Corporate tax avoidance and off-shoring solution.
Stop all corporate taxes and replace it with a steep progressive tax on ALL personal income equally–investment as well as salary income. Tax all financial assets as is done on property. Tax all financial transactions above a certain number per year–the FTT– say, at .025%.
An equal opportunity society starts with the children; and it is only government that can make that happen. The child of a poor parent must have the same opportunity as the child of a rich parent to a degree that is reasonable, relative to the taxable wealth of the nation as a whole. Can anyone of wealth inside a given society or nation, in good conscience, say that a child that is without a good home, without adequate nutrition, without good health care, without the opportunity of learning opportunities equal to the wealthy is, himself or herself at fault?
Also, an equal opportunity society ends with the old. Did that person have the opportunity through out his or her working years, the opportunity to have a job or profession that paid a wage that provided for self and family with the living and learning environment described heretofore. And have an adequate retirement income without having to be expert in financial matters due to a required contribution to a social-security program that was provided by the government. A contribution, by the way, that had no income cap.
The government, in addition to providing a healthy climate for goods and services inventiveness and productivity, its role also, is to create and adequately fund an intellectual and physical infrastructure that provides that—the child of poor or middle class parent(s) has an opportunity at upward mobility equal to a child of rich parent(s). This will be accomplished by adequate funding of public schools, extending the school day and removing the assignment of homework, providing adequate numbers of teaching staff, providing a quality school lunch program. The taxation structure–income and all other taxes and fees–must provide for a) access to good nutrition, b) access to adequate housing, c) access to free, quality health care and d) equal access to advanced education to every primary and secondary school graduate that desires it.
“A society good for children will be good for everyone.” From Guerrillas of Peace by Blas Bonepane
Excerpt:
Stop talking about cutting school budgets, Social Security benefits, Medicare, Veteran’s pensions. Stop cutting subsidies to transit systems, to foreign aid. Stop cutting unemployment benefits. Stop it all. There can not be any justification for budget cutting while wealthy criminals, corrupt politicians and business executives are hiding what reportedly totals between $29 trillion and $32 trillion in offshore tax havens.
USAID Famine Relief Needs Fixing
Excerpt:
[For famine relief] The quickest and most effective thing to do would be to find some farmer or group of farmers in other parts of the country, or in neighboring countries, buy their food and get it to the stricken area. After all, one key cause of famine is the lack of money, not lack of crops. But under current law, USAID is basically forbidden from doing that. Instead, it must buy grain in the United States and ship it several thousand miles to the famine area. You can imagine the amount of time that that takes; sometimes, several weeks. it’s a logistic nightmare. In the meantime, thousands die, usually the weakest such as children and the elderly.
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/04/obama-proposes-making-food-aid-less-insane
Excerpt:
Crucially, both the Gulf and Caspian Sea blow-outs had the same identical cause: the failure of the cement “plug”.
To prevent blow-outs, drilled wells must be capped with cement. BP insisted on lacing its cement with nitrogen gas – the same stuff used in laughing gas – because it speeds up drying.
Time is money, and mixing some nitrogen gas into the cement saves a lot of money.
However, because BP’s penny-pinching method is so damn dangerous, they are nearly alone in using it in deep, high-pressure offshore wells.
The reason: nitrogen gas can create gaps in the cement, allow methane gas to go up the borehole, fill the drilling platform with explosive gas – and boom, you’re dead.
So, when its Caspian Sea rig blew out in 2008, rather than change its ways, BP simply covered it up.
http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=33e4ec877eed6a43863a4a92e&id=e33bf3fa9a&e=a0bc63139c
The Republicans like to say that the Democrats are just buying votes when arguing for legislation for social fairness and justice. However, the true “buying of votes,” is the rich and powerful buying votes from the Republican politicians.
Excerpt: The principle at work here is not new. Julien Benda raised it long ago in The Treason of the Intellectuals. As Benda said, “There are two sets of principles. They are the principles of power and privilege and the principles of truth and justice. If you pursue truth and justice it will always mean a diminution of power and privilege. If you pursue power and privilege it will always be at the expense of truth and justice.” In our time we may identify Noam Chomsky and the late Alexander Cockburn among those who follow in the tradition of Benda. They represent the best in the tradition of PEN
http://dissidentvoice.org/2013/04/u-s-cooption-of-the-human-rights-movement-continues/#more-48267
