Tuesday 12 March 2019
Photo:
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Monica Crowley, Washington Times senior columnist, and Fox News; Christopher Nixon Cox, nonresident Fellow at the Liechtenstein Institute at Princeton; in Azerbaijan .
SPONSORED BY SCALA.COM
Hour One
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 1, Block A: Liz Peek, The Hill, and Fox News; in re: Federal income is up 10%. The Fed action seems to have been overly aggressive in raising rates a lot last year, resulting in a slowdown (“mini-recession”) at the end of 2018, exacerbated a bit by the govt shutdown, and uncertainty about trade; but most think it’ll pick up in the next two quarters. Despite the new-jobs number of only 20,000, we're almost at full employment. During the last presidency, businesses were not investing in capital goods; but under Trump, immediate depreciation of capital purchases and a virtuous circle. Substantial revisions have been made to all the data of the last few weeks; let’s see what [shakes out]. Chris Cox: The Green New Deal – what are they thinking? Not just the Democrats; it's also the media. China is also a problem: it's really slowed; has accounted for about 30% of global growth over the last decade. Need to solve this; and today a vote on Brexit.
In Beijing, you see that the leaders are worried about what’s happening there. Again, for the moment the US is [economically] the only game in town. The sea fog on the Caspian comes in not on little cat feet but like a lion.
Sky-high taxes have many critics — including AOC's mother / BY LIZ PEEK, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR, THE HILL
New York has become a veritable “roach motel” — easy to get in but nearly impossible to get out. That’s bad news for the thousands trying to flee the ever-more expensive and high-taxed state.
The latest New Yorker to flee is none other than the mother of the left's progressive darling, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). Bianca Ocasio-Cortez (BOC) apparently does not see eye to eye with her daughter about the virtues (and high taxes) of socialism, at least when it knocks on her door.
BOC bailed on the state recently, explaining, “I was paying $10,000 a year in real estate taxes up north. I’m paying $600 a year in Florida. It’s stress-free down here.” That commonsense message may not yet have percolated through to AOC, who may wonder why her mom's phone number now has a Florida area code.
BOC really needs to have a chat with her daughter about real-life economics, like supply and demand, and how if you drive up the cost of something, like labor, you’ll drive down demand. Which is why arbitrarily raising the minimum wage, for instance, so often turns out to hurt the very workers it is meant to help.
It also explains how high taxes can drive people to move, and take their marbles with them.
BOC is but one of tens of thousands who have decamped from New York. The Empire State ranked first in the nation in population loss last year, as over 48,000 people said sayonara to the steady increase in Albany’s tax grab.
It is not the first year that New York, which also ranks among the top 10 highest-taxed states in the union, has seen an exodus of residents, especially among the wealthy.
BOC is not a high earner, but many others moving out of the state are those paying not only high real estate taxes, but also high state income taxes, which are no longer totally deductible under the new tax law passed in 2017.
Those moving to Florida are also fleeing New York’s estate tax, which allows the state to grab 16 percent on estates valued at more than $5.5 million. Florida has zero income taxes and no estate tax. For millionaires and billionaires it is a good place to live ... and die.
The 42nd “National Movers Study” conducted by United Van Lines reported earlier this year that of the folks departing New York, more than 41 percent earned over $150,000 per year, while only 8 percent had incomes below $50,000.
Since the top 1 percent of earners in New York pay 46 percent of all income taxes, the exodus of deep-pocketed residents is a serious threat to the state’s already shaky fiscal outlook.
It’s not easy to escape. Talk to wealthy people about leaving the state, and you’ll find there is a thriving cottage industry of lawyers and tax accountants advising on how to elude the grip of New York tax collectors.
The city and the state are becoming ever-more aggressive in demanding proof of residency. If you keep a house in New York, a long-forgotten Social Security box or have a doctor you see once a year, you may well find your claim to Florida residency challenged.
CNBC recently reported that New York conducted roughly 3,000 “non-residency” audits annually between 2010 and 2017, yielding a haul of about $1 billion from taxpayers who failed to prove their case.
Investigators for the state, according to the report, review cell phone records, dentist records and have even been known to check out refrigerator contents to see whether someone is actually living where they say they are. Nearly everyone leaving New York for Florida can expect an audit, according to CNBC.
It’s no wonder the state is so aggressive. Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) recently announced a $2.3 billion revenue shortfall for December and January. Last year, as revenues began to sink, he blamed the weather. Now he says the new limits on (state and local tax) SALT deductions are responsible for the state’s fiscal woes.
Cuomo fails to take any responsibility for a steadily rising budget, which incorporates ever-greater benefits for people in the country illegally, higher pay for public employee unions, free college tuition and a cornucopia of other goodies handed out by legislators but paid for by a dwindling number of taxpayers.
At some point, the public balks.
New York has also persistently made it more expensive to do business in the state, demanding higher minimum wages and expensive benefits such as parental leave.
he hostility toward employers, personified by AOC, who helped drive Amazon to abandon its plans for a second headquarters based in NYC, is dangerous.
Not only does the state need to attract businesses to create jobs and opportunities for residents, but it also needs the taxes generated by firms, or the burden on individuals will only escalate.
Meanwhile, progressive politicians like AOC ignore these realities and are proposing ever-more costly national programs like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. They ignore reality and common sense. Just as residents of New York can pull up stakes, so can wealthy individuals choose which country they want to live in.
AOC earned a degree in economics from Boston University. Maybe instead of swallowing whole the kind of leftist theory taught on college campuses today, she should have that heart-to-heart with her mom. She might actually learn something useful.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 1, Block B: Liz Peek, The Hill, and Fox News; in re: Elizabeth Warren, up against Kamala Harris and Corey Booker, is like the kid in the back of the class waving her hand to be noticed. She’s aiming to be a trust-buster; how’s that working out? Europe is ahead of the US in regulating the tech behemoths. A growing dread here, esp as people listen to AOC making wild, unsubstantiated charges about capitalism. Her colleagues are scared of her; I’ve been slammed by her twitter fans. I find her alarming. We started with Obamacare and now have Medicare for all.
Winston Churchill, 1945: “You start with socialism, end up with the Gestapo.”
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 1, Block C: Monica Crowley, Christopher Nixon Cox, in re: Soviet architecture in Azerbaijan: plundered the country for agriculture and wine. Yesterday we discovered a mass grave of mass-murder by Bolsheviks; it was hidden for a century out of deep shame. Today the glamourization of socialism by AOC and her associates in the US. Because human beings inherently have different strengths and weaknesses; the only way to enforce absolute equality is at the barrel of a gun, as it does not exist in Nature. Among everyone who’s lived under socialism, they're running away from it as fast as they can. Why is a small group of Americans talking about it? You’re right, Monica: it’s about governmental control. Among Americans, chit-chat about socialism is not about serving people but about control: an elite ruling class. The state is supposed to wither away – but thanks to human nature it never does.
Yesterday’s trip to Daghestan: the roads were broken. Here, they actually enforce their borders. Trucks pass thr0ugh a gate that opens and closes for each truck. A neutral zone, then the river, then a Russian zone. This is a small border crossing; people have lived here for 10,000 years; just taking sensible precautions. Try to imagine a caravan approaching this border!
Dust off Adam Smith! American youth don’t even know what socialism means – they certainly don't want to be under government control. The first hundred people at Microsoft or Amazon are called The Party – and it’s permanent. You never get in.
Russia is not developing, while Azerbaijan is. Theory is that its foreign policy of the last decade has been designed to cover up the economic problems by taking territory back. The new expansionism shows that Putin understands that there’s weakness at home. The nomenklatura is now the oligarchy? The entire Russian system is designed to keep [the upper strata] from killing each other; the KGB [FSB] runs the country. Imagine a Muslim Facebook – will it start here in Baku?
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 1, Block D: Emmanuele Ottolenghi, FDD; in re: Venezuela crisis. US has withdrawn its staff form the embassy in Caracas. Years of incompetent mismanagement coupled with corruption and graft have left the country in shambles; growing humanitarian crisis with a lack of freedom; a human wave of refugees, esp skilled workers, The Regime now has everything crumbling, lack the skills or resources to fix. Expect things to get worse. Venezuelans are now going to sewerage pipes to get water. Ultimately, can the opposition maintain the pressure either to push Maduro and kleptocrats to leave, or to get the military to remove him?
Look at Russia and China there, trying to snuff out the US shale revolution. If the country [is freed], hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of business will flow in in the next few years. Recall that Iran is a major stakeholder there with Russia, China and Cuba. Prepare for a long game; no happy resolution in the days to come. To bring Venezuela back online to full production . . . will take yeas to rebuild the country and its infrastructure. A long trail of misery.
Heard that the regime is keeping Maduro for lack of a Number Two; but mainly because they’re all likely to fall together; and none of the regimes behind this one wants this regime to go because they realize that Venezuela will turn to the US.
Hour Two
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 2, Block A: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; American Committee for East-West Accord; author: War with Russia?; Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War, & The Victims Return: Survivors of the Gulag after Stalin; in re: Russian culture in Asia; and also the last moments of the Mueller fairy tale. The considerable dangers of demonizing Russia in this new cold war.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 2, Block B: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; American Committee for East-West Accord; author: War with Russia?; Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War, & The Victims Return: Survivors of the Gulag after Stalin; in re: Russian culture in Asia; and also the last moments of the Mueller fairy tale. The considerable dangers of demonizing Russia in this new cold war.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 2, Block C: Bill Whalen, Area 45 podcast from the Hoover Institution; in re: US politics and Joe Biden.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 2, Block D: Bill Whalen, Area 45 podcast from the Hoover Institution; in re: US politics; Bernie Sanders and the weakness of the Democratic field. . . . Hamlet on the Hudson, Andy Cuomo. Hickenlooper. Beto O’Rourke. Bernie Sanders presents history falsely — in order to paper over monsters! Will we entertain a candidate from major political party who ________. . . . Americans want to support someone who creates jobs in the private sector.
SPONSORED BY SCALA.COM
Hour Three
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 3, Block A: Liz Peek, The Hill, and Fox News; in re: Federal income is up 10%. The Fed action seems to have been overly aggressive in raising rates a lot last year, resulting in a slowdown (“mini-recession”) at the end of 2018, exacerbated a bit by the govt shutdown, and uncertainty about trade; but most think it’ll pick up in the next two quarters. Despite the new-jobs number of only 20,000, we're almost at full employment. During the last presidency, businesses were not investing in capital goods; but under Trump, immediate depreciation of capital purchases and a virtuous circle. Substantial revisions have been made to all the data of the last few weeks; let’s see what [shakes out]. Chris Cox: The Green New Deal – what are they thinking? Not just the Democrats; it's also the media. China is also a problem: it's really slowed; has accounted for about 30% of global growth over the last decade. Need to solve this; and today a vote on Brexit.
In Beijing, you see that the leaders are worried about what’s happening there. Again, for the moment the US is [economically] the only game in town. The sea fog on the Caspian comes in not on little cat feet but like a lion.
Sky-high taxes have many critics — including AOC's mother / BY LIZ PEEK, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR, THE HILL
New York has become a veritable “roach motel” — easy to get in but nearly impossible to get out. That’s bad news for the thousands trying to flee the ever-more expensive and high-taxed state.
The latest New Yorker to flee is none other than the mother of the left's progressive darling, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). Bianca Ocasio-Cortez (BOC) apparently does not see eye to eye with her daughter about the virtues (and high taxes) of socialism, at least when it knocks on her door.
BOC bailed on the state recently, explaining, “I was paying $10,000 a year in real estate taxes up north. I’m paying $600 a year in Florida. It’s stress-free down here.” That commonsense message may not yet have percolated through to AOC, who may wonder why her mom's phone number now has a Florida area code.
BOC really needs to have a chat with her daughter about real-life economics, like supply and demand, and how if you drive up the cost of something, like labor, you’ll drive down demand. Which is why arbitrarily raising the minimum wage, for instance, so often turns out to hurt the very workers it is meant to help.
It also explains how high taxes can drive people to move, and take their marbles with them.
BOC is but one of tens of thousands who have decamped from New York. The Empire State ranked first in the nation in population loss last year, as over 48,000 people said sayonara to the steady increase in Albany’s tax grab.
It is not the first year that New York, which also ranks among the top 10 highest-taxed states in the union, has seen an exodus of residents, especially among the wealthy.
BOC is not a high earner, but many others moving out of the state are those paying not only high real estate taxes, but also high state income taxes, which are no longer totally deductible under the new tax law passed in 2017.
Those moving to Florida are also fleeing New York’s estate tax, which allows the state to grab 16 percent on estates valued at more than $5.5 million. Florida has zero income taxes and no estate tax. For millionaires and billionaires it is a good place to live ... and die.
The 42nd “National Movers Study” conducted by United Van Lines reported earlier this year that of the folks departing New York, more than 41 percent earned over $150,000 per year, while only 8 percent had incomes below $50,000.
Since the top 1 percent of earners in New York pay 46 percent of all income taxes, the exodus of deep-pocketed residents is a serious threat to the state’s already shaky fiscal outlook.
It’s not easy to escape. Talk to wealthy people about leaving the state, and you’ll find there is a thriving cottage industry of lawyers and tax accountants advising on how to elude the grip of New York tax collectors.
The city and the state are becoming ever-more aggressive in demanding proof of residency. If you keep a house in New York, a long-forgotten Social Security box or have a doctor you see once a year, you may well find your claim to Florida residency challenged.
CNBC recently reported that New York conducted roughly 3,000 “non-residency” audits annually between 2010 and 2017, yielding a haul of about $1 billion from taxpayers who failed to prove their case.
Investigators for the state, according to the report, review cell phone records, dentist records and have even been known to check out refrigerator contents to see whether someone is actually living where they say they are. Nearly everyone leaving New York for Florida can expect an audit, according to CNBC.
It’s no wonder the state is so aggressive. Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) recently announced a $2.3 billion revenue shortfall for December and January. Last year, as revenues began to sink, he blamed the weather. Now he says the new limits on (state and local tax) SALT deductions are responsible for the state’s fiscal woes.
Cuomo fails to take any responsibility for a steadily rising budget, which incorporates ever-greater benefits for people in the country illegally, higher pay for public employee unions, free college tuition and a cornucopia of other goodies handed out by legislators but paid for by a dwindling number of taxpayers.
At some point, the public balks.
New York has also persistently made it more expensive to do business in the state, demanding higher minimum wages and expensive benefits such as parental leave.
he hostility toward employers, personified by AOC, who helped drive Amazon to abandon its plans for a second headquarters based in NYC, is dangerous.
Not only does the state need to attract businesses to create jobs and opportunities for residents, but it also needs the taxes generated by firms, or the burden on individuals will only escalate.
Meanwhile, progressive politicians like AOC ignore these realities and are proposing ever-more costly national programs like Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. They ignore reality and common sense. Just as residents of New York can pull up stakes, so can wealthy individuals choose which country they want to live in.
AOC earned a degree in economics from Boston University. Maybe instead of swallowing whole the kind of leftist theory taught on college campuses today, she should have that heart-to-heart with her mom. She might actually learn something useful.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 3, Block B: Liz Peek, The Hill, and Fox News; in re: Elizabeth Warren, up against Kamala Harris and Corey Booker, is like the kid in the back of the class waving her hand to be noticed. She’s aiming to be a trust-buster; how’s that working out? Europe is ahead of the US in regulating the tech behemoths. A growing dread here, esp as people listen to AOC making wild, unsubstantiated charges about capitalism. Her colleagues are scared of her; I’ve been slammed by her twitter fans. I find her alarming. We started with Obamacare and now have Medicare for all.
Winston Churchill, 1945: “You start with socialism, end up with the Gestapo.”
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 3, Block C: Monica Crowley, Christopher Nixon Cox, in re: Soviet architecture in Azerbaijan: plundered the country for agriculture and wine. Yesterday we discovered a mass grave of mass-murder by Bolsheviks; it was hidden for a century out of deep shame. Today the glamourization of socialism by AOC and her associates in the US. Because human beings inherently have different strengths and weaknesses; the only way to enforce absolute equality is at the barrel of a gun, as it does not exist in Nature. Among everyone who’s lived under socialism, they're running away from it as fast as they can. Why is a small group of Americans talking about it? You’re right, Monica: it’s about governmental control. Among Americans, chit-chat about socialism is not about serving people but about control: an elite ruling class. The state is supposed to wither away – but thanks to human nature it never does.
Yesterday’s trip to Daghestan: the roads were broken. Here, they actually enforce their borders. Trucks pass thr0ugh a gate that opens and closes for each truck. A neutral zone, then the river, then a Russian zone. This is a small border crossing; people have lived here for 10,000 years; just taking sensible precautions. Try to imagine a caravan approaching this border!
Dust off Adam Smith! American youth don’t even know what socialism means – they certainly don't want to be under government control. The first hundred people at Microsoft or Amazon are called The Party – and it’s permanent. You never get in.
Russia is not developing, while Azerbaijan is. Theory is that its foreign policy of the last decade has been designed to cover up the economic problems by taking territory back. The new expansionism shows that Putin understands that there’s weakness at home. The nomenklatura is now the oligarchy? The entire Russian system is designed to keep [the upper strata] from killing each other; the KGB [FSB] runs the country. Imagine a Muslim Facebook – will it start here in Baku?
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 3, Block D: Emmanuele Ottolenghi, FDD; in re: Venezuela crisis. US has withdrawn its staff form the embassy in Caracas. Years of incompetent mismanagement coupled with corruption and graft have left the country in shambles; growing humanitarian crisis with a lack of freedom; a human wave of refugees, esp skilled workers, The Regime now has everything crumbling, lack the skills or resources to fix. Expect things to get worse. Venezuelans are now going to sewerage pipes to get water. Ultimately, can the opposition maintain the pressure either to push Maduro and kleptocrats to leave, or to get the military to remove him?
Look at Russia and China there, trying to snuff out the US shale revolution. If the country [is freed], hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of business will flow in in the next few years. Recall that Iran is a major stakeholder there with Russia, China and Cuba. Prepare for a long game; no happy resolution in the days to come. To bring Venezuela back online to full production . . . will take yeas to rebuild the country and its infrastructure. A long trail of misery.
Heard that the regime is keeping Maduro for lack of a Number Two; but mainly because they’re all likely to fall together; and none of the regimes behind this one wants this regime to go because they realize that Venezuela will turn to the US.
Hour Four
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 4, Block A: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; American Committee for East-West Accord; author: War with Russia?; Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War, & The Victims Return: Survivors of the Gulag after Stalin; in re: Russian culture in Asia; and also the last moments of the Mueller fairy tale. The considerable dangers of demonizing Russia in this new cold war.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 4, Block B: Stephen F. Cohen, NYU & Princeton professor Emeritus; American Committee for East-West Accord; author: War with Russia?; Soviet Fates and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War, & The Victims Return: Survivors of the Gulag after Stalin; in re: Russian culture in Asia; and also the last moments of the Mueller fairy tale. The considerable dangers of demonizing Russia in this new cold war.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 4, Block C: Bill Whalen, Area 45 podcast from the Hoover Institution; in re: US politics and Joe Biden.
Tuesday 12 March 2019 / Hour 4, Block D: Bill Whalen, Area 45 podcast from the Hoover Institution; in re: US politics; Bernie Sanders and the weakness of the Democratic field. . . . Hamlet on the Hudson, Andy Cuomo. Hickenlooper. Beto O’Rourke. Bernie Sanders presents history falsely — in order to paper over monsters! Will we entertain a candidate from major political party who ________. . . . Americans want to support someone who creates jobs in the private sector.