Tax Man and the Moochers

So today's the day we all sit around complaining about how much we have to pay in taxes to support those lazy good-for-nothing moochers who live the good life on the government's dime. You know, these guys:

On tax day, when millions of American taxpayers and small businesses pay their fair share to support critical public services and the economy, they will also get stuck with a multi-billion dollar tax bill to cover the massive subsidies and tax breaks that benefit the country’s largest employer and richest family. 

Walmart is the largest private employer in the United States,1 with 1.4 million employees.2 The company, which is number one on the Fortune 500 in 2013 and number two on the Global 500,3 had $16 billion in profits last year on revenues of $473 billion.4 The Walton family, which owns more than 50 percent of Walmart shares,5 reaps billions in annual dividends from the company.6 The six Walton heirs are the wealthiest family in America, with a net worth of $148.8 billion.7 Collectively, these six Waltons have more wealth than 49 million American families combined.8 

This report finds that the American public is providing enormous tax breaks and tax subsidies to Walmart and the Walton family, further boosting corporate profits and the family’s already massive wealth at everyone else’s expense. 

The whole report is worth reading, although it is guaranteed to make you angry. The crazy thing is this doesn't begin to take into account all of the ways the Waltons benefit at our expense. The report only focuses on the taxes they avoid paying, and the way we subsidize their low-paid workforce, but what about all of the extra services they use (that they clearly aren't paying for)?

How many times do you use the police each year compared to Wal-Mart stores across the country. Access the court system much? Wal-Mart does on a daily basis. Their trucks use our roads; their container ships use our ports; they get great value when we sign trade agreements allowing them to import cheap goods from China. They over-consume every one of these "common goods," profit handsomely from them, and then do not come close to paying their share of taxes, while underpaying their workers so the rest of us get stuck making up the difference.  

Next time a right-wing relative starts talking about the makers and takers, share this report with them so they can see who the real moochers are.

From Whence We Came

"Whenever I find myself going grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off -- then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me." 

                     Herman Melville, Moby Dick

Here I sat of a morning or an evening, and merely breathed the salt and sticky air, and listened to the ceaseless and ever-changing susurrations of the waves. And it was good.

Things you see in South Carolina

From the Constitution of the State of South Carolina:

SECTION 2. Religious freedom; freedom of speech; right of assembly and petition. 

The General Assembly shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . . .

From the South Carolina Dept. of Motor Vehicles:

The www.IBelieveSC.net plate is available for private passenger vehicles and trucks with an empty weight of 9,000 pounds or less and a gross vehicle weight of 11,000 pounds or less. The biennial fee for the plate is $25.00 every two years in addition to the regular registration fee of $24.00. Proceeds from the sale of this plate are used to support faith-based educational and religious programs.  

Love that this is on a Lexus. It could have only been more perfect if they hadn't yet scraped off their Romney for President bumper sticker.

Relatively Recently Read (sort of)

I used to be someone who had to finish a book once I started it. Then I realized life is too short to spend my precious free time reading something I don't want to be reading. I am really glad I had this epiphany before picking up David Foster Wallace's The Pale King.

I knew nothing about the book before I started it, and as I began reading I thought, "hmmmm, this is really kind of dull." Then I started thinking, "Okay, it's clear this guy is writing a dull book on purpose. Interesting in a conceptual way, I suppose, but I hope this picks up, because reading a dull book isn't really that much fun." Then I got pissed off because it started feeling hostile to me that someone would write over 500 pages of dullness for readers to have to slog through. Then I said "fuck this" and put the book down.

Shortly after my attempted slog, I watched a video made from part of a commencement speech Wallace gave at Kenyon College in 2005, and realized I was right in thinking Wallace inflicted this boredom on us on purpose. As he (quite engagingly, I must say) lays out in the speech, life is generally one long, hard, boring slog, and how we respond to those moments of dullness and disconnection is what's going to save us (or not, in Wallace's case). But the thing is, I don't want a novel to be a boring object lesson. I get enough tedium in my real life, not to want to invite more of it in. I don't need the books I read to serve as an escape, necessarily, but I also don't want them to be a needlessly difficult struggle, simply so I can say I made it through to the other side and some sort of artificial grace.

Vay-Cay

Getting away for the weekend with a good friend. Posting will be light or nonexistent through Sunday.

Large and sincere thanks to the husband for making an escape possible, although, as he well knows, it is ultimately in his best interest. When Mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

"Petulant Children"

I got a nice chuckle when I opened the mailbox today:

Then I went to the New Yorker site to download the image and got an even bigger laugh:

“This whole enterprise was just an elaborate excuse,” says Barry Blitt about his cover for this week’s issue. “I enjoyed drawing Ted Cruz, John Boehner, and Michele Bachmann as petulant children—and I especially wanted to draw an open-mouthed Mitch McConnell being spoon-fed his meds.”

Vermont - Who Knew?

Sarah Kliff at Vox has a really interesting piece about the move to single-payer healthcare in Vermont.  I had no idea this was going on up there.

Vermont prides itself on passing bills first. It was the first state to abolish slavery in 1777 and, in more recent history, pioneered same-sex civil unions with a 2000 law. It’s a tiny state that’s fiercely independent: Montpelier’s 7,000 residents like to boast that they are the smallest state capital, and the only one without a McDonald’s.

Vermont wasn’t satisfied with the health reform law that Washington passed in 2010, the Affordable Care Act. That law expands health coverage by growing the existing health-care system. Americans who already had health insurance have seen barely any change. Uninsured people have gotten covered through two existing programs: the individual insurance market (where millions of Americans now receive subsidies to help buy coverage) and Medicaid, a public program for low-income people.

[Vermont Governor, Peter] Shumlin had a different idea. He didn’t want to build on what existed. He wanted to blow up what exists and replace it with one state-owned and operated plan that would cover all of Vermont’s residents — an example he hopes other states could follow.

Shumlin ran for Governor on a single-payer platform, and he is well aware of the stakes in making sure it gets done right. The fight to successfully implement and pay for single-payer in Vermont is far from over, but it's encouraging to see lawmakers really fighting to improve the lives of the citizens they are supposed to represent.

As opposed to, say, the inmates running the asylum down here. Too bad Vermont is so damned cold.