Republicans used to be thought of as the pro-business party. These days, however, any benefits that might accrue to businesses from federal legislation seem to take a back seat for Republicans to saving this country’s very rich from paying a bit more in taxes. Consider the Payroll Tax debate now going on in congress. The newest proposal from Democrats aimed at extending lower payroll taxes, would only keep them at a lower rate for America’s 160 million workers. The previous Democratic...

It looks like the Republican nominating contest has narrowed down to two finalists whose monikers sound like characters in a Wodehouse novel. Mitt and Newt. All that’s needed now to round out this protracted and embarrassing clownfest is for Ron, Michelle and Rick to drop away, and be replaced by Bingo, Bertie and Piggy. The fact that many of Wodehouse’s male characters are also members of the Drones Club, an assemblage of well-heeled wastrels spouting inanities, well…In any case,...

In these per’lous times, it’s good to see that at least one major political party still has a sense of humor. I refer, of course, to the Republicans. Their latest beau jeste, in he form of a proposal to keep funded the Payroll Tax reduction for all working Americans, had me rolling with laughter when I read it over. The Democrats want to fund this lower Payroll Tax rate with a surtax of 3 1/2 percent on those making more than a million dollars a year. But where’s the humor in that?...

Like many other Americans, I’ve been thinking that a strong third party party candidate for president would be a good development given the likely unappealing choices offered by the two major parties. After a bit of research, however, I’ve come to a very different conclusion. A strong third party choice in 2012 could well prove an absolute, utter disaster for this country. In 1992 Ross Perot garnered almost 19 percent of the popular vote. Because of our strange electoral system, he nonetheless...

Around the world a pernicious belief now exercises such a strong hold on political leaders that it shapes virtually all their economic policies. It’s the belief that “markets” are the primary source, the appropriate source, of wisdom when it comes to shaping these policies; and that it has to be this way because like it or no, governments can do nothing to check the power of markets. Resistance, in other words, is futile. And foolish to boot, because markets (in this thinking)...

When markets force Congress to finally get serious about reducing deficits, you’ll start hearing a lot about a Value Added Tax. Long popular in Europe, VATs raise huge amounts of money for a government while falling most heavily on the poor. And what Republican congressman could object to that? The VAT Song Oh, give me a home, Like in Stuttgart or Rome, Where you’re taxed on the basics you buy; Though it may not seem fair, Tax collectors don’t care, Cause the take is so wonderfully high. Chorus VAT,...

Oh euro, my euro, ’twas said your time had come, You’d withstood all the early flack, your doubters seemed undone; With francs a ghost, with liras toast, and deutschmarks just a mem’ry, Around the globe, your worth was sold, in circles monetary. But now, alas, that time has past, A new day has arrived, With traders asking could it be The euro won’t survive? Oh euro, once mighty, the money pack outpaced, You made Dutch guilders disappear, pesetas you replaced; With you baguettes...

Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, a read so turgid it makes Das Kapital seem like a John Grisham novel, is the acknowledged inspiration of some leaders in the House of Representatives such as Paul Ryan. Even House Speaker Boehner the other day made a reference to this Rand ideological pot boiler, suggesting that America’s present economic malaise is related to the rich going on a kind of strike (the theme of Rand’s shrugger) in response to threats of tax increases. Are Rand acolytes reading...

I don’t know what tomorrow’s October CPI inflation report will show. But if today’s producer price index is any indication, tomorrow’s CPI may well be viewed as a positive by Wall Street and its enablers in Washington. The October producer price numbers showed a 0.3 percent decline in prices, the largest in 20 months. Much of this decline was due to a 1.4 percent drop in the price of energy, while the decline in new model car prices also played a part. The fact that energy...

Anyone who follows politics in this country knows what the word “reform” has come to mean. These days it means a deal in which the poor and the working middle class get stiffed on their benefits and pensions, while the rich either get additional compensation or are simply excluded from making their own sacrifices. That’s the basis of the reform of the tax code being pushed by Republicans. The reform embedded in recommendations by President Obama’s panel that was supposed...

Some think this country’s income pie Is too top-tier allotted, And should be changed in ways that make The rich less so besotted; They see a moral issue here, The way income’s divided, Because it leaves so many poor, So scared and ill-provided. I have a different focus though, Not based on moral feeling, But rather geared to something else, An economic healing; Unless a broader income spread Lets more folks boost their spending, There’s little hope that we’ll soon see This...

While the national debate on taxes is currently dominated by the latest help-the-rich flat tax concoctions, the 5 percent surtax proposal on millionaire and billionaire incomes has faded into the background. This is very sad because this simple, easy to understand, highly popular approach toward meeting budgetary necessities is probably the most sensible thing to come out of Washington in years — maybe decades. So much conservative effort has been directed toward misinforming about this proposal,...

Banks are backing off new fees on debit card use, but retaining many other fees that today are one of their main sources of income. Airlines are making billions a year in fees for things that used to be — and still ought to be — part of their regular service. Fees have become so outrageous at some airlines that a carrier that doesn’t charge some of them promotes this fact prominently in its ads. Imagine. Not egregiously screwing airline passengers. What a deal! Bank and airline fees, however,...

A few, a very few, of the Wall Street hustlers who made fortunes in various market misdeeds are now coming to the bar of justice. Will they get the punishments they deserve? Or will some of them—as this poem suggests—end up turning their “tribulations” into another hustle? A Reformed Financial Felon’s Confessional For many long years I lived in a prison, A prison of vulgar materialism, Acquiring goods was the aim of my toilings, Ignoring all higher spiritual callings. With all kinds...

Accountants working for companies provide a valuable service. They compile numbers about various aspects of a company’s operations that management can use as guides to improve performance. But there are caveats. If the counting doesn’t include all important factors, if it seems to emphasis one factor above another in an incorrect way, or if management uncritically uses numbers that accountants provide as its guide, the business suffers. Economists serve roughly the same function for...

The leaders of EU countries have successfully confronted the Greek Crisis. The crisis of 11 million Greeks being ground down into national penury, their economic futures taken away? Oh, no. Why bother about that? The crisis that EU leaders successfully confronted was the possible lose of a lot of money by banks that had loaned money to Greece. It was important that this challenge be met because if it weren’t, there could be horrible spin-off crises in places like Ireland, Spain and Italy. Am...

My friend Kay suffers from two afflictions that cause her great difficulties in this political season — common decency and common sense. It was the latter that brought on a very strong reaction the other day while we were driving in Philadelphia, and she noticed a bridge that had just undergone repairs with federal funds. “How can the government not be spending big on infrastructure improvements these days,” she wondered aloud? “It’s crazy!” Crazy indeed. Unlike the...

I’ve been surprised about all the flat tax talk this October by Republican presidential candidates. The flat tax idea usually doesn’t surface much until April, when taxpayers and their helpers gather around dining room tables to figure out how much they can get away with in their tax reporting. The fact that flat tax mania among Republican White House aspirants has come to the fore this early thus strikes me as a seasonal affectation gone awry. Whatever the season, however, the appeal...

A headline in today’s New York Times reads: “Occupy Wall Street Not Like Us, Tea Party Says.” The subhead then goes on to read: “Where Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party differ is in where they place the blame.” Nonsense. The Tea Party blames government for the country’s present economic problems. The Occupiers blame the heavies in the financial community. But these aren’t separate, distinct entities competing to set the country’s economic policies....

You need a highly developed sense of humor to follow the stock market these days. You need an even more developed taste for exotic fun to cope with pronouncements coming from the Fed and other official sources of financial and economic wisdom. At about this time most months, however, when inflation numbers and their interpretation are made public. even those of us well used to laughing through our tears are hard-pressed not to race panting to the liquor cabinet for solace. For this is the time...

Democratic Party strategists are busily trying to figure out how they can tap into the enthusiasm and spreading popular appeal of the Occupy Wall Street movement. President Obama is recasting his own rhetoric to sound like he supports what these occupiers want, and he is even traveling around by bus as a sign that he is in tune with their Main Street populism. But none of this amounts to a hill of beans without real changes in the policy making establishment of the Democratic Party. Democratic leaders...

During most of his presidency, Barack Obama has adopted a respectful attitude toward Republicans, seemingly hoping, against all reason and experience, that this would lead to bipartisan agreements about important issues. Toward one other group, however, Mr. Obama has been consistently and overtly disrespectful, disdainful, patronizing, and occasionally outright hostile — the progressive populist wing of his own party. He appeared genuinely annoyed that these people didn’t understand that...

I won’t tell you about Gail Collins’ column in the New York Times today. I will just strongly suggest that you read it. And then forget about the rest of the paper because everything else there is repetitive versions of things too often said in pretty much the same old ways signifying…well, you know what it’s signifying. The photo of Ms. Collins that runs with her column makes her look like she should be wearing a derby and standing next to the pot of gold she’s guarding....

I tuned into a Public Radio interview this morning and happened to hear a guy who was identified as a venture capitalist saying that the first thing he looks at when considering an investment is a company’s “head count” — the number of people on its payroll. The idea here, presumably, is that the best way to improve a bottom line id to fire as many employees as possible, thereby cutting a company’s labor costs. This idea struck me as incredibly dumb and I turned off the...

The other day the president of the European Commission gave a speech before the European Parliament calling for a transaction tax on stock, bond and derivative trades. The very considerable sums generated by such a tax will be needed to help refinance banks after Greece defaults, which just about everyone now understands will happen soon. The Obama Administration, however, strongly opposes such a transaction tax (also known as a Tobin Tax after the man who originally proposed it) in this country,...