When Will 'Muricans Grasp The Next Stock Crash Is Around The Corner?

Examining the prime financial news of the last three weeks it's clear we're headed for another crash. The only question is 'when?' When it comes to irrational exuberance, it’s never if there will be a bust but when. Examples:

Automated Trades Seen Worsening Swings (Sept. 5)

"The growing influence on markets of algorithmic traders and trend-following funds - which use automatic directives - potentially makes markets more vulnerable to sharp swings if everyone starts to sell at once."

Is Indonesia the Next Emerging-Market Domino to Fall? - WSJ   (Sept. 11)

"Investors who gorged themselves on Turkish delight and Argentine beef have had a rude awakening in 2018—the two countries are at the heart of a broadening crisis that has sent emerging-market currencies tumbling.

In Asia, one name keeps coming up: Indonesia, which also has a growing trade deficit—and lots of foreign debt."

The Bear Mauls Another Market -- WSJ - Morningstar (Sept. 12)

"Hong Kong's stocks fell into a bear market Tuesday, another casualty of an international selloff driven by trade tensions, a stronger dollar and worries about the resilience of developing economies.It is the latest sign that stocks around the world are feeling the pressure of the trade fight, exposing the global market's fragility to the sparring between the U.S. and major trading partners in Europe and Asia."

And perhaps most worrisome:

Retiring Soon? Plan for Market Downturns - WSJ

Wherein we read:

"For each year in which a bull market persists, workers become likelier to retire. But those who leave the workforce now—the ninth year of the longest U.S. bull market—are potentially setting themselves up for a tough stretch that could test their portfolio’s long-term resilience.

Why? When the stock market becomes historically expensive, as some metrics suggest it is today, research shows it’s often a harbinger of below-average future returns."

All of these (and more) are screaming alarm - but who's paying attention? Anyone? Perhaps not because too ,many are drowning in irrational exuberance. Trump, always exuberant when talking about himself and his putative accomplishments, loves to boast about how well the American economy is chugging along. The stock market reached its all-time high at the end of August. In its second quarter this year, U.S. economic growth was 4.1 percent. Unemployment remains below 4 percent, and inflation remains moderate. Even wages are going up.

Irrationality enters the picture because there’s little if any connection between Dotard's spurious  policies and the outcomes he lauds (since these trends began before he took office). Also, the prosperity that has resulted from this economic expansion has largely been enjoyed by the wealthier sectors of society. Finally, Trump’s economic fever dream is fueled by an enormous and growing amount of debt.

This is an issue I've warned about in many previous posts. For example, citing a Financial Times report  dated April 17, ('IMF Sounds Alarm On Excessive Global Borrowing') :

"The world's $164 trillion debt pile is bigger than at the height of the financial crisis a decade ago, the IMF has warned, sounding the alarm on excessive global borrowing.  The fund said the private and public sectors urgently need to cut debt levels to improve the resilience of the global economy, and provide greater firefighting ability it things go wrong.

Fiscal stimulus to support demand  is no longer the priority the IMF said Wednesday in a report published at its spring meetings in Washington. "

To fix ideas, let's note here that "support demand" refers to support of  "aggregate demand", i.e. getting citizens to spend more - which was the basis for the Trump-GOP tax cuts. This was an incredibly bad play given how much they will add to the debt, and deficits going forward, and how little they will contribute in terms of a job picture already near full employment. 

The IMF warning goes on noting what is most worrisome:

"World borrowing is more than twice the size of the value of goods and services produced and 225% of global gross domestic product. This is 12 percentage points higher than the peak of the previous financial crisis in 2009."

And the U.S. is singled out as a debt offender, e.g.

"Vitor Gaspar, the director of fiscal affairs at the  IMF, singled out the U.S. for criticism, saying that it was the only advanced country that was not planning to reduce its debt pile - with the recent tax cuts keeping public borrowing high."

In the above context, although Trump promised to balance the books if he became president, he’s done the opposite. The deficit for this year will rise to $890 billion (it was about $660 billion when Obama left office). The shortfall in government expenditures will rise above $1 trillion next year. Deficit spending makes sense during a recession. But what Trump is doing now is essentially allowing the rich to siphon the cream off the top, providing the middle class with some skim milk, and leaving the sour dregs for everyone else. 

And to the point of Vitor Gaspar,  government revenues are actually falling, which is what small-government advocates are secretly cheering: less money, less government.  But they are perversely courting disaster.   Further, it’s not just the government that’s in hock. Total household debt reached a new high in August: $13.3 trillion. That includes a record amount of student debt ($1.5 trillion), an ever-growing amount of mortgage debt ($9 trillion, which is perilously close to the $10.5 trillion it reached during the mortgage crisis in 2008), and an overall credit card debt that just surpassed $1 trillion for the first time.

Then there’s corporate debt which is now set to be on rocket power given the corporate tax cuts.  Companies have taken advantage of low interest rates to borrow like crazy. This summer, corporate debt hit a new high of $6.3 trillion. Worse, the cash-to-debt ratio, which was 14 percent in 2008, has dropped to 12 percent: that’s $1 in cash for every $8 of debt.

Economists are quick to reassure the public that all of this debt is not catastrophic. After all, the economy is humming along. America doesn’t look like Greece. But in fact debt is like a hidden hive of termites eating away at the foundation of your house. You don’t see anything wrong except a bit of sawdust and the faint sounds of consumption. And then one day, you’re sitting at your kitchen table and, boom! You’re sprawled out in your basement with the wreckage of your house around you.

Currently,  as I noted in my previous post on the Reep tax cuts,  the U.S. government owes $21 trillion, which is slightly more than the household and corporate debt combined. The owners of U.S. debt include federal agencies like Social Security (which currently runs a surplus that it uses to buy Treasury bonds), the Federal Reserve (which bought a lot of debt during the financial crisis to lower interest rates), mutual funds, and banks.

 

Foreign countries also hold about a third of the debt. China and Japan own a little more than a trillion dollars each, followed by Brazil, Ireland, the UK, and Switzerland.In ordinary times, foreign ownership of U.S debt is uncontroversial. Countries with revenue surpluses need a safe place to park their money. And the United States has never defaulted on its sovereign debt, unlike Greece or Argentina.

But these are not ordinary times. With the sharp downturn in U.S.-Russian relations, Moscow decided this spring to unload 84 percent of its holdings of Treasury bonds. That amounts to about $87 billion, a considerable sum.  In addition,  Japan got rid of $18.4 billion in Treasury bonds in the spring. In the first half of 2018, Turkey unloaded 42 percent of its holdings in U.S. debt. Both countries currently have trade disputes with Washington.

The big player, however, is China, and right now the Trump administration is escalating its trade war with China. Trump just announced tariffs on another $200 billion in Chinese imports after targeting $50 billion of goods in the first round. China retaliating with more tariffs of its own is one thing but another possibility  is  devaluing its currency. An even more potentially devastating action would be to follow Russia’s example and sell its stake in Treasury bonds.

Each of these bond selloffs is akin to a gambler cashing in his chips. If the house lacks the money to pay the guy, then all hell will break loose- and that casino - like a Trump casino - wil be a loser and not last long.  In the U.S. case, each selloff of Treasury bonds creates even more instability in the markets and all that is then needed is a trigger to incite a shitstorm and crash, such as the Utility Forecaster predicted at the beginning of the year.

An even more somber warning: Americans (1 in 3 homeowners who earn less than $30,000/yr.) are now using home equity loans to cover their day to day expenses.  ('Americans leveraging their homes to pay bills', Denver Post, Business, p. 5K, Sept. 23)

My hypothesis is the trigger will likely arrive via algorithmic trades (see topmost header), and a massive lockstep selloff - leading to a crash of 50 to 60 percent.   In other words, a lockstep in asset prices - subject to algorithmic trading-  could lead to a "multiplier" sell-off effect that would overshadow a normal correction, So if 10 percent is a normal correction and the DOW was initially at 25,000 or so, that would mean a loss (total) of 2500 points.  If this is a multiplier effect at work, we could instead be looking at a  50 percent correction, or a 12, 500 point drop    If you have $100,000 parked in your company's 401(k) you might be lucky to see $50,000 in it at the end of the trading day.

Then there is the not wholly unrelated surmise of economist Martin  Feldstein (WSJ,  Save Interest For Rainy Day', July 27th)  who wrote:

 

"The downturn is almost certainly on its way. The likeliest cause would be a collapse in the high asset prices that have been created in the exceptionally relaxed monetary policy of  the last decade. It's too late to avoid an asset bubble. Equity prices have already risen far above their historical trend.  The price -earnings ratio of the S&P 500 is now more than 50 percent higher than the all time average, sitting at a level reached only three times in the past century.

The inevitable return of these asset prices to their historical norms is likely to cause a sharp decline in household wealth and in the rate of investment in commercial real estate. If the P/E ratio returns to its historical average, the fall in share prices will amount to a $9 trillion loss across all U.S. households."

 

Feldstein basically is predicting a   $10 trillion drop in U.S. household assets, warning:. “When the next recession comes, it is going to be deeper and last longer than in the past,”

Again, is anyone paying attention? I somehow doubt it. Too many are enamored of and trapped in Dotard's  asset bubble of irrational  exuberance.

Yes, The GOP And Trump Want To Give Even Bigger Tax Cuts To The Already Rich

It seems clear with every move they make the GOOPs are determined to toss this country into history's dumpster, certainly financially - as well as in their protection of Traitor Trump. But it is the first that concerns us here.  Namely the news,
House Republicans Move to Extend Individuals' Tax Cuts - WSJ

The feckless GOP plans are now to extend the existing Trump tax cuts, despite massively growing  deficits .  Clearly these poltroons believe that at least making a show for an extension will win them the hearts and minds of their GOP base- who will then turn out in greater numbers for the midterms. But I have news for them: that base doesn't care one way or other, they are already complacent with the crumbs they've received and will not turn out like the Dems.

Meanwhile we learn (ibid.):

"On top of last year's $1.5 trillion tax cut, the new proposal would reduce federal revenue by $613 billion over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation. Most of that cost is packed into the end of the  next decade and the cost beyond that would be much higher."

And bear in mind, that means your kids and grand kids will be paying the freight - mainly to support the lifestyles of the rich, the famous and the corporate - since they will reap the greatest rewards by the extension as they have the 2017 cuts. (Politifact has found that median income families received only about 6.6 percent of the $1.5 trillion tax cut, while 93.4% went to the corporations and top earners.)

In the words of Lloyd Bloggett, a Texas Dem quoted in the above piece:

"We have something that is truly disastrous headed our way and it's not just a hurricane."

What is it?  How bad? In a separate piece in the same issue ('Deficit Widens On More Spending'), we learn:

"The U.S.  federal deficit nearly doubled in August from a year ago, as government spending swelled and revenues decline".

And again, let us make note here the GOP's planned tax cut extension will starve revenues even more.

We also learn:

"The government ran a $214 billion deficit last month, compared with a $107.7 billion budget gap in August, 2017... the Treasury Department said Thursday."

So, even as the great jobs and growth narrative is spreading, we are being undermined by massive deficits, debt.    The biggest revenue -starving culprit?  The ill-advised cut in corporate income taxes.


As we further note (ibid.):

"Corporate income taxes in particular have dropped off. The Treasury said Thursday
gross corporate taxes have fallen 20 percent so far this fiscal year, while indiviudal
tax receipts are up 1 percent"

The loss in corporate tax revenue might  - in a stretch - be worth it - if the bastards paid decent wages to their workers, but as per my previous post, we know this isn't the case.  Worse, because the Congressional Budget Office now projects a total deficit of $793 billion for fiscal year 2018.

The "big picture" of U.S. debt isn't any better, as the CBO notes. As per a WSJ op-ed reveal (Sept. 15-16, p. A15):

"The U.S. owes $21.5 trillion of Treasury debt, the majority of which is scheduled to be refinanced in the next eight years. - disregarding the additional $1 trillion required by the 2017 tax reform and an estimated $100 trillion of unfunded entitlement spending ahead."

Incredibly, three days ago there we beheld one of the biggest tax cuts propagandists (Stephen Moore,  'The Corporate Tax Cut Is Paying For Itself', WSJ, p. A13) scribbling:

"Thanks to the magic of compounding the corporate tax cuts will yield more than $6 trillion in additional GDP over the next decade..."

But seems unable to reckon in that additional GDP growth doesn't translate to revenue growth, i. e. to pare back growing deficits as the CBO forecasts, though he does add:

"Perversely, because the economy is bigger now than expected, the CBO has revised upward  its estimated cost of the tax cut..."

Well, duh, of course they've revised it upward given - as pointed out above - corporate tax revenue has fallen off 20 percent this year, and will continue to fall off each year it's in effect.  In other words, never mind the GDP growth, it will not overtake the loss in revenue growth (including from individual income tax cuts).  But this is the sort of fantasy land we now inhabit where 'up' is down, and 'down is 'up'. Blame a lot of it on the lying landscape imparted by Trump and his pack of maggots,

Folks, let's not  accept bullshit or pretend: we are not swimming in a literal sea of red ink. In this environment the proposal of an extension of tax cuts borders on the derelict and criminal, and those pushing it need to have both their sanity and patriotism questioned.

See also:

Another Tax Scam for the Rich

Why You Won't Be Getting A Pay Raise Anytime Soon

As I noted in an earlier (June 19) post, quoting managing director of Aspen Advisors, Andrew Gadomski (from a WSJ piece), when companies lament they can't find workers to fill key openings, that is code for: "I can find talent, I just don't want to pay them as much as they cost."

Now from a Denver Post Business column  (Jan. 7 p. 3K, 'Don't Get Your Hopes Up For A Raise') we learn the raise situation is even more dire. We learn, first and foremost, companies would much rather give one off "bonuses" and leave out any permanent pay raises.  As the piece noted:

"Those one time bumps, whatever really precipitated them, don't mean higher wages are around the corner. ...And for now employers are in no hurry to raise them."

Why?  According to Paula Harvey, VP of Human Resources at Schulte Building Systems in Houston:

"Companies are really hesitant to give raises. When you give a raise, it's stuck in the pay system. It is something you're guaranteeing: it's becoming a fixed cost. "

She insists it's much better for companies to preserve "flexibility" so instead companies enact "variable pay". This can come in the form of one off bonuses - say on a per year basis- or if you are a stellar performer you can get a "bigger bump". Say equal to a half year's wage increase of 3 percent. (If you are a super star performer you have the optimal chance of getting a permanent good raise.)

But for the rest it's 'catch as catch can'.  In other words, permanent salary bumps are just too expensive and if "times get tough, the needed pay cuts hurt morale and productivity".

But why, if the labor market is so tight (such low unemployment), do wages remain stagnant?  You can blame a "combination of factors including the globalization of the work force, job automation and the decline of unions."

In the case of the first, jobs can be dispatched to anywhere in the world . In effect, factory workers in Pennsylvania compete for jobs not only with each other but also in China and Mexico where wages are lower..  And tech workers, say in Silicon Valley, also compete with tech workers in India. So do tech customer service reps - say working for Comcast or Xfinity.

Automation speaks for itself, and is now taking over most repetitive jobs.In fact, it will merely be a matter of time before 'higher level" work is also taken over by AI-robots using quantum computing technology.   And as colummist Jim Hightower points out, already the jobs of "accountants, bank loan officers, and insurance claims adjustors are "falling to the bots"

Why? Because they can calculate more rapidly and more accurately than humans. What about "journalism"? Well, the associated press already uses an AI program to "write thousands of financial articles and sports reports".  Meanwhile, FORBES uses an AI system called  'Quill" to pen its articles.

The same applies to the realm of manual labor, and Hightower cites the example of "SAM" a robotic bricklayer that "lays three times as many bricks in a day as a human can". Hence, it has the potential to displace three times the number of human workers.

Meanwhile, unions - which had fought ceaselessly for improved wages and working conditions - are slowly going the way of the Brontosaurus - this as more offshore workers and automation renders unions redundant.

All of this portends a much more difficult path to the middle class, or remaining there. Currently, according to the Pew Research Center, the minimum qualification to be considered middle class is to be independent of government support. That means an income which is "self-sufficient": no food stamps, no Medicaid, or other extraneous gov't inputs.  In Denver right now, an income of $47,000/yr. is generally regarded as meeting this standard. But barely 2 in 5 Denverites  meet it, mainly because they spend up to 50 percent of income on rent or mortgage.

And who benefits most from the GOP tax rewards? According to the same article:

"Dan Ryan who runs a Nashville -based executive search firm predicts the main winners will be the star performer - the same people companies are already plying with bigger raises and bonuses."

Looking for a pay raise this year? The optimal way to get it is to leave your existing job and find another paying more, according to Ryan and other experts. The problem? You are going to encounter stiff competition from others attempting the exact same strategy.

Trump's 2017 Grade : F-Minus ( Lazy Bum, Liar & Poseur)

"Hey, I'd rather loaf in Florida than stay in the White House and work! Whaddya think I am, a real President?"

The verdict is pretty well in after Donnie Dotard's first 11 months in office, and the general consensus is that we have a no good bum, twitter troll and poseur on our hands - occupying the oval office. As noted on NBC  News 2 nights ago, this lazy maggot has been goofing off on his various properties (Mar-A-Lago, Bedminster,  etc.) for 109 days or nearly a third of the time he's been in office This is the same obnoxious turkey who promised during his campaign he'd "never take a day off," bragging, unlike his predecessor, that he "loves to work".

I don't think so. Unlike Obama, who took fewer than one fifth the days off that Trump has up to now,  the unadulterated fact is that Donald Dotard hates to work. He watches cable TV for up to 8 hours a day, and when he isn't tweeting bunkum he's on the crapper reading comics (and The National Enquirer) -out of sight. When he's not doing any of those things he's bumming at his various properties, especially Mar-A-Lago, but always claiming he's on a "working vacation".

Working vacation my ass. He no more knows what that means than he knows the role of differential calculus in computing planetary orbital elements. The New York Times reports that by his fourth month in office, Trump had already spent more time on the links than his three predecessors combined.

Former JFK assassination researcher and political blogger Jefferson Morley has written in a recent post (smirkingchimp.com) :

"In 2016, Americans who work full time accrued an average of 22.6 paid vacation days, though only used 16.8, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The second figure represents a half-day increase over 2015. During Trump's 11-plus months in office, he has already spent over 100 days on golf resorts, including more than one month each at his properties in New Jersey and Florida, per the Wall Street Journal."

As I noted, it's already 109 days  bumming on the job and counting.  That is how lazy this ambulatory turd is, and it boggles the mind his delusional followers haven't wised up yet on how he's also screwing them. (The tax money Trump has spent on golf carts alone could have bought 54,095 school lunches.)

Lest we forget, five days into his presidency he  even bawled that the job had  turned out to be too much for him to deal with. Too many details, too much stuff to master for an extensive government bureaucracy.  Hence, his penchant for becoming a cable TV addict and twitter troll. See e.g.

http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/donald-trump-stunned-to-learn-presidency-is-an-actual-j-1792215349

Excerpt:

“Being president is harder than Donald Trump thought,” begins the article, neatly capturing the blithe, criminal ignorance that characterizes both Trump himself and the many dozens of millions of morons who thought he should be the leader of the free world. Yes, being the president is a harder job than Donald Trump would expect, because Donald Trump had never previously held an actual job, because actually, spending your inheritance on a succession of failed cons is not an actual job."

 But hey, if the job is too much maybe he ought to resign. It beats wasting time tweeting and watching TV for a combined nine hours a day - when he isn't in Palm Beach hosting his rich country club boys with lavish dinners or playing golf with them. On the taxpayer's dime.

This bum and his parasite family are also running up security costs, helping to bleed out taxpayers. As of March 18, The Denver Post (page 9A) reported 

$60 M Extra for Trump-

The U.S. Secret Service requested $60 million in additional funding for the next year, offering the most precise estimate yet for the escalating costs for travel and protection resulting from the unusually complicated lifestyle of the Trump family.  Nearly half of the additional money ($26.8m) would be used to protect Trump's family in Trump Tower, while $33 million would be used for Trump's regular travel costs, especially to Mar-a-Lago.

Current (most recent) estimates are that these figures will be exceeded five fold.  By all that's just and fair, this con man bum and his family ought to be paying for their own security instead of bleeding taxpayers dry.

In addition, each time this bum goes to his Palm Beach hacienda he disrupts the lives and businesses of everyone there. The local costs that add up include: for local police deputies guarding the estate, the U.S. Coast Guard having to be deployed in surrounding waters and Air Force One - costing $180,000 per hour to operate. Oh, and extra cops on duty in case of any demonstrations.

That's not all, not by a long shot. Back in March, The Palm Beach Post reported Trump's golfing excursions were threatening to put the Lantana Airport in Palm Beach County out of business because it has to close every weekend the lazy bum.....errrr "president",  is in town.  At least one business owner estimated the  Airport was losing over $35,000 each weekend the  loafer-in-chief and his entourage came in, as opposed to staying at the White House.

Morley adds:

"Common Dreams notes that not only do the president's excursions raise questions about his level of interest in governing, they also likely constitute an ethics violation, as each trip benefits his properties financially. Prior to assuming office, the president handed control of the Trump Foundation to his sons, Eric and Donald Jr., but refused to divest from his business interests, which include the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster and Mar-a-Lago; the president calls the latter his "winter White House."

Let's also acknowledge the guy is a pathological liar and swindler.  Naomi Klein in her book, No Is Not Enough, reports (p. 140) how Dotard related to his Fox n' Friends sycophants how he swindled a land renter some years ago.  In his own words:

"I rented him a piece of land. He paid more for one night than the land was worth for a whole year. And then I didn't let him use the land. I don't want to use the word screwed, but I screwed him. That's what we should be doing."

Bingo!  And this swindler has also screwed his own delirious, gullible groupies, feeding them the malarkey they will get some good money in his just passed tax cuts, so much that  he will suffer like the other rich assholes. Then turning around and bragging to his rich parasite pals how THEY will be the ones to reap the rewards and get richer! See e.g.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/12/trump-celebrates-tax-bill-with-mar-a-lago-friends-you-all-just-got-a-lot-richer.html

Excerpt:

President Trump was in a celebratory mood on Friday night and told a group of his wealthy friends, “You all just got a lot richer” after he signed the tax cuts into law. Trump reportedly uttered the words to a group of friends who were having dinner nearby at Mar-a-Lago, including two friends who spoke to CBS News


In other words, a goddamned liar. But what's new? He's been lying his ass off all year, from accusing Obama of wiretapping to lying about his inauguration crowd, and about James Comey.  Even recently lying that he's "signed more bills into law than any modern president since Harry Truman". Hell, his daft groupies even lie for him having the gall to compare him to JFK. For those who might somehow think he signed as many bills this past year as JFK here's a reality check: Up to now Dotard has signed 92 bills but that is still HUNDREDS fewer than JFK signed (700) up to the same point in his presidency.

Even Bill Clinton signed 209 bills in the same amount of time, and Gee Dumbya Bush signed 242, according to a bill tracking website.  In other words this lazy putz really does spend more time lollygagging on his twitter feed or watching TV than anyone else in modern history, As I said, he's a lazy bum and liar.

 Perhaps if Donnie Dotard feels he no longer belongs in "the People's House" and the job is too much for his senile brain, he ought to resign. Leave it.  Again, let's remind ourselves this is the same turd who claimed Obama was "wasting tax  money"  and "taking more time off than any other human" barely three years ago.

Before leaving let's also recognize that even beyond Dotard's laziness, lies and swindles is the danger he poses to this Republic. He is, as the contributors to the recent book 'The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump' note, a disruptive personality and a peril to our collective security each day he remains in office.  Few of Trump's followers may believe the psychologists and therps who contributed to Bandy X. Lee's  above cited book, but maybe they will believe Tony Schwarz,  the ghost writer who helped him do 'The Art of the Deal'.   In his words (p. 73, ibid.):

"His amygdala is repeatedly triggered...and his prefrontal cortex - the part of the brain that makes us capable of rationality and reflection - shuts down. He reacts rather than reflects - and damn the consequences.  This is what makes his access to the nuclear codes so dangerous and frightening."

And why we in the sane segment of the populace need to keep an even sharper eye on this degenerate, in the coming year. He's a true cancer on the office of the presidency - until he can be extracted, removed.

For his lies alone, breaking even the record of Richard Milhous Nixon, Donnie Dotard merits an F minus as a grade for 2017.  And that's being generous!

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/jefferson-morley/76911/donald-trump-has-spent-more-than-a-quarter-of-his-presidency-at-his-golf-resorts

And:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/jacob-sugarman/76932/donald-trump-is-forging-an-america-as-greedy-deceitful-and-cruel-as-its-president

Excerpt:

"Trump launched his real estate career by extracting exorbitant sums of money from the state; the New York Times estimates that his deal for the Hyatt Regency alone has cost New York City as much as $350 million since the mid-'70s. Only the scale of his con has changed over the ensuing decades."

Donald Dotard Can Keep His Tax Cut "Christmas Gift"- I Don't Want It

Earlier yesterday, as is usual for the dolt masquerading as a president in the White House, he engaged in another snake oil salesman performance.  This time appearing before a stack of thousands of tax pages and cutting the phony yards of red tape  (actually a ribbon) while aping a Barbary ape.

He then bellowed: "I wanna give the American people a really biiiiiiigg tax cut for a Christmas present."   He couldn't help grinning like a shit-eating Cheshire cat - probably just antsy to get back to his 10 hour a day cable TV -watching. (He reportedly hides when any WH visitors pass by the TV room where he's glued to FOX  on a 60" set- - since he doesn't want them to see him doing nothing.)

But I will make this clear again, as an American who understands something of the nation's financial issues, and its already exploding debt, I want no part of Dotard's tax cut gift.  It is literally a gift of "chocolates" all laced with arsenic.  The so called GOP tax cuts are just a straight gimmick to give more to the richest who don't need (and already admitted they will not create more jobs) and provide an excuse to implement massive social spending cuts under 'pay-go' when the deficits explode in the next year or two as they surely will.

These "tax cuts" Donnie Dope sees as a "gift" amount to perhaps $450 all told for wifey and me. And yeah, that lump of dough would make a nice little gift - IF there were no downsides or strings attached.  But that isn't true. Getting that dough would subsequently mean suffering spending cuts to my Medicare much much greater than the value of the tax cut.

Meanwhile. Donnie Dotard and the pukes are betting you won't grasp that with inflation still low the value of any new debt taken on will remain high.   Also, that any marginal gains in economic growth are purchased at the cost of raising our debt to 99 per cent of the GDP.  That means the pukes and Dotard know full well revenue won't outpace spending anytime soon -including $700b  they want for more defense in the next fiscal year. In effect, the only way these rats can even halfway claim their phony bill will work is by: a) putting a "sunset" provision on most middle class tax cuts, and b) savaging the social safety net to pay for giving the rich and the corps. money they don't need.

By all rights and standards, raging citizens ought to be burning them in effigy right now - and protesting in front of their stupid homes.

As I examined the CMS Summary sheets 6 weeks ago for the procedures carried out this past year I noted a total of more than $60,000 for the 3D staging biopsy and cryotherapy cancer treatment at UCHealth.  The ultrasound guidance part of the cryo treatment alone came in at $16,000 and the anesthesia just for that treatment, not including the 3D biopsy anesthesia, was $3,149..

If I had to operate under a $20,000 per annum GOP voucher plan- say implemented under a pay-go cut to Medicare- I'd have ended up shelling out nearly $40,000 out of pocket for the uncovered procedures. And none of that even includes the cost for wife's hip replacement surgery, including 7 days in rehab.. By contrast, the estimated "payoff" I\we can expect in tax cuts from the proposed GOP tax reform is about  $450. 

Do the math and compare that chump change promised as a Xmas "gift" by Donnie Dotard with the $40,000 cited earlier and you will see why I'd rather pay the taxes - any day, twice on Sunday - just like our European friends are happy to do. Given they know which side their economic bread is buttered on, and it ain't the tax cuts side!

My trepidation is reinforced by that of economist Bruce Bartlett who pointed out one month ago ('Last Word') that once the tax reform plan itself passes the stage is set for worse. This is because the next step will be reconciliation with the budget that has already passed.Why is this an atrocity? Because the budget the Republicans passed to increase the deficit by $1.5 trillion , in Bartlett's words: "also contains 4 trillion dollars in cuts to Social Security and Medicare".

Thus a BIG part of what's paying for this egregious tax cut are future spending cuts to the most needed safety nets, including Medicaid as well.  Bartlett also sought to alert viewers that once this perfidy passes, the  worst is still to come. In his words:

"The Congressional Budget Office pointed out yesterday that because of existing law called 'pay go' automatic spending cuts will take place the minute this legislation takes effect and $25 billion will be cut out of Medicare in fiscal 2018  and for many years to come - and that's already in law."

We also expect some of these cuts to Medicare will be indirect, in the form of cuts to  physicians' reimbursement by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services.  This means many Medicare beneficiaries  will no longer be able to get medical access because doctors will no longer accept them. As it is, millions of Medicare recipients have to do arduous searches to find providers because Medicare doesn't reimburse at private insurance rates. It also lays the ground for the implementation of a voucher system.

Apart from the other vile aspects of this REPUKE excrement, it's little wonder two thirds of  the nation is against it. They know they will be robbed by the pukes to pay for this damned thing when it goes south in deficits - as it will. So NO, spare us the Christmas "gift"!

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/richard-eskow/76434/orrin-hatch-s-bullcrap-on-taxes-is-exactly-that

And:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/jack-lessenberry/76454/how-the-gop-tax-bill-would-ruin-michigan

And:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/steven-rosenfeld/76431/why-arent-dems-in-congress-raising-more-hell-to-oppose-the-worst-gop-tax-bill-ever