BEVERLY HILLS
July 13, 2012 | Page 31 Publisher Clifton S. Smith, Jr ******* Associate Publisher Marcia W. Hobbs Senior Editor John L. Seitz Special Sections Editor Steve Simmons
******* Founding Publisher March Schwartz (Publisher 1965 - 2004)
From the Publisher CLIF SMITH
CONGRATULATIONS, BEVERLY HILLS! ....AND QUIT FEELING GUILTY We hope our readers pay attention to facts and let their emotions take a rest. For the most part, we believe that The Courier’s readers generally pride themselves on looking at facts and trying to leave emotion behind. Not always, but most of the time. Taxes, wealth, poverty and guilt – they’re shaping up to be the main issues in the upcoming presidential election. We know that guilt about “success” can be very debilitating. We know that, politically, “guilt” is a big motivator. “Envy” is the flip side of “guilt,” and both when used together are powerful. It is now clear President Barack Obama and the Democrats will wage all-out class warfare based largely on guilt and envy. Republicans will try to blunt those attacks, as they usually do, by making some sort of lame rejoinder like “We need to grow the economy,” but still act guilty about being successful. Democrats will respond by repeating (endlessly) the usual guilt trip they place on higher income earners. Republicans will then pretend they don’t make that much money. (Actually, Democrats make up more of the “1 percent” than Republicans, but who’s paying attention?) While we wish that Americans would again celebrate success instead of demonizing it, that’s a wish for another day. That’s not the point of this column. This column is strictly about facts and our wish for you to consider them. Please, “take a moment” and look at the facts. The Congressional Budget Office is about as close as we get to an unbiased impartial source. What about income “disparity”? What about “fair share taxation”? What about “justice”? The results are in and . . . guess what? Beverly Hills need not feel guilty! Are you paying your “fair share” of taxes? What are the facts? Hurray! You have actually done more than your share! You’ve done almost EVERYBODY’S share! The top 20 percent of wage earners in the United States now pay 94 percent of all income taxes! You are way ahead on points! You’re in great shape from the “social justice” point of view. Not only that, but when it comes to the deficit, your “Bush tax cuts” hardly added to the deficit at all. In fact, based on CBO numbers, your share of the “deficit” was less than 4 percent. The other 96 percent came from new spending and its consequences. Most of “deficit” spending went to the lower 60 percent of wage earners and government workers at all levels. Specifics: Two new government reports analyzed deficit growth from 2001 through 2011. Those reports show how a 2001 projected 10year surplus of $5.6 trillion turned into an actual $6.1 trillion deficit over the same period. It was not your failure to pay taxes. The first report, found at http://cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/06-07-ChangesSince2001Baseline.pdf , shows the tax policies enacted a decade ago (the “Bush tax cuts”) are responsible for just 16 percent of the swing from surplus to deficit. Furthermore, given that only about one-fourth of the tax cuts went to upper-income earners, just 1/25th of the switch from projected surpluses to actual deficits came from upper-income tax cuts. (NOTE: Given that CBO does not take into account any of the positive impact of tax cuts on investment, savings and economic growth, the percentage was actually even smaller than the 1/25th estimate).
So, be happy! Remove your guilt! It’s not your fault! President Bush’s “help the rich” tax cuts hardly show up in the deficit. In truth, the economic growth you provided more than offset any “help the rich” tax cuts you received. You were good stewards. You took the small additional amount of your own money the federal government allowed you to keep and earned a ton of money from it – and paid the taxes accordingly. But what about that deficit? Isn’t that somehow your fault? Nope. The CBO answered that question, too. Answer: new spending and interest on the (massive new federal) debt created 75 percent of the deficit. That also means that you selfish, greedy, guilty, rich Beverly Hills residents–getting richer off the Bush tax cuts–can only be blamed for about 1/12th of the deficit. So, it was NOT your fault after all! And did you get any of that government money? No. Of course not. If you are in the upper 20 percent of wage earners in the United States, you are only supposed to pay, not get. Well, that’s exactly what you did. You paid, and paid, and paid, and paid. You did not “get.” Will any of you look up these reports? They’re pretty easy to read. If you are on our eedition at www.bhcourier.com, just put your cursor on the links and click. The reports will come up. We’ve also put them on www.bhcourier.com directly. If you don’t want to look at these reports, or really don’t want to know facts that relieve your guilt, then please don’t look. The results are so clear and easy to see that, for the guilt-ridden, you won’t like it. We all know some people who revel in guilt and we don’t want to spoil their revelry. For those with an open mind, however, but who are committed Democrats or statists, this may be traumatic. The entire campaign pitch of President Obama and the Democrats is based on supposed unfairness, injustice, income disparity, discrimination, victimhood, and all the other liberal buzz words. The fact that none of these accusations are real should trouble you (but only if you read the facts). Even if you read the facts, absorb them and still don’t care because you want to “get even” or “be fair” or “help the poor,” there is hope, there, too. If the attitude of “soak the rich” prevails, you will shortly be deprived of your earnings and your wealth. There will be no “top 20 percent” to pay for everyone else and you will have no reason to feel guilty! Why? Because most of that “top 20 percent” will become “everyone else” and there will be no one left to pay for everyone else. If you still have any money left, you can always travel to Greece or Spain or Portugal where they’ve already eliminated the top 20 percent and there is no one left to pay for “everyone else.” France and Italy are racing to see who’s to go broke next. Or, if you just want a budget trip, visit Mammoth Lakes, San Bernardino or Stockton – they’re already bankrupt so you would feel right at home. We hear there are good deals on houses in Maryland, too, because nearly all of that state’s “rich” have left. But these are just the facts. If knowing the facts spoils your guilt trip, then just ignore them. We cannot ignore the facts. Sorry – we just can’t. We’d like to (sort of like a fantasy that USC will some day have a championship basketball team), but we just can’t. Whether you look at the facts or not, the message is clear: “Beverly Hills – rejoice! It’s not your fault!”
Rabbi Jacob Pressman DO YOU KNOW YOUR ACRONYMS? Dear Erudite Reader: While reading last week’s edition of The Courier, I was struck by how many acronyms I saw there. What’s an acronym? It is a word made up of the initials of other words in order to be brief. You know many. For example, our television call letters: ABC is short for American Broadcasting Company. IOU is short for “I owe you.” We see many acronyms in the press. I went for a search for them in our own newspaper, and while I came across 25 of them I am not certain I saw them all. Nor do I know what each of them meant. There are at least 5 whose meanings escape me. If this pursuit interests you and you know all the meanings, please complete this list and send it back to me c/o (care of) The Courier and I will send you a copy of one of my books. Thanks. ABX AEG AOL AMERICA ON LINE ATS AMERICAN TECHNION SOCIETY AWOL ABSENT WITHOUT LEAVE BET BHBA BEVERLY HILLS BAR ASSOCIATION BHEF BEVERLY HILLS EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION BHHS BEVERLY HILLS HIGH SCHOOL BHUSD BEVERLY HILLS UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT BMW BAVARIAN MOTOR WORKS BOG BOARD OF GOVERNORS CEO CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER CHLA CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL LOS ANGELES COOCP COPTSA DMV DEPARTMENT OF MOTOR VEHICLES EMT GLAZA GREATER LOS ANGELES ZOO ASSOCIATION ioLA EYE ON LOS ANGELES MoCA MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART MOU MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING R&B RHYTHM AND BLUES RDC RODEO DRIVE COMMITTEE RTK ARCHITECTS USSR UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS
STOP! STOP! STOP! Cartoon for The Courier by Janet Salter
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