Coming to your TV Screen in 2009 and Beyond
If you think this year has been one of great turmoil and uncertainty, just wait until next year.
With tongue firmly planted in cheek, the following is a preview about what might happen in 2009 and beyond in the aftermath of the Great Financial Debacle of 2008. The public will demand someone be held accountable and it will be ugly even by Washington standards. The media guillotine will have a sharp edge and be very busy.
My scenario assumes an Obama Administration. My apologies to Republicans but I think they will like the ending.
So take a trip in my handy time machine as we fast forward to the spring of 2009…
Congress throws a Hail Mary, but will it work?
It’s fourth and long and the wind is blowing and the snow is snowing.
The offensive line is all gone now; all the regulars will never play again. It’s dark and cold and everybody holds his or her breath as the quarterback drops back.
And, just when three huge shapes, Depression, Recession, and Omigod-is-this-Really Happening, converge from out of the fog, and seem to pound the quarterback into the snowy, bare, winter field like so many giant hammers, the football actually emerges and flies up, up and away . . . toward the goal line and through the mist and snowflakes . . .
Will Congress’ passage of the Rescue or BailOut or ‘Wall Street Meets Main Street –We are all in this Together Bill,’ really save the day? Or, are we in for a doozey of a long 21st Century Depression, which we will all tell our grandchildren about like we Baby Boomers grew up hearing about in our childhoods? Recall, that it took until 1954 for the Stock Market to return to its 1929 heights!
A Lesson both Modern and Ancient for the Tax Commission
Now that the legislative session is over and Speaker Karen Bass is contemplating her commission on taxation, I want to recommend a piece in the September 25th Sacramento Bee by Jason Clemens of the Pacific Research Institute.
Clemens, a Canadian, tells the tale of how Canada’s left leaning political party pursued a course of reducing spending and at the same time cutting taxes which produced more revenue and dramatically reduced Canada’s budget deficit. What makes this story intriguing is that Canada’s population size is roughly equivalent to California’s and the size of the budget deficit when the new economic policies were implemented was larger than California’s deficit.
This lesson of cutting taxes to bring in more revenue is nearly as old as history itself.
The Hidden Tax from Abusive Lawsuits
The troubling state of our economy is, appropriately, being discussed all around us.
While Americans are making less, losing their jobs and fighting to keep their head above water, there is yet another clandestine way we are being robbed of our hard-earned money. In times of economic uncertainty, we need to be more aware than ever of where our every dollar is going.
Lawsuit Abuse Awareness Week, (October 6 to 10) is the ideal time to illustrate one tax most people are unaware they even pay – the lawsuit tax. In its 2007 annual report on U.S. tort cost trends, Tillinghast Towers Perrin found that our country paid $247 billion in tort costs. That comes out to $825 for every man, woman and child, or $3,300 for a family of four.
This “tax” is excised in numerous ways, such as higher prices for goods and services, higher insurance premiums, and higher medical and pharmaceutical bills.
As hard as this cost hits citizens, it impacts company’s even harder, particularly small businesses. A recent survey by California Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse (CALA) and members of the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) found that lawsuits have a significant impact on the small business community.