Feel that Bern! No, really... feel it.

So according to the Berniementum blog (yes, that's what they chose as their name), we're all about to get to eat some crow.  Because OMG TOTALLY YU GAIZ, Bernie totally has a plan to pay for all his rainbows and unicorns!  And just wait till you hear it!



To pay for:
- Tuition-Free College : a 0.5% tax on stock trades, a 0.1% tax on bonds, and a 0.005% tax on derivatives

- Universal Health care : a 6.7% payroll tax on employers a, 2.2% - 5.2% income tax on employees (dependent on income bracket from less than $200k a year to over $600k a year), an 5.4% tax on modified adjusted gross income exceeding $1 million, and a .02% tax on securities transactions

- Green Energy Initiatives : $20 carbon tax per ton of carbon emissions, rising by 5.6% per year over 10 years

- Job Creation : The bill proposes to spend $1.6 trillion on rebuilding America's roads, bridges, railways, airports, waterways, ports, national parks, and electric grids from 2015 to 2022. Funding for this proposal appears to come in the establishment of a National Infrastructure Development Bank to give out loans.

- Minimum Wage Increase : Business are expected to adjust their finances to cover this cost

And best of all is the conclusion:
"None of Bernie's proposals will raise taxes for average Americans, except for the health care bill. I don't know many people who make more than $200,000 a year. So consider that 2.2% income tax alongside what comes out of your paycheck for your employer's health insurance and what an average visit to the doctor's office costs (and then imagine what it costs for x-rays and surgery and things of that nature, and heaven forbid you have a medical emergency). Is 2.2% really that high? I've been told Briton pays 10%."

Yeah... because no sales tax gets passed on to consumers, and no payroll tax ever gets passed on to employees.  Sorry rainbows and unicorn lovers... this won't work.  That payroll tax would mean an additional 8.9% in taxes on my current pay (or a reduction to cover the new employer mandate and a 2.2% on whatever remains, which still works out about the same if not worse).  $20 per ton of carbon tax will literally spike energy prices immediately and destroy the economy in the process.  I would LOVE to know where this National Infrastructure Development Bank is going to get the $1.6 TRILLION dollars from in order to make loans (which almost certainly won't get paid back... see 'Federal Student Loan Debt').  And I'm SURE businesses can eat such a massive increase in operation costs without cutting employees or raising prices.  ...  Seriously?  And as for all this "it will soak the rich" nonsense, what makes these people think the rich will just sit there and take it.  They can afford to move.  To nice places.  With low tax burdens.  And you don't think that would hurt the economy?

Grim, this is why I can't bring myself to vote for Sanders.  He honestly believes that the economy will operate on cruise control regardless of how much of this silly garbage he throws onto it.  And while I accept his followers have zero concept of how the economy works, he doesn't have an excuse.  He's been a US Senator for decades.  The only way he can honestly believe this clap-trap is that he is so blinded by his Utopian ideology.  And people like that are actually dangerous.  It's people like that who will declare opposition to their positions to be 'mental illness' and lock people up (because he's so obviously right, only a crazy person could disagree).  Or who build walls to keep people in.  This is how you get a Soviet Union.

5 comments:

Grim said...

Grim, this is why I can't bring myself to vote for Sanders.

OK, although it strikes me that there are scenarios in which you aren't voting for him as much as against Clinton (or, if he wins the primary, possibly against Trump). He'd have a Republican Congress to work with, which isn't going to give him any of this, after all.

Possibly he's a third bad option, which makes all three of the most likely next Presidents terrible. More and more, I think what I really want is not to have a next President -- not, at least, a President with the kind of powers we've seen over recent decades. Scaling the Federal government back to its bare, explicitly Constitutional role might avoid the tyranny that otherwise towers on all sides, were it possible to do that. The executive has become too dangerous to invest in anyone but a good person, and the Founders knew -- as we can see so obviously in front of us today -- that there is no guarantee of electing good people. We may not even have the option of a good person left on the table by the time the primary is over.

MikeD said...

Oh, I'd still vote for him over Clinton in the primary, just not the general election. If it comes to it, I won't vote (or write in your name).

Grim said...

That's safe enough. Not only would I not win, they wouldn't know who I was to tell me if I did. :)

Ymar Sakar said...

Hussein did pay for all that gas and cars and new smart phones for the hood, after all.

douglas said...

You know, maybe he's perfect. He's so far left, nothing he proposes will even get enough Dems on board, and whatever passes the congress, maybe he'll veto, and voila! The government we've been dreaming of in DC- one that doesn't do anything! Well, maybe he'd be perfect after we have a chance to undo BO's malfeasance a bit.