Monday, July 02, 2012
Policies
I'm actually not nearly as anti-other-people-driving-cars as some of you probably think, but I do not like this kind of thing.
If I ran the zoo I'd require participating employers to just hand over $x in cash to people tax free and then require them to pay market rates for parking or transit or jetpack or whatever. Employers would give tax free cash benefit for commuting costs, and people could use it any way they wanted to. Including booze.
In a gratuitous snub to people who rely on mass transit, tax deductibility for transit expenses is being set at half the maximum for parking. For a while, both maxed out at $240 per month. Now they will be $125 for transit and still $240 for parking.
If I ran the zoo I'd require participating employers to just hand over $x in cash to people tax free and then require them to pay market rates for parking or transit or jetpack or whatever. Employers would give tax free cash benefit for commuting costs, and people could use it any way they wanted to. Including booze.
By Christmas
I suppose admitting up front you're going to shove it into the holiday news dump gets a bit of credit for refreshing honesty.
I spent one Christmas in London. Everything shuts. Everything. No buses or subway even. Nothing is open.
I spent one Christmas in London. Everything shuts. Everything. No buses or subway even. Nothing is open.
Autoless
I'm sure most of this is economy-related, as in I'm not sure how people with no jobs and massive student loans are supposed to be able to afford a car payment and insurance, but such events can have longer term cultural impacts as well. As it's more common to be carfree, people who are carfree won't be so freakish. When I was 18, anyone outside of a college campus (some of them) or Manhattan without a car was quite the weirdo. At least in areas where people aren't so car-dependent, that increasingly isn't the case.
So They Were Complete Dicks Then
I'm not all that interested in Supremo Kreminology, and I certainly don't expect Roberts to turn into a Warren liberal overnight, but the consequences of the lesser conservative Supremos being complete dicks to the Chief Supremo could be interesting.
They Love Imaginary Problems
One thing about our millionaire pundits is that part of their job is to grapple with problems and provide solutions. But they don't have any real problems, except perhaps personal ones they don't want to share, or a bit of trouble with the help, so they have to make up problems. And the solution is always that other people who aren't millionaire pundits need to suffer more.
Free lifetime subscription to Eschaton to anyone who actually gets Tom Friedman to answer the question, "What is the median monthly Social Security payment for current retirees?"
I don't expect a precisely correct answer. I'll give him +/-$500.
Free lifetime subscription to Eschaton to anyone who actually gets Tom Friedman to answer the question, "What is the median monthly Social Security payment for current retirees?"
I don't expect a precisely correct answer. I'll give him +/-$500.
Maybe They'll Learn?
Germany begins to discover what happens to them if they demand that everybody is a net exporter.
And generally in Yurp, 4 straight years of the people in charge making it worse.
(Reuters) - Germany's manufacturing sector shrank in June at the fastest pace in three years, with new business intake dropping for the 12th month running, in a sign the economy is suffering from both the euro crisis and a broader global economic slowdown.
And generally in Yurp, 4 straight years of the people in charge making it worse.
Sunday, July 01, 2012
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)