What is threatening the Spanish pension system, Francisco Martín Seco says, is not a longer life expectancy or the population pyramid but policies that drive the entire economy into a permanent recession, like reforms to make the tax system more regressive.
Don’t kill the Spanish pension system: it’s one of the cheapest!
Weekend link fest
A curated selection of links we hope can enlighten us all; some come from our corner, some do from other corners of the net. And as always, our comment widgets are anxious to get your suggestions. How a company becomes a listed company like, let’s say, Facebook Can London pay for the Olympic Games? We give [...]
California Gov turns to European austerity
NEW YORK | ”Cutting alone really doesn’t do it, and that’s why I’m linking the serious budget reductions — real increase to austerity — with a plea to the voters: please increase taxes temporarily on the most affluent and everyone else with a quarter of a cent sales tax,” California governor Jerry Brown said in releasing [...]
Habemus UK 2012 Budget: happy banks, hurt pensioners, cautious markets
LONDON | Budget Battle began Wednesday after midday in the House of Commons at the rhythm of Hollywood action blockbuster-like slogans, with which chancellor George Osborne wrapped his delivery speech. The Coalition government aimed at convincing Britons in and out the Parliament that it will be able to reduce the deficit while supporting growth. “Britain is [...]
Federal government benefits for 46 million Americans
NEW YORK | One in seven Americans gets help from the federal government to feed themselves and their families. That is 46 million people, many of whom didn’t need help before the crisis. The current situation now leaves them no choice: their business collapsed, they were part of a company that filed for bankruptcy, they lost [...]
What Obama didn’t say in his State of the Union speech
NEW YORK | In his fourth speech in front of the nation, president Barack Obama addressed the financial crisis and pledged to fight for economic fairness. In the middle of the race to the November election, the president couldn’t find a better moment to speak about inequality. Earlier on Tuesday, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney [...]
Weekend link fest
A curated selection of links we hope can enlighten us all; some come from our corner, some do from other corners of the net. And as always, our comment widgets are anxious to get your suggestions: How Greenpeace tricked big oil firm representatives into a meeting OPEC summit and worries about oversupply The last major US [...]
The US new battle arena: tax policy
NEW YORK | Every Republican candidate is trying to get as much political momentum as possible these days. And the tax code renewal is particularly inspiring the frontrunners. Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 tax proposal (9 percent federal sales tax, a 9 percent income tax and a 9 percent levy on businesses) has been a big point [...]
The war on taxes
“I don’t mean to get all class-warfare on you… But unless we find a way to spread the burden upward and cut the middle class some slack, it isn’t Greece we will soon be resembling”, writes Ellis Henican for Fox News, “it’s those old Caribbean islands Jimmy likes to sing about. Where a few super-rich families own just about everything. Where the vast majority of others have hardly anything at all.”
Buffett, the socialist
You’ve certainly read by now Warren Buffet’s op-ed column in The New York Times “Stopping to coddle the super-rich”. Mr Buffett talked about raising the tax rate to the “rich” and “super-rich” in an effort to reduce the huge deficit in the US. While in Europe some members of the wealthy elite –like Maurice Lévy, [...]
