Social Welfare | InvestmentWatch

Bloomberg News: Yahoo, Dell, Google Dodging U.S. Taxes

Morning — Bloomberg News reporting this AM on how the multinational tech giants like Yahoo, Dell and Google are taking advantage of the Netherlands’ “lenient policies and extensive network of tax treaties” to move large profits through the country.

Dell uses the Netherlands to avoid paying taxes in both Holland AND the U.S.; its subsidiary, Dell Global BV, paid income taxes at a rate of 1/10 of 1 percent on profits [...]

Cash Strapped Red Cross Predicts Violent Riots in Europe

Red Cross boss warns of upheaval similar to the Arab Spring.

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
January 2, 2013

The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Tuesday that the organization’s staff experienced working in conflict areas will now concentrate on Europe.

“We need to prepare for more violence here,” ICRC Director General Yves Daccord told the Danish daily Politiken.

“For the first time we see growing pressure on Europeans, where more and more people have become really poor. [...]

The Worst Is Yet To Come In Eurozone Crisis, The Next Phase Will Quickly Reach Escape Velocity And Accelerate Beyond The Reach Of Politicos And PR

The Next Eurozone Crisis

The eurozone is currently in Phase II, basking in the temporary calm of official reassurances and half-measures. Notice that the crisis level, the pressures building beneath the surface, are significantly higher than the initial crisis phase.

In the third and final phase, pressure skyrockets as the time available to reach a new equilibrium is compressed. If we boil away the distracting propaganda and complexity, the European crisis is not one [...]

Charles Hugh Smith: The Next Eurozone Crisis

by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds

The Next Eurozone Crisis

Europe is currently basking in the temporary calm of official reassurances and half-measures. The calm won’t last long.

Two of the more interesting dynamics at work in our world are geometric growth and stick-slip events. Geometric growth (or progression) is also known as exponential growth, where the initial phase accelerates into a steep rise–the famous “hockey stick.” Exponential growth is unsustainable and either [...]

Top economist Martin Feldstein: The economy is doing “terribly” and Bond-buying from the Fed won’t revive the economy or spark any hiring

The economy is doing “terribly” and may not even reach 2% growth this year, warns economist Martin Feldstein. Bond-buying from the Fed won’t revive the economy or spark any hiring, Feldstein says, its all about the fiscal outlook and tax reform. As long as people think their taxes are going up, they’re going to hold back on spending, and businesses are not going to hire.

From CNBC:

The economy is doing “terribly” and may [...]

Special ops group launching media blitz over Obama’s bin Laden bragging, leaks

(Reuters) – A group of former U.S. intelligence and Special Forces operatives is set to launch a media campaign, including TV ads, that scolds President Barack Obama for taking credit for the killing of Osama bin Laden and argues that high-level leaks are endangering American lives.

Leaders of the group, the Special Operations OPSEC Education Fund Inc, say it is nonpartisan and unconnected to any political party or presidential campaign. It [...]

100,000 Workers in Spain Will Not be Paid Because Regional Government of Catalona is Broke

The crisis in Spanish regional governments continues to escalate. El Pais reports Catalona Will Not Pay Hospitals or Private Centers and 100,000 workers are affected.

” This month, the Government of Catalona cannot tackle payments owed to hospitals, schools, residences, social organizations, and children in care centers and workshops. These are the services provided by entities, public and private, funded by the Government but managed not depend on it.

The move affects up to [...]

The Devastating Beijing Floods Reveal A Major Flaw In Chinese Infrastructure Spending

Beijing’s heaviest rainstorm in 61 years killed 77 people and many are criticizing Beijing’s underdeveloped drainage network and its inability to deal with severe rainstorms.

Despite talk of over-investment in infrastructure and China’s propensity to build “bridges to nowhere” it is evident that Chinese aboveground infrastructure has benefited at the cost of underground infrastructure, namely drainage, subway and social housing, according to Bank of America’s Ting Lu.

Lu writes that there is a huge disparity between “profitable and [...]

France considering raising CSG social charge – Hollande

(Reuters) – French President Francois Hollande said on Saturday his government was considering raising the CSG social welfare charge as part of measures to cut the country’s deficit.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/14/france-hollande-tax-idUSP6E8I400620120714

California As Broke As Greece?

Published on May 21, 2012 by RTAmerica

The state of California has been in a downward spiral when it comes to it’s financial situation. Governor Jerry Brown is now proposing implementing austerity measures to pull the Golden State out of the red. Social programs such as welfare and healthcare for the poor are the first to be slashed and Dr. Caroline Heldman, politics professor at Occidental College, joins us with her take on [...]

The recent J.P. Morgan derivatives fiasco demonstrates that the Federal Reserve’s zero interest rate policy has encouraged risky financial speculation that is highly dangerous and potentially destructive.

It’s time for the Federal Reserve to let interest rates rise and banks to get back to the business of financing the growth of America’s real-economy.

Achilles Macris, J.P. Morgan’s CIO in their London office, began using the bank’s access to cheap capital from the Federal Reserve to amass a huge over-the-counter derivative gamble that high yield and sovereign debt interest rates would fall, after MF Global suffered a $1.2 billion [...]

The US economy is so bad that Mexican illegal immigrants are going home in large numbers and replacements are not showing up.

Net undocumented immigration is now zero:

Number Of Undocumented Immigrants From Mexico Who Are Entering and Leaving U.S. Hits Net Zero, by Amanda Peterson Beadle, ThinkProgress: According to Mexican census data, 1 million undocumented immigrants returned to Mexico from the U.S. between 2005 and 2010 — more than three times the number who said they had returned from 2000 to 2004. The majority of these immigrants are returning to their homes [...]

California Seeks to Repress Self-Insurance

Michael S. Rozeff
LRC Blog
March 23, 2012

California insurance regulators want to stop the growth of self-insuring health care plansamong smaller businesses. Yes, they want to stop this free market growth. Why? Because they want socialized (forced) medicine in which those who are better risks pay for those who are worse risks. Is it any wonder America is in deep trouble, following in the footsteps of the European bureaucratic social welfare states with high [...]

What are Goldbugs? I hate gold—but I’m not a moron.

1779, 1790, 1841, 1862, 1934, 1971 & 201?

Today we reached banana republic status—we borrow or print 54 cents of every dollar the government spends. And for all the “we can cut the unfunded liabilities advocates” think forward. We hit the 54 cent point becuase revenues fell. Cutting social welfare that 49% of Americans use today will cut more tax revenues.

This thing is done, stick a fork in it. It WILL [...]

BOJ Kamezaki warns Europe debt woes hold lessons for Japan

29 Feb 2012 12:14
FUKUOKA (Japan) – Japan needs to learn from Europe and act steadily to restore its fiscal health to avoid a sudden spike in bond yields, a central bank policy maker said on Wednesday, calling for bolder social welfare and tax reforms to fix the country’s dire finances.

Bank of Japan board member Hidetoshi Kamezaki also said that while the central bank must act proactively to support the fragile [...]

Why It’s ‘Cool’ To Work Into Old Age

by Michael Hodin

At the core of this week’s economic news – President Obama’s fiscal 2013 budgetand the Greek debt bailout – is a political unwillingness to be honest about the changes needed to our social welfare contract, something that was created literally in an earlier century. Today, neither the American insistence on continuing the entitlements of the 1960s nor the notion of Greeks retiring in their 50s is truly feasible.

We need to work longer [...]

India Implements Biometric ID Program for all of its 1.2 Billion Residents

Brandon Turbeville
Activist Post
January 13, 2012

Over the past few months, I have written several articles dealing with the coming cashless society and the developing technological control grid. I also have written about the surge of government attempts to gain access to and force the use of biometric data for the purposes of identification, tracking, tracing, and surveillance.

Unfortunately, the reactions I receive from the general public are almost always the same. While [...]

Cashless Society: India Implements First Biometric ID Program for all Residents

Brandon Turbeville
Infowars.com
January 12, 2012

Unfortunately, the reactions I receive from the general public are almost always the same. While some [...]

Troika warns of more tax hikes and welfare cuts (Ireland)

By Alan O’Keeffe

Tuesday January 03 2012

Income tax increases and more cuts in social welfare may be likely as the Government struggles to meet its international bailout commitments, troika officials have warned.

Irish people will be forced to carry an even heavier financial burden in the years ahead. Officials from the EU Commission and International Monetary Fund (IMF) believe the Cabinet will be unable to keep election promises not to adjust tax [...]

MONTI SAYS EFSF NEED `SIGNIFICANTLY MORE’ FUNDING

While the technocrats cling to their vision for a European Bloc (amid a tumbling ‘stable’ EUR), Italian Prime-Minister-in-lieu Mario Monti is spreading the good word. Presented with little comment, via Bloomberg headlines, from a press conference in Rome, the Goldmanite builds the bridge to nowhere that the Socialist construct is unsustainable, yet the EFSF needs more funding to ensure the unsustainable social welfare model remains, err, unsustainable?

*MONTI SAYS EUROPE MUST [...]

Rich Chinese Are Set On Emigration

You don’t see rich Americans applying for Chinese citizenship and pickin up to move to China. What you see instead is the opposite. As soon as they are wealthy enough, they want to leave – or at least have the ability to leave.

China’s “Wealth Drain”: New Signs That Rich Chinese Are Set On Emigration
“So why are wealthy Chinese so eager to leave their country? The [...]

Saudi Arabia: “Day of Rage” on March 11 and March 20

From CNBC:

Oil prices are finally retreating from two-and-half year highs but the market is bracing for more volatility as anti-government protests threaten to spread beyond the borders of Libya towards the world’s top exporter Saudi Arabia.

The message for oil markets this week is unequivocal: watch Saudi Arabia. Inspired by the unfolding ‘Arab Spring’, there have been Shi’ite marches in the past few days in the [...]

Saudi’s $36 billion bid to beat unrest…

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia announced financial support measures, worth an estimated SR135bn ($36bn), in a bid to avert the kind of popular unrest that has toppled leaders across the region and is now closing in on Libyaâ€™s Muammer Gaddafi.

The measures include a 15 per cent salary rise for public employees to offset inflation, reprieves for imprisoned debtors, and financial aid for students and the [...]

Richard Duncan: The Great Depression(1930) and The New Depression(2008)

A worldwide economic depression began in 2008. This New Depression was caused by the same factors as the Great Depression and followed exactly the same pattern. Thus far, however, the New Depression has been milder than the Great Depression because the policy response this time has been completely different.

Both depressions were caused because governments began creating money. The Great Depression originated with the collapse of [...]

The Government Has Been Desperately Seeking Ways To Spend Our Money As The Economy Unacceptably Weak

by Greg Liautaud

1,431,853 bankruptcies YTD

990,348 foreclosures YTD

132 banks shut down YTD

The second piece was for social welfare and employment programs

27,347,499 unemployed Americans.

42,947,425 Americans on food stamps.

An average of 450,000 Americans are losing their jobs per month. With unemployment at a constant 9.5%, that means that an average of 450,000 Americans are losing benefits per month.

â€œThe third piece of the package offered $230 billion to fund an array of projects [...]

Joining the EU seems to have become a nightmare for Germans.

Now they have to pay off the debts of other countries like Greece as well as pay off their OWN debts – debts that incidentally add up to 150% of Germany’s GDP (look it up). Even greater debts than America’s.

Germany and America is pretty similar in its social and economic policies as well as in their political systems. So it wasn’t too difficult to predict that Germany would come [...]

Bubbles are created by money chasing actual value.

Value itself is a fluid definition, comprising both psychological hype and fashion and substantive improvements in experience.

I would conclude that most bubbles are speculative bubbles, that the terms go hand in hand. So, in homes that applies to the mix of purposes of spending money on a home. 1. For one’s use and enjoyment. 2. As a leveraged speculative “investment” for gain.

There remain many bubbles in the domestic and even [...]

Bruce: I applaud your positive take and wanting to get this mess fixed.

46 of 50 states are in a dire financial mess. CA is Greece and many others are having their credit default spreads blow out. Since the states can’t print all they will be able to do is go to the Fed gov with their hat in hand and beg. What will the Fed govt do? Counterfeit aka print. Just like the EU.

Greece x 50. ‘Fugetabout’ the local government fixing our [...]

As a longish term personal investor from Europe there are a few trends that I am basing my investment decisions on over the next two years:

- Government deficits: Besides Greece there is a real threat of default amongst Ireland, UK, Portugal, Italy, Spain (should be called puiigs). In Ireland where I’m from, we spend 50bn a year and only take in 30bn. The pain of the correction required from reductions in social welfare and public sector pay, may be too difficult or too slow, so that as we layer on 20bn a year, the interest [...]

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