Does Obama Want a Trillion-Dollar Global Tax?

Dangerous

These are some of the single most dangerous ideas that I have heard in some time. The notion that the US should further bankrupt itself throwing money down third world despot rat holes, where the funds will be used to further repress the people and engage in armed conflicts, is absurd. Even more disturbing is the idea that the US should pass off its hard earned technology to tyrants in China to create a global police force. Such a force would risk become an agent of repression and a threat to our national sovereignty. The United States needs to come home; if the last administration has taught us anything it should be that meddling in the affairs of other nations is unwise.

Pliny of MO @ Feb 21, 2008 12:28:46 PM

Will Money Solve Africa's Development Problems?

according to William Easterly, professor of economics at New York University, joint with Africa House, and co-director of NYU's Development Research Institute; also a non-resident fellow of the Center for Global Development in Washington, DC:

"NO

In fact, after fifty years of trying and $600 billion worth of aid-giving, with close to zero rise in living standards in Africa, I can make the case for “No” pretty decisively. . .

Clearly, money alone does not solve problems. What is needed instead are business, social, and political entrepreneurs who take responsibility for, say, making sure medicines reach victims, rather than more grandiose slogans about comprehensive administrative solutions that only serve as publicity vehicles for raising yet more money for ineffectual aid bureaucracies. Entrepreneurs would be accountable for results, in contrast to the aid bureaucrats and rich country politicians who make promises that nobody holds them accountable for keeping.

As for facilitating African development, free enterprise has been the tried and true vehicle for escaping poverty everywhere else (see China and India most recently) and it is patronizing to suggest that it won’t work in Africa. . ."

http://www.templeton.org/questions/africa/

I believe the accusation above that "Mr Pethokoukis is misleading the public" in regards to Dr Easterly's position is misleading.

Chaz of NY @ Feb 21, 2008 12:16:38 PM

For God's Sake, Please Stop the Aid!

an interesting interview and perspective from Kenyan economics expert James Shikwati:

"Huge bureaucracies are financed (with the aid money), corruption and complacency are promoted, Africans are taught to be beggars and not to be independent. In addition, development aid weakens the local markets everywhere and dampens the spirit of entrepreneurship that we so desperately need. As absurd as it may sound: Development aid is one of the reasons for Africa's problems. If the West were to cancel these payments, normal Africans wouldn't even notice. Only the functionaries would be hard hit. Which is why they maintain that the world would stop turning without this development aid. . .

SPIEGEL: If the World Food Program didn't do anything, the people would starve.

Shikwati: I don't think so. In such a case, the Kenyans, for a change, would be forced to initiate trade relations with Uganda or Tanzania, and buy their food there. This type of trade is vital for Africa. It would force us to improve our own infrastructure, while making national borders -- drawn by the Europeans by the way -- more permeable. It would also force us to establish laws favoring market economy."

Former Central African Republic leader Jean-Bedel Bokassa: "We ask the French for money. We get it, and then we waste it."

http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,363663,00.html

Chaz of NY @ Feb 21, 2008 12:00:05 PM

Bush has already signed to the same thing!

In the Monterrey Conference in 2002 GWBush himself came to pledge - in person - that the United States will increase its foreign assistance in this way. He signed up to a document where the signatories "urge all developed countries that have not done so to make concrete efforts toward the goal of 0.7 percent of gross national product (GNP) as official development assistance."

As of 2002, aid equalled 0.2 percent of rich-world GNP.

As you might be aware, not much came out of that.

----------

James Pethokoukis, in the above article: "So not only does Obama want to raise taxes on Americans making over $250,000 a year and eliminate the $102,000 wage cap on Social Security taxes, he perhaps wants to tack on another trillion dollars in taxes to pay for dramatically increased foreign aid. "

No. For the United States, foreign aid would rise from around $15 billion per year (0.14% of GNP) to around $75 billion (0.7% of GNP).

------------------

James Pethokoukis, above: "Here is what Sachs critic William Easterly, an economic professor at New York University, wrote in the Journal of Economic Perspectives in 2003 on the topic: ... "

Mr Pethokoukis is misleading the public. Here is what William Easterly wrote in his book "White Man's Burden," page 368:

“Put the focus back where it belongs: get the poorest people in the world such obvious goods as the vaccines, the antibiotics, the food supplements, the improved seeds, the fertilizers, the roads, the boreholes, the water pipes, the textbooks, and the nurses. This is not making the poor dependent on handouts; it is giving the poorest people the health, nutrition, education, and other inputs that raise the payoff to their own efforts to better their lives.”

Ivan of NY @ Feb 21, 2008 06:24:47 AM

very bad !

So, Obama wants to take 70 cents out of every $100 I earn to help the poor in third world countries ! This is just criminal. How can I survive with 99.3% of my income ? Very bad. What? Don't we spend money for the poor of other countries? America gave an aid of full 17 cents out of every $100 of GDP. Then ? Isn't 0.17% of our GDP enough for those guys?

And charging full 6.2% social security tax for people earning over $100000 is pure socialism. Come on ! There are full 20% households in USA that earn over $100000. I think that we, the bottom 80% should pay more tax so that those 20% can pay less tax.

SP of MO @ Feb 21, 2008 00:48:23 AM

oh my gosh

i totally agree

Sharon Chawla of CA @ Feb 20, 2008 22:15:04 PM

Global Tax

Obama is a member of the CFR and as such is a proponent of globalization and one world government. The more the globalists have their way, the more you can say so long to our national sovereignty and our Constitution.

I don't know what makes people think they have the right to reach into my wallet and take my money at gun point and give it away for causes that I may or may not support. I don't care what YOU think is "good"; it's my labor and my money. It's theft.

The United States is bankrupt, just where do you Obama supporters think the money is coming from to pay for all of this stuff? Do you think China and Japan want to pay for our healthcare, wars, and foreign aide? Do you really think they want to buy more of our debt and take on more worthless dollars?

Every penny of the Income Tax goes back to the Federal Reserve to pay the interest on the debt. The debt our government racks up every time it borrows money from the Fed. Yeah, that's right, they charge the Federal Government interest and guess who pays the bill? You and I. Wake Up! Read the Constitution - watch From Freedom to Fascism on youtube. Get a clue -stop being sheeple.

MME of PA @ Feb 20, 2008 16:12:41 PM

Anti-tax advocates refuse to argue merits

I've seen a lot of pundits criticize Obama's proposal to lift the payroll cap on Social Security taxes without discussing its merits. Okay, so I realize most of you guys make more than $100,000 a year, probably a lot more, but how exactly is it fair for middle-class Americans to pay a higher effective tax rate than the already very rich? What about hedge-funders and the hugely wealthy that pay an effective 15% tax rate on dividends and capital gains instead of paying income tax? Is that fair?

Do we need tax hikes in some places? ABSOLUTELY. Reagan trickle-down economics is a fallacy. Crashing the dollar by financing tax cuts for the wealthy with deficit spending and phony accounting methods is a de facto tax on the poor. Ask any economist--the current mess of stagflation and foreign debt that we're facing is a huge and unsustainable problem.

Here's an idea: lift the payroll tax cap so we can fully finance entitlements; make the capital gains and dividend tax rate progressive, just like income tax--i.e. 0% for families with less than $100,000 in assets, 15% for families up to $500,000, 20% for families over $1 million...on up to 35% for families with more $25 million--remember that the pre-Bush rates were 25 and 30% across the board; raise the highest marginal tax rate for the top 1% of earners to above 40%; and finally, use the increased revenues to lower the corporate income tax rate below 20%, thereby encouraging corporations to source production domestically, transferring more money to shareholders and consumers, and promoting U.S. competitiveness.

Look at what Ireland has been able to accomplish by similarly lowering its corporate tax rate to 18%. They built a world-leading IT and services industry out of nothing in less than a decade.

Democrats can win this debate and shouldn't shy from it. You think Obama's full of empty platitudes? Try listening to an all-white guy love-in on Fox News or at a Republican debate when they talk free trade and lower taxes. Talk about short on substance. Most Americans know now that "the all trade is good trade" paradigm from the 70s is a myth and that lower taxes means more debt for your kids and a dollar that doesn't seem to buy as much in Canada anymore.

Mark of CA @ Feb 20, 2008 15:27:41 PM