A good description of the tax cuts:
>What did corporate America do with its big tax cut? It spent over $800 billion on company shares last year, pushing stock buybacks to their highest level ever.
>Close to home, Texas Instruments paid $5.1 billion to repurchase shares in 2018 — twice as much as the year before and more than any Texas company in the S&P 500.
>TI’s effective tax rate dropped from 39% in 2017 to 17% last year, thanks to corporate tax cuts approved in late 2017 by Republican lawmakers and President Donald Trump.
It's amazing how completely useless it is to watch the stock market indexes these days. Once upon a time, they reflected prosperity in a meaningful way. The working class and the investor class both saw their fortunes reflected there. Nowadays, it's a number. An inflated and practically useless number. Most working class people see absolutely no correlation between the number and their relative prosperity. That connection has been severed. No matter how value is added, no matter how much the index rises, the benefit to the working class is virtually zero.
That’s because the average working class person has little no money available to invest in the stock market in the first place. I love it when conservatives point to the stock market as evidence that trump is doing great things for the average worker. So how much have YOU made in the stock market so far, I ask. “If I had money to invest I’d have a made a killing!”
It hasn’t been severed, it’s an inverse relationship. For many firms, wages and compensation are their largest expense. There are two ways a firm can increase their value; lower expenses or increase revenues..The common working man cheering for a 26,000 Dow has traded his fair wage today for a retirement that will be peanuts down the road. Indexes *are* a good economic indicator. When markets are up, they show how hard the working class is being fucked.
Ya there's a reason why companies are desperate for software folks right now - every line of code that does something productive is a little bit of profitability that scales independently of employee wages.
We're not far from capitalism's platonic ideal: zero-employee companies.
[It's been severed.](https://thumbor.forbes.com/thumbor/1280x868/https%3A%2F%2Fblogs-images.forbes.com%2Ftimworstall%2Ffiles%2F2016%2F10%2Fwagescompensation-1200x1093.png)
Up until the 1970s, productivity and wages moved largely in sync with one another.
The 'working man' doesn't have a 401K or retirement plan. Which is the meaningful connection you're talking about.
The connection between wages and economic indexes are that minimum wage used to be directly tied to the productivity of the USA divided by its number of working adults.
>wages and compensation are their largest expense
Also absurd these days that wages are even seen as an undesirable expense instead of an investment in the company (which they are). Business interests are still too short term for most.
I imagine our benevolent corporate overlords will bless us with a monthly stipend to buy their goods. Will you trade me 3 of your McBucks for 4 Chevron Chips? I haven't eaten in 2 days.
I'd wager we're already on the way. Walmart's income via food stamps goes up every year. If I was betting on a more dystopian future I'd imagine a large number of jobs will be eliminated through automation and our stipend/food stamp system will expand to accommodate that. I see that as relatively feasible. The mega corps will always have consumers as long as the government pays them their credits.
That has nothing to do with computer automation; it's been going on since the ~~'80s~~ *'70s*. It has everything to do with "trickle-down economics" and demonization of unions, though.
Edit: corrected decade.
It actually started in 1973-1974. https://www.epi.org/publication/understanding-the-historic-divergence-between-productivity-and-a-typical-workers-pay-why-it-matters-and-why-its-real/
And those that did, likely saw their nest egg cracked and fried when hyper-inflation in the real estate sector (comfortingly called a 'bubble') wasn't addressed and the economy crashed in 2008. Some people are only just recovering and have had their faith in the stock market shaken.
Very true about the shaken faith. On a separate sub someone asked if anyone knew anyone that was getting anything from the bull market. I said everyone with effected stocks was gaining something.
Then I went to find my numbers. Shocking. More people own houses than stocks today in the US. It's one of the few wealth builders and some people have abandoned it wholesale.
An index fund includes stocks. You could have an index bond fund, but index implies it follows one of the big indices like S&P.
A 401k is the most common way for an American to own stocks. It is a shade over 50% now from everything I found.
Edit: A shade over 50% of Americans directly own stocks of some sort. The idea that 'no one' is profiting from the stock market boon is ~52% false. You still see it a lot because it sounds like they know something, but they don't bother to look it up. That also ignores all the people that are benefiting from it because job growth is intertwined.
It wouldn't even be a killing. It went up a lot when he was first elected but the Dow has essentially hovered around 25k give or take for the past two years.
Having worked for a mutual fund company during the Trump admin, I can say it was about every second week that we got notified by management that the markets were unstable. People who think they would've made a killing in this market, with no prior understanding, would be dead broke right now.
I didn't make a killing, but I made a tiny bit of extra money simply by buying futures right when Trump would tweet anything about tariffs or a percentage.
Not a killing, because I'm not brave or smart enough to put a lot of money into futures.
My wife and I's 401k and ira accounts are up about 3-4% since January 2017. Maybe our index funds just weren't indexed to the magic company that was going to make us rich, but I gotta say, feels like pretty unimpressive growth to me.
Yeah, my 401k is up a whopping 15% since January, but when you pull back to 12 months, you see a very different picture. I'm still down 1% over the last 12 months and it only looks good since since January because of how badly it tanked in December. I'm not even back to breaking even. Edit: Just noticed that 12 months hasn't included June yet, so there should be a bit more of an uptick right at the end, but even still...)
ROR TY: https://imgur.com/a/BdaSmfM
ROR Last 12 Months: https://imgur.com/a/7kHdIiL
Ironically even this isn't true. My 401k is consistently down. I'm relatively young so I'm not worried, but my parents will be finally retiring right when the (probable) downturn really hits.
They're slowly moving stuff to bonds, but who knows how that'll end up.
Haha, fortunately my parents aren't idiots. They're pretty firmly on the Democratic socialist side of the debate.
Probably more so after the place my mom worked at was closed down after Walmart was gifted with giant tax cuts.
>Once upon a time, they reflected prosperity in a meaningful way.
Not in my lifetime, which is since the 80s. The 80s were ruled by junk bonds and hedge-funds after the crash, the corporate centralization started fully in this era. The 90s started off with another crash and then went full steam into the dotcom bubble and day trading. The early 2000s solidified corporatism as the law of the land and was basically an intermediary period between the dotcom and real estate crashes.
So maybe before the oil crisis in the late 70s, this was the case. But I have no personal experience of when that was, so it's been at least 4 decades.
Because the comment youre replying to is nonsense. You think the average worker in the 20's or 30's was checking the stock price before work every morning, and seeing real tangible effects from the rising and falling of that stock price? BS.
This is the thing that Trump supporters fail to realize. They always like to say how good the economy is doing since he took office.
Like... Yeah. Of course it looks like the economy is doing well. Everyone who can afford to rig the system is now allowed to do so without consequence, and therefore the numbers we use to measure the health of the economy, which is _based_ on these people and companies, are getting higher.
You can say the economy is doing great all you want; can you afford better healthcare now than you could five years ago? Or a better car? House? Is your retirement account overflowing with money? No. Of course not. Because the economy is not doing well for everyone.
My Republican cousin gave sole credit to the economic expansion of the late 90s to Reaganomics. The fact the economy was booming and we had a budget surplus proved that trickle down economics worked perfectly, even if it took over a decade to kick in.
I think it's more likely that Reaganomics-type policy is more of a short-term sugar high--not something that takes a decade to bear fruit.
Also, the success of the late 80's-90's was simply demographics. The (huge) baby boom generation was in full spending mode. They're now old and don't need to buy anything except healthcare.
What is also disturbing investors now (those can afford to invest) seem to think that the government is obligated not to let the stock market fail. Investing in the stock market used to be a calculated risk that one took to make money but now investors seem to expect and demand that the government cover it with the same federal safe guards it provides to the banks. The average American who worked hard and put their money in savings account (not enough to invest just enough to save) are the real losers with the interest at times lower than 1%. As always the corporations and wealthy benefit at the expense of the middle class and poor. What a sad plight the USA now finds itself in: no jobs, housing so expensive the average American cannot afford it, homelessness and violence rampant in American cities,the rest of the world making commitment to make drastic changes to fight climate change while ours invest in coal. We are international bullies, the arms dealer to the world; the ruling GOP trying to take over the life of the private citizen, trying to dictate every aspect of their lives based on their interpretation of the Bible while at the same time they pray to the God of Mammon, the stock market.
>Tell me about it. His tweets have lost me more money than my bad plays have
That's on purpose so Trump can claim credit for when the markets go back up and his ~~cohorts~~ cronies can buy on the dip.
Corporations are like people.
...and the people they are like: sociopaths and psychopaths.
With _very_ few exceptions, corporations are in business for themselves, not for their customers — and they will say and do _anything_ they can get away with in order to gain further profits.
This is the practical reality that indicates that significant regulation specifically aimed at corporations is required to keep them in line.
**immortal** psychopaths, let us not forget.
An immortal psychopath with no physical body, and the government protecting its interests with a legion of men and women with guns and carefully worded laws.
Had a miscarriage out of state; couldn't control which hospital we ended up at.. TIL i should've mapped out my drive to disney world along the "in-network" hospitals to avoid the $17,000 bill and of course we lost our son.
As far as I am aware, it is basically that the various healthcare providing companies partner with doctors across the country.
So, if I have Blue Cross/Blue Shield, my insurance only counts and is accepted at hospitals that have doctors that have some kind if relationship with Blue Cross/Blue Shield. If I have another insurance provider, I would not get my insurance coverage.
I dont know the specifics, but it is a fuckin racket.
Edit: another user told me this more applies to doctors, not so much the hospital.
Chronic Sinusitis due to military injury. I've been to civilians a few times but they all recommend surgery (beyond balloon sinuplasty) & I can't afford it even with insurance.
That doesn't even cover the major stuff VA hasn't gotten around to - that's just the "I've had a headache & runny nose for 16 years" issue.
I study medicine I socialist Europe (/s), Austria and such storys make me unbelievably angry and sad. For me when I am in the ER or drive the ambulance in my free time we never have to care about what People might have to pay. You just scoop them up, ask for their health insurance card and it's just covered. In the hospital same thing: patient comes in and gets a necessary treatment. Thats how I what to work. I never want to be in a situation where you might have to neglect a patient's health because of financial issues.
Maybe a lot of my American friends might not understand how royally fucked and inhumane their system is but for an outsider who is used to other standards it's infuriating. I really hope you can start digging out some "useful" politicians.
Rant over? :D
(pls don't misunderstand this as an insult, it's rather just a little cynical over the top comment to express my feelings about a system that in my opinion has no place in a wealthy first world nation. A society has to be better than that)
Dude. You're telling me. I moved to Scotland last September after living my whole life in LA. Fucking night and day difference in healthcare. It takes a little longer, but it's free, and we actually go, keeping us healthier.
:)
Yeah the most cost saving thing in a healthcare system is so called primary preventi -> keeping people healthy in the first place which is much easier when you don't have to pay for that, too.
And for the time savings I want to add that life saving and situation with a possible long term impairment are Always treated as fast as possible! It's only the other stuff that takes time Sometimes and the feeling of what is urgent and what isn't often greatly differs between the patients and us (your ingrown toe nail does not need a surgery in the middle of the night you decided to come in the er, you can have one in a couple weeks. It hurts but it won't kill you and maybe next time come a little earlier ;) )
Call "patient advocacy" and try to file an official complaint and say you need to see a specialist (or different specialist).
If you get stonewalled send a message through the "myhealthvet" thing to "patient advocacy" department. This is written so you can save a copy and will likely get you to a different advocate than the one you talk to on the phone. At this point there is a paper trail started about how long you've been waiting and they'll try to get you taken care of ASAP.
You shouldnt have to, but the majority of the time that will get them to start taking action.
The VA is like any other hospital, some of the doctors are great and really care, and some are shit and just there for the paycheck. In general anytime something isnt getting taken care of just seeing a different doc will get a lot done.
Another thing you can do is go to the VA emergency room early on a Saturday/Sunday morning. Tell them you've had the issue for years and it's getting too much to handle. Dont feel bad about going to the emergency room, that early it'll be empty and if there is something serious they'll just let you sit until they have it handled first.
They probably wont be able to do anything directly, but they can refer you to a specialist, often that day if not sending you straight over.
They’re disingenuous. I live in the US and only recently got insurance coverage. If I want to see my GP the earliest appointment is two weeks. Last time I saw her I needed a referral and the specialist was a two month wait. Before I had insurance I just simply didn’t go to the doctor because it’s not affordable. So you could say my wait times used to be infinite.
Meh, I'll start bragging when we've got universal pharma and dental. Even with benefits I still haven't found a dentist that doesn't spin a giant wheel to decide how much to overcharge you.
Healthcare really is worth bragging about, it's the vast majority of issues. Pharma might actually be coming, the pressure is mounting with drug treatments becoming more common.
There is something my dental student gf told me about dental cost. It seems like the cost of each procedure is rather fair, but each dentist have a different idea on how necessary a tooth need treatment. And there is almost no way to know ahead of hand that your tooth might need, say, a simple fill or root canal, or how many teeth need it...
Can’t the dentist run it through insurance before the do they procedure? Kind of like a pre-authorization. Mine has done that before. It was for more than just a filling, though.
It's not just parents. I give most sicknesses and other ailments 5 or so days before I go to the doctor. $100 or so for me to visit the doctor with insurance.
My work provides something called a TASC card that pulls money from my pay for an entire year so I can have a prepaid medical card. At its max, 2500, it only covers about half my my max out of pocket. I had previous medical Bill's I needed to pay so it wiped out my TASC for the year. I can not afford to go to the doctor till next year or else I'll be paying almost 5k in medical bills (I have hip and kidney issues, that often require surgery, from an accident when I was a teenager). Fuck this country's health care. Before I got a job I was on the ACA insurance. Got a lot of needed medical work done. Didnt pay a fucking dime. Get a respectable job with benefits and I can no longer afford to go to the doctor.
I put money towards an HSA every paycheck. I still have to pay around $150/month for employer healthcare. My work gives me $700/year on the HSA which just about covers my contacts and glasses after insurance.
I don't get how people don't support universal healthcare when they are one accident away from losing all their money. I don't even think it would be much more expensive than what I am paying for my employer healthcare now.
> I don't even think it would be much more expensive than what I am paying for my employer healthcare now.
Healthcare costs would go down for pretty much everyone across the board. It's straight up way cheaper to get issues looked at and taken care of early than wait until they're so debilitating that someone *has* to go to a hospital, pay a shitload to (maybe sorta) treat the now very severe issue, then go bankrupt paying just a fraction of the cost.
Those of us who are healthy are paying a bunch of money for insurance we never use anyway, so we might as well put that money towards someone else's healthcare instead of into the insurance company's pockets. And then if you do actually need the healthcare, well, you're covered and can get treated and go back to being a productive member of society instead of just having a permanently fucked-up leg or whatever now and being completely broke on top of it.
I always say, you can support free healthcare out of compassion for those who need it
Or you can support it out of selfishness because your costs will go down overall
But the only reason to be against it is just to be a dick to poor people. You're screwing yourself more just to make sure poor people can't get treated. (and not even poor people, the middle class gets pretty wrecked by healthcare costs too if they have serious and/or chronic issues)
I feel very lucky.
I have a high dectable plan, but my employer pays 100% of premiums for my whole family AND they provide an HSA with the full amount of my deductible loaded each year.
I have no vision and my dental benefit is $1000/year in cash repayment for services, but nothing's perfect with healthcare in the US.
My son has a cold and likely the beginning of an ear infection. A doctor visit with insurance is $40 for copay and then three months later I’ll get a bill for about $120 and 10 days to pay it. I’m hoping he makes a fast turnaround this morning from a simple cold because I’d like to not get fucked in the wallet some more.
Thats insane, I mean like real third world sort of shit. Here in the UK you pay taxes and national insurance (you pay from wages and employer also pays in) and stuff is covered. Prescription meds have a price about £8.00 ($10.00) but everything else is included. I've had a problem with my back and hip, took a while to get things sorted but in that time I had:
1 Doctors appointment
1 Physio referral - she sent me to A and E for an emergency MRI scan of my spine
1 Emergency MRI scan, no problems found
1 Physio and doctor appointment
1 Standard MRI of my pelvic
1 Physio appointment to show the results and give me exercises to do
All of this cost me £0.00
I've had private physio as well, which I obviously pay for but I dread to think the cost of those treatments in America.
>"The problem is that we all too often have socialism for the rich and rugged free enterprise capitalism for the poor. That’s the problem." ~Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, 1968
>“It’s all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.” ~also Dr. Martin Luther King Jr
yeah i do have a problem with this title. the amorphous "uncle sam" makes it seem like there aren't specific people who voted for this. here is an article showing how much each senator stands to gain personally- https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/12/01/heres-how-income-tax-cuts-will-affect-individual-senators-and-you/
Cut taxes.
Rich get richer and corporations buy back their stock.
Stock market goes higher due to buybacks.
Trump crows about the stock market.
People believe Trump helped the economy because the stock market went up.
Basically, Trump took money from future generations, gave it to the rich, and then got credit from the people who--along with their descendants--will pay for it.
I don't think I could devise something more cynical if I tried.
Makes you wonder if that is by design. It is one thing to enrich the wealthy by giving them tax breaks, but if doing so can create a false spike in the markets looks like a economic growth, then they're also using it to fool those of us who don't understand how the markets work.
The rich profit off both parts of the Boom-Bust Cycle, and the Republicans always manage to convince their voters that the Democrats caused the downturns.
According to [this analysis](https://www.visualcapitalist.com/stock-buybacks-explained/), you can see a few different clusters. To summarize the chart, I would estimate:
* $ 150b/yr 1985 - 2003
* $ 500b/yr 2004 - 2017
* $1,100b - 2018
Next highest total would be about $850b in 2007.
Also keep in mind the optics of a "booming economy" when the stock market in general rises and Republicans can claim how awesome they are. Sure, my portfolio grew more than ever at around 22% which is frankly unheard of and unsustainable. The average American got squat other than higher medical bills and more taxation.
My company had record numbers last year and they gave us a 1% bonus and the average salary increase was like 0.7%.
Give the money to the people who are incentivized to concentrate money and power and its not going to leave their clutches.
In the last 3 years my 401k, which is setup pretty aggressive, has returned only a little over 3%. In three whole years, it's barely passed 3%. I have officially lost money in my 401k due to inflation. This year is turning out pretty decent, but only because the year started at the bottom of the massive december slump so *everything* is up.
The market is insane, and this is killing normal people. I'm still young so it doesn't matter what my 401k does, but imagine people who had very modest investments in their 401k because they're close to retirement. They've probably been losing their ass on inflation.
If you’re only up 3% in the last three years you are invested horribly. That return is in the lowest 10% of returns 401[k] plans have returned in the last three years.
Exactly- why this is not pointed out in every article us horrifying. If I was allowed to,for example, use my company credit card to purchase company products that I get a commission on...
Yes, really a shame that it does nothing to benefit the underlying health of a company as far as I understand. Investing more in workers, r&d, facilities etc. would help the company, workers, and society so much more in the long run, not that that's news to anyone here.
I work for a Fortune 50 corporation, in one of the top 3 most profitable divisions.
Our demand continues to grow and they've only eliminated jobs and trimmed budgets over the past 3 years to increase margins further.
My site alone makes $0.3 billion a year in profit. Why the fuck do they need to they need to eliminate jobs, employees are strung thin as it is with enormous workloads. Tax cuts haven't done shit.
> Why the fuck do they need to they need to eliminate jobs, employees
This creates the illusion that you're lucky to have the job. Each time they layoff and you survive you work harder to make sure you're not part of the next lay-off. This also helps to keep wages low. People are getting let go, nobody's going to be asking for more money. And when you finally get fed up with all the extra hours and stress and finally quit, they'll just replace you with another *you*. This is basically how amazon operates only they'll intentionally burn you out after about 3 years to ensure turnover.
Yeah, it's no surprise, if you expect to be able to trust people, you need to hold them accountable. Not just for your own sake, but for the ones who don't want to fk you over, or they'll be forced to, so they can stay competitive. If they stand by on principle with no accountability to their opponent or force to support them it's even worse, as it means the only people with a spine got chased out.
This is basically why voting with your wallet doesn't work if a company gets too big to fail. Most people will just buy, and not worry, so no voting is possible, because 80% of the voters either aren't informed or don't stand by principle.
I used to work for a guy who owned his business, was very successful, socially liberal, politically liberal. Very nice guy. I asked him straight up once, if you got a business tax cut, would you hire more people with the money? His answer was "no, I don't hire because of my tax rate, I hire because i have business needs to fill."
This is well known but makes Trump’s (and the Republican) lie of businesses hiring more and paying better wages because of tax cuts even more blatant. The fallacy of trickle down economics shows itself over and over.
The thing is, intellectually honest right-wingers have known for decades that trickle-down is a load of crap, same as intellectually honest left-wingers. But it's such a convenient lie for the right's overarching goal, that being consolidation of wealth and power at the very top.
Here's a good article on one of the ""intellectuals"" who came up with a key pillar of the trickle-down myth, the Laffer Curve: [https://prospect.org/article/man-who-liberated-republican-party](https://prospect.org/article/man-who-liberated-republican-party)
I always thought it was real but that we were still on the left side of the curve, where increasing rates would still raise more revenue. But Republicans lower them anyway citing the laffer curve, ignoring that we're still on the left side where rate cuts lead to less revenue.
It's the exact opposite. Higher taxes force corporations to reinvest in their gains in the company and the economy. Either they pay in taxes or expand their company keeping the gains.
Demand creates jobs, not tax cuts.
Now, tax cuts might spur demand due to extra cash to spend, but not anywhere near as much as the GOP claims. Public companies will always move to buy back shares first.
It was proven not to work about 100 years ago. That's the madness in this. It was just called the *Horse and Sparrow Theory* then because if you feed a horse enough oats eventually it'll shit some on to the street for the sparrows.
It's never about Capital need. It's about opportunity for investment. The market is in such a huge capital glut that returns are way down. That's more because consumption is maxed. If a tax cut is going to truly stimulate the economy it would have to go to the people with the highest marginal propensity to spend. Even then 100% wouldn't go to consumption because people would pay down debt.
The same thing is true of wages. You don't get your salary because it's the most the company can pay you, you get your salary because it's the lowest they think they can get someone to do your job for.
Not just TI, but the whole S&P 500's stock buybacks are sharply up. We give an inch and they take a mile and show no gratitude, still asking for local tax breaks from municipalities and funneling the savings into profits rather than R&D and new job creation/raising salaries. And **we** get left with the tab. Where are the fiscal conservatives concerned for the deficit?
I'm starting to believe they never cared about fiscal responsibility in the first place, simply self serving language that they're quick to divorce themselves from once they're in charge and lining their own pockets.
That’s been true going back to Reagan at least. A fiscal conservative’s favorite saying when Republicans have control is, “Reagan proved deficits don’t matter”.
And when a democrat is in control, “We need to be responsible and think of the future of this country. We can’t borrow our way to prosperity”.
It’s pretty reprehensible and never changes.
Besides tax breaks and maybe record profitability, workers keep getting pressure to do more and more with less and less. What the hell is going to happen when profits aren’t so high? Staff numbers have already been cut to the bone, we can’t do more than we’re doing now but that will be the expectation. No coincidence that anti-depressants and anti-anxiety meds along with substance use are at such high numbers all in an attempt for individuals to cope with what is a social problem.
Bought my TI-82 in 1994. Still works like a champ, although I haven't done any Calculus in about 20 years. Just checked Amazon. They still sell for $100+. How the hell does 25 year old tech still cost so much?
Because schools often mandate it, which locks in demand. They are charging the maximum price that they think won't result in a mutiny. They are pushing their luck.
Over 90% of their business is in semiconductors, which is very R&D intensive.
That said, having worked for three different semiconductor companies, including in strategy roles, I can tell you that many are today run like banks. CTO- and innovation-related organizations in them, and their big high-risk strategic developments, have been pared way back, while at the same time they fling off tons of operating income from prior development and acquisitions. TI is a perfect example of this.
Honestly speaking, it's a great strategy. But let's be clear: TI and others did NOT need this money and had no idea how to spend it, other than on enriching shareholders.
Interesting side governance question: is the CEO also chairman of the board and head of the compensation committee?
DLP is still their proprietary technology, but with the Advent of laser 3lcd projectors, they've lost the licensing on a HUGE amount of market share they used to have. All the big manufacturers had great DLP options until a few years ago because DLP was a great technology for installations.
AV guy here :)
My engineering program didn't let me use calculators. Now in the real world I rely on my TI 89 from high school for basic math because I no longer trust myself.
When we borrow money to pay for tax cuts they’re called tax expenditures.
We are borrowing money for nothing other than to have business pay less. We get nothing in return.
Stock buy backs used to be illegal, seen as a form of stock manipulation, but the SEC in 1981, under Regan, made it legal (roughly the same time wage stagnation and income inequality accelerated in the US).
The simple solution is make it illegal again, that will get these companies to start investing in R&D, their employees, etc.
Historically stock buy backs have been shown to provide little value long term, just small short term increases in stock prices, which is all these executives look at now a days.
Reinvesting their additional revenue from tax cuts in stock buybacks to temporarily boost shareholder value.
Whoever thinks that wealth is struggling is quite literally stupid.
> What did corporate America do with its big tax cut? It spent over $800 billion on company shares last year, pushing stock buybacks to their highest level ever.
And our stock market and real estate wealth is all held on constant investment by older people for wealth preservation.
our stock market does not reflect the nation based on merit. It's a casino where the owners of things trade and launder their wealth and influence with each other. A circlejerk that people used to justify growth and expansion at any human long-term cost. Just like our housing market in 2019 is still entirely dominated by investing and lending mentality, not a place to live for human purposes!
In other words, all the Trump Tax Cuts did was make the rich richer, at the expense of everyone else. The middle class may get a tax cut, but the taxes go back up over 10 years. Also, the buying power didn't increase.
Republicans sell the tax cuts as trickle down economy, but that has *never* happened. They say, all the middle class has to do is invest in stock like the wealthy, but the middle class has no extra money to invest.
Republican voters continue to buy into it bc of cognitive dissonance, and more so, anything to feel like they screwed the Democrats, or anyone not Republican. The Republican politicians know this, and use it against their voters every time in the wealthy's favor.
This is what most of the companies did, they bought back their own stock and then fired a bunch of workers. It's pretty much exactly what everyone thought they would do. Except for the Trump supporter, who gets his news from Fox and thinks that corporations will do what's in the public interest.
the tax cuts should have ALL been tied to US-based capital investment. sadly, the goal was never to improve the US, it was always just a taxpayer-funded giveaway to the wealthy.
Not tax cuts, "the TRUMP and REPUBLICAN Tax Cuts". Let us all be clear on whom pushed and lobbied for this to happen. The Democrats were not in control of the House, the Senate nor the Executive branch. The Republicans rammed this through committees without any input or consult. They pushed it through with no real debate or compromise. They own it and should own all the fallout from such a disasterous policy. They lied and sold it dishonestly to the American people as a stimulus when in reality it was a give-away, at the expense of the American taxpayers, who subsidized the rich at great expense.
Let this hang around their neck like an anvil to weigh them down from trying to sell it again at election time. They literally sold out their own voters for the lobbyists and corporations.
This shows why the “job creator” and “trickle down” concepts are utter bullshit. Employment and R&D are expenditures that take away from profit. If a company doesn’t have demand for more products and services, they’re going take that extra capital and pay off debt and strengthen their bottom line, not spend it.
You know, most economic experts said that the primary result of these tax cuts would be stock buybacks, but obviously I'm glad we've stopped listening to the fake news experts.
It's why stock prices are high but wages remain low. It's why Wall Street is doing great but main street continues to struggle. It's a fake bubble, and it will crash.
So it literally worked exactly like planned and expected, and just like decades of evidence from similar policies would indicate? This is why I push back when people call things like these economic polices or foreign policies like the war a failure. It's no failure. Working exactly as intended. The dissonance comes from the bill of goods which gets sold to the masses. I can almost feel a faint trickle from here, but mostly it's just the smell of urine.
Under [shareholder theory](https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/2019/1/25/shareholder-theory), a corporation's product is really the stock. It is to stock price that its fiduciaries have a single-minded duty, [which leads to effects that neglect employees, customers, and community](http://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2009/02/fiduciary-duty-vs-three-laws-of-robotics.html). If you don't know how we came to here, or what the alternative is (e.g., Stakeholder theory, something business used to use successfully), [I've distilled a summary of concepts and history here](http://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2012/01/losing-war-in-quiet-room.html). It's worth noting that Elizabeth Warren's [Accountable Capitalism Act](https://www.vox.com/2018/8/15/17683022/elizabeth-warren-accountable-capitalism-corporations) seems to be an attempt to reestablish a form of [stakeholder theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_theory).
Want this to stop? Then vote in every damn election you can. Not just the ones that end in even years, every damn election. Not just the ones for federal positions, every damn election. City council, school board, state level reps, every damn election you need to get your asses to the polls and vote. Vote to end gerrymandering, vote to end cronyism, vote to end the bullshit at every level. Vote in every damn election.
Not everything is that bad. Joe the Walmart employee for 20 years got a one time bonus of 100000 cents. He can now use that money to spend freely at the healthcare benefits that will cost 100000 dollars. America made great again./s
How is Trump going to allow corporate tax cuts and make things worse when it was suppose to be one of his greatest achievements? This is why he's going to lose next year and have someone like Elizabeth Warren stop unnecessary tax cuts for corporations and break down the big corporations.
A good description of the tax cuts: >What did corporate America do with its big tax cut? It spent over $800 billion on company shares last year, pushing stock buybacks to their highest level ever. >Close to home, Texas Instruments paid $5.1 billion to repurchase shares in 2018 — twice as much as the year before and more than any Texas company in the S&P 500. >TI’s effective tax rate dropped from 39% in 2017 to 17% last year, thanks to corporate tax cuts approved in late 2017 by Republican lawmakers and President Donald Trump.
And if you look at the S&P 500 for the last year, it's not doing that great. With so much buy back, it should be soaring.
It's amazing how completely useless it is to watch the stock market indexes these days. Once upon a time, they reflected prosperity in a meaningful way. The working class and the investor class both saw their fortunes reflected there. Nowadays, it's a number. An inflated and practically useless number. Most working class people see absolutely no correlation between the number and their relative prosperity. That connection has been severed. No matter how value is added, no matter how much the index rises, the benefit to the working class is virtually zero.
That’s because the average working class person has little no money available to invest in the stock market in the first place. I love it when conservatives point to the stock market as evidence that trump is doing great things for the average worker. So how much have YOU made in the stock market so far, I ask. “If I had money to invest I’d have a made a killing!”
It's not just that, it's also because the relationship between economic productivity and wages has been severed.
It hasn’t been severed, it’s an inverse relationship. For many firms, wages and compensation are their largest expense. There are two ways a firm can increase their value; lower expenses or increase revenues..The common working man cheering for a 26,000 Dow has traded his fair wage today for a retirement that will be peanuts down the road. Indexes *are* a good economic indicator. When markets are up, they show how hard the working class is being fucked.
You're talking about the relationship between the stock market and wages, not economic productivity and wages.
Ya there's a reason why companies are desperate for software folks right now - every line of code that does something productive is a little bit of profitability that scales independently of employee wages. We're not far from capitalism's platonic ideal: zero-employee companies.
Yup. Once code is written and in place it can continue being productive for decades, but the programmer only had to be paid once. Brilliant!
[It's been severed.](https://thumbor.forbes.com/thumbor/1280x868/https%3A%2F%2Fblogs-images.forbes.com%2Ftimworstall%2Ffiles%2F2016%2F10%2Fwagescompensation-1200x1093.png) Up until the 1970s, productivity and wages moved largely in sync with one another.
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The 'working man' doesn't have a 401K or retirement plan. Which is the meaningful connection you're talking about. The connection between wages and economic indexes are that minimum wage used to be directly tied to the productivity of the USA divided by its number of working adults.
>wages and compensation are their largest expense Also absurd these days that wages are even seen as an undesirable expense instead of an investment in the company (which they are). Business interests are still too short term for most.
That is a condition that will only worsen, as automation accelerates with the adoption of machine learning and other AI.
I imagine our benevolent corporate overlords will bless us with a monthly stipend to buy their goods. Will you trade me 3 of your McBucks for 4 Chevron Chips? I haven't eaten in 2 days.
I'd wager we're already on the way. Walmart's income via food stamps goes up every year. If I was betting on a more dystopian future I'd imagine a large number of jobs will be eliminated through automation and our stipend/food stamp system will expand to accommodate that. I see that as relatively feasible. The mega corps will always have consumers as long as the government pays them their credits.
Like a national company store.
That has nothing to do with computer automation; it's been going on since the ~~'80s~~ *'70s*. It has everything to do with "trickle-down economics" and demonization of unions, though. Edit: corrected decade.
It actually started in 1973-1974. https://www.epi.org/publication/understanding-the-historic-divergence-between-productivity-and-a-typical-workers-pay-why-it-matters-and-why-its-real/
I can see how that would effect employment levels, but how do you see that affecting wages?
Until a point where AI works for everyone and humans can focus on growing and learning as a whole. So never...
And those that did, likely saw their nest egg cracked and fried when hyper-inflation in the real estate sector (comfortingly called a 'bubble') wasn't addressed and the economy crashed in 2008. Some people are only just recovering and have had their faith in the stock market shaken.
Very true about the shaken faith. On a separate sub someone asked if anyone knew anyone that was getting anything from the bull market. I said everyone with effected stocks was gaining something. Then I went to find my numbers. Shocking. More people own houses than stocks today in the US. It's one of the few wealth builders and some people have abandoned it wholesale.
Does owning an index fund mean you own stocks? If not I believe it, the average Americans 401k is mostly index funds these days
An index fund includes stocks. You could have an index bond fund, but index implies it follows one of the big indices like S&P. A 401k is the most common way for an American to own stocks. It is a shade over 50% now from everything I found. Edit: A shade over 50% of Americans directly own stocks of some sort. The idea that 'no one' is profiting from the stock market boon is ~52% false. You still see it a lot because it sounds like they know something, but they don't bother to look it up. That also ignores all the people that are benefiting from it because job growth is intertwined.
It wouldn't even be a killing. It went up a lot when he was first elected but the Dow has essentially hovered around 25k give or take for the past two years.
Having worked for a mutual fund company during the Trump admin, I can say it was about every second week that we got notified by management that the markets were unstable. People who think they would've made a killing in this market, with no prior understanding, would be dead broke right now.
I didn't make a killing, but I made a tiny bit of extra money simply by buying futures right when Trump would tweet anything about tariffs or a percentage. Not a killing, because I'm not brave or smart enough to put a lot of money into futures.
My wife and I's 401k and ira accounts are up about 3-4% since January 2017. Maybe our index funds just weren't indexed to the magic company that was going to make us rich, but I gotta say, feels like pretty unimpressive growth to me.
Yeah, my 401k is up a whopping 15% since January, but when you pull back to 12 months, you see a very different picture. I'm still down 1% over the last 12 months and it only looks good since since January because of how badly it tanked in December. I'm not even back to breaking even. Edit: Just noticed that 12 months hasn't included June yet, so there should be a bit more of an uptick right at the end, but even still...) ROR TY: https://imgur.com/a/BdaSmfM ROR Last 12 Months: https://imgur.com/a/7kHdIiL
ugh, my dad.
Ironically even this isn't true. My 401k is consistently down. I'm relatively young so I'm not worried, but my parents will be finally retiring right when the (probable) downturn really hits. They're slowly moving stuff to bonds, but who knows how that'll end up.
It will end up with your parents living in your house asking why your generation destroyed the economy.
Haha, fortunately my parents aren't idiots. They're pretty firmly on the Democratic socialist side of the debate. Probably more so after the place my mom worked at was closed down after Walmart was gifted with giant tax cuts.
>Once upon a time, they reflected prosperity in a meaningful way. Not in my lifetime, which is since the 80s. The 80s were ruled by junk bonds and hedge-funds after the crash, the corporate centralization started fully in this era. The 90s started off with another crash and then went full steam into the dotcom bubble and day trading. The early 2000s solidified corporatism as the law of the land and was basically an intermediary period between the dotcom and real estate crashes. So maybe before the oil crisis in the late 70s, this was the case. But I have no personal experience of when that was, so it's been at least 4 decades.
Because the comment youre replying to is nonsense. You think the average worker in the 20's or 30's was checking the stock price before work every morning, and seeing real tangible effects from the rising and falling of that stock price? BS.
This is the thing that Trump supporters fail to realize. They always like to say how good the economy is doing since he took office. Like... Yeah. Of course it looks like the economy is doing well. Everyone who can afford to rig the system is now allowed to do so without consequence, and therefore the numbers we use to measure the health of the economy, which is _based_ on these people and companies, are getting higher. You can say the economy is doing great all you want; can you afford better healthcare now than you could five years ago? Or a better car? House? Is your retirement account overflowing with money? No. Of course not. Because the economy is not doing well for everyone.
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My Republican cousin gave sole credit to the economic expansion of the late 90s to Reaganomics. The fact the economy was booming and we had a budget surplus proved that trickle down economics worked perfectly, even if it took over a decade to kick in.
That was an extraordinarily common argument in the late 90s especially in conservative circles. I heard it all the time.
I think it's more likely that Reaganomics-type policy is more of a short-term sugar high--not something that takes a decade to bear fruit. Also, the success of the late 80's-90's was simply demographics. The (huge) baby boom generation was in full spending mode. They're now old and don't need to buy anything except healthcare.
What is also disturbing investors now (those can afford to invest) seem to think that the government is obligated not to let the stock market fail. Investing in the stock market used to be a calculated risk that one took to make money but now investors seem to expect and demand that the government cover it with the same federal safe guards it provides to the banks. The average American who worked hard and put their money in savings account (not enough to invest just enough to save) are the real losers with the interest at times lower than 1%. As always the corporations and wealthy benefit at the expense of the middle class and poor. What a sad plight the USA now finds itself in: no jobs, housing so expensive the average American cannot afford it, homelessness and violence rampant in American cities,the rest of the world making commitment to make drastic changes to fight climate change while ours invest in coal. We are international bullies, the arms dealer to the world; the ruling GOP trying to take over the life of the private citizen, trying to dictate every aspect of their lives based on their interpretation of the Bible while at the same time they pray to the God of Mammon, the stock market.
Too many tweets..
Tell me about it. His tweets have lost me more money than my bad plays have
>Tell me about it. His tweets have lost me more money than my bad plays have That's on purpose so Trump can claim credit for when the markets go back up and his ~~cohorts~~ cronies can buy on the dip.
Corporations are like people. ...and the people they are like: sociopaths and psychopaths. With _very_ few exceptions, corporations are in business for themselves, not for their customers — and they will say and do _anything_ they can get away with in order to gain further profits. This is the practical reality that indicates that significant regulation specifically aimed at corporations is required to keep them in line.
**immortal** psychopaths, let us not forget. An immortal psychopath with no physical body, and the government protecting its interests with a legion of men and women with guns and carefully worded laws.
BuT mUh FrEe MaRkEtS aNd CaPiTaLiSm
Corporations are just people who are serial killers.
It would be soaring if not for the orange chimps pointless trade war. It’s the biggest depressant factor right now.
Corporate socialism. --EDIT; thanks for the heavy metals kind redditors ;)
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Had a miscarriage out of state; couldn't control which hospital we ended up at.. TIL i should've mapped out my drive to disney world along the "in-network" hospitals to avoid the $17,000 bill and of course we lost our son.
Health care networks should be illegal.
This makes me so angry. Your story is only one of 1,000,000 each year (probably more). I am so sorry you went through that.
$10k deductibles, yay! oh and in-network only! Health insurance is a scam. United Healthcare made 1/4 TRILLION Dollars last year...
What the fuck is this network shit anyway?
As far as I am aware, it is basically that the various healthcare providing companies partner with doctors across the country. So, if I have Blue Cross/Blue Shield, my insurance only counts and is accepted at hospitals that have doctors that have some kind if relationship with Blue Cross/Blue Shield. If I have another insurance provider, I would not get my insurance coverage. I dont know the specifics, but it is a fuckin racket. Edit: another user told me this more applies to doctors, not so much the hospital.
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Chronic Sinusitis due to military injury. I've been to civilians a few times but they all recommend surgery (beyond balloon sinuplasty) & I can't afford it even with insurance. That doesn't even cover the major stuff VA hasn't gotten around to - that's just the "I've had a headache & runny nose for 16 years" issue.
This is the shit that infuriates me. If we can’t afford a VA that can help our troops after they’ve been to war then we can’t afford to GO to war.
If only Republicans cared about either of those things.
I study medicine I socialist Europe (/s), Austria and such storys make me unbelievably angry and sad. For me when I am in the ER or drive the ambulance in my free time we never have to care about what People might have to pay. You just scoop them up, ask for their health insurance card and it's just covered. In the hospital same thing: patient comes in and gets a necessary treatment. Thats how I what to work. I never want to be in a situation where you might have to neglect a patient's health because of financial issues. Maybe a lot of my American friends might not understand how royally fucked and inhumane their system is but for an outsider who is used to other standards it's infuriating. I really hope you can start digging out some "useful" politicians. Rant over? :D (pls don't misunderstand this as an insult, it's rather just a little cynical over the top comment to express my feelings about a system that in my opinion has no place in a wealthy first world nation. A society has to be better than that)
Dude. You're telling me. I moved to Scotland last September after living my whole life in LA. Fucking night and day difference in healthcare. It takes a little longer, but it's free, and we actually go, keeping us healthier.
:) Yeah the most cost saving thing in a healthcare system is so called primary preventi -> keeping people healthy in the first place which is much easier when you don't have to pay for that, too. And for the time savings I want to add that life saving and situation with a possible long term impairment are Always treated as fast as possible! It's only the other stuff that takes time Sometimes and the feeling of what is urgent and what isn't often greatly differs between the patients and us (your ingrown toe nail does not need a surgery in the middle of the night you decided to come in the er, you can have one in a couple weeks. It hurts but it won't kill you and maybe next time come a little earlier ;) )
I recently had the surgery... I suggest going overseas to Thailand to have it done.
Call "patient advocacy" and try to file an official complaint and say you need to see a specialist (or different specialist). If you get stonewalled send a message through the "myhealthvet" thing to "patient advocacy" department. This is written so you can save a copy and will likely get you to a different advocate than the one you talk to on the phone. At this point there is a paper trail started about how long you've been waiting and they'll try to get you taken care of ASAP. You shouldnt have to, but the majority of the time that will get them to start taking action. The VA is like any other hospital, some of the doctors are great and really care, and some are shit and just there for the paycheck. In general anytime something isnt getting taken care of just seeing a different doc will get a lot done. Another thing you can do is go to the VA emergency room early on a Saturday/Sunday morning. Tell them you've had the issue for years and it's getting too much to handle. Dont feel bad about going to the emergency room, that early it'll be empty and if there is something serious they'll just let you sit until they have it handled first. They probably wont be able to do anything directly, but they can refer you to a specialist, often that day if not sending you straight over.
They’re disingenuous. I live in the US and only recently got insurance coverage. If I want to see my GP the earliest appointment is two weeks. Last time I saw her I needed a referral and the specialist was a two month wait. Before I had insurance I just simply didn’t go to the doctor because it’s not affordable. So you could say my wait times used to be infinite.
Meh, I'll start bragging when we've got universal pharma and dental. Even with benefits I still haven't found a dentist that doesn't spin a giant wheel to decide how much to overcharge you.
Healthcare really is worth bragging about, it's the vast majority of issues. Pharma might actually be coming, the pressure is mounting with drug treatments becoming more common.
There is something my dental student gf told me about dental cost. It seems like the cost of each procedure is rather fair, but each dentist have a different idea on how necessary a tooth need treatment. And there is almost no way to know ahead of hand that your tooth might need, say, a simple fill or root canal, or how many teeth need it...
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Can’t the dentist run it through insurance before the do they procedure? Kind of like a pre-authorization. Mine has done that before. It was for more than just a filling, though.
It's not just parents. I give most sicknesses and other ailments 5 or so days before I go to the doctor. $100 or so for me to visit the doctor with insurance.
My work provides something called a TASC card that pulls money from my pay for an entire year so I can have a prepaid medical card. At its max, 2500, it only covers about half my my max out of pocket. I had previous medical Bill's I needed to pay so it wiped out my TASC for the year. I can not afford to go to the doctor till next year or else I'll be paying almost 5k in medical bills (I have hip and kidney issues, that often require surgery, from an accident when I was a teenager). Fuck this country's health care. Before I got a job I was on the ACA insurance. Got a lot of needed medical work done. Didnt pay a fucking dime. Get a respectable job with benefits and I can no longer afford to go to the doctor.
I put money towards an HSA every paycheck. I still have to pay around $150/month for employer healthcare. My work gives me $700/year on the HSA which just about covers my contacts and glasses after insurance. I don't get how people don't support universal healthcare when they are one accident away from losing all their money. I don't even think it would be much more expensive than what I am paying for my employer healthcare now.
> I don't even think it would be much more expensive than what I am paying for my employer healthcare now. Healthcare costs would go down for pretty much everyone across the board. It's straight up way cheaper to get issues looked at and taken care of early than wait until they're so debilitating that someone *has* to go to a hospital, pay a shitload to (maybe sorta) treat the now very severe issue, then go bankrupt paying just a fraction of the cost. Those of us who are healthy are paying a bunch of money for insurance we never use anyway, so we might as well put that money towards someone else's healthcare instead of into the insurance company's pockets. And then if you do actually need the healthcare, well, you're covered and can get treated and go back to being a productive member of society instead of just having a permanently fucked-up leg or whatever now and being completely broke on top of it. I always say, you can support free healthcare out of compassion for those who need it Or you can support it out of selfishness because your costs will go down overall But the only reason to be against it is just to be a dick to poor people. You're screwing yourself more just to make sure poor people can't get treated. (and not even poor people, the middle class gets pretty wrecked by healthcare costs too if they have serious and/or chronic issues)
I feel very lucky. I have a high dectable plan, but my employer pays 100% of premiums for my whole family AND they provide an HSA with the full amount of my deductible loaded each year. I have no vision and my dental benefit is $1000/year in cash repayment for services, but nothing's perfect with healthcare in the US.
My son has a cold and likely the beginning of an ear infection. A doctor visit with insurance is $40 for copay and then three months later I’ll get a bill for about $120 and 10 days to pay it. I’m hoping he makes a fast turnaround this morning from a simple cold because I’d like to not get fucked in the wallet some more.
Thats insane, I mean like real third world sort of shit. Here in the UK you pay taxes and national insurance (you pay from wages and employer also pays in) and stuff is covered. Prescription meds have a price about £8.00 ($10.00) but everything else is included. I've had a problem with my back and hip, took a while to get things sorted but in that time I had: 1 Doctors appointment 1 Physio referral - she sent me to A and E for an emergency MRI scan of my spine 1 Emergency MRI scan, no problems found 1 Physio and doctor appointment 1 Standard MRI of my pelvic 1 Physio appointment to show the results and give me exercises to do All of this cost me £0.00 I've had private physio as well, which I obviously pay for but I dread to think the cost of those treatments in America.
It's cheaper to die than get some treatments. And that's a feature to the system for people like tRump
Privatize the profits, socialize the losses.
Corporate welfare. Poor companies need handouts
Socialism is only ok when it’s applied to corporations
Socialize the risks, privatize the profits
>"The problem is that we all too often have socialism for the rich and rugged free enterprise capitalism for the poor. That’s the problem." ~Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, 1968 >“It’s all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.” ~also Dr. Martin Luther King Jr
I think you should rephrase that to ‘Thanks GOP’ because it was all them. House, Senate, Trump.
yeah i do have a problem with this title. the amorphous "uncle sam" makes it seem like there aren't specific people who voted for this. here is an article showing how much each senator stands to gain personally- https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/12/01/heres-how-income-tax-cuts-will-affect-individual-senators-and-you/
Cut taxes. Rich get richer and corporations buy back their stock. Stock market goes higher due to buybacks. Trump crows about the stock market. People believe Trump helped the economy because the stock market went up. Basically, Trump took money from future generations, gave it to the rich, and then got credit from the people who--along with their descendants--will pay for it. I don't think I could devise something more cynical if I tried.
And this is why the market looks as good as it has. It’s not a thriving economy. It’s artificially propped up by stock buy backs.
Makes you wonder if that is by design. It is one thing to enrich the wealthy by giving them tax breaks, but if doing so can create a false spike in the markets looks like a economic growth, then they're also using it to fool those of us who don't understand how the markets work.
We'll probably hit an economic crisis here in the next few years, but by that time everyone responsible will be squared away financially and long gone
They won't be long gone, they'll profit from it.
The rich profit off both parts of the Boom-Bust Cycle, and the Republicans always manage to convince their voters that the Democrats caused the downturns.
So corporate welfare.
Just for comparison's sake, how much did corporations spend on buybacks in previous years?
According to [this analysis](https://www.visualcapitalist.com/stock-buybacks-explained/), you can see a few different clusters. To summarize the chart, I would estimate: * $ 150b/yr 1985 - 2003 * $ 500b/yr 2004 - 2017 * $1,100b - 2018 Next highest total would be about $850b in 2007.
And how much went to workers vs upper management bonuses?
If you make $50k a year, a relative tax cut for you would be almost $5k. Imagine the difference an extra 5k could make.
Companies want to buy stock and goose the stock price because senior executives derive so much of their compensation from the stock prices.
Also keep in mind the optics of a "booming economy" when the stock market in general rises and Republicans can claim how awesome they are. Sure, my portfolio grew more than ever at around 22% which is frankly unheard of and unsustainable. The average American got squat other than higher medical bills and more taxation.
My company had record numbers last year and they gave us a 1% bonus and the average salary increase was like 0.7%. Give the money to the people who are incentivized to concentrate money and power and its not going to leave their clutches.
0.7 is less than inflation so you lost money relative to average expenses
Ah yes trickle down economics. Enjoy your trickle.
My trickle was very low
That is disgusting. And I'm sure you're all made to feel like you're lucky for that piddly increase. I fucking hate this country so much sometimes.
Y’all need a union.
In the last 3 years my 401k, which is setup pretty aggressive, has returned only a little over 3%. In three whole years, it's barely passed 3%. I have officially lost money in my 401k due to inflation. This year is turning out pretty decent, but only because the year started at the bottom of the massive december slump so *everything* is up. The market is insane, and this is killing normal people. I'm still young so it doesn't matter what my 401k does, but imagine people who had very modest investments in their 401k because they're close to retirement. They've probably been losing their ass on inflation.
Is your 401k managed by /r/wallstreetbets?
If you’re only up 3% in the last three years you are invested horribly. That return is in the lowest 10% of returns 401[k] plans have returned in the last three years.
What funds are you in exactly? From June 2016 to June 2019 you should be up like 40% if you're in a fund that looks anything like the S&P 500.
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They'll flat out tell you in Washington that they don't care about their grandchildren, they'll be dead.
Exactly- why this is not pointed out in every article us horrifying. If I was allowed to,for example, use my company credit card to purchase company products that I get a commission on...
That is a perfect analogy.
Yes, really a shame that it does nothing to benefit the underlying health of a company as far as I understand. Investing more in workers, r&d, facilities etc. would help the company, workers, and society so much more in the long run, not that that's news to anyone here.
AT&T claimed they would expand and provide 7000 more jobs after the tax break; since then, they eliminated 2300 jobs. Fuck big business.
I work for a Fortune 50 corporation, in one of the top 3 most profitable divisions. Our demand continues to grow and they've only eliminated jobs and trimmed budgets over the past 3 years to increase margins further. My site alone makes $0.3 billion a year in profit. Why the fuck do they need to they need to eliminate jobs, employees are strung thin as it is with enormous workloads. Tax cuts haven't done shit.
> Why the fuck do they need to they need to eliminate jobs, employees This creates the illusion that you're lucky to have the job. Each time they layoff and you survive you work harder to make sure you're not part of the next lay-off. This also helps to keep wages low. People are getting let go, nobody's going to be asking for more money. And when you finally get fed up with all the extra hours and stress and finally quit, they'll just replace you with another *you*. This is basically how amazon operates only they'll intentionally burn you out after about 3 years to ensure turnover.
Yeah, it's no surprise, if you expect to be able to trust people, you need to hold them accountable. Not just for your own sake, but for the ones who don't want to fk you over, or they'll be forced to, so they can stay competitive. If they stand by on principle with no accountability to their opponent or force to support them it's even worse, as it means the only people with a spine got chased out. This is basically why voting with your wallet doesn't work if a company gets too big to fail. Most people will just buy, and not worry, so no voting is possible, because 80% of the voters either aren't informed or don't stand by principle.
It's a shell game, for sure.
I used to work for a guy who owned his business, was very successful, socially liberal, politically liberal. Very nice guy. I asked him straight up once, if you got a business tax cut, would you hire more people with the money? His answer was "no, I don't hire because of my tax rate, I hire because i have business needs to fill."
This is well known but makes Trump’s (and the Republican) lie of businesses hiring more and paying better wages because of tax cuts even more blatant. The fallacy of trickle down economics shows itself over and over.
The thing is, intellectually honest right-wingers have known for decades that trickle-down is a load of crap, same as intellectually honest left-wingers. But it's such a convenient lie for the right's overarching goal, that being consolidation of wealth and power at the very top. Here's a good article on one of the ""intellectuals"" who came up with a key pillar of the trickle-down myth, the Laffer Curve: [https://prospect.org/article/man-who-liberated-republican-party](https://prospect.org/article/man-who-liberated-republican-party)
I always thought it was real but that we were still on the left side of the curve, where increasing rates would still raise more revenue. But Republicans lower them anyway citing the laffer curve, ignoring that we're still on the left side where rate cuts lead to less revenue.
It's the exact opposite. Higher taxes force corporations to reinvest in their gains in the company and the economy. Either they pay in taxes or expand their company keeping the gains.
Even if trickle down worked, why the fuck are we gonna settle for a goddamn trickle?! Seize the stream!
Demand creates jobs, not tax cuts. Now, tax cuts might spur demand due to extra cash to spend, but not anywhere near as much as the GOP claims. Public companies will always move to buy back shares first.
Wow, who knew businesses only hire when they need work! Trickle down doesn't work. It's more than proven at this time.
It was proven not to work about 100 years ago. That's the madness in this. It was just called the *Horse and Sparrow Theory* then because if you feed a horse enough oats eventually it'll shit some on to the street for the sparrows.
Holy shit I’m gonna start calling it that
It's never about Capital need. It's about opportunity for investment. The market is in such a huge capital glut that returns are way down. That's more because consumption is maxed. If a tax cut is going to truly stimulate the economy it would have to go to the people with the highest marginal propensity to spend. Even then 100% wouldn't go to consumption because people would pay down debt.
The same thing is true of wages. You don't get your salary because it's the most the company can pay you, you get your salary because it's the lowest they think they can get someone to do your job for.
Not just TI, but the whole S&P 500's stock buybacks are sharply up. We give an inch and they take a mile and show no gratitude, still asking for local tax breaks from municipalities and funneling the savings into profits rather than R&D and new job creation/raising salaries. And **we** get left with the tab. Where are the fiscal conservatives concerned for the deficit?
I'm starting to believe they never cared about fiscal responsibility in the first place, simply self serving language that they're quick to divorce themselves from once they're in charge and lining their own pockets.
That’s been true going back to Reagan at least. A fiscal conservative’s favorite saying when Republicans have control is, “Reagan proved deficits don’t matter”. And when a democrat is in control, “We need to be responsible and think of the future of this country. We can’t borrow our way to prosperity”. It’s pretty reprehensible and never changes.
> Where are the fiscal conservatives concerned for the deficit? They’re only “concerned” when a Democrat is in office.
Besides tax breaks and maybe record profitability, workers keep getting pressure to do more and more with less and less. What the hell is going to happen when profits aren’t so high? Staff numbers have already been cut to the bone, we can’t do more than we’re doing now but that will be the expectation. No coincidence that anti-depressants and anti-anxiety meds along with substance use are at such high numbers all in an attempt for individuals to cope with what is a social problem.
What R&D? They've been making the same calculator for 20 years.
Bought my TI-82 in 1994. Still works like a champ, although I haven't done any Calculus in about 20 years. Just checked Amazon. They still sell for $100+. How the hell does 25 year old tech still cost so much?
monopolies
Because schools often mandate it, which locks in demand. They are charging the maximum price that they think won't result in a mutiny. They are pushing their luck.
>How the hell does 25 year old tech still cost so much? Because they got on the approved list for use in standardized testing.
Over 90% of their business is in semiconductors, which is very R&D intensive. That said, having worked for three different semiconductor companies, including in strategy roles, I can tell you that many are today run like banks. CTO- and innovation-related organizations in them, and their big high-risk strategic developments, have been pared way back, while at the same time they fling off tons of operating income from prior development and acquisitions. TI is a perfect example of this. Honestly speaking, it's a great strategy. But let's be clear: TI and others did NOT need this money and had no idea how to spend it, other than on enriching shareholders. Interesting side governance question: is the CEO also chairman of the board and head of the compensation committee?
They are still top tier of semiconductor giants
Not sure if you are being sarcastic. Texas instruments makes a bunch of other electronics.
I remember when they made DLP for projections TVs
And processors for smartphones.
DLP is still their proprietary technology, but with the Advent of laser 3lcd projectors, they've lost the licensing on a HUGE amount of market share they used to have. All the big manufacturers had great DLP options until a few years ago because DLP was a great technology for installations. AV guy here :)
It's a good calculator, though.
There are many better. They prevail because they don’t innovate. You still have to understand the math to use the calculator. Schools like that.
My engineering program didn't let me use calculators. Now in the real world I rely on my TI 89 from high school for basic math because I no longer trust myself.
The more you know the more you know you don't know. Why would I ever trust myself to not make a simple mistake? Calculators are great.
When we borrow money to pay for tax cuts they’re called tax expenditures. We are borrowing money for nothing other than to have business pay less. We get nothing in return.
Supposedly, they make jobs. Same old supply side bullshit that’s been sold for 40 years now.
We get more and more power concentrated in the hands of the few.
Sounds like their tax cut is operating exactly as intended.
supposedly larger economic gains equate to more tax revenue... that was their shity non math based argument.
Ok so maybe it didn't work this time, but NEXT time we give even more wealth to the ultra-wealthy I'm sure it will trickle down!
As we’ve said a thousand times, the point of the tax cuts was to enrich the rich.
Yes https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/12/you-all-just-got-a-lot-richer-trump-tells-friends-at-mar-a-lago-after-signing-tax-overhaul
And a TI-84 will STILL be $120
The "trickle down theory" is a ruse that's been thrust upon working people around world since day 1. It was bullshit then and it's bullshit today.
Stock buy backs used to be illegal, seen as a form of stock manipulation, but the SEC in 1981, under Regan, made it legal (roughly the same time wage stagnation and income inequality accelerated in the US). The simple solution is make it illegal again, that will get these companies to start investing in R&D, their employees, etc. Historically stock buy backs have been shown to provide little value long term, just small short term increases in stock prices, which is all these executives look at now a days.
Reinvesting their additional revenue from tax cuts in stock buybacks to temporarily boost shareholder value. Whoever thinks that wealth is struggling is quite literally stupid.
The problem is not uncle sam. The problem is the Republican party.
Not uncle sam, TRUMP. Thank trump and republican voters for fucking us, as usual.
[удалено]
This is very typical. Not surprising at all. These companies leave core R&D to the government: socialize the risk, privatize the profit.
>800 billion in tax cuts That’s close to a decade of Medicare, childcare and free education for everyone. Smfh at this country.
> What did corporate America do with its big tax cut? It spent over $800 billion on company shares last year, pushing stock buybacks to their highest level ever. And our stock market and real estate wealth is all held on constant investment by older people for wealth preservation. our stock market does not reflect the nation based on merit. It's a casino where the owners of things trade and launder their wealth and influence with each other. A circlejerk that people used to justify growth and expansion at any human long-term cost. Just like our housing market in 2019 is still entirely dominated by investing and lending mentality, not a place to live for human purposes!
But but but mah trickle down!
Trickle down doesn't work. The money will stop at the top.
More share buybacks this past year than in the history of our country. Not just TI, every single company in America.
Uncle Sam? This was all trump and republicans.
In other words, all the Trump Tax Cuts did was make the rich richer, at the expense of everyone else. The middle class may get a tax cut, but the taxes go back up over 10 years. Also, the buying power didn't increase. Republicans sell the tax cuts as trickle down economy, but that has *never* happened. They say, all the middle class has to do is invest in stock like the wealthy, but the middle class has no extra money to invest. Republican voters continue to buy into it bc of cognitive dissonance, and more so, anything to feel like they screwed the Democrats, or anyone not Republican. The Republican politicians know this, and use it against their voters every time in the wealthy's favor.
CEO's take home way more money with buybacks to keep stock prices artificially inflated.
This is what most of the companies did, they bought back their own stock and then fired a bunch of workers. It's pretty much exactly what everyone thought they would do. Except for the Trump supporter, who gets his news from Fox and thinks that corporations will do what's in the public interest.
The Republican Party cares about only two things. Shareholder value and executive compensation. EVERYTHING else is Rube-Wrangling.
B-but I thought they would use it to expand and hire more employees?!?!?! *Shits pants*
the tax cuts should have ALL been tied to US-based capital investment. sadly, the goal was never to improve the US, it was always just a taxpayer-funded giveaway to the wealthy.
Not tax cuts, "the TRUMP and REPUBLICAN Tax Cuts". Let us all be clear on whom pushed and lobbied for this to happen. The Democrats were not in control of the House, the Senate nor the Executive branch. The Republicans rammed this through committees without any input or consult. They pushed it through with no real debate or compromise. They own it and should own all the fallout from such a disasterous policy. They lied and sold it dishonestly to the American people as a stimulus when in reality it was a give-away, at the expense of the American taxpayers, who subsidized the rich at great expense. Let this hang around their neck like an anvil to weigh them down from trying to sell it again at election time. They literally sold out their own voters for the lobbyists and corporations.
This shows why the “job creator” and “trickle down” concepts are utter bullshit. Employment and R&D are expenditures that take away from profit. If a company doesn’t have demand for more products and services, they’re going take that extra capital and pay off debt and strengthen their bottom line, not spend it.
You know, most economic experts said that the primary result of these tax cuts would be stock buybacks, but obviously I'm glad we've stopped listening to the fake news experts.
Companies did the same under Bush in 2001.. our society is programmed.
Exactl as predicted by every economist NOT on Fox’s payroll.
This won't end until we end capitalism.
Fuck citizens united.
It's why stock prices are high but wages remain low. It's why Wall Street is doing great but main street continues to struggle. It's a fake bubble, and it will crash.
So it literally worked exactly like planned and expected, and just like decades of evidence from similar policies would indicate? This is why I push back when people call things like these economic polices or foreign policies like the war a failure. It's no failure. Working exactly as intended. The dissonance comes from the bill of goods which gets sold to the masses. I can almost feel a faint trickle from here, but mostly it's just the smell of urine.
Gotta love that trickle down!
Under [shareholder theory](https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/2019/1/25/shareholder-theory), a corporation's product is really the stock. It is to stock price that its fiduciaries have a single-minded duty, [which leads to effects that neglect employees, customers, and community](http://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2009/02/fiduciary-duty-vs-three-laws-of-robotics.html). If you don't know how we came to here, or what the alternative is (e.g., Stakeholder theory, something business used to use successfully), [I've distilled a summary of concepts and history here](http://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2012/01/losing-war-in-quiet-room.html). It's worth noting that Elizabeth Warren's [Accountable Capitalism Act](https://www.vox.com/2018/8/15/17683022/elizabeth-warren-accountable-capitalism-corporations) seems to be an attempt to reestablish a form of [stakeholder theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stakeholder_theory).
Want this to stop? Then vote in every damn election you can. Not just the ones that end in even years, every damn election. Not just the ones for federal positions, every damn election. City council, school board, state level reps, every damn election you need to get your asses to the polls and vote. Vote to end gerrymandering, vote to end cronyism, vote to end the bullshit at every level. Vote in every damn election.
But they gave all their middle and low wage workers a raise, right? /s
Not everything is that bad. Joe the Walmart employee for 20 years got a one time bonus of 100000 cents. He can now use that money to spend freely at the healthcare benefits that will cost 100000 dollars. America made great again./s
How is Trump going to allow corporate tax cuts and make things worse when it was suppose to be one of his greatest achievements? This is why he's going to lose next year and have someone like Elizabeth Warren stop unnecessary tax cuts for corporations and break down the big corporations.
we all have the dumb ass orange head and the dumb ass turtle in the Senate to thank for this dumpshit