Tag: taxes

Cities Are Spending Absurd Sums on Modular Bathrooms

Philadelphia recently installed two Portland Loos: modular, stand-alone public restrooms first commissioned by Portland, Oregon. The single-stall metal structures are easy to keep clean and feature rounded walls to deter graffiti and walls that are louvered at the top and bottom to deter mischief inside stalls. However, despite these supposed benefits, cities regularly spend absurd amounts of taxpayer funds to purchase and install the bathrooms.

Philly plans to install six Loos over the next five years as part of the city’s public restroom pilot, which Philadelphia Health and Human Services launched in January 2021. The city has budgeted $1.8 million for six units, or $300,000 per unit, including installation costs.

According to a Portland Loo spokesperson who spoke with Reason, the total cost is around $200,000: up to $155,000 for the unit, including shipping, and between $30,000 and $80,000 for installation. Maintenance is about $14,000 annually.

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Congress Sneaks In Stealth $34,000 Pay Raise; Gaetz, AOC Among More Than 200 Lawmakers To Benefit

As House Democrats were set to hand power over to the Republicans following their midterm loss, they slipped in a provision into the House’s internal rules under the guise of aiding their less affluent members; a $34,000 allowance to ostensibly help with living expenses in Washington D.C.

A deep dive into the records by the Washington Free Beacon reveals that over 200 lawmakers, including the vociferous Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), have dipped into this taxpayer-funded pot, a sumptuous feast on the nation’s dime.

Ocasio-Cortez, who has previously lamented the costliness of D.C. living on a Congressperson’s salary, now enjoys taxpayer support for accommodations in a luxury building replete with amenities that seem more Silicon Valley than Capitol Hill.

Bipartisan handout

So far, 113 Democrats and 104 Republicans, including millionaire members like Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) and House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA), have partaken in the program, drawing $1.4 million from taxpayers during the first half of 2023 alone.

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), a critic of past budgetary excesses (whose wife says she’s got a ‘chef husband’), claimed the largest share of the fund.

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Youth Smoking Nears Zero

New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show youth smoking at a historic low, with just 1.9 percent of high schoolers lighting up in the past month. Youth vaping is also at its lowest level in a decade at 10 percent, and cigar use is down to 1.8 percent from 2.8 percent the previous year.

That’s good news from a public health standpoint, but the data raise questions regarding the Biden administration’s plan to ban menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars. A key argument for prohibition is that menthol cigarettes and flavored cigars appeal to youth, especially black youth, and banning them is essential to prevent future generations of addiction and outweighs the risks of illicit markets that are certain to follow. But the CDC data show that smoking rates among black high schoolers are so low they can’t be reliably calculated.

A smoke-free society is typically defined as one where cigarette smoking is below 5 percent of the population. Applying this standard to youth, the U.S. has achieved a smoke-free generation. With youth smoking all but eliminated, it’s hard to see menthol prohibition as anything other than an attempt to target adult consumers, particularly black smokers who are more likely to choose a menthol product.

Kids may have ditched cigarettes, but there are millions of adults who still use menthol cigarettes. Experiments in menthol prohibition in the European Union, Canada, and even Massachusetts aren’t promising examples for the United States. A study of the effect of menthol prohibition in Poland, which had the highest menthol consumption in the E.U. at almost a third of the cigarette market, found no statistically significant change in cigarette consumption after the ban. Canada, which had a far smaller share of menthol smokers at 11 percent of the population, did see 21.5 percent of menthol smokers quit after the ban was imposed. However, 19.5 percent of menthol smokers continued to source their preferred cigarettes through other channels, and 59 percent just switched to nonmenthol cigarettes. Massachusetts became the first state to ban all flavored tobacco products. The ban was a boon to neighboring states like New Hampshire and Rhode Island, which enjoyed a surge in cigarette sales. Massachusetts lost $116 million in cigarette tax revenue in the first 12 months of the ban, according to the Tax Foundation.

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Democrats Say They’re Fighting Inequality. But Many of Their Policies Favor the Rich.

In the grand ballroom of American politics, Democrats have long waltzed to the melody of progressivism while ridiculing Republicans’ preference for outdated tax cut tunes. Ironically, they don’t want to pay for their style of big government with higher taxes on ordinary Americans, which their expansionary ambitions would require. Instead, they loudly proclaim that they want to tax the rich. It remains to be seen how true this is.

Indeed, while Democrats profess their devotion to social justice and fight against income inequality, they often push for policies that favor the rich. Take their nonstop battle over the last five years to ease the tax burden of their high-income constituents.

The State and Local Tax (SALT) deduction cap, part of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), placed a $10,000 limit on the amount of state and local taxes that can be deducted from federal taxable income. This move predominantly affected high earners in high-tax states like New York, California, and many others that are Democratic strongholds.

That’s a tax hike on the rich. This shouldn’t bother Democrats, who are usually happy to demonstrate their egalitarian chops by clamoring for that very thing. Yet this time, by demanding repeal of the SALT cap, they are on the front lines of a battle to restore tax breaks for the rich. As it turns out, when affluent Californians and Northeasterners felt the pinch, Democrats were ready to cha-cha for tax relief.

Contrast this with the refusal by moderate New York Republicans to vote for Jim Jordan (R–Ohio) for House speaker in exchange for doubling the deduction cap to $20,000 for individuals and $40,000 for married couples. Now, this might mean these guys really didn’t want Jordan as speaker, but they wouldn’t roll over even in exchange for tax cuts for their own constituencies.

Would New York Democrats be so principled? Back in 2021, 17 of 19 members of this delegation threatened to block a Democrat-sponsored infrastructure bill if the SALT deduction cap wasn’t entirely repealed. I would have been OK with that crony bill failing; I highlight this incident only to reveal some Democrats’ commitment to tax breaks for rich blue-state voters.

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NJ Gov. Murphy used thousands in taxpayer funds to party at Taylor Swift concert, stadium events: report

Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy is asking the state Democratic Party to reimburse taxpayers after he used $12,000 in state funds at a Taylor Swift concert and other stadium events.

Murphy’s expenditures, first reported by Politico, were all for food and drinks at MetLife Stadium. When confronted with the spending, Murphy’s office reportedly said it was asking the state Democratic Party to pay back the state.

Murphy’s office says it had always expected the state party to cover the costs, but noticed it had failed to do so. The governor’s office then dipped into a $95,000 personal expense account set up for the office. That account is set up to pay for “Official Receptions, Official Residence, and Other Official Expenses,” and cannot be used for “personal purposes,” according to Politico.

“Once it was clear that there were outstanding bills that had not been paid, the state stepped up to meet this responsibility,” Murphy spokeswoman Jennifer Sciortino told the outlet in a statement. “We are pursuing reimbursement from the state party for costs incurred at MetLife Stadium.”

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Test Scores Are Plummeting Despite California Spending Wildly on Education

I’ve recently been investing in some long-deferred maintenance at my home and it should be no surprise to anyone that I’ve sought to receive as much quality work done for as little money as possible. When people spend their own hard-earned money on such projects, they measure success by results, such as a sparkling new kitchen. They don’t brag about how much they spent, but how much they got in return.

By contrast, state officials seem to delight in how much money they “invest” in different priorities, without worrying too much about outcomes. Sure, they sometimes pay lip service to results—but they don’t care enough about them to actually change the way they provide public services. (They’re not about to annoy the public-sector unions, which represent the people paid to provide those services.)

I’m not the only one to have noticed. State Sen. Steve Glazer (D–Orinda), in a July column about the $310-billion budget, complained that “we’ve already spent billions of dollars on the same problems—with very little to show for it.” He called on his fellow Democrats to ensure that the spending “actually improving the lives of the people we say we are committed to helping.” What a novel idea.

This dynamic is most pronounced in public education, which consumes more than 40 percent of the state’s general fund budget—plus local bond measures. Although lawmakers slowed education funding increases to close a $32-billion budget deficit this year, as of last year—during an unprecedented $97.5-billion budget surplus—they lavished public schools with money.

“The revised budget directs a total of $128.3 billion to education, lifts up the most critical needs including historic funding for school mental health, recruitment and retention of teachers,” boasted Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, following last year’s budget deal.

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Pentagon Officials Say US Ready to Fight War with China While Supporting Ukraine and Israel

Defense Department officials said US military assets in East Asia are sufficient to confront China as the Pentagon supplies the Israeli and Ukrainian armies with weapons. One official described 2023 as a “banner year” for Washington increasing its military presence in the region surrounding China. 

On Tuesday, the Pentagon held a press conference to discuss 180 “unsafe…unprofessional… corrosive and risky” encounters between Chinese and American aircraft over the past two years. However, reporters asked the officials, Commander of Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) Admiral John C. Aquilino and Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs Dr. Ely Ratner, about the Pentagon’s ability to deter China as it arms Israel and Ukraine. 

Aquilino said that INDOPACOM has not seen any reduction in military assets available in the region, and the US was ready to win a war with China. “What I’ll tell you is I haven’t had one piece of equipment or force structure depart. The US is a global power, and that means we can deliver effects and execute our deterrence responsibilities across the globe, but I don’t think any other nation can do that at this time, but the US can,” he explained. “INDOPACOM prepares every day to ensure we execute both of the missions the Secretary gave me. Number one, to prevent conflict in the Indo-Pacific; and number two, if mission one fails, be prepared to fight and win.”

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NYPD COPS SUED FOR MISCONDUCT COST CITY MILLIONS IN SETTLEMENTS — THEN GET PROMOTIONS

NEW YORK CITY is on track to fork over more than $100 million this year in payouts for lawsuits alleging police misconduct against members of the New York City Police Department. Twenty of the officers stand out over the last decade for being named in the most suits or being named in suits with the highest payouts. Of the 20, the department has promoted at least 16 of the officers, some more than once. 

“They’re kind of failing upwards when they’re not only staying in the department but they’re also being promoted,” said Jennvine Wong, staff attorney with the Cop Accountability Project at the Legal Aid Society, a public defense organization in New York City. Last month, Legal Aid released an analysis of data on settlements in cases alleging police misconduct. 

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Earmarks Are Back: House Republicans “Opened The Bar” For The Spendaholics

Democrats take every opportunity to spend your tax dollars. The GOP was supposed to know better…

Unfortunately, the first thing the GOP did after they took control of the U.S. House – before the new Congress was even sworn in – they held a secret vote on earmarks. Last December, 158 GOP members of Congress voted to include earmarks in the year-end omnibus spending bill.

House Republicans “opened the bar” for the spendaholics.

Those 158 secret-voting members caused $16,012,272,565 of your tax dollars to be spent on 7,509 earmarks.

Not only did those 158 members adopt earmarks, the Republicans spent more of your tax dollars than their Democratic earmarking colleagues.

In the fiscal year 2024 spending bills being debated this fall, the top 63 earmarkers in the U.S. House are Republicans. Eight of the top ten earmarkers in the U.S. Senate are Republicans.

The U.S. House has a bartender at the spendaholics earmark bar – Rep. Kay Granger (R-Texas). She chairs the Appropriations Committee that approves every one of those earmarks. When she was elected to Congress in 1997, the federal debt was $5.4 trillion.

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