget surplus of over $20 billion which includes over $3 billion for the state’s “rainy day fund” and half a billion dollars set aside to respond to disasters. That may come in handy this hurricane season.

The governor says it’s the largest budget surplus in the history of Florida.

Karine Jean-Pierre Stumped On Her First Day When Peter Doocy Asks How Raising Corporate Taxes Lowers Inflation

May 17, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Daily Caller

The new White House press sec. Karine Jean-Pierre appeared to dodge a question from Fox News’ Peter Doocy about a tweet from President Joe Biden regarding inflation.

“Karine, congratulations, it’s nice to see you up there,” Doocy began. “The president’s Twitter account posted the other day if you wanna bring down inflation, let’s make sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share. How does raising taxes on corporations reduce inflation?”

“Um, so, are you talking about a specific tweet?” Jean-Pierre, who appeared stumped, asked.

Doocy then referenced a May 13 tweet from Biden that said “you want to bring down inflation? Let’s make sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share.”

You want to bring down inflation?

Let’s make sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share.

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) May 13, 2022

“Look, we have talked about, um, we have talked about this past year, about making sure that the wealthiest among us are paying their fair share, and that is important to do. That is something the president has been working on everyday when we talk about inflation and lowering costs, so it’s very important that as we’re seeing costs rise, as we’re talking about how to, you know, build an America that’s equal for everyone and doesn’t leave anyone behind, that is an important part of that as well,” Jean-Pierre said.

“But how does raising taxes on corporations lower the cost of gas, the cost of a used car, the cost of food for everyday Americans?” Doocy pressed.

“So I think we encourage those who have done very well, especially those who care about climate change, to support a fairer tax code that doesn’t charge manufacturers workers, cops, builders a higher percentage of their earnings, that the most fortunate people in our nation, and not let that stand in the way of reducing energy costs and fighting an existential problem if you think about it, that is an example. To support basic collective bargaining rights as well.”

“But look, by not, without, having a fairer tax code, which is what I’m talking about, then all, like, manufacture workers, cops, you know, it’s not fair for them to have to pay higher taxes than the folks who are not paying taxes at all,” she continued.

“But what does that have to do with inflation?” Doocy asked. “The President said if you wanna bring down inflation let’s make sure the wealthiest corporations pay their fair share. Jeff Bezos came out and tweeted about that, he said ‘the newly created disinformation board should review this tweet.’ Would you be okay with that?”

“Look, it’s not a huge mystery why one of the wealthiest individuals on earth, right, opposes an economic agenda that is for the middle class, that cuts some of the biggest costs families face, fights inflation for the long haul, right, and that’s what we’re talking about, that’s why we’re talking about lowering inflation here, and adds to the historic deficit reduction the president is achieving by asking the richest taxpayers and corporations to pay their fair share. That’s what we’re talking about,” Jean-Pierre said.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos criticized the aforementioned tweet, arguing that “misdirection doesn’t help the country.”

“The administration tried hard to inject even more stimulus into an already over-heated, inflationary economy and only Manchin saved them from themselves. Inflation is a regressive tax that most hurts the least affluent.”

In fact, the administration tried hard to inject even more stimulus into an already over-heated, inflationary economy and only Manchin saved them from themselves. Inflation is a regressive tax that most hurts the least affluent. Misdirection doesn’t help the country. https://t.co/a8cygcunEG

— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) May 15, 2022

Inflation reached its quickest uptick since December 1981 after soaring 8.5% in March.

AUTHOR

BRIANNA LYMAN

Reporter. Follow Brianna on Twitter

California Admits that 65,000 Students in its Community Colleges Are Fake – Costing the State Millions

May 10, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Education, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Geller Report

These fake students get financial aid. And the poor, beleaguered, abused American taxpayer foots the bill for all this graft, corruption and treachery. And no doubt these ‘fake students’ also voted for Biden and Newsome in their last respective elections too.

California Admits that 65,000 Students in its Community Colleges Are Fake – Costing the State Millions

By Joe Hoft, Gateway Pundit, May 7, 2022:

The state agrees that there are 65,000 cases of ghost students in the California community college system but some say there may be as many as 180,000 ghost students. This is costing the colleges millions in lost dollars while preventing real students from receiving the education they desire.

Professor Kim Rich believes that there may be some classes with 50% of the students who are fake.

Fake bots are now signing up for California community colleges, seemingly to get financial aid dollars for her online courses. That is money that was lost and will never be repaid. A professor of criminal justice at Pierce College, Kim Rich said about a third of her class were fake students. She said some classes had 5% fake students, others 10%, and some had 50%. It’s costing millions of dollars. Rich discovered students were submitting plagiarized work and that led her to search for the students via google. That’s when she discovered they were fake students.

CEO and founder of OpentheBooks.com, Adam Andrzejewski, was on a local news program where he discussed the situation in California.

Once you’re enrolled you’re eligible for federal and state student aid…They’ve [the colleges] have known about this for at least a year and have moved too slow for too long.

Some students have the names of Barack Obama and Donald Trump. These fraudsters are costing the state and country millions.

The VA Bought 10,000 Smartphones during the Pandemic. 85% Were Never Used

May 7, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Elections, Featured, Healthcare, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

There’s a right way and a wrong way to help homeless veterans.

The US Department of Veterans Affairs wasted $1.8 million in data plan costs for unused phones, according to an inspector general’s report released on Wednesday. The Veterans Health Administration had spent $7 million to purchase 10,000 phones with unlimited prepaid calling plans for homeless veterans, but 85% of the phones went unused. The report also found that $571,000 was wasted on data plans for iPads sitting in storage due to poor oversight.

“The smartphones and iPads were purchased as part of the efforts to increase homeless veterans’ access to telehealth,” the Associate Press explains. “The veterans were enrolled in a Department of Housing and Urban Development VA Supportive housing program.”

The report called for the VA to “establish a realistic goal for days in storage along with a process for closely monitoring days in storage for each data plan provider and taking corrective actions when the goal is not being met.” It also called on the VA to create a process that starts the data plan charges only after the device has been issued to a veteran.

Regrettably, government waste and mismanagement like this is nothing new. From $2 million bathrooms to $400,000 camel statues, governments have managed to throw mad amounts of money down the drain over the years. In fact, government waste is so common that Senator Rand Paul prepares an annual “Festivus” report detailing the most egregious examples of wasted resources from the year.

But while government waste is nothing new, what’s intriguing about this particular case is the reason that was given for the problem.

“The inspector general concluded that Veterans Health Administration officials…made a good faith effort to help veterans get smartphones,” the Associated Press notes. “But they found there was a ‘lack of information for officials to be able to determine the quantity needed for the targeted veteran population.’”

If this assessment sounds familiar, well, it should. As the Nobel-prize-winning economist F. A. Hayek famously asserted, the “lack of information” possessed by government bureaucrats regarding the “quantity needed” of various resources is in fact the key problem with central planning. Waste is inevitable in these systems precisely because they can never accumulate, let alone manage, the knowledge that is required for determining the best allocation of resources.

Hayek spells out the knowledge problem in his famous essay, The Use of Knowledge in Society.

“The peculiar character of the problem of a rational economic order is determined precisely by the fact that the knowledge of the circumstances of which we must make use never exists in concentrated or integrated form but solely as the dispersed bits of incomplete and frequently contradictory knowledge which all the separate individuals possess. The economic problem of society is thus not merely a problem of how to allocate “given” resources—if “given” is taken to mean given to a single mind which deliberately solves the problem set by these “data.” It is rather a problem of how to secure the best use of resources known to any of the members of society, for ends whose relative importance only these individuals know. Or, to put it briefly, it is a problem of the utilization of knowledge which is not given to anyone in its totality.”

The solution to this problem, says Hayek, is decentralization and market prices. With market prices, we can learn what people find valuable and direct production to those ends. But without market prices, we are “groping in the dark,” as Mises says. This is why Veterans Affairs wasted over a million dollars on these data plans. They had no way of knowing the demand for these phones, so they ended up buying way more than were needed.

Of course, none of this is to say we shouldn’t help homeless veterans. The question here is what’s the most effective way to help them. The government approach, or the market approach?

The government approach, as this story illustrates, is to assume that we know what homeless veterans need, buy a bunch of it, and then realize that we actually misjudged the need and wasted a bunch of money.

The market approach, on the other hand, begins with the assumption that we don’t know what’s best for other people or what their specific needs are. Following from that, we realize that it makes little sense to have central planners spending money on their behalf. Thus, rather than trying to guess what they need, we focus our efforts on getting out of their way. We get rid of minimum wage laws and occupational licensing requirements that might be keeping them out of jobs. We cut taxes so they can save money, and we tear down crony regulations that make everyday goods more expensive than they need to be. In other words, we let the market work.

To be sure, the market approach is radically different from what we’ve been doing. But given how things have turned out, perhaps radically different is exactly what we need.

This article was adapted from an issue of the FEE Daily email newsletter. Click here to sign up and get free-market news and analysis like this in your inbox every weekday.

AUTHOR

Patrick Carroll

Patrick Carroll has a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Waterloo and is an Editorial Fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education.

VIDEO REPORT: Afghan Refugees Given $400,000 To Purchase Houses In Florida As Americans Go Homeless

May 6, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Immigration, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Dr. Rich Swier

The WarRoom published this video report on relocating Afghan refugees.

On September 7th, 2021 USA Today in an article titled, “White House asks Congress for billions in emergency funds for Afghan resettlement” Joey Garrison reported:

WASHINGTON — The White House is seeking billions in emergency funds this month from Congress to help resettle tens of thousands of Afghan immigrants into the U.S.

In a spending request Tuesday outlining “urgent needs,” President Joe Biden’s administration asked Congress to authorize $6.4 billion for Afghan resettlement efforts one week after the U.S. ended its military effort in Afghanistan. The U.S. is currently working to resettle Afghan allies evacuated from the war-torn country.

White House officials also requested “at least $10 billion” for recovery efforts from Hurricane Ida, and an additional $14 billion for other recent natural disasters – including Hurricanes Laura and Delta from last year.

Shalanda Young, acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, made the budget request Tuesday, less than four weeks before the current 2021 fiscal year ends Sept. 30. Together the requests total more than $30 billion.

[ … ]

The funding for Afghan refugees would support U.S. resettlement operations overseas and plans for as many as 65,000 vulnerable Afghans to arrive in the U.S. by the end of his month, according to the White House, and up to 30,000 additional Afghans over the next year.

Read the full article.

Mapped: Afghan refugees headed to 46 states https://t.co/d5aCenKaGH pic.twitter.com/GhpcGvF7ri

— Axios (@axios) September 16, 2021

On September 16th, 2021 Nexstar Media Wire in an article titled “Florida to receive over 1,000 Afghan refugees in coming weeks, report says” reported:

The Biden administration began notifying governors and state refugee coordinators across the country about how many Afghan evacuees from among the first group of nearly 37,000 arrivals are slated to be resettled in their states.

California is projected to take more arrivals than any other — more than 5,200 people, according to State Department data for the Afghan Placement and Assistance program obtained by The Associated Press.

Alabama and Mississippi are each slated to welcome 10, U.S. officials said Wednesday. Hawaii, South Dakota, West Virginia, Wyoming and the District of Columbia are not expected to resettle anyone from the first group of evacuees who fled during the final days of the chaotic U.S. withdrawal last month.

Read the full article.

The True Cost of Government ‘Pay More, Get Less’

May 4, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Dr. Rich Swier

Americans for Prosperity has release a video and a free eBook titled The True Cost of Government – Pay More, Get Less.

Watch this short video on the True Cost of Government:

The True Cost of Government – Pay More, Get Less asks:

Do you feel your paycheck isn’t going as far as it used to?

That when you go to the grocery store, you’ve noticed your bill is higher, but there are fewer and fewer items in your cart with every trip? (Perhaps you’ve even taken items out while waiting in line at the checkout counter.)

And that when you pull into the gas station, you decide more often that maybe you can stretch it before you need a full tank?

You’re not crazy. 62 percent of Americans think their family’s income is falling behind, and 83 percent of voters say they’re experiencing hardship due to increased prices.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, real wages are down 2.6 percent in the last year.

On top of that, inflation is costing the average American household $430 per month — essentially an additional tax of $5,200 this year

Here are Americans for Prosperity‘s solutions to the ongoing problem of we the people paying our federal, state and local governments more and getting less.

But there’s a better way. We can reimagine how to make life more affordable for everyday Americans.

It’s possible if we:

Unleash energy abundance
Cut red tape that keeps prices high
Stop restricting housing supply
Beat inflation through better budgeting
Fuel the flexible workforce of tomorrow
Tackle rising costs through trade

Watch: Joe Biden Mocks Americans, Laughs at Rampant Inflation at White House Correspondents Dinner

May 4, 2022/in Commentary, DrRichSwier.com, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Geller Report

This is the POTUS for the middle class. Laughing about everyday Americans who are struggling to make ends meet because of his policies. Watch below.

Joe Biden thinks it funny that the American people are struggling to pay for groceries, gas, and their rent.

It’s not funny. It’s a crisis hurting #NY21 families struggling to make ends meet. https://t.co/e67FYgZaDH

— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) May 2, 2022

Watch: Joe Biden Laughs at Rampant Inflation at White House Correspondents Dinner

By The Paradise.NG, May 3, 2022

While Americans are suffering due to the Biden administration’s incompetent policies, which have fueled higher gas prices, food prices, and threaten to suck the nation into a European war, the president was yucking it up at their expense on Saturday night.

“Since you’ve come into office, things are really looking up. Gas is up, rent is up, food is up! Everything!”

BIDEN: *laughs* pic.twitter.com/Chtdwotnrs

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 1, 2022

Daily Show host Trevor Noah, who calls himself a comedian, was the host of the White House Correspondents Dinner on Saturday night. At one point, he made an inflation joke that caused Biden to guffaw.

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College debt belongs to those who signed for it!

April 30, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Education, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Save America Foundation

Mentally challenged usurper “Sniffer” Joe Biden renewed his desire to cancel college debt for those who took it upon themselves to take the money, by up to $10,000! Libtards and no good commie members of the New Socialist Democrat Party have been calling out for $50,000 to be forgiven.

Let me give you the pure and unadulterated truth as far as I see and understand it. I will try make it simple incase any democrats who voted for Biden read this as if it’s not simple they will not comprehend – yes, even those with college degrees!

Firstly let me clearly state that a college degree is not a right. Not as an American or anyone else. It is also my right to not have to pay for or subsidize someone’s college education. I understand certain professions need a degree but how many graduates have degrees in fields they never use? How many graduates are on unemployment? How many of those are on unemployment because they cannot get a job in the useless field they chose?

These young adults and their parents chose to take on a loan. That comes with a commitment to pay it back on the terms they agreed to. Just like any other loan.

Why do they not go to community colleges? Or trade schools? Most of the worlds very successful entrepreneurs were drop outs or did not go to college. Richard Branson, head of Virgin, is a prime example.

NOTE: 55 of the world’s billionaires dropped out of or did not go to university/college.

I look at myself. I have a South African high school diploma. I have travelled the world, held many jobs, run highly successful large companies, earning good money all my life and supporting my family. My daughter did not go to college but through great work ethic and determination earns 6 figures and is a senior executive in a large company.

Now, as this administration filled with thieves, traitors, criminals, fraudsters and other evil beings sees their demise in the mid term elections, they have resurrected this vote catcher to possibly forgive $10,000 of college debt. This is on top of students not having to have made payments seemingly for ever due to the China Virus debacle.

There is a real cost to America to forgive $10,000 of this debt to all students. Those loans are federally backed. All of them. The total it would cost us is $321 Billion. This is per an analysis by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That would benefit about 11.8 million borrowers, or roughly 31.1%, and cancel 30.5% of loans delinquent or in default prior to pandemic forbearance. Looking at it another way as of December 2021, the outstanding balance for federally owned college loans was $1.38 trillion. Our national debt stands at $30 Trillion.

Democrat lawmakers are clamoring for Biden to take executive action and cancel $50,000 of debt. So multiply the figures above by 5. Our national deficit totaled a record $2.8 Trillion for fiscal year ending 2021. How many of the students getting loan help don’t actually need it? How many come from rich families? $192 Billion of it would go to families in the top 20% of wealth. $29 Billion to those in the lower 20% of wealth.

About 1 in 6 American adults owe money to college loans. This is now the second largest amount of loan value after mortgages.

Reducing or eradicating college loans is also unfair to those that kept their word and paid back the money as they agreed to. Should they get a $10,000 check too? Of course not.

As Biden sees his polling numbers tank he is desperately looking to bribe voters.

Putting all this money back into an already boiling, sky high inflation economy, will only increase inflation thereby further hurting everyone other than the uber rich.

Suck it up buttercups! You wanted to go party for 4 or more years instead of working. Pay the piper. Stop looking for handouts. Stop all this socialist thinking and reliance on big government. They will run out of tax payers money sometime!

U.S. Economy Shrank 1.4% Marking Worst Quarter in 2-Years

April 29, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Geller Report

How do President Trump’s tweets look now, America? Under President Trump the American economy was booming in all sectors. It was the envy of the world. Today, under the Biden Administration socialist economic policies, America’s economy is shrinking, and Wall Street is warning of a recession. Once again, the Biden Administration is a dangerous joke.

‘Biden economics.’ The economy should be exploding post COVID lockdowns. It takes serious enemy action (Democrats) to take down the economic engine of America.

“The U.S. economy cooled markedly in the first three months of the year, as snarled supply chains, record-high inflation and labor shortages weighed on growth and slowed the pandemic recovery.”

Americans’ confidence in the economy remains very low, and mentions of economic issues as the most important problem in the U.S. are at their highest point since 2016. Inflation, which registered as the top economic problem last month and continues to be, was previously at this level in 1984 (Gallup). Breitbart: On the eve of the election of Donald Trump in 2016, 31 percent of Americans named an economic issue as the most important facing the country. That number steadily fell throughout the Trump administration, eventually surpassing the previous record low of 13 percent set in 1999 (Breitbart).

We are officially experiencing NEGATIVE economic growth under Joe Biden.

Our country is being systematically destroyed while China laughs and laughs.

— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) April 28, 2022

The economy SHRANK by 1.4% last quarter.

The “Biden plan” is not working!

— Ronna McDaniel (@GOPChairwoman) April 28, 2022

Majority of Americans will ‘struggle’ to make ends meet: Expert https://t.co/3r3nJX245S @MorningsMaria @FoxBusiness

— Maria Bartiromo (@MariaBartiromo) April 28, 2022

US economy shrank 1.4% at beginning of 2022, marking worst quarter in 2 years

By Fox News, April 28, 2022

Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of goods and services produced across the economy, shrank by 1.4% on an annualized basis in the three-month period from January through March, the Commerce Department said in its first reading of the data on Thursday.

Refinitiv economists expected the report to show the economy had expanded by 1.1%.

Quick note: We cannot do this without your support. Fact. Our work is made possible by you and only you. We receive no grants, government handouts, or major funding.

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Washington state Congressional candidate wants $30 an hour minimum wage

April 29, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Jihad Watch

Why not $60? Or $100? Or $1,000,000? Make everyone a millionaire, and all our economic troubles will be over, right? Rebecca Parson, and there are many others who think like this “patriotic, Catholic, and queer” candidate, lacks a basic understanding of economics. If you force businesses to pay more in wages, they’ll cut expenses in other ways, often by reducing the number of people employed. So minimum wage hikes often lead to increased unemployment. And when producers know that everyone has that kind of money, they raise prices in order to try to make back some of what they’re paying in increased wages. Minimum wage hikes thus often lead to inflation. They thus more likely increase misery than alleviate it.

$30 An Hour Minimum Wage? This Democratic Candidate Says Yes

by Dillon Burroughs, Daily Wire, April 25, 2022:

A Democratic congressional candidate in Washington State is arguing for a $30 per hour minimum wage, claiming that the $15 minimum wage movement is an outdated number.

Rebecca Parson, a candidate for Washington’s 6th District that includes Tacoma, shared the comment recently in a post on Twitter.

“$15 minimum wage is an antiquated demand. It should be $30 per hour,” she tweeted.

“1 adult supporting 1 kid needs $30 an hour across the country. Rural, urban, suburban: $30 is the floor. As you say your nightly prayers to Saint Elon while you fall asleep tonight, reflect on why you punch down on poor people instead of up at your heavenly billionaire,” she added in another post.

In her campaign video, Parson said, “I and other organizers have occupied empty buildings, demanding housing for our homeless neighbors. I risked arrest because we can’t just wait for the corporate establishment to help.”

Parson also claimed in her video that she will emulate “Congresswoman Cori Bush,” a “Squad” member and progressive Democrat who slept outside in Washington, D.C., to advocate for housing. Parson claims she can identify with the need, as she’s “been homeless, too,” despite holding a master’s degree from Johns Hopkins.

AUTHOR

ROBERT SPENCER

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Governor Ron DeSantis, ‘Florida is going to hold Twitter’s board of directors accountable for breaching its fiduciary duties’

April 20, 2022/in Courts & Law, DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Dr. Rich Swier

Bloomberg’s Nathan Crooks reported:

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said the state could take action against Twitter Inc. for launching a poison pill defense to thwart an unsolicited bid by Elon Musk.

“Why would you reject the 20% premium?” DeSantis said Tuesday at a press conference, accusing the company of censorship. “I don’t think that was a rejection based on financial concerns or business judgment. They rejected it because they know they can’t control Elon Musk. They know that he will not accept the narrative.”

Read more.

Watch Governor DeSantis explain how the Sunshine state will hold Titter’s Board of Directors accountable:

DeSantis announces that Florida is going to look at ways to hold Twitter’s board of directors accountable for breaching its fiduciary duties to the state, which is a shareholder of Twitter stock. pic.twitter.com/DpKdMrHUkr

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) April 20, 2022

The Governor has a fiduciary responsibility to insure that Florida’s pension fund, and the companies the pension fun has invested in, increase the value of their stock to keep the fund solvent. Twitter’s stock has not performed well and dropped 10% on April 20th, 2022.

(USD)	Dec 2021	Y/Y
Revenue	1.57B
Net income	181.69M
Diluted EPS	0.21
Net profit margin	11.59%

Top Biden Pollster Warns ‘Most Americans Are Pissed’

April 19, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Daily Caller

Top Biden Pollster Warns ‘Most Americans Are Pissed,’ Says Democrats Are Facing ‘Really Sour Environment’

President Joe Biden’s chief pollster John Anzalone warned Democrats about major electoral problems going into the 2022 midterms in an interview released Friday, although he believes that they can still avoid major losses.

Anzalone, who also worked on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, has previously warned of Biden’s low approval rating overall and among Hispanic voters in particular. He told Politico’s Ryan Lizza that voters are unhappy with the Democrats’ lack of action on key issues such as inflation and health care.

“Voters are very much in ‘What have you done for me lately?’ They always are. And they don’t feel Democrats can get their shit together and get things done,” Anzalone said.

“So if we’re able to do something — a skinny BBB or whatever — on health insurance costs, prescription drug costs, elderly care, childcare, that’s a big deal because it will give Democrats a competitive advantage on what they’re doing for working families. And it’ll cut through the inflation narrative, the Ukraine narrative, the Afghan narrative, the border narrative, etc.,” he continued.

Biden’s campaign pollster John Anzalone thinks Ds are blowing it on their economic messaging by not highlighting inequality enough:

“We’re scared of our own shadow on taxes, and it fucking makes no sense”

via @playbookdc https://t.co/2yWPU4B8yZ pic.twitter.com/6GmNO3lQLe

— Joseph Zeballos-Roig (@josephzeballos) April 15, 2022

Anzalone also pushed back on the perception that Hispanic voters primarily care about immigration.

“There’s this narrative in D.C. among Democrats that you only talk to Latinos about immigration. Like, immigration is the twelfth issue that they’re concerned about. It’s always about the economy or inflation or healthcare or schools,” he said.

Republicans are pinpointing a July special election in South Texas as a test of their newfound gains among Hispanic voters. Republican Mayra Flores, who will also seek a full term in November, is hoping that concerns about immigration and inflation will be decisive in flipping a seat formerly held by Democrat Filemon Vela.

Anzalone also argued that Democrats should push tax increases on wealthier Americans, adding that Democrats are too “scared of their own shadow” to do so.

“Biden’s proposal of making those making over $400,000 pay a little bit more taxes and big corporations pay a little bit more taxes so they pay their fair share to make investments in healthcare and education and childcare is really important,” he claimed. “Most Americans are pissed at the fact that they pay their fair share in taxes as middle-class people. They work hard. They want to see the benefits of the economy.”

Election forecasters believe that Republicans could pick up as many as 35 seats in the midterms, which would create the party’s largest majority since the Great Depression. Anzalone believes that such losses could be in the cards for Democrats if they do not act quickly.

“No one’s going to sit there as a Democratic consultant and try to bullshit you that this is anything but a really sour environment for Democrats,” he said.

AUTHOR

MICHAEL GINSBERG

Congressional reporter.

These 5 States Will Have Highest Tax Burdens in 2022, New Analysis Reveals

April 18, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

Don’t be surprised if the states topping this new list start losing people to states that don’t take as much of their money.

ax season is in full swing, and many Americans are likely grimacing as they crunch the numbers and prepare to open up their wallets. But some more so than others, as the relative tax burden in the US varies vastly across different states. And now, a new analysis reveals which states will have the highest (and lowest) taxes in 2022.

The right-leaning, nonpartisan Tax Foundation just ran the numbers to rank the states based on their average combined state and local tax burden. This does not include the many federal taxes all Americans must pay regardless of state residency.

Here’s what analysts Erica York and Jared Walczak found:

The 5 States With the Highest Tax Burdens

New York: 15.9 percent
Connecticut: 15.4 percent
Hawaii: 14.1 percent
Vermont: 13.6 percent
California: 13.5 percent

The 5 States With the Lowest Tax Burdens

Alaska: 4.6 percent
Wyoming: 7.5 percent
Tennessee: 7.6 percent
South Dakota: 8.4 percent
Michigan: 8.6 percent

Important Context

This ranking does not look solely at the absolute amount received in taxes by state and local governments. It also attempts to account for the true burden of taxes, given that sometimes the real cost of a state tax can be imposed on residents of other states. (For example, people who live in New Jersey but work in New York City also pay many New York taxes).

The Takeaway: Tax Competition

These differences in taxation levels are more than just a pleasant surprise for taxpayers in some states (and an ugly reality for taxpayers in others). With combined state and local tax burdens varying between nearly 16 percent in New York and just 4.6 percent in Alaska, there’s a big enough difference between the states to encourage tax competition.

What is tax competition?

It’s when “jurisdictional competition leads to better tax policy,” economist Dan Mitchell explains. “Simply stated, politicians are less greedy when they have to worry that the geese with the golden eggs can fly away.”

Americans can (and do) relocate when their local and state governments excessively raise taxes. This means states must always be on the watch against losing residents to lower-tax neighbors, a positive incentive structure that helps keep the growth of government in check and protect our wallets from greedy politicians.

So, don’t be surprised if the states topping this new list of high tax burdens start losing people to states that don’t take as much of their money.

WATCH: Reacting to Robert Reich’s 4 Worst Socialist TikToks (CRINGE)

AUTHOR

Brad Polumbo

Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is a libertarian-conservative journalist and Policy Correspondent at the Foundation for Economic Education.

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Inflation Under Biden Reaches Staggering New Heights

April 12, 2022/in DrRichSwier.com, Economy, Elections, Politics, Taxes /by DrRichSwier.com

By The Daily Caller

The federal government’s latest inflation indicator showed that consumer prices skyrocketed 8.5% in March, the quickest uptick in four decades.
“We’re seeing strong inflation momentum across the board, both for goods and services,” Blerina Uruci, a U.S. economist at T. Rowe Price Group, told The Wall Street Journal.
“This is a direct result of Biden’s Federal Reserve being too preoccupied with ‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ and ‘climate change’ while ignoring all the warning signs on inflation for more than a year,” said E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis.

A key consumer price metric used by the government to measure inflation soared 8.5% over the last 12 months — the fastest pace of inflation since December 1981 — the Department of Labor (DOL) announced Tuesday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) increased 1.2% between February and March, the fastest month-over-month figure since 2005, according to the Labor Department report released Tuesday morning. Economists surveyed by the Dow Jones projected that CPI would increase 1.1% last month and 8.4% over the 12-month period ending in March, CNBC reported.

“We’re seeing strong inflation momentum across the board, both for goods and services,” Blerina Uruci, a U.S. economist at T. Rowe Price Group, told The Wall Street Journal.

The White House warned Monday that the CPI figures would be “extraordinarily elevated” ahead of the report, but blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin. Gasoline prices hit record highs in March after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine which disrupted global energy markets dominated by Russian supplies.

“Because of the actions we’ve taken to address Putin — the Putin price hike, we are in a better place than we were last month,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters at a press briefing. “But we expect March CPI headline inflation to be extraordinarily elevated due to Putin’s price hike.”

“We expect a large difference between core and headline inflation, reflecting the global disruptions in energy and food markets,” she added.

Prices at an Exxon gas station in Washington, D.C. are pictured in March. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

But core CPI, which measures prices of all goods excluding the historically-volatile energy and food categories, still rose 6.5% between April 2021 and March, the DOL said. While lower than the headline figure, the core inflation number reported Tuesday still represented its largest jump since August 1982.

Inflation has surged over the past several months: CPI surpassed the Federal Reserve’s 2% benchmark in May 2021 and has since precipitously climbed higher, according to federal data. Inflation increased a whopping 7.5% and 7.9% in January and February respectively, before Putin ever ordered troops to assault Ukraine.

Prices for new and used vehicles, rent, medical care, commodities and transportation costs like airline fares have all skyrocketed over the past year, the Tuesday report showed.

“As expected, inflation soared in March,” Joel Naroff, the chief economist of the Pennsylvania-based economic consulting firm Naroff Economics, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “But it wasn’t just energy, which continued to spike as a consequence of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Food, clothing, medical care and transportation were all up sharply as well.”

While recent jobs reports have shown strong growth, Americans are more concerned about inflation when it comes to the economy, according to a CBS News poll released Monday. Just 31% of those surveyed said they approved of President Joe Biden’s handling of inflation.

Small business owners listed inflation as the biggest issue facing them, a survey released Tuesday by the National Federation of Independent Business showed.

The dotted line is Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

Oh, wait, it’s not.

It’s Biden’s inauguration. pic.twitter.com/4JYsxGBqDd

— Brad Polumbo 🇺🇸⚽️ 🏳️‍🌈 (@brad_polumbo) April 11, 2022

Critics, meanwhile, have accused the Federal Reserve of failing to properly act as prices have shot up across sectors over the last 12 months. Fed officials have turned their focus too much toward social justice issues instead of monetary policy, a recent Independent Institute report concluded.

“This is a direct result of Biden’s Federal Reserve being too preoccupied with ‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ and ‘climate change’ while ignoring all the warning signs on inflation for more than a year,” E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis, told the DCNF. “The Fed is laughably behind the curve and people are demonstrably poorer because of it.”

Prior to the report Tuesday, Antoni predicted the 12-month figure to reach 8.3% and the month-over-month number to surpass 1.0%. He added that, under his projections, real wages would be down over 4.0% since Biden took office in January 2021.

Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee have repeatedly slammed the Federal Reserve for its persistent push to address climate change in recent months. The lawmakers said the Fed is increasingly focusing on areas outside of its congressional mandate.

AUTHOR

THOMAS CATENACCI

Energy and environment reporter. Follow Thomas on Twitter

RELATED TWEET:

White House wants to blame inflation on the Russia-Ukraine war in Eastern Europe but the US itself went to war in Iraq and Afghanistan and more and we didn’t see inflation like this from it

— Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) April 12, 2022

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