Tax increase

When the government spends more that it takes in we have a deficit. To make up the deficit the government sells bonds. The accumulation of the bonds year over year is the national debt. These bonds are held in various accounts some personal, some in pensions and in other investment portfolios. So the national debt is the total of all these bonds which are held by various investors. If you ask a person would it be a good thing if we could get rid of the national debt they would say yes. This means that all of those investors would see their savings disappear overnight. If you look at the national debt clock as it moves above $29 trillion it is scary but if you call it the national saving account it doesn't look so bad. According to modern monetary theory (MMT) the deficit only becomes a problem when it causes inflation and at that point taxes are increase to counter inflation. Biden is proposing a massive spending plan for things like infrastructure which should spur economic growth but he is also proposing a tax increase which will slow the economy.

Infrastructure

Biden's infrastructure plan will spur economic development and create new high paying jobs and will use corporate taxes to help pay for it. According to the proponents of modern monetary theory (MMT) raising taxes is the wrong thing to do as that will take money out of the economy and slow growth. Political pressure based on the old economic methods forces the idea of paying for benefits and so the tax increase. The plan puts money in the hands of the private sector and the tax takes money out of the private sector. One force working against the other. Every time this has been done it was followed by recession. MMT teaches to expand government spending until full employment is reached and then increase taxes to slow inflation. MMT is not well known at this time so the old ways will prevail.

Windmills

Only one of the top ten wind mill manufacturers is in the United States and that is a GE plant in Boston. They produce 7.57 Gwts per year. Biden calls for 67 Gwts by 2023 which means that they will need to purchase from outside the country and mostly from China. In addition to the windmill proper the engine needs dysprosium, neodymium and praseodymium which are rare earth metals mined in China. The recently passed National Defense Authorization Act direct most Pentagon systems to use rare earth metals that have been mined and refined outside of China within five years. This does not apply to private companies like GE. The government is currently funding an Australian company to mine rare earths in Texas. How environmentalist react to this remains to be seen. The goal, based on Biden's buy America plan, is to manufacture and mine everything in the US.

Covid MMT

One of the lessons learned from Covid was the sending of government checks to people for whom the government told them not go to work. This made the idea of a government check more amenable to many saying it was not that people didn't want to work but that the government forbid them to work and thus it is OK to sent a government check. This came at a time when modern monetary theory (MMT) was just coming into the main stream of economic theory. The basis of MMT can best be understood with a simple example. There are two buckets, one is government and the other is all else. The government spends $100 so we remove $100 from the government bucket and add $100 to the all else bucket. The government then collects $90 in taxes and thus ends up with a $10 deficit. Under our normal way of looking at economics things end there but the all else bucket now has a $10 surplus and that belongs to us. The more the government goes into debt the more surplus the people have. If people are looking for jobs the government can supply those jobs and pay the people by going further in debt while adding more surplus to the peoples account. This works until full employment is reached at which time the government can no longer spend because it would cause wage/price inflation. Under normal economics the fed controls inflation by adjusting interest rates but MMT does so by adjusting government spending.

Flu

There are active discussions concerning the use of Covid safety procedures in future years. In the 2018/2019 flu season 34,000 died from the flu and this season fewer than 200 have died. Would the wearing of mask along with social distancing and frequent hand washing be too much of a sacrifice to save the lives of 30,000 people. Next season will lack the political controversy of this year and so the whole thing will likely be forgotten.

Taxes

When the government pays interest on the debt it is paying this to the people who own government bonds. Higher interest rates mean more money going into the economy to spur growth. To go to negative interest rates is a way to take money out of the economy and would be akin to a wealth tax. If you have a one percent negative interest rate the $100 you invested this year is worth $99 next year and if you have a one percent wealth tax your $100 becomes $99. The wealth tax like any tax takes money out of the economy and slows growth. MMT says to increase economic activity you reduce taxes to put more money in the hands of consumers but you must reduce taxes in the proper area. If you reduce tax on a millionaire he will not spend that much more but if you reduce tax on a working man he will spend. If you reduce taxes on small business the owners will invest in ways to grow their business. Lowering taxes on large corporations may increase growth but it is more likely to be spent on mergers and acquisition which do not expand growth. Tax reductions are best utilized if they are targeted to middle income workers and small businesses.

MMT

Stephanie Kelton is an economist and an advocate of modern monetary theory (MMT) and she was the economics adviser to Bernie Sanders. This is where he got his ideas about spending our way to prosperity. According to MMT experts, any country that prints its own money, as the US does, cannot run out of money and is only limited by inflation. This has been around for many years but not often said in public. In 2005 Alan Greenspan was asked if social security would run out of money and he replied: "I wouldn't say pay-as-you-go benefits are insecure in the sense that there's nothing to prevent the federal government creating as much money as it wants in payment to somebody." In 2009 Ben Bernanke was asked about financing the one trillion dollar bail out of the banks came from the taxpayers and he replied: "It's not tax money. The banks have accounts with the Fed, much the same way that you have an account in a commercial bank. So, to lend to a bank, we simply use the computer to mark up the size of the account that they have with the Fed. It's much more akin to printing money than it is to borrowing." The current GDP is $22 trillion and the current debt is $29 trillion and the ratio of GDP to debt is 131%. Japan has a GDP to debt ratio of 240% and their inflation rate is negative .3%. According to MMT the country can keep printing money until full employment and then, to stop inflation, it will increase taxes. MMT proposes no tax increases and zero interest government loans to banks to create money at very low interest rates to fire up the economy. This is about to happen and we shall see.

Jobs

Many people who might otherwise be opposed to public assistance found it acceptable with the Covid relief because it was the government who ordered people not to go to work so the government should compensate these people. One of the ways suggested to do this and spur economic growth was in two approaches. Either offer government jobs to those who are unemployed or just sent them a government check, something called universal income. The second method discourages work as was seen during the last Covid relief when people were earning more money on unemployment than they could get by working so many chose not to work. If you are working for the government you are staying active and available to companies when the economy improves. The government job should pay a minimum like $15 per hour so when the private sector opens up these government workers will be encourage to move to private jobs. In both cases the payments are helping the economy to recover.

Asians

For the past ten years most immigrants have come from Asia and 40% of those are from China and India. This group is better educated and most speak English. Allowing these people a preference is called merit based immigration and used in Canada, Australia, England, Japan and South Korea. They are especially adept at science and technology which are skills badly needed in today's world. This is not prejudice as some have claimed since people from Asia and Central America are both brown skin. It is looking for immigrants who can fill an employment need while providing for their own needs. President Biden said we can accept 2 million immigrants a year and this is a reasonable number especially if they are self sufficient. Asians have a proven track record as they have higher incomes than whites, perform at a higher level in school and have fewer run ins with the law. Asian Americans also start businesses at a higher rate than other Americans and small business is the engine that drives the economy.

Unions

Today is a big day for United States workers. There are 6,000 Amazon employees in Alabama voting to authorize a union. The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union is facing an uphill battle because unions are not popular in the south. This could be the start of revitalizing unions, something that is badly needed to help the middle income groups who have suffered the loss of manufacturing jobs to other countries. This along with the Presidents plan to buy American and make American can bring back the good old days of the 1950's when wages outpaced inflation for the blue collar folks.

MMT

Politicians who are opposed to government spending often say that the government doesn't have any money except the money it gets from the people. Modern monetary theory (MMT) says just the opposite. The people don't have any money until the government creates it. The money comes from the government through the banking system and returns to the government by way of taxation. Imagine two buckets, one for government and the other for all else. The government creates $100 and puts it in the government bucket. Then they transfer it to the all else bucket. Then they collect $90 in taxes and the government now has a $10 deficit. However the all else bucket now has a $10 surplus. The people now have the surplus at their disposal. As they spend this it creates economic growth. The larger the deficit the larger the surplus and the larger the economic growth. According to MMT this process can continue until the country reaches full employment. At that point inflation becomes a problem and the government then increases taxes to remove money from the people and taking the surplus to pay down the deficit. This is not easy to refute and will be tried with the Biden administration. The government can increase the money supply to pay pay off college loans, the new green deal, infrastructure and any other projects approved by congress. The money supply has increased from $5 trillion in 2000 to $19 trillion today and inflation has stayed below 2%. Why not keep going.

The threat that North Korea could wage war with the US by using ICBM's tipped with nuclear weapons was not realistic because they would be shot down and it would mean the total destruction of their country. That all changed this week. North Korea appears to be preparing to launch a new submarine capable of firing nuclear-capable ballistic missiles, with US and South Korean intelligence “thoroughly monitoring” developments at the North’s Sinpo shipyard. Instead of the 6,000 mile journey from North Korea to California it will now mean a sub 20 miles off shore of LA. NK would still be annihilated but only after LA was destroyed. This has always been the true threat but no one ever talked about it and now it is here. Here is news from 2 years ago. In recent weeks, North Korean media have released images of a “newly built submarine” and subsequent analyses researchers and think tanks theorize it is a second Sinpo-class ballistic missile submarine (SSB) that might be capable of launching nuclear ballistic missiles. While the eyes of the world are on the land based missile launches the more serious threat is from under the sea. A sub off the coast of California and one off the coast of New York could hit a half dozen US cities using a first strike strategy. It would mean the end of North Korea but it puts them in a powerful bargaining position.

Nirvana

Historically liberals tended to provide government benefits to people while conservatives preferred tax breaks for business so they could provide private industry jobs. Some people would get a public assistance check and others would get a private business check. Over time a balance was achieved based on changing needs but now there is a new kid on the block and his name is modern monetary theory (MMT). Some people will now receive both a government check and a private business check, because under MMT anyone who is unemployed and wants to work will get a government job. These jobs will fill the gap where help is needed, things like child care, workers in nursing homes and helpers building infrastructure. The pay will be at least $15 per hour and include benefits. This theory provides that any government that prints its own money cannot go broke and the only long term concern is inflation. Congress has just passed the $1.9 trillion Covid relief bill and President Biden is now proposing a $3 trillion dollar stimulus bill. Many feel this will be followed up with $1.5 trillion to pay off student loans and on the horizon money to pay off the $4.6 trillion in personal debt not counting home mortgage loans. There is talk of increasing corporate taxes from 21% to 28% but MMT says that is not needed since debt does not matter as long as inflation is under control. It appears we have reached Nirvana or as the old democratic party song says, happy days are here again.

Smugglers

Reuters news reports that children from Central America make the journey across Mexico in three groups. First some come with families, second some with friends who are not legal guardians and finally some with smugglers with children as young as two years old. More than half the smugglers consulted said they had transported unaccompanied minors in recent weeks, moving them by bus, car, boat and even by plane, which one well-connected smuggler called his network’s “faster new method” to bring children up from Central America. The trips cost thousands of dollars per child and are often financed by parents or relatives already in the United States. US policy allows families with children under age 7 to stay but DNA shows that the children are often times not related. Investigation indicates that children are used for a price to get families into the country and are then released to be used again. In addition unaccompanied children are allowed entry. This results in children being abused in various ways and the facilities are not able to care for this influx of children. One smuggler said that in the past 6 months 90 people have paid him to cross the border. With coyote fees of $3,000 this is $270,000 or $45,000 per month which means this process will continue and grow.

Test scores

In 1966 Sociologist James S. Coleman conducted extensive research in K- 12 education by surveying 600,000 students, 60,000 teachers and 4,000 schools. The report hoped to show that with equal opportunities, things like funding, facilities, teacher or curricular quality and extra-curricular offering would help achievement. To their great disappointment this did not happen. They hoped to answer the question, what kinds of educational inputs would improve academic performance of poor, minority students. Because the results did not provide the answers that were wanted the report was considered faulty and others felt it proved that the schools couldn't do anything about the problem. This was just after the civil rights act was passed and to look at the home life of these students was considered racist. It is only in the past few years that such discussion have come out into the open and not without controversy. This sort of thinking is considered blaming the victim. Setting aside race, data shows the children from two-parent families perform one grade level higher than those from single parent families.

Projects

I grew up in central Illinois in the 40's and 50's and Chicago was always in the news. At that time many Blacks from the south were moving to Chicago to work. There were manufacturing plants like steel mills and jobs for public employees. They came with high hopes but were funneled into the south side because the city was segregated. In time these areas became slums and the high hopes faded. Along came urban renewal and high hopes. After building what became known as the projects consisting of affordable housing in newly enhanced neighborhoods things seem to be on the up swing. Hundreds of huge housing units some in small buildings and many in high rise were built where the slums used to be. By the turn of the century these projects had turned into drug invested slums and they were demolished. They were replaced with new mixed race housing but the cost was so high that most poor Blacks could not afford to live there. I always thought of the projects as the modern day equivalent of the reservation. This is only one of the ways that government has attempted to help Blacks but the root problem comes down to education and that is where the biggest failure lies.

Trial

The congress began the first step to investigating the January 6th riot at the Capitol on February 24 and the second impeachment of Trump began on January 13th. The trial began in the senate on February 9th and concluded on February 13 with a not guilty. Note that the investigation began after the trial concluded. A gunman opened fire at a grocery store in Boulder, Colo., on Monday afternoon, killing 10 people, including a police officer, the authorities in Boulder said. What follows will be an investigation to gather facts and then a trial to determine guilt or innocence.

Micro nationalism

Just as the tribes in the Middle East and the American plains were constantly at war so is the country today with the various groups in the US. While nationalism generally refers to a given nation, for example Germans living in Germany and French living in France, it can be applied on a micro level to different groups in the United States. Skin color, various genders, income and geography are used to create groups that can be encouraged to be antagonistic toward one another. This distrust between groups can be manipulated by those in power to maintain power. As these groups express their animosity it results in Anti Americanism and concentrates on all that is wrong in the country. Accusations against the rich, the white, the elite and the educated abound and lead to further division. Striving for equal opportunity is no longer enough. The new goal is equal results or as it is called today, equity.

Dirty tricks

In England, the land of soccer, there is a saying that you tackle the ball and not the man. This goes along with Eleanor Roosevelt's famous quote, great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people. The point here is that when talking about politicians stick to policy and not personality. That was the case back fifty years ago. The personal lives of people like Eisenhower and Kennedy did not make the nightly news. Over the intervening years news people have discovered that you get more clicks talking about personality. A cynic might say this is because most people have small minds. Others would say it simply means more viewers means more profit. Now with the aid of the Internet we have a large group of researchers who wile away the hours looking for and finding all sorts of embarrassing tidbits to throw in the face of anyone they happen to be after on that given day. This can be a warning to any politician not to go after the personal life of another politician lest you want the same treatment and so it is left up to the outsiders to carry out this dirty task. Sometimes in campaigns this was used and was called dirty tricks. Or other times it was called dirty politics but in either case the practice has been greatly accelerated with advent of the Internet. Best get used to it as it is not going away and will likely get more popular. One good thing is that this should open the door to more women getting into politics since in most cases their past is not as checkered.

BLM

It takes a lot of research to find information about Black Lives Matter (BLM) that is not biased one way or the other. After considerable effort I found a young woman, Marissa Lucero, who is a business owner but active in the BLM movement. Here is her rather thought provoking comment: For most white people, their first instinct is to believe that the police are here to protect them and their property but for many Black people, their first instinct is that the police are there to protect someone else from them-they are there to make sure that you do not break the law not to protect you from lawbreakers. If that is true then why. Black neighborhoods in the cities are high crime areas. This may well be the result of past discriminatory treatment by police but it remains a fact. When police go into these areas they are not trusted and thus extra cautious. The tendency is to react based on a preconceived notion of guilt and this caution often saves the lives of police but it also results in unfair action. It is not automatically racist since many officers are Black and react in the same manner. Honest citizens living in these neighborhoods need and want police protection but others want the police to stay out.

Asians

The tensions between the Black and Asian communities first came to the forefront in the 1992 LA riots. Over 2200 Korean businesses were destroyed costing $400 million dollars in damages. Differences in academic performance adds to the hard feelings. Medium household income for Asians is $98,000 and Black households $46,000. Many Asians are first generation immigrants and most Blacks have been here for many years. These race problems are rarely exposed because the news always looks for white privilege. A Korean business is vandalized by Blacks but this doesn't warrant any news coverage. In 2018 there were 182,000 reports of Asian victims and 24% were caused by whites and 28% by Blacks even though the population is 62% white and 12% Black.

Shootings

When ever there is a news worthy incident some people reserve judgment for later but others immediately offer an opinion. Those in the latter group usually have an agenda and are looking for clicks. What is more interesting, to say we must wait for the facts or to say he was a white extremist or a Muslim terrorist. If this is the story for a number of days by the time the facts come out many people have already made up their minds. In both cases the news concentrates on the perpetrator with very little coverage on the victims. An exception occurs if a police officer is the perpetrator in which case there is a lot of coverage on the victims.

Les Miz

On small border towns illegals are crossing unimpeded and crime is increasing. If you are an illegal who has made the 2,000 mile journey from Central America and you are broke what can you do. You see the local grocery store so you break in to get something to eat. It sounds like the musical Les Miz. Will these thieves now go to jail.

Jobs

President Biden is proposing a $3 trillion dollar spending bill which includes infrastructure, education, work force development and climate change. There are currently dozens of job training programs available so this will just add more. The US has increased spending on education over the years and today spends more per student than any country but the test scores are not improving and the gap between races is increasing. Climate change means job creation in building wind mills and solar panels. Infrastructure means new construction jobs. It will be much like defense spending. The government hands out checks to private industry. This is the way government creates jobs. Biden plans to tax companies to get money to pay for the spending which means companies will have less money to create jobs. As companies have less profit they add fewer jobs. This is transferring job creation from the private sector to the government.

MMT

The qualitative easing which took place during the 2008 mortgage crises added $4.5 trillion dollars to the money supply. Since then another $5.5 trillion has been added bringing the total increase since 2008 to $10 trillion. I first studied economics in college in 1955 and the rule was that inflation was caused by too many dollars chasing too few goods. In spite of the more than doubling of the money supply in 12 years, inflation has stayed under 2%. This opens the door to the concept of modern monetary theory which says when a country has its own currency, as the US does, it can cover its debts just by printing more money. They do not have to be concerned about debt. This idea is gaining in credibility as we spend more and go deeper in debt without any negative consequences. If this keeps going we can spend the new $3trillion that Biden wants even if no new taxes are approved. It is like the old story of the money tree or Midas touch. This is all counter intuitive.

CRT

The latest new thing on the horizon is something called critical race theory (CRT). It is somewhat of a mystery to most people and difficult to understand to many. The basic premises are: 1.Recognizing that race is not biologically real but is socially constructed. Race is the product of social thought and is not connected to biological reality. 2.Acknowledgment that racism is a normal feature of society and is embedded within systems and institutions. 3.Rejection of the popular thinking that racism is just limited to a few bad apples when in fact it is systemic. 4.Recognition of how racism effects the everyday lives of people of color. The question is what if anything can be done about racism. There are different types of racism. Internalized. What you think and feel about racism. Interpersonal. How you treat and react with others. Institutional. Policies and practices that reinforce racist standards within the community. Many steps have been taken to minimize and remove institutional racism things like affirmative action. The way to change the way people think and feel must start in the home. You can best learn how to treat people with dignity and respect from your parents assuming they have learned that from their parents. One simple example occurred to me when I left Florida and sold my condo to a Black couple. I left a note for them and it said when I look at you on the outside, I see how we are different but when I look at you on the inside, I see how we are the same. I believe that is the message that number 1 is offering.

Covid test

I used to work in a poultry processing plant and once in a while a USDA inspector would randomly check the birds for salmonella and find 30 or 40% were contaminated. The last things that happens to the birds is that they pass through a large tank filled with ice water to cool them down for shipping. At any given time there are 4 or 5,000 birds in the tank and they are in there mixing for 40 minutes. If even one bird was contaminated they would all be when the left the tank. Today's news said that in some over crowded facilities at the border as many as 10% test positive for Covid. This virus is easy to transfer and in these close quarters where the people stay up to a week, it is likely that they will all test positive.

Black progress

Watching the chaos at the southern border is mindful of the old cold war days. People from around the world were entering the lottery hoping to win passage to the United States and meanwhile the Soviets had built a wall to keep people from leaving. Nothing has changed. People who are unhappy see the US as their best hope for a brighter future. At the same time many people living in the land of the free are complaining that they are living in a white supremacist country where they have limited opportunities. Here is some data that is rarely published. In 1940, 60 percent of employed black women worked as domestic servants; today the number is down to 2.2 percent, while 60 percent hold white- collar jobs. In 1958, 44 percent of whites said they would move if a black family became their next door neighbor; today the figure is 1 percent. In 1964, the year the great Civil Rights Act was passed, only 18 percent of whites claimed to have a friend who was black; today 86 percent say they do, while 87 percent of blacks assert they have white friends. 40 percent of African Americans now consider themselves members of the middle class. Forty-two percent own their own homes, a figure that rises to 75 percent if we look just at black married couples. There is much room for improvement but much has been accomplished.

China

There were accusations that Biden had some nefarious dealings with China but there was no proof. So far Biden has been following the get tough policies that Trump installed and this will be evidence that China has nothing on Biden. The question comes up as to how will Biden handle China's aggressive moves in the South China Sea and threats against Taiwan. The best way to deal with China is economically. China needs the US far more than the other way around. The US should set policies that would encourage the return of US business and use incentives for people to buy American. The US should continue placing import tax on Chinese goods. As their economy feels the pressure they will be more willing to cooperate with the West. The American people will have to pay more for American made products as wages in the US rise. The US makes the best quality products but they cost more. Start with appliances and move into electronics. This is from the White House on January 25, 2021.Today, while many American businesses are on the brink of having to close their doors because of the crises that our country faces, President Biden will sign an Executive Order to support manufacturers, businesses, and workers to ensure that our future is made in all of America by all of America’s workers.

Racism

There is a big story in the news as people are surprised that China called out the US for racism. If the press, on an almost daily basis, promotes the idea that America is a racist country, it should be expected that people in other countries would think that. President Biden said that Trump was the first racist president and many articles suggest that the US is a country of white supremacist. It is so prevalent that some people are saying publicly that they are ashamed of their whiteness. One of the problems for white people is how can you prove you are not a racist. If you are called a racist what is your response.

Ilegals

In early 2019 there was a dramatic rise in the number of illegal border crossings rising to over 850,000 per year. At that point Trump convinced the Mexican government to stop the flow at their southern border and started making illegals wait in Mexico while their cases were adjudicated and increased deportations. This resulted in a decline to 400,000 arrest between September 2019 and October 2020. Since the election the decline stopped and the number started to increase and today is at 4,000 per day. If that isn't stopped it means up to 1.5 million this year the highest ever.

Science magazine

Science, also widely referred to as Science Magazine, is the peer-reviewed academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Here is the conclusion of the latest review of the Covid virus. In late-December of 2019, the first cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, were described in the city of Wuhan in Hubei province, China (1, 2). The virus quickly spread within China (3). The cordon sanitaire that was put in place in Wuhan on 23 January 2020 and mitigation efforts across China eventually brought about an end to sustained local transmission. In March and April 2020, restrictions across China were relaxed (4). By then, however, COVID-19 was a pandemic (5). It appears that Science has concluded that the virus started in China but the WHO says it may have been introduced to China from some animal outside of China. Even if that is true the basic question about transmission remains. Why did China close down travel within China but allow the continuation of travel outside of China. In other words if they thought it could infect other people within the country why were they willing to infect others around the world.

Internet

Attention all teens. Be careful what you put on the Internet' Alexi Jo McCammond (born 1994) is an American political journalist. She served as an NBC and MSNBC contributor a reporter for the political website Axios, and a contributor for PBS's Washington Week. McCammond appeared on 2020's Forbes 30 Under 30 list. When this young lady was 17 she referred to her chemistry teacher as a stupid Asian with google eyes and this week she was fired from her job when someone dug up this old information. It did not matter that she publicly apologized for these remarks. There are people who search the Internet in the hopes of finding some dirt so they can ruin someones life. It is a sad commentary on their lives but it is a fact.

Diesel

Sometimes big problems can best be understood by using a simple example. A new neighbor moved in to our area last summer and he owns his semi truck. He has three school age children and his wife is a stay at home mom who home schools the children. He drives about 65,000 miles per year and get 5 miles per gallon which means he uses 13,000 gallons of diesel per year. He says since diesel has been under $3 he is doing very well but if it goes to $4 he has to tighten his belt and do without. He says that somewhere between $4 and $4.50 he starts to lose money and must draw out of savings to stay afloat. The price has risen 40 cents in the past few months and this cost him $5,200 on an annual basis. Most people pay little attention to the price of diesel but for some it can have a profound effect.

School police

In the past 20 years or so as the number of school shootings increased the push to have police officers in the schools increased. These officers acted as a deterrent to some outsider entering the school and causing havoc. These officers are also used to deal with student problems within the schools and this has led to a problem with race. It turns out that a disproportionate number of students that have interactions with the officers are minorities. The LA teachers union has called for the removal of officers from the schools and to use that money to add more counselors. This could be an experiment to see if police in the schools actually help. This sort of thing happens in some big cities. There are times when the neighborhoods want more police protection and then they want less. The police chief has to use good judgment and move his personnel accordingly.

Hate crimes

The analysis released by California State University this month examined hate crimes in 16 of America’s largest cities. It revealed that while such crimes in 2020 decreased overall by 7 percent, those targeting Asian people rose by nearly 150 percent. The reason given is that Trump called the virus the China virus. These crimes more than doubled from 2019 to 2020, increasing from 49 to 122. The rash of anti-Semitic attacks gripping the New York-New Jersey area may feel like chilling coincidences, but statistics show they’re part of a wave of anti-Semitic violence that has risen across the country over the past half-decade. There were 835 instances in 2020. While the news about the Asians is on every network, the news about the Jews is no where to be found. Hate crimes in the US rose to the highest level in more than a decade last year, according to an FBI report. This includes a 14% increase in crimes against Jews. There are 7 million Jews in the US and 17 million Asian Americans in the US.

EV's

California has a goal of all electric cars by 2035. The state currently gets 47% of its power from natural gas. This is needed as back up even if more wind and solar are built. If this can be changed the use of EV's will make more sense. It is inefficient to make power using natural gas and then use that to charge the vehicle. There is no mention of what they will do with airplanes, rail road engines, heavy construction and farm vehicles and even large trucks. The state has 32 military basis including air force and military jets cannot run on batteries. The use of EV's makes sense if the power source is not fossil fuels. The problems of charging time and use in cold weather climes remain but will improve with technology.

Trump economy

The first three years of the Trump presidency were highlighted by economic success. Household income rose $5,000 to $68,700 and the biggest percentage increase went to low and middle income groups. They also received a $2,000 tax cut. Utility cost and gasoline remained low because of fracking. The poverty rate fell to 10.5% the lowest since records were kept. Unemployment for minorities and women were the lowest in history. Home ownership increased as home prices reached record levels. The stock market rose to record levels. While these numbers are impressive the real gains were in the intangibles. When a person has a job they gain independence and the dignity that goes with taking care of their family. They have the respect of their friends and neighbors. They are positive role models for their children. All of this progress came tumbling down when the pandemic hit. As the virus is defeated will the country go back to the Trump policies of job creation. It is not likely since the past shows that democrats are less interested in jobs and more interested in providing government assistance. Not only will millions be getting checks there is talk of plans for guaranteed income. At least 11 direct-cash experiments will be in effect this year, from Pittsburgh to Compton. Another 20 mayors have said they may launch such pilots in the future, with several cities taking initial legislative steps to implement them.

Covid relief

The Covid relief bills set aside $180 billion dollars for K-12 schools. Since there are 130,000 such schools this equated to $1.38 million dollars per school. It is hard to believe that all of this money will be used to tame the virus. Also some schools will get a lot more than others. Syracuse, NY has will receive $128 million dollars and they have 32 K-12 school so this is $4 million dollars per school. Will there be some parking lots resurfaced?

Separate but equal

The Supreme Court case in 1896 of Plessy v Ferguson was the first attempt to ease the pain of slavery. The new principal was called separate but equal and was meant to maintain segregation but do it in a equitable manner. The result was that things remained separate but not equal. The white schools had the best books, buildings, teacher and equipment and the black schools had the left overs. This was corrected in the 1954 case of Brown v Board of Education and schools were integrated. There are some colleges this year, including Ivy League schools, who have reverted back to separate but equal. They are having graduation ceremonies by race, ethnicity and income. If you are a Black you can go to the Black graduation. Assuming the quality is equal we are back to separate but equal.

Election power

Here is a hypothetical case that could well happen in today's news world. It is a close presidential election and just a week before voting day a major newspaper comes out with a story that rocks the country. It says that according to an anonymous source candidate John Smith was accused by six youths of molesting them in his home. The source says this happened over a period of months with different children each time. This information was passed on to the FBI for further investigation. A few weeks after the election which Smith lost the same newspaper reports that their anonymous was found to be unreliable and in fact a activist who opposed Smith. The newspaper apologized on page 8. While many have expressed concern about the power of the social media companies, the old time established press can also effect elections.

Filibuster

The Georgia senatorial election in January was pivotal since it changed the majority. At a crucial point just before the election the Washington Post ran a story that damaged Trump. The Post said that Trump had called Georgia officials and told them to "find fraud". This story was based on one anonymous source. It turns out this source was Frances Watson an election official. The election was won by 12,000 votes and some feel this report was the difference. Later a reporter from the WSJ found a tape of this phone conversation and presented it to the Washington Post and they then this past week printed a retraction. The Washington Post admitted in a correction that it had “misquoted” former President Donald Trump telling Georgia’s top elections investigator “to find the fraud,” in December. This is a classic example of too little too late. The Post should not rely on one source and why did they not ask for the tape. The senate now plans to use this vote to get rid of the filibuster. Some of the things they promise to do will change the senate and the country forever. Plans are to increase the Supreme Court to 15 Justices, offer citizenship to 4 million illegals, make Washington DC a state, pass the new green deal and Medicare for all to name a few things. To understand what one party rule means, take a look at California. Four years ago when the republicans controlled the senate, 27 democratic senators, including Schumer, signed a letter asking to keep the filibuster. Once again party over country. Power is a strong aphrodisiac.

Teachers

A question that comes up in the news these days is why grocery workers go to work and teachers stay home. The answer is that if you work at Walmart and refuse to work you don't get paid. The teachers in California must be different than the teachers here in Minnesota. The teachers here put students first. The union is different in that they put teachers first. Teachers in a number of big cities like Los Angeles refuse to work on the grounds that it is unsafe. Safety seems to go out the window where some teacher returned to work because they received hazard pay. The question is if they did not get paid would they go to work. It is not unlike being on strike and still getting paid. While teachers here are anxious to return to regular school the teachers in these other areas seem to want to stay home. The teachers in Chicago finally agreed to return to school. Maybe these other cities will do the same.

Illegals

Reading about the benefits accorded illegal immigrants is difficult at best. For example they are not entitled to health insurance until they have been here for five years but anyone who goes to the emergency room cannot be turned away. They do not qualify for food stamps but can get help under the women's, infants and children (WIC) program. This includes food. If a person qualifies as a refugee then many other benefits are available. 25,000 qualified in 2019 and can get universal credit. Universal Credit - if you're unemployed, too ill to work or on a low wage. Pension Credit - if you're over working age. a refugee integration loan - to help pay for a rent deposit, household items, education and training for work. The cost to the government by the lowest estimate is $54 billion per year. This is calculated by taking the cost less the taxes collected. There are also state benefits. This is based on 11 million illegals but some feel the number is higher. This does not include the cost incurred at the border. It would be safe to say that the costs are difficult to accurately assess.

Change

The process of going back in time and trying to make up for past mistakes can be tricky. Things like removing and/or renaming statues and buildings cannot undo the past. The best is to understand that times change and people change. A simple example is Joe Biden's support of the 1994 crime bill. The 1994 crime bill paved the way to mass incarceration of Black Americans. Biden says his support was a ‘mistake’ Many politicians as well as many people have changed positions over time and this is to be expected. To quote Emerson, A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. Every scientist and businessman knows that when information changes its time for review.

Taxes

One of the crowing achievements that parents have in passing the torch is when children inherit the old home. Mom and Dad purchased their home 40 years ago for $50,000. They paid the monthly cost for 30 years and then had a mortgage burning party. That may be about to change. The kids got the home tax free because of something called stepped up basis at death. Simply put this meant that if you inherit property the value is stepped up to the present appraised value and there is no tax. Under the proposed changes in the Biden administration they will do away with the step up. This means if the kids sell the house for $300,000 they will pay 20% capital gains tax on $250,000 or 50 grand. This will hurt the middle income group more than any other. Also when the corporate tax was lowered many utility companies passed some of the savings on to their customers and that will likely be reversed and that hurts middle incomers. In addition there is talk of increasing the gasoline tax which once again hurts middle income people. Meanwhile if the restrictions on fracking continue this will raise the price of all oil and natural gas products, things like utilities and gasoline. Single and married adults will lose about $2,000 in tax savings they got from the Trump tax cuts. These death by a thousand cuts will not receive much attention in the press but they will be felt if enacted.

Capital gains

I am not one to predict the stock market but my common sense tells me there will be a sell off at the end of this year. Capital gains occur when you sell something you own or when you receive dividends. The current capital gain rate is 20%. Recall Warren Buffett saying he paid a lower tax rate than his secretary. Biden's tax plan will increase the capital gains to 40%. This means if you sell your stock this year (2021) you will pay 20% but if you wait until 2022 you will pay 40%. When are you going to sell. Is anyone awake. This higher rate applies to people who have earnings of more than one million dollars. These are people who have the no how to move their money around and they will do just that.

Taxes

When Biden campaigned he said he would only raise income tax on those earning more than $400,000 but he also said he would get rid of the Trump tax cuts. This was dishonest because getting rid of the Trump cuts would in essence add $2,000 to the average families tax. In his new plan he will increase the child tax credit from $2,000 to $3,000 and this would make up for the cut for all families with two or more children under the age of 17. His plan would also increase the child care tax credit but most low income families will not qualify because they don't owe any taxes and this credit is non-refundable. The rest of his plan increases corporate taxes from 21% to 28%. This is a way to increase taxes on the rich without adversely effecting the poor except it will indirectly cost jobs. Jobs are not at the top of the list.

Cuomo

The way most people are dealing with the Governor Cuomo situations shows a breakdown in law and order. If there are concerns about Cuomo's ability to govern he should be asked to turn over power to the lieutenant governor until an investigation has been completed. If the facts warrant he should then be charged and taken to court. If found guilty he should be punished according to law. If not guilty he should remain in office until the next election. This idea of convicting people before they have had their day in court is not the way a country of law and order proceeds. Every time the law is not followed it makes it easier to disregard the law the next time.

Woke and equity

Two new ideas represented by two new words are coming together to limit free speech. The words are woke and equity. It started slowly some years ago in the schools. It first effected teachers who found their speech limited by certain words they could not use and soon led to subjects they needed to avoid. Today teachers are allowed to discuss slavery, mistreatment of Native Americans, Japanese interment, and Jim Crow laws but they tread carefully when pointing out the many gifts that America has given to the world. The emphasis is on the negative. Most teachers are fearful of saying the wrong thing and possibly losing their jobs so they avoid controversial subjects like politics and religion. Many spend the day walking on egg shells. Following the killing in Ferguson and in the six years since Brown's death, "woke" has evolved into a single word summation of leftist political ideology, centered on social justice politics and racism. This is the woke part. Equity requires a push for equal results especially in the area of social justice politics. It started 50 years ago with things like not keeping score at games and getting rid of valentines and Christmas. It then spread into the business world with affirmative action. Today it involves changing pronouns and using euphemism to soften the meaning of words. These changes start with the goal of lessening the hurt but each one takes away some small bit of free speech. In a civilized society people will refrain from using words and phrases that might offend but those same people might well object to government demanding that they not use those words. Should the government be the final arbiter on what is acceptable speech. Be careful and reread Animal Farm.

Babbitt

Ashli Babbitt is the woman who was shot and killed by a police officer during the riot at the capitol. In the United States, the use of deadly force by sworn law enforcement officers is lawful when the officer reasonably believes the subject poses a significant threat of serious bodily injury or death to themselves or others. Babbitt was a unharmed smallish woman and the question is why did the officer feel she was a dangerous threat. Last July in Minneapolis a police officer answering a 911 call shot an unarmed women and he was sentenced to 12 years. Investigators have determined the Capitol Police officer who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt during the U.S. Capitol riot should not be charged with any crimes, a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation told NBC News.

Vaccine

Trump not only got the vaccine developed in record time he also order enough for all citizens. Last summer the government started purchasing vaccines and this was long before they were approved. It was a way to get a head start so when the approval came they were ready to go. Here were the orders placed last summer. Pfizer-BioNTech: 100 million doses (two-dose regimen) Moderna: 100 million doses (two-dose regimen) Johnson & Johnson: 100 million doses (one-dose regimen) AstraZeneca: 300 million doses (two-dose regimen) Novavax: 100 million doses (two-dose regimen) Sanofi-GlaxoSmithKline: 100 million doses (one- or two-dose regimen) In all, the amounts agreed to under these contracts total about 800 million vaccine doses, or enough for more than 400 million people. This allowed a head start so that when Biden took office the process was well underway. During December 14, 2020–January 13, 2021, a total of 13,794,904 COVID-19 vaccine doses were administered in the United States;

Alibaba

Alibaba is an example of how China uses a market system under the control of a communist government. Jack Ma was an English teacher in China and in 1999 with 25 million dollars from an American investor started his company Alibaba which was to be the Chinese equivalent of Amazon. His company grew and Jack became a billionaire. He started to accuse the government of undermining his business. In September of 2019 he stepped down as chief officer amid rumors that the Government was forcing him out. When he started he was like a folk hero but as the government run press started to bad mouth him things changed. But lately, public sentiment has soured and Daddy Ma has become the man people in China love to hate. He has been called a “villain,” an “evil capitalist” and a “bloodsucking ghost.” Bo Zhuang, chief China economist at TS Lombard said that the suspension "forms part of a wider political drive as the leadership seeks to widen and consolidate its control over finance and technology".What followed was an unexpected Chinese government-released draft on 10 November 2020, which gives regulatory authorities a wider latitude to regulate their biggest tech enterprises. Using the powers of government the company is being forced to give up its independence. This is like the communist governments in the past where they nationalized all business. Notice that the name calling of Ma is now what is going on against Jeff Bezos of Amazon and there are threats of a breakup of the company and a wealth tax against Bezos.

Trump policies

Trump started his campaign saying he would not cut social security or Medicare and he didn't. He said he would cut taxes and he did. He said he would get tough on China and he placed import taxes on billions of Chinese imports. He said he would pull out of the Paris Accords and he did. He said he would cancel the Iran nuke agreement and he did. He promised to tighten the borders and he did. He said he would build a wall and he did. He said he would replace NAFTA with something better and he did. He said he would build up the military and he did. He said he would place import taxes on European products and he did. He said he would make NATO members pay their fair share and he did. He said he would appoint judges who stick to the constitution and he did. He said he would make America energy independent and he did. He promised trade agreement with individual countries and he did this with Japan and South Korea. He promised to help raise wages for working people and he did. He promised to get rid of the individual mandate in Obamacare and he did. He said he would stop Chinese communication giant Huawei from putting 5 G in the US and he did. He also stopped them from going into Europe. This is a partial list. It it necessary to toot Trumps horn because the media only talks about why they don't like him and very seldom bother to discuss policies. It appears that Biden's main policy will be anti Trump although it looks like he will keep the new NAFTA and the ban on Huawei.

Covid

The early timeline for Covid starts in China. The first known case was a 55 year old from Hubei province in China and occurred on November 17, 2019. Following that one to five new cases were reported everyday and by December 15 reached 27. By December 20 the case count was up to 60. By January 20 there are 500 confirmed cases with 17 deaths. Note this is 3.4% which is twice the rate that the US experienced. China locked down all domestic traffic internally by the end of January, 2020 but pushed to open foreign travel till the end of March. The World Health Organization (WHO) says that the virus started with some animal outside of China. The investigation continues as to where this virus started but the question remains as to why China shut down traffic within the country but allowed travel outside the country. No one seems to be interested in this aspect. Once again politics interfered when Trump called it the China virus. Infectious diseases throughout history have been named for geographic locations where they were thought to have originated: Spanish flu, West Nile virus, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, Zika and Ebola, to name a few.

Although the 2020/2021season is not over, the CDC estimates there have been 453 flu-related deaths in the United States which includes one child. Last season 2019/2020 there were 62,000 deaths including 180 children. A reasonable person might conclude that social distancing, washing hands and wearing mask has prevented many from getting the flu. The question then arises should the country follow these precautions every flu season. Is the inconvenience of wearing a mask worth saving 60,000 lives. There was much concern about the 60,000 who died from drugs like opioids. Will there be a similar concern about flu.

Race today

Today on NPR a Black lady was talking about race and she said after the past four years things are not much different in 2020 than they were in 1920. Why was this person given an audience. In 1920 there were no Black mayors, congressmen, senators, CEO's, theater stars, and sports stars. There were separate facilities for Blacks, things like drinking fountains, restaurants and even churches. Most states had laws against mixed marriage and lynchings were not uncommon. In spite of all the progress that has been made in race relations this women suggested that nothing had changed. Her remarks were not challenged and many listeners may not stop to think about the progress. What was the point of this program if not to further racial stress.

Inflation cure

As the government continues to spend, the fear of inflation lurks in the background. Going back to the Carter days of stagflation when the inflation rate hit 13% and interest rates hit 21% what did the government do. Reagan came in and cut government spending and cut income tax. Within a few years inflation was tamed but it was a tough couple of years. After that followed 20 years of economic growth with low unemployment. Can this approach work again? 20 million new jobs were created Inflation dropped from 13.5% in 1980 to 4.1% by 1988 Unemployment fell from 7.6% to 5.5% Net worth of families earning between $20,000 and $50,000 annually grew by 27% Real gross national product rose 26% The prime interest rate was slashed by more than half, from an unprecedented 21.5% in January 1981 to 10% in August 1988 The price paid for this growth was the national debt nearly tripled going from $738 billion to $2.1 trillion. Reagan made three promises. He would grow the economy, build up the military and balance the budget. He did the first two but went down in flames on the debt.

Fracking gas

The price of natural gas, the kind that heats most homes, has been coming down for the past 15 years. In 1990 shale gas, gas from fracking, was about 14% but by 2013 it was 60% and today it is over 70% even though the US is now an exporter of natural gas. In 2019 the US produced 34Tcf (trillion cubic feet) and exported 4Tcf. That represents $40 billion in export sales and exports are expected to double this year. A report in November of 2020 says natural gas exports to China will grow substantially and this helps China lower its CO2 emissions. One of the most efficient ways to fight climate change is to use more natural gas.

Border

Smuggles along the southern border are well organized and use color coded bracelets to help them. The “information on the bracelets represents a multitude of data that is used by smuggling organizations, such as payment status or affiliation with smuggling groups'. This is a billion dollar business and people often times do not get the promised protection and thus are robbed and raped. It is so prevalent that all girls over age 10 are tested for pregnancy when the arrive at the border. The recent changes by Biden were not well planned and the system is overwhelmed. They should have made changes gradually giving the border patrol time to adjust to the new rules.

Epstein

The words two tiered legal system come up in the news on a regular basis and many seem surprised. There are many examples of how money can buy not guilty or lesser sentences. One of the more famous cases was OJ Simpson. A more recent case in the news was Jeffrey Epstein who was convicted of sex crimes in 2007. He was sentenced to 18 months but spent that time in a country club style jail where he was allowed out 12 hours per day, six days a week. While he was accused of having many victims none showed up on his day of sentencing. An arrangement was made with the prosecutors not to inform the victims until after the trial was over. His crime was reduced to felony prostitution which allowed him to claim the girls were not victims but were in fact prostitutes. The most interesting part of the plea bargain was to immunize others. The United States also agrees that it will not institute any criminal charges against any potential co-conspirators of Epstein. This has and is protecting many people who were involved in Epsteins famous island. It is alleged that the FBI has a long list of people who went to the island and also video tapes of their activities. This case has been in limbo and will likely stay there. Is that two tiered justice?

Single mom

A single mom, with two children ages 3 and 5, working full time at Walmart and no overtime earns about $30,000. This time of year she looks to catch up on bills and this year there will be a bonus. She will receive $3,600 from the Earned Income Tax Credit, $7,200 from child tax credit, and $5,100 from Covid relief for a total of $15,900. She will owe $1,760 in federal tax and $2,295 in payroll tax so her net income will be $41,845. In order to just survive she must have grandma or some equivalent to care for her children. The bonus is the Covid even though she was not laid off and continued to work at her regular job.

Covid data

The experts feel they know what is best for Covid protection but that is not the case as witnessed by looking at data from California and Florida. Both states have similar death rates as a percent of population but Florida has been open while California has followed the CDC guidelines. These hidden differences must be uncovered to get a thorough understanding of the problem. In California 8.75% test positive and 1.55% of those die. In Florida 8.84% test positive and 1.62% of those die. This is close even though Florida has a higher percent of elderly. Simple things should be investigated. For example why do some poor African countries have such low death rates. Answer, they have a large young populations. Does life style have an effect. We know obesity does but what about other diet factors. What about professions and working conditions. Experts will have all summer to analyze the data and come up with helpful hints for next flu season.

Living wage

What is a living wage and who is rich are two questions that arise when discussing economics. I was a financial planner and found that it is not how much you earn but how you manage your affairs. Two examples that represent many situations I encountered. One young family where the man worked at a farm implement company where his job was changing tires on farm equipment. It was called busting tires. This is in the 1970's and he earned $4 an hour or $8,000 per year. He had two children with a stay at home mom, a small house with a mortgage, a small college funds and a lot of home cooked food. Another couple were both professors in the business school and earned $15,000 each and they were always broke. In the summer they would travel to places like Europe, they ate most of their meals out and they had a big house. As far as the question who is rich goes. A simple answer is anyone who makes twice what you make is rich. For a Walmart employee who earns $25,000 his friend who makes $50,000 is rich. For the engineer who makes $100,000 his friend who makes $200,000 is rich. Another factor that comes into play is comparing oneself with others. Back in the depression almost everyone you knew was poor so it wasn't as bad as today when some are super rich. Learning to manage money is difficult for most people.

What's right

After 9/11 I spent ten years in a Muslim chat room trying to understand the world from their viewpoint. One thing I learned early on is not to try and defend the many mistakes that the US had made over the years. I told them that our country had gone astray on a number of important issues going all the way back to the constitution which did not allow blacks and women to vote. I would counter that with the many things the US has done to help the people of the world. Because of the political differences today many face a similar situation and when any controversial issue arises they go to their respective corners and set up their defenses. They then find themselves in the awkward position of arguing for or against positions they are not comfortable with. People who want secure borders or energy independence are in a quandary. Those who want to enact voting rules that promote legal voting are questioning such rules. If you lean conservative or liberal you don't have to always agree with those positions. You are permitted to use your common sense and reach your own conclusions. Don't be bullied into one side or the other.

Insurance for all

Government insurance comes in four different categories, 44 million in Medicare, 75 million in Medicaid, 8 million in Obamacare and 9 million under the VA. The cost to the government is $14,600 per person for Medicare, $11,400 for Medicaid and $11,700 for Obamacare. In addition there are 30 million Americans who have no health insurance. Low income people use Obamacare because it offers subsidized premiums. A single man age 55 earning $20,000 pays $79 per month for the silver plan and has a $2,850 annual deductible. This means he must incur $3,700 of out of pocket expenses before his insurance kicks in. This is why many who are eligible for Obamacare don't sign up. They just wait until they get sick and sign up for Medicaid which has no waiting period and no preexisting conditions clause. That is likely what the 30 million uninsured are going to do. The entire insurance industry is in a tizzy because of Obamacare. It might be wise to find a way to incorporate Obamacare into another group and this is where the idea of Medicare for all comes into play. You then have 136 million Americans in one government plan and 200 million covered by private insurance. The final step will be move the private insurance into the government plan. It is surprising that someone like Senator Warren hasn't figured out a way to have private companies send the money they pay for healthcare to the government and let the government cover everyone with one national plan.

Amnesty

Back in 1986 Reagan agreed to amnesty for 3 million illegal aliens in return for a secure border. The illegals were legalized but the border was not secured. Ever since that time republicans have wanted a secure border before agreeing to amnesty. It's the old fool me once idea. It makes sense to secure the border first otherwise a new group of illegals will come in for more amnesty. Some believe that the democrats do not want to solve the immigration problem but would prefer to just allowing more and more illegals. The thinking is that one day these people will gain citizenship and they will become democratic voters. The plan is to turn Texas blue but that is not carved in stone. For example in 2016 Trump got 34% of the Hispanic vote in Texas and in 2020 this improved to 45%.

Covid relief

The 3rd Covid relief bill passed the senate. They wanted to get it done before unemployment benefits run out for many on March 14. Many others lost their unemployment on December 31st but they had to do without. Last summer many people lost their income but the congress couldn't agree on what to do but what they did today was almost the same bill that was proposed last summer. People had to go without help for 6 months while congress dawdled over minor changes. These congress people were getting paid all of this time. This is our government at work.

Covid stimulus

Recent polls say that Americans overwhelming approve of the Covid relief which includes, among other things, $1,400 to 300 million citizens as a cost of $424 billion dollars. For a retired couple this is a $2,800 handout and a married couple with two kids will get $5,600. It is not a surprise that this polls well. Over the years the country has spent $15 trillion on the war on poverty, one trillion on the war on drugs, $2.4 trillion on Afghanistan and $2 trillion for the Iraq war. There are other things in the bill that will directly help low income people. There is $300 federal unemployment going to those who qualify for state unemployment and this will cost $184 billion. Child tax credit is increased to $3,000 and $3,600 for children under age 6 at a cost of $143 billion. Other things that help the poor are, childcare, extra nutrition, sick leave, extra help for those on Obamacare for $125 billion. This is about one trillion and the remaining money goes to various pet projects that democrats have wanted for years.

Migrants

Here is what is called a typical story about refugees crossing Mexico. Chris Cruz age 22 left El Salvador and paid a smuggler $6,000 to guide him to the US. This brought him near Brownsville but it would cost another $6,500 to get him the next 500 miles to Houston. That is because this area is heavily guarded by the border patrol. The smugglers have set up an underground railroad similar to the way southern slaves made their way north. He watched other migrants who could not keep up be abandoned along the way. Cruz said they can build walls and send soldiers to the border but they won't keep us from the freedom we seek. Smuggling is a big business around the world. The money is the incentive but danger lurks. Each year refugees are injured and die along the way. The DHS gives a pregnancy test to every girl over ten. Along the way, many of these men, women and children suffer assaults, robbery and abduction by criminal gangs. There are also reports of extortion and ill-treatment by police and immigration officials. Tragically, some migrants are killed before they even get this far.

Domestic panels

Most experts agree that the US needs to upgrade the infrastructure and that is needed whether there are green jobs or not. Those who push for green jobs include infrastructure in their predictions as to how many new jobs will be created by going green. In fact there are 250,000 jobs in the solar industry and 50,000 jobs in wind. 15 million solar panels were made in the USA last year and that works out to 6 panels per person per year. These people must have other responsibilities besides making panels. The US installed 40 million panels in 2020 so 62% were imported. Imports are expected to decline since Trump placed a 30% import tax on panels. Environmental groups predict that going green will create 9 million jobs each year over the next ten years. Some feel that number is too high but the point is that a story line is being created to suggest that these jobs are going to be in building wind mills and solar panels. This reinforces the belief that many have that wind and solar can replace fossil fuels and no one is challenging that belief. As things stand now even if the US starts to make more panels they will still be relying on China for the rare earth metals. China controls 93% of the world market in rare earths and will likely raise the price as the US taxes their panels. The US must start mining rare earths if they expect to make panels. If scientist point this out the environmentalist will object. The mining can be done cleanly but it will cost. The price will make US panels even less competitive but it will provide good American jobs. The trade off for more panels made cleanly is higher price per panel.

Election results

Trump increased his share of votes in the 2020 election vs the 2016. His vote totals increased by 3% with white women, 6% with black men, 5% black women, 4% Hispanic men, 5% Hispanic women and 7% among Asian Americans. His vote from white males decreased by one percent. In 2016 Trump receive 63 million votes and in 2020 he got 74 million. In the down ballot the republicans picked up 12 seats in congress but lost two senate seats. They picked up two state congresses now holding 61 of the states. Republicans gained one governorship and now hold 27 states. These gains in the state are of particular importance because of redistricting that occurs during census years and is determined by the state legislators. It is this broad base support that caused some to question the validity of the election.

Mask and such

A commentator on the news said of the Governor of Texas, "when the governor said you don't have to wear a mask, he is shifting responsibility to the individual". There is much to be gleaned from that statement. The implication is that there is something wrong about an individual deciding for himself how he should deal with the mask. The speaker infers that the governor is more capable of determining how the citizen should behave than the citizen himself. This same argument has been made regarding wearing helmets, diet and overweight, smoking and many other risky behaviors that people seem to delight in. These things effect not only the person but others who are not involved. It is well known that life styles represent the biggest health risk and the cost associated with these risk are shared by others who may be following a healthy life style. In a free country the citizens must decide how much individual control they want to give over to the government and there will be many opinions. The solution is to have open discussions that reach conclusions that most can be comfortable with but once again politics gets in the way and people close their minds and choose sides.

Jan 6 riots

The investigation of what happened in Washington DC on January, 6 is still ongoing but a number of facts have been presented which together paint a different picture of what the original reports portrayed. First off the remark that Trump made that caused people to riot was,"We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore," This was on the news daily and the concern was the use of the word,"fight". In the same speech Trump said, I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard. This line is rarely quoted. An estimated 40,000 people attended the rally which was expected to be much like the other 320 rallies so there was no need to have special police. It appears that some 800 invaded the capitol and so far 300 have been arrested and charged. Five people died, three of whom were Trump supporters, one police officer and one woman who was unarmed and shot by a police officer. Early reports said that weapons were found and here is the latest list. Some of the weapons that were confiscated had been seen being used inside the US Capitol including a baseball bat, a fire extinguisher, a wooden club, a spear, crutches, a flagpole, bear spray, mace, chemical irritants, stolen police shields, a wooden beam, a hockey stick, a stun gun, and knives. Jill Sanborn, assistant director of the FBI’s counterterrorism division, told a Senate committee that the FBI did not recover any guns at the Jan. 6 Capitol riot As the investigation continues it will evolve as is often the case. There is much to be learned as more information is uncovered. Stay tuned.

More on unions

What is wrong with public unions. Before I get into the details, understand that in the US the district attorneys are elected and in most big cities the election is determined by how the police union votes. In other words the DA owes his position to the police. Many agree that this puts the DA between a rock and a hard place when the accused is a police officer. Lets look at the situation with the St Paul school district. Four candidates closely aligned with the district’s teachers union won a majority of seats on the St. Paul school board Tuesday in a rout that cranks up the heat on Superintendent Valeria Silva in the state’s second-largest school system. The same thing happens in the MPLS school district. First off the election is held in August when the turnout is very low. Teachers select candidates that are favorable to their views and then they campaign for them. These candidates usually win and then they negotiate with the teachers representatives for contracts. The board members are using tax payer money and it is usually easier to spend someone else money. Over the years money has been short so negotiators offer legacy benefits (retirement stuff like pensions and health insurance).The result is that career teachers retire at age 62 with more net income than while they were working. In recent negotiations this strategy has changed and teachers are asking for more money up front. That only makes sense since the need for money is greater when you have a mortgage, kids to feed and college ahead. Here is a quote from FDR. “It is impossible to bargain collectively with the government.” When government unions strike, they strike against taxpayers. F.D.R. considered this “unthinkable and intolerable

Unions

I have often expressed my view that I am for private company unions and against public unions. I worked in industry in 8 different production plants, four were union and four not. As a plant manager I realized that the best way to get along with union members was to be more concerned about results than credit. My role was to aid the plant supervisors in conjunction with the union stewards by providing them with the time, tools and training needed to run the plant. Whenever I contacted the home office, I would propose some additional changes that would help the employees. Minor things like rule changes or major things like an additional holiday or other benefits. When ever a change was approved, I would make sure that the production employees knew that their union representatives were given most of the credit. The employees wanted to see the results of their union dues. In turn for this the stewards would help to run the plant in an efficient, safe manner. It was following a simple life lesson that most learn as children. When you treat people with dignity and respect they respond in a favorable way. This way of looking at things was made clear in the 70's when American businessmen went to Japan to see how they were making quality cars while in the US a lot of junk cars were coming off the end of the line. These supposedly smart people came home with a single message. They discovered that if people are treated respectfully they do not want a union but if they are not treated that way they deserve a union. Unions did a lot for this country in the late 1800's and early 1900's and 100 years later it is their time once again.

Poverty

There is a large group of Americans composed a different races that have one thing in common. They are White, they are Black, they are Hispanic, they are Asian, they are Native American and they are all poor. They number 45 million and they live in poverty. These are individuals who earn less than $13,000 and families of four that earn less than $26,000. This includes 31.7 million Whites and 14.5 million non Whites. One of the best ways to attack this problem is to help these poor people help themselves and one way to do that is to promote unions. Politicians are not generally interested in people helping themselves so they propose things like a wealth tax so they can then dole that money out to the poor. This keeps these people dependent on government. If they help themselves they become independent of government. Currently Amazon employees in Alabama are trying to unionize and they are opposed by Jeff Bezos. He would rather pay a wealth tax than pay union wages so big business forms a partnership with government to keep the poor people dependent on government and in their place. Bringing back manufacturing jobs to America would help these poor people help themselves but once again big business works with big government to keep sending these jobs overseas.

NY state

Recent reports illustrate the difference between states on how much they need help from the Covid relief. New York is a good example of how not to manage. New York State legislature is under control of democrats and has been since 1976. Currently there are 101 democrat house members and 49 republicans. In the senate there are 43 democrats and 20 republicans. NY population has been on the decline losing 1.5 million people over the last few years. The 2020 census indicated a loss of two congressional seats and the state lost 2 seats in the 2010 census. NY had 39 seats in 1970 and is now down to 27. New York Is the most tax burdened State In the nation. The state is currently $135 billion in debt. This year New York faces a $59 billion revenue shortfall. Gov. Cuomo says services will be cut and taxes will increase if congress doesn't pass another relief package. While the state is in trouble, it was that way long before Covid.

Virus

Today Biden says every American will have a vaccine by May. This is from the Washington Post from Sept of last year. Enough Vaccine For All Americans By April? Trump Says Yes, Experts Say Probably Not This is from August 27 of last year. Trump pledges a Covid-19 vaccine by end of 2020 — without acknowledging the scientific uncertainty. Contradicting The CDC, Trump Says COVID-19 Vaccine Could Be Ready By End Of Year Sept 2020 Under most presidents Biden would not be predicting when all would be vaccinated because there would be no vaccine.

Universal income

When Andrew Yang ran for president he proposed what he called universal basic income suggesting that each American adult receive a $1,000 per month. While that was too much for most people to consider a recent proposal by some democrats moves in that direction. 10 democratic senators sent a letter to Biden suggesting that part of the Covid relief fund be used to send monthly checks of $1,000 to low income people. This will continue as long as the pandemic last. Keep in mind that after people receive a benefit for a certain period of time it becomes difficult to stop that benefit. Maybe this is the first step to Yang's universal income.

Pensions

Back in the post war years pension benefits were often risky and all too often not there as promised. In 1978 ERISA (employee retirement income security act) was enacted to protect private pensions from default. It did not include public pensions. Pension plans were evaluated yearly to make sure they were properly funded, meaning that they had the ability to pay the promised benefits. Public pensions like government employees and teachers did not have to follow these rules and they did not. The result is many public pensions cannot meet their commitments. This is called being underfunded. There is a fundamental flaw with public pensions. Take any government entity say county employees. People elect the county commissioners and then the county employees negotiate with these elected officials. County employees are active in these elections and normally elect people who are sympathetic to their cause. The result is benefits are provided without proper consideration to funding. A commissioner thinks I can offer these benefits because 30 years from now when payment comes due, I will be long retired. This sort of thing happens across the country and the time has come to pay up and the money isn't there.

US immigrants

The US brings in on average 1 million immigrants per year and Canada with a population of one ninth of the US brings in 400,000. Most immigrants to Canada come from India and China because the emphasis is on education. Only 15% represent refugees. This is the kind of plan that Trump wanted to pursue. It is called merit based immigration. The US desperately needs STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) people and Asians fill this need. Most US immigrants are refugees and family members of refugees.

State debt

Commentators often point out that the big cities run by democrats are in dire straights. Crime invested neighborhoods, high unemployment rates, poverty, poor schools and broken down and dilapidated houses and infrastructure. What they don't say is the debt the whole state incurs because of public employee benefits. Pensions are underfunded and promised retirement health care benefits have put these states in deep debt. Illinois, with Chicago leading the way, is one of the worst examples. 29% of the states annual budget goes toward pensions. This fund is $229 billion in the hole. That is $19,000 for every man, woman and child in the state. The state owes another $56 billion in retirement health care benefits. This is to cover some of the cost for early retirees before Medicare. Money from the Covid relief bill will be used to cover some of this debt. States that have been more fiscally responsible will not benefit as much. States like North Dakota with $32.3 billion in assets and $7.8 billion in liabilities.

Cuomo

Governor Cuomo should take a lesson from former MSNBC host Chris Mathews. Accusations of sexual misconduct were rumored and Chris resigned unexpectedly while on the air. Near the end of his program he suddenly said this is my last night and went to commercial and upon return another person sat in his seat. He was gone. This avoided the long painful dragged out slow drip of other instances coming forth. It saved his family from nightly embarrassments. Besides the women he was also under some pressure because when Trump announced America First at his inaugural address. Mathews called it Hitlerian. Wonder what he would have said about Biden's America First plan. Mathews is 75 and in his day many men made inappropriate comments to women. If the truth be known many other prominent names could be revealed. Much of this is still going on as many young women in the work place can attest to. Men who were fortunate enough to grow up in a household where their father respected their mother are less likely to behave in this crude manner.

KSA

On 2 October 2018, Jamal Khashoggi, a US-based journalist and critic of Saudi Arabia's government, walked into the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where he was murdered. While campaigning Biden promised to punish Saudi Prince bin Salman but has now changed his mind. The Saudi's buy large quantities of military equipment from the US and that is seen as a good deal. If they did not buy from the US they would buy from the Soviets. While the profits from such sales helps the US economy there is another advantage. Using such high tech equipment requires a secure supply chain for replacement parts and this gives the US some control over how these weapons are used.

Spitzer

Elliot Spitzer was governor of New York and took office Jan of 07 and resigned in March of 08. He was caught using campaign funds to pay for prostitutes that cost $4,000 per night. The report says he spent $80,000 so he must have been busy. He was not criminally charged. He then got a full time job with CNN but that lasted a couple of years and the show was canceled because of poor ratings. Some people say this is another example of the two tiered justice system.

Charter schools

There was a minie scandal in the news today regarding a California teachers union head sending his kid to private school. Nation wide 11% of students go to private schools but the stats are quite different for public school teachers. Across the nation 20% of teachers kids go to private schools but the percent is much higher in big cities. For example is 44% in Philadelphia, 41% in Cincinnati, 39% in Chicago and 34 % in San Francisco. 40% of congressmen send their kids to private schools. Knowing the conditions in most big city schools this is understandable but what is not is the fact that the teachers unions opposed charter schools. These schools give people the option to schools of their choice. In St Paul one of the problems with school choice is transportation but a number of St Paul families have car pooled to schools in the suburbs.

Fracking

Whenever the issue of fracking comes up environmental groups protest. Here is a wake up call. Mining and processing of lithium turns out to be far more environmentally harmful than fracking. Add to that the environmental impact of recycling lithium batteries and you have a double whammy. The way these two issues are dealt with is further proof that politics plays a big part. Scientist must speak up.

Lithium

An early warning signal threatens electric cars. Last week a weed known as Tiehm's buckwheat was dug up and destroyed. It grows wild in Nevada and an Australian company wanted to start mining lithium in that area. The clash of environmental priorities underpinning the battle over this week, conservation vs green energy, is a microcosm of a much larger political dispute. Mining lithium is bad for the environment but nothing like mining rare earths. Those who are pushing for wind and solar have to face up to the mining problems and make some tough decisions. Some wonder if politicians promoting the new green deal have any knowledge about the mining of these metals. Do they understand that wind and solar need backup. Scientist should be in the news explaining the problems so the average citizen can get a better understanding of what the future holds.

Amazon

Amazon now has more than 800,000 employees in the US and about half are blue collar. The average blue collar worker earns $15 per hour. If they raised that to $25 it would cost the company $8 billion. Last year Amazon had a profit of $25 billion. 6,000 workers at an Alabama warehouse are voting to join the union. If they succeed it will spread to other warehouses as Alabama is not a pro union area. In addition the union's success will spread to other companies like Walmart. This will mean only slightly higher prices for consumers but give these workers a chance at a decent life.

Biden immigration plan

As the US prepares for a new influx of immigrants across the southern border the concern about Covid rises but there are other concerns. Child trafficking and fentanyl are at the top of the list. Children are enticed by promises to the US and later used for other purposes. Fentanyl is manufactured in China and sent to the US by mail and by way of the Mexican cartels. Biden reportedly met with Mexican President Lopez to work out an arrangement to send 800,000 Mexican workers to the US each year. This will be in addition to the 800,000 expected illegal immigrants.

Immigrantion

Prior to 1960 most immigrants to the US came from Europe. The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 change all of that. Over the next 50 years 60 million immigrants arrived and the composition changed. Hispanics grew from 4% to 18% of the population and Asians grew from 1% to 6%. During this time about 12 million came across the border illegally. Between 1965 and 2015, new immigrants, their children and their grandchildren accounted for 55% of U.S. population growth. Over these years the government repeatedly proposed changes to the immigration rules but there still remains a problem. The problem is exacerbated by politics. Trump reversed some of what Obama did and now Biden is changing the Trump policies. For years republicans have said they would offer a path to citizenship but only after the border was secured. The democrats say they will secure the border after the path to citizenship is created. Both parties gain from illegals. Businesses get a fresh supply of cheap labor and many will become voters in the future. Neither of these help the average working American who seems to be lost in the shuffle. 800,000 crossed in 2019 and that figure declined to 400,000 in 2020. The drop occurred because people were forced to remain in Mexico awaiting their day in court and the Mexican government began to stop immigrants at their southern border. The caravans from Central America stopped. The Biden proposals have reignited the reasons for crossing and the results show new problems at the border. Illegal crossings averaged 40,000 per month during 2020 before the election but increased after that to 78,000 in January 2021. February totals are high but include 9,000 unaccompanied minors which pose an added burden to the border agents.