LeBron to the Income Tax Free State of Florida and Other Friday Thoughts
LeBron James turned down the Los Angeles Clippers and a few other teams and joined high priced free agents Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh to play basketball in Miami. It’s reported all may have to cut back their salaries a bit so all three players can join up with the Miami Heat under the salary cap.
But they will probably make it up by not paying income taxes. LeBron could save perhaps $10-11 million by practicing his basketball skills in Miami instead of Los Angeles.
I don’t have the exact figures but check out this article, which suggests that James would keep over $12 million in his pocket under a $96 million deal by playing for Miami instead of the New York Knicks, where the state and city income tax is soon to hit 12.85%.
The Future of Digital Democracy; Lessons from the Swiss
Last month, I had the privilege of traveling through Switzerland on a tour sponsored by the Initiative and Referendum Institute of Europe (IRI Europe). The six-day tour led us through five cities and connected us with dozens of experts covering a wide range of topics on direct democracy (more info here from our friends at Ballotpedia.org).
As a technologist, what perhaps captured my attention most was a cutting edge system of Internet voting that is being rolled out in a multi-year process across Switzerland, starting with trials in three cantons (or Swiss "states"): Geneva, Neuenburg and Zurich.
A Lesson for School Board
The
graduation rate for students in the Los Angeles Unified School District
is down to less than 41 percent, it was reported recently. That’s the
second worst in the country.
Now if you were on the LAUSD board,
you’d probably figure there was hard work to do. You might even be
humbled by a number like that.
Silly you.
Paul Koretz’s Beauty Pageant Monologue
While many of Los Angeles’s city officials are seemingly ignoring our
fiscal decline into Chapter 11, one Valley city councilmember thinks
he has the answer, "people power!"
In his monthly column published in the June edition of the Sherman
Oaks News, Councilman Paul Koretz writes, "Even though Los Angeles
faces many tough challenges, I have great hope for the future of our
city. The reason is simple – I’ll call it people power!"
He continues: "Every day, people in action make a difference for the
sake of their community. To me, this is absolutely inspiring."