Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force: Looting Will C

Post by Amskeptic » Sun Mar 29, 2015 8:45 am

72Hardtop wrote: What about now? Oil is at a 30 year+ low, demand is down, oil glut is at an all time high...yet I just filled up for ~ $3.00 per gallon. The price for a gallon of gas should be no where near 3 bucks.
It should be closer to $5.00. When you calculate the hidden costs to the biosphere, when you calculate the costs for alternative energy, gasoline should be much higher. We *should* put a floor under the price of gas so that our move to sustainable energy is more fluid, and this would have been an excellent opportunity to increase the Federal Excise Tax to pay for critically needed infrastructure. You know that I drive for a living. You know that my single highest business expense is gasoline. Yet you read here that I seriously want to pay a higher price for gasoline IF we invested in our roadways with the windfall. I am so deeply disgusted with the people we call "leaders" in this country. I am disgusted with the abuse my Volkswagens have to endure on these disgraceful roadways all across the country. It is like we have no self respect.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force: Looting Will C

Post by 72Hardtop » Sat Apr 11, 2015 12:34 am

Amskeptic wrote:
72Hardtop wrote: What about now? Oil is at a 30 year+ low, demand is down, oil glut is at an all time high...yet I just filled up for ~ $3.00 per gallon. The price for a gallon of gas should be no where near 3 bucks.
It should be closer to $5.00. When you calculate the hidden costs to the biosphere, when you calculate the costs for alternative energy, gasoline should be much higher. We *should* put a floor under the price of gas so that our move to sustainable energy is more fluid, and this would have been an excellent opportunity to increase the Federal Excise Tax to pay for critically needed infrastructure. You know that I drive for a living. You know that my single highest business expense is gasoline. Yet you read here that I seriously want to pay a higher price for gasoline IF we invested in our roadways with the windfall. I am so deeply disgusted with the people we call "leaders" in this country. I am disgusted with the abuse my Volkswagens have to endure on these disgraceful roadways all across the country. It is like we have no self respect.
Colin

$5.00...good luck with that. No one in America would buy that thought. Until a viable cheap alternative that won't be taxed or priced to death towards the consumer comes about gas will be our means of going point A to B. Roads today should be cheaper made today than 30 years ago. Why? 30 years ago they didn't recycle/reuse asphaplt and the method for laying the road was far more labor intensive. Roll forward to today and they want more of our hard earned dollars for road repair yet when repaired the results are almost always less than stellar. You end up with a mound or a pot hole. NOT EXCEPTABLE. Want to fix the problem start with...

1. Once a bid is given for road work/repair any excess cost/expense overuns outside of the final bid are eaten by the company providing the work. NO EXCEPTIONS.

2. Once the work is complete it MUST meet a certain QA level. If it does not meet an acceptable level then the company must fix the issue/s at THEIR cost. NO EXCEPTIONS

3. Work must be completed upon agreed time. If not, any extra work/ costs are the responsibility of the company providing the road work. NO EXCEPTIONS.

4. All funds (state or federal) provided for road/highway work can only be used for such. NO EXCEPTIONS.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Tue Apr 14, 2015 9:41 am

Bravo...Bravo...Bravo...

Finally someone with enough courage to do the right thing.



After hearing about a study that claimed income-- to a certain level-- directly affects one's emotional well-being, the founder of a Seattle-based credit card processing company announced Monday that he will take a large salary cut so he can increase the pay for each employee to at least $70,000 a year.

The New York Times reported that Dan Price, the head of Gravity Payments, told his 120-person staff about the plan after talking to friends about the difficulties of making $40,000 a year.

"As much as I'm a capitalist, there is nothing in the market that is making me do it," he told the paper.

Price said he will cut his nearly $1 million salary to $70,000 and use about 80 percent of the business’ anticipated profit to increase the salary of about 70 employees. About 30 employees, including the lowest-paid clerk, will see their salaries increase to the $70,000 threshold.

The workers reportedly clapped and cheered when he made the announcement at the Seattle office.

"I’m completely blown away right now," Hayley Vogt, 24, who earned $45,000 a year at the company, told the paper. "Everyone is talking about this $15 minimum wage in Seattle and it's nice to work someplace where someone is actually doing something about it and not just talking about it."

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/04/14/se ... -to-70000/

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/201 ... ntent.html

http://www.9news.com.au/world/2015/04/1 ... a-pay-rise
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by Amskeptic » Tue Apr 14, 2015 5:53 pm

72Hardtop wrote:Bravo...Bravo...Bravo...

Finally someone with enough courage to do the right thing.



After hearing about a study that claimed income-- to a certain level-- directly affects one's emotional well-being, the founder of a Seattle-based credit card processing company announced Monday that he will take a large salary cut so he can increase the pay for each employee to at least $70,000 a year.

The New York Times reported that Dan Price, the head of Gravity Payments, told his 120-person staff about the plan after talking to friends about the difficulties of making $40,000 a year.

"As much as I'm a capitalist, there is nothing in the market that is making me do it," he told the paper.

Price said he will cut his nearly $1 million salary to $70,000 and use about 80 percent of the business’ anticipated profit to increase the salary of about 70 employees. About 30 employees, including the lowest-paid clerk, will see their salaries increase to the $70,000 threshold.

The workers reportedly clapped and cheered when he made the announcement at the Seattle office.

"I’m completely blown away right now," Hayley Vogt, 24, who earned $45,000 a year at the company, told the paper. "Everyone is talking about this $15 minimum wage in Seattle and it's nice to work someplace where someone is actually doing something about it and not just talking about it."

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/04/14/se ... -to-70000/

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/201 ... ntent.html
Good for him. I want to see what happens here. This may upend a lot of assumptions held in boardrooms.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by denjohn » Wed Apr 29, 2015 2:53 pm

72Hardtop wrote:
One problem...NFL is NOT a sport nor has been for quite sometime. It was deemed a form of 'Entertainment' back in the late 60's and given a tax free status. It operates and is funded heavily with guess what? US taxpayer money thru subsidies. This needs to stop. Not $1 dollar of tax payer money should go to funding entertainment...cough...cough...football (aka a sport).
Hot off the press......NFL Voluntarily Ends Tax-Exempt Status
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/2 ... 62874.html
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by Amskeptic » Thu Apr 30, 2015 8:15 am

denjohn wrote:
72Hardtop wrote:
One problem...NFL is NOT a sport nor has been for quite sometime. It was deemed a form of 'Entertainment' back in the late 60's and given a tax free status. It operates and is funded heavily with guess what? US taxpayer money thru subsidies. This needs to stop. Not $1 dollar of tax payer money should go to funding entertainment...cough...cough...football (aka a sport).
Hot off the press......NFL Voluntarily Ends Tax-Exempt Status
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/2 ... 62874.html
?


Wow, is it in the water or sumpin'?

Or are they the bellweather for recognizing that a growing public irritation with the obscene money game is heading their way?
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Tue May 05, 2015 2:13 am

Here you go...

The annual Sunday Times Rich List reveals that the UK has more billionaires per head of population than any other country. There are now a record 117 billionaires among the country’s top 1,000 richest people.



The total wealth of just the billionaires on the list is a staggering £325.131 billion. Within the space of a year, the top 1,000, as a whole, have increased their total wealth by 5.4 percent to a record £547.126 billion. Last year, the figure stood at 104 billionaires and £519 billion—one third of the country’s GDP.



The Rich List, first published in 1989, but in its 18th year in its current form, is always an underestimation of the wealth of the super-rich as it includes land, property, assets, and significant shares but excludes cash in bank accounts.



This year’s list reveals the extent to which the global financial elite ensured that the world’s population has been forced to bear the entire burden of the 2008 financial crash. In the years since, the super-rich in the UK have more than doubled their wealth, which stood at £258 billion in 2009 (an increase of 112 percent). The number of billionaires has grown by 12 percent in the last year, by 172 percent since 2009, and, as the Sunday Times notes, they “are far wealthier than many of them dared to hope seven years ago”.



The list, writes the Times, “confirms that Britain is more attractive to the global super-rich than any country except America. There are so many billionaires based here now, they outnumber those in mainland China, whose economy is four times larger than ours.”



It notes, “Mainland China is home to 115 sterling billionaires, who are collectively worth £24bn less.”



It continues, “Although the United States has the highest overall number of sterling billionaires of any country at 384, Britain’s smaller population means it boasts more per head than any other country in the G20 group of the world’s biggest economies—one billionaire for every 547,000 Britons, compared with one for every 833,000 Americans. London, where most of Britain’s billionaires are based, has more than any other city—80—who enjoy a collective wealth of £258bn. The capital’s nearest European rival, Paris, has just 21.”



The Times ’ front page article on the Rich List began “Recession? What recession? Britain’s super-rich have powered through the economic crisis and are now more than twice as rich as they were in 2009 when the economy was on the rocks…”



In the same period workers, pensioners and young people have suffered the impact of brutal austerity, with tens of billions of pounds slashed from public spending. In comparison, the income of the super-rich only fell once during that period (in 2009 when it fell by 37 percent to £258 billion) and their wealth is now growing at a record rate. The Sunday Times notes, “The rise has been greatest in the past 12 months. You need £100m to get on the list this year. That is £45m more than in 2009 and £15m more than last year…”



Vast amounts of the wealth accumulated by the super-rich are the product of speculation and outright criminality, with London being one of the world’s leading centres of financial swindling. The Sunday Times notes, “Most of the billionaires based in London are from abroad, but choose to live or base their businesses in the capital. London is a magnet for the super-rich because of its low taxes (for now)… The rise in the wealth of the top 1,000 is so sharp this year thanks to booming stock markets. Both the FTSE 100 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average have hit record highs in the past 12 months.”



The rapid emergence of this layer is illustrated by the fact that the queen, who was listed as the richest individual in 1989, is now not even among the top 300. The Times notes that although her wealth increased by £10 million this year to £340 million, she represents “old money.”



The richest individual on the list is the Ukrainian-born and Harvard-trained Len Blavatnik, who has investments in industry, music, and media, and is worth £13.17 billion, up £3.17 billion on 2014. Among the firms Blavatnik has investments in is LyondellBasell, one of the oil refinery companies with which workers in the United States were recently involved in a bitter struggle.



In the case of individuals such as Blavatnik, who made his initial fortune by participating in the pillage of the nationalised state assets of the Soviet Union following its dissolution in 1991, the adage of Balzac that “behind every great fortune there is a great crime” was never more apt.



A Forbes article last year noted, “In the history of Wall Street there haven’t been too many moneymaking machines quite like LyondellBasell, which has seen its shares return 500 percent since it emerged from bankruptcy four years ago. And that’s been especially lucrative for Blavatnik, 57, who cobbled the company together, saw it fail and plunge into bankruptcy court, and then doubled down on the same assets, personally investing another $2.37 billion in LyondellBasell the second time around. His investment is now worth more than $10 billion, generating $8 billion in mostly unrealized personal profits.”



The World Socialist Web Site noted, “These vast sums have been made through the brutal exploitation of oil workers facilitated by the [United Steel Workers] and other unions in the global industry.”



Another oligarch, placed at number four on the list, is the Uzbekistan-born Alisher Usmanov, who owns a stake of almost 30 percent in the leading London Premier League team, Arsenal FC. Usmanov is worth £9.8 billion, even though the value of his mining and other interests fell by £850 million over the past year, partly because of the West’s sanctions against Russia and collapse of the rouble.



So rich is this miniscule layer of parasites that servicing their whims is a lucrative industry in itself. The Daily Telegraph commented on Ten Group, “which has two million high-net-worth members worldwide” and “has spent around £36.5m of its clients’ money in the past 12 months.”



Reading the media’s commentary, one is left with the distinct impression that they consider the existence of this fetid, anti-social layer to be so entrenched and “normal” that it is barely worth discussing anymore. The BBC’s article on the list totalled just 270 words.



In its front-page article, the Sunday Times itself refers to a “wealth gap” that “has become a chasm.” But the gap it refers to is the disparity between the number of billionaires in the “capital and the rest of the country”! It commented that “there are only 37 billionaires based outside London and their collective wealth is £67bn—£191bn less than the London total of £258bn.”



The grotesque levels of wealth recorded in the Rich List speak to the enormous gulf between the super-rich and everyone else. But that is no longer considered a subject of journalistic comment.


Britain’s super-rich have doubled their wealth since 2009
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Tue May 05, 2015 8:50 am

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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by Amskeptic » Tue May 05, 2015 10:45 am

May 5 (Reuters) - The three best paid U.S. hedge fund managers in 2014 each took home more than $1 billion, according to an industry survey released on Tuesday.

Citadel's Kenneth Griffin, topped the list with $1.3 billion, according to Institutional Investors' Alpha's 14th annual rankings. Renaissance Technologies founder James Simons came in second with $1.2 billion, and Bridgewater Associates' Ray Dalio placed third with $1.1 billion.
Now, I am not one to bash a Steve Jobs, not even Bill Gates (though he was ethically challenged), or Mark Zuckerberg (also ethically challenged). They improved daily life in some significant way.

But these hedge fund managers are true parasites. And the numbers are INSANE. And we the people have to at least try to work within the system that we *have not participated* in with any sort of discriminating attention to what was happening. I cannot say with assurance that I would not have become one of the parasites if I had had the chance. Do I "blame" the hedge fund managers? No.

But we have a responsibility and the Constitutional right to persuade our legislators to pass tax laws and other adjustment strategies so that the compensation for our work is somewhat related to the value of our work. The rich may cry "socialism!" to which I can easily reply, you already enjoyed your own ass-saving "socialism" when the market crashed, now we must consider the painful social costs you dumped on the rest of us. I'd like to see us do it through the lawful channels available to us. We *must* exercise our citizen power long before talk of revolution. Share your informed opinions with your fellow citizens.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Tue May 05, 2015 11:42 am

". We *must* exercise our citizen power long before talk of revolution."

I'd agree but up till now talking and voting has clearly gotten the vast number of hard working people no where fast.

It's time to rise...

'People should not fear government'....'Government should fear the people'
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by Amskeptic » Tue May 05, 2015 2:05 pm

72Hardtop wrote: till now talking and voting has clearly gotten the vast number of hard working people nowhere fast.

It's time to rise...
No, look at man in the street interviews as seen on the Tonight Show and Jimmy Kimmel. We are as dumb as rocks. We have to brighten up fast, or we will get led by our noses by revolutionary megalomaniacal idiots. We are better than that.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by Amskeptic » Wed Oct 28, 2015 9:23 am

We have an update on Dan Price, CEO of Gravity Systems, who cut his salary to $70,000.00, and increased his worker's pay to $70,000.00

viewtopic.php?f=16&t=12757#p217001
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Thu Dec 17, 2015 9:23 pm

Amskeptic wrote:
72Hardtop wrote: till now talking and voting has clearly gotten the vast number of hard working people nowhere fast.

It's time to rise...
No, look at man in the street interviews as seen on the Tonight Show and Jimmy Kimmel. We are as dumb as rocks. We have to brighten up fast, or we will get led by our noses by revolutionary megalomaniacal idiots. We are better than that.
Colin
I'd like to believe that would happen with today's system but reality is it won't. Only 2 ways it will.

1. The system has to be allowed to fail (another depression) Not likely to happen.

2. Wide spread anarchy directed specifically towards those who hold a position in office.
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Re: Wall Street As a Negative Economic Force

Post by 72Hardtop » Sun Jan 17, 2016 7:23 pm

http://in.reuters.com/article/davos-mee ... NL8N151092


* Oxfam says richest 1 pct of own more than other 99 pct

* Edelman survey shows widening trust gap with politicians

* Inequalities blamed for rise of populism in U.S., Europe

* Obama acknowledges more wealth concentrated at "very top"

By Ben Hirschler and Noah Barkin

DAVOS, Switzerland, Jan 18 Politicians and business leaders gathering in the Swiss Alps this week face an increasingly divided world, with the poor falling further behind the super-rich and political fissures in the United States, Europe and the Middle East running deeper than at any time in decades.

Just 62 people, 53 of them men, own as much wealth as the poorest half of the entire world population and the richest 1 percent own more than the other 99 percent put together, anti-poverty charity Oxfam said on Monday.

Significantly, the wealth gap is widening faster than anyone anticipated, with the 1 percent overtaking the rest one year earlier than Oxfam had predicted only a year ago.

Rising inequality and a widening trust gap between people and their political leaders are big challenges for the global elite as they converge on Davos for the annual World Economic Forum, which runs from Jan. 20 to 23.

But the divisions go far beyond those that exist between the haves and have-nots. In the Middle East, the divide between Shi'ites and Sunnis has reached crisis point, with Iran and Saudi Arabia jostling openly for influence in a region reeling from war and the barbarism of Islamic extremists.

The conflicts there have spilled over into Europe, causing deep ideological rifts over how to handle the worst refugee crisis since World War Two and - with Britain threatening to leave the European Union - raising doubts about the future of Europe's six-decade push towards ever closer integration.

The shock emergence of Donald Trump as the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination has exposed a gaping political divide in the United States, stirring anxiety among Washington's allies at a time of global turmoil.

Among the key figures in Davos, will be U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the foreign ministers of both Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Canada's new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be on hand, as will Britain's David Cameron and Mario Draghi at a time when a new transatlantic monetary policy divide is opening up between his loosening European Central Bank and a tightening U.S. Federal Reserve.

Celebrities will also be out in force, including film stars Leonardo Di Caprio and Kevin Spacey.

FUELLING POPULISTS

Edelman's annual "Trust Barometer" survey shows a record gap this year in trust between the informed publics and mass populations in many countries, driven by income inequality and divergent expectations of the future. The gap is the largest in the United States, followed by the UK, France and India.

"The consequence of this is populism - exemplified by Trump and Le Pen," Richard Edelman, president and CEO of Edelman, told Reuters, referring to French far-right leader Marine Le Pen, whose National Front has surged ahead of traditional parties in opinion polls.

The next wave of technological innovation, dubbed the fourth industrial revolution and a focus of the Davos meeting, threatens further social upheaval as many traditional jobs are lost to robots.

The Oxfam report suggests that global inequality has reached levels not seen in over a century.

Last year, the organisation has calculated, 62 individuals had the same wealth as 3.5 billion people, or the bottom half of humanity. The wealth of those 62 people has risen 44 percent, or more than half a trillion dollars, over the past five years, while the wealth of the bottom half has fallen by over a trillion.

"Far from trickling down, income and wealth are instead being sucked upwards at an alarming rate," the report says.

It points to a "global spider's web" of tax havens that ensures wealth stays out of reach of ordinary citizens and governments, citing a recent estimate that $7.6 trillion of individual wealth - more than the combined economies of Germany and the UK - is currently held offshore.

"It's a major wake-up call," said Jyrki Raina, general secretary of IndustriALL Global Union, which represents 50 million workers in 140 countries in the mining, energy and manufacturing sectors. "Inequality is one of the biggest threats to economic well-being and it needs to be addressed."

U.S. President Barack Obama touched on the issue in his recent State of the Union address, noting that technological change was reshaping the planet.

"It's change that can broaden opportunity, or widen inequality. And whether we like it or not, the pace of this change will only accelerate," he said.

"Companies in a global economy can locate anywhere, and face tougher competition...As a result, workers have less leverage for a raise. Companies have less loyalty to their communities. And more and more wealth and income is concentrated at the very top."
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