Posted on 06/19/2008 4:20:41 AM PDT by shrinkermd
Sen. Obama promised, "I'll make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and we'll use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills."
Set aside for a minute that Jimmy Carter passed a "windfall profits tax" to devastating effect, putting American oil companies at a competitive disadvantage to foreign competitors, virtually ending domestic energy exploration, and making the U.S. more dependent on foreign sources of oil and gas.
Instead ask this: Why should we stop with oil companies? They make about 8.3 cents in gross profit per dollar of sales. Why doesn't Mr. Obama slap a windfall profits tax on sectors of the economy that have fatter margins? Electronics make 14.5 cents per dollar and computer equipment makers take in 13.7 cents per dollar, according to the Census Bureau. Microsoft's margin is 27.5 cents per dollar of sales. Call out Mr. Obama's Windfall Profits Police!
....Most dramatic change comes from new businesses, not old ones. Buggy whip makers did not create the auto industry. Railroads didn't create the airplane. Even when established industries help create new ones, old-line firms are often not as nimble as new ones.
So why should Mr. McCain expect oil and gas companies to lead the way in developing alternative energy? As with past technological change, new enterprises will likely be the drivers of alternative energy innovation.
Messrs. Obama and McCain both reveal a disturbing animus toward free markets and success. It is uncalled for and self-defeating for presidential candidates to demonize American companies. It is understandable that Mr. Obama, the most liberal member of the Senate, would endorse reckless policies that are the DNA of the party he leads. But Mr. McCain, a self-described Reagan Republican, should know better.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Yep
Why?
Even he admits he knows little about economics.
Either of these two characters as President will be a disaster for our country.
SCAREY!
BOLTEN/ROVE 2008!!!
Heh, just imagine all the heads exploding with this ticket!!
I can dream.
:-)
Excellent article! The “buggy whip makers” who infest the Congress should read this as well!
Then prepare for the worst...
“But Mr. McCain, a self-described Reagan Republican, should know better.”
Ah yes, our “foot soldier in the Reagan revolution,” also “self-described” because few if any others would describe him that way.
Who voted for this weasel?
Fantastic article. Rove hits the nail on the head, and there are some good figures in there to use in beating down libs in a debate.
Barack/McCain ‘08. Let’s get another candidate.
That be a hoot of a dream ticket!
“CORPORATIONS AND BUSINESSES DO NOT PAY TAXES. ONLY PEOPLE PAY TAXES!”
UNLESS YOU ARE SELF EMPLOYED YOUR INCOME TAXES ARE PAID BY YOUR EMPLOYER.
Companies never even let employees see the money paid to the IRS for an employee’s taxes. They don’t even let the employee tell the employer how much to pay the IRS. Employees just get an entry on their paycheck stub that tells them how much the employer sent the IRS for the employees income tax for that pay period.
Employees don’t even get to tell their employer how much money to send to the IRS.. They only get to tell their employer how many deductions they have. And then the IRS and the employer decide how much tax money the employer is to pay the IRS. The company check is deposited by the IRS and the proper amounts credited to the employees account.
Employees get to make their own house or rent payment. Employees get to buy groceries and clothes. They even get to pay for their gasoline. But their employer pays their income tax to the IRS.. They don’t.
Perhaps you have never read a paycheck stub .. or maybe you never earned one.
“Then prepare for the worst...”
That’s exactly what I’m doing....and thanks for the sage advice!
You’re welcome. It shouldn’t be hard, we always plan on the worst every time a democrat gets elected...but the US is still here.
Point being made is that it all gets passed on to the consumer. New taxes mean higher priced products and services. If new taxes are imposed on oil companies, oil gets more expensive. Taxes up on other corporations, their prices go up.
He’s too arrogant and “maverick” to take advice,
but if he’d spend a couple of hours reading
“Basic Economics” by Dr Sowell, he’d be at least 2 orders of magnitude further in his understanding than Obambi is.
"And why do we see more poverty and illegitimacy today - after all, we have all these gov't programs set up to alleviate the problems!"
When you slap them in the face with the facts, you usually will get something to the effect of "oh, people don't respond to incentives like that".
I’m still waiting for the windfall profit tax on law firms.
Nobody can touch these guys in terms of profit margins.
I hope you’re not implying that the employer is the bad guy in this situation.
I believe it is the employee’s responsibility to see how much they are paying, which they can do when they look at their tax return in April.
That aside, the solution (within the current system) to the problem would be to eliminate withholding and move tax day to Halloween (right before November elections). Make people write one big check one time a year.
Bumper stickers & T-Shirts
I’m putting one on my car - a sticker that is.
Jeeez, I don’t even know where to begin with this one but I suspect it could take DAYS to straighten this fellow out.
I ran a business for a number of years (and collected some nice checks, thank you very much). And, yes, I in fact COLLECTED the withholding taxes of the other folks there and passed them on to the government.
And when government hiked our BUSINESS taxes, not wishing to go bankrupt, we invariably raised prices to cover the increased burden and passed the burden on to our customers (who were, strangely enough, actually PEOPLE). We COLLECTED those higher taxes and passed them on to PEOPLE.
In case it eluded you, the operative term in both instances was “COLLECTED.” Not “PAID” — “COLLECTED.”
The statists and libs — and too many of the — er — less informed conservatives will use the nasty old corporations to launder their ever-increasing cost of government and hide the scam from the equally — er — less informed members of the general population.
The point of the post you replied to was to show that as entities, corporations and businesses are merely the collective finances of their owners. The taxes are passed onto the owners, and the resulting inflation to their customers. The above post does not pertain to the mechanism of payment, but the origin of the finances the taxes are taken from.
The money paid in taxes by companies for employees is merely a mechanism of taking part of the employees’ wages. It is still the employees money that is being taken.
Employers only collect the taxes for the IRS... the money itself is still paid by the employee. The employer simply handles the administrative task of passing that money to the federal government.
And when businesses are taxed they don’t eat that cost. They factor it into the price of goods and services they sell. In other words, the taxes get passed to the consumer. Most businesses would go out of business if they didn’t do this.
So, whether it comes out of their paycheck or whether they pay it at the retail level, in the end all taxes are indeed paid by individuals. ‘Corporate taxes’ are a paper artifica... all of these taxes are simply passed to the consumer.
I went to the shelf, picked out eight histories on Reagan, ending with Lou Cannon’s bio, and check the index of each for a mention of John McCain. The result. Zero, zip, nada.
Yes, Rove is very smart. President Bush was smarter in that he saw the exceptional talent of Rove and hired him a long time ago. No doubt Rove does better than the President on any IQ test by SD or two. The fact that Rove did not attend college is not that important; real thinkers are always self-taught.
I am anxious about Senator McCain. Getting a top political job sometimes does not require much thinking. I note Senator McCain does not use the Internet and some of his statements about the economy and other issues seem lacking in thought and reflection.
I can only hope he is acting or using some political strategy on some of his positions.
You never have the perfect candidate. I hope the Senator’s common sense is such that he finds a superior intellect to help him with some issues.
The genuinely economically literate are quickly stereotyped as "wackos" because they aren't willing to go along with the game - and the attendant campaign contributions.
You are so wrong, and smug about it.
Bolten I can go along with, what is your fascintion with turdblossom, IMHO he was instrumental in destroying the gop
Yet Wall Street is backing this Marxist. Go figure!
Somebody should make an obama/mccain08 sticker because we are so screwed no matter what.
well the is a difference ‘tween taking in the end with KY and without (so I hear, okay?) - and I prefer to minimize the pain myself
The donks should tax beer too. And meat since mostly crackers eat red meat. /s
oh i love their conniptions but still , turdblossom is a loser.
“Either of those 2 characters as President will be a disaster...”
Wrong! Osbama WOULD surely be much more worth...And you sould know why! No?
The guy has about a 5th grader's grasp of economics and the marketplace. Geez.
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