Revised Version of "If I were the President"

If I were the president

If I were the president of these United States of Political and Economic malfeasance, I could not only offer you the promise of a better tomorrow for the U.S.A. but, in my efforts, a possibility of a better tomorrow for the world. I cannot do this without the support of everyone possible. I know there are more than a fair share of you out there who will disagree with me at first. However, I endeavor to show you my point of view and how, with your help, we can change this country and this world. The answer is not big government and taxes incurred upon the rich. The answer is to bring production back into this country, to make us a competitive force in the world market. We need to give incentives to companies to help others, to develop new technology that will increase our productivity. If we can achieve these goals, we will be on our way to a better tomorrow.

A major problem that we face today is the lack of a real market for productive labor. We have such powerful labor unions that our producers cannot afford to become competitive. When labor costs are more than the equilibrium price, which is the price at which the market demands this labor, the producer ends up packing a hundred dollar bill or so into each product. Take our auto industry in Detroit for example. Before the institution of the United Auto Workers Union, Detroit represented most of the world market for auto production. Now, because Japanese and German car producers have opened factories in non unionized states such as Alabama, Kentucky and Louisiana, the Big Three Automakers, who at present are begging for 25 billion of our tax dollars to support their unions, are nearing the point of needing to file for chapter 11 Bankruptcy until their union contracts expire and can be renegotiated. Today, according to the Center for research on globalization, if you combine the salaries as well of all of the benefits for each individual worker, it adds up to 75 per hour. This all sounds great except for the fact that these people are being paid more to produce less and a lesser quality at that. Production must be cut unfortunately. We are finding ourselves unfortunately inefficient these days because labor unions are spending their time manipulating big businesses, leaving these large businesses with less money to devote to Research and Development to find more efficient, cheap ways to produce their goods. This would leave them with more money to create jobs that pay more and still make more profit. Now, if our government spent less time taxing big corporations and instituting socialist programs that, in essence benefit no one in the long run, we would have more money to offer in the forms of grants for R&D for technologies to improve our capabilities when it comes to production of goods.

The first step to benefiting the people of this country is to drop unnecessary taxes on corporations and businesses. I do not want you to think that I am fighting for big business, because at the base of my sentiments, I am not. What many people fail to realize is that taxes come in many forms. They come in the form of income tax, sales tax, property tax, pollution taxes and tariffs. The list is exhaustive and is not worth mentioning all of it. When you get your paychecks every other week, you see that a portion has gone out to state, local and federal taxes, Medicaid and Social Security. What you have left after that is known in the world of economics as your disposable income, meaning that you can either save or spend this money, nobody else gets to tell you what to do with it. However, when you go to the grocery store, the toy store for your child or anywhere where you might procure a good or service, you must pay the price of the item plus, generally speaking, a sales tax. What you don’t realize is that, at the same time, you are also paying the taxes of the corporations or companies that have produced this good or service. People tend not to realize that a tax levied upon a corporation is a tax levied upon the citizens of the U.S. Companies do not make money and stay in business by eating the taxes placed on them by the government. So next time a politician tells you that the big companies must be taxed, realize that they are taxing you and do not allow it. This is a country based on the voice of the people. We, as a country, were created so that people who were living in places where oppression reigned could come and enjoy a life of free choice and power of the people.

If we want our government to increase its tax revenue so as to pay off the massive debt that it has incurred, we must lower the taxes on everyone in this society. This may not make sense to you at first look, but don’t worry, I will explain. There is an economic theory called supply side economics. The particular aspect of this economic theory that I will discuss here is the issue of taxes, focusing on the Laffer curve. Arthur Laffer was a supply side economist who became well known during Ronald Reagan’s presidency. He put together a graph of the effects of a rising tax on government revenue. This curve shows that as taxes increase, government revenue first increases and then decreases drastically, forming and upside down U. This also may not make sense on the surface, so let me explain. Just so that we are all on the same page, I would like to break down the percentages of the tax burden in this country and who carries them. According to the Internal Revenue Service’s 2006 report, the top 10% of wage earners pay 70% of the tax burden. The top 25% pay 86%. The bottom 50% pay 2.9%. The remaining 25% pay the remaining 11%. If you look at this graph, I will show you how the Laffer curve works. Now, when taxes are drastically low, obviously government revenue will be low. As the tax rate increases, so then does government revenue. However there comes a tipping point where that top ten percent who are already wealthy say, “Hey, after this point, I’m leaving the market and taking my money with me.” And as I have said before, corporations themselves pay 0% of the tax burden, so with this top 10% gone from the picture because of exorbitantly high tax rates, we find our government revenue plummeting. There have been many people who have said that supply side economics does not exist and it is just a theory. Ronald Reagan’s Administration and the subsequent economic brilliance that followed his presidency are proof otherwise.

When Reagan took office, the top wage earners in this country paid 70% of their wages in taxes. As soon as he took office, Reagan dropped taxes on the top earners to 28%. The following years were the best that the U.S. has ever seen, with low inflation and the lowest unemployment ever. If I were president I would take a page out of Mr. Reagan’s book and drop taxes immediately. This would increase our government’s revenue drastically. I would also attempt to do away with many government programs that wastefully spend our money. If I were to do away with these programs, the government would have a surplus of funds, the surplus necessary to pay back the countries to whom we are indebted.

If I were president, I would remove all taxes from businesses, with the caveat that any company that causes a negative externality on the environment around it such as greenhouse emissions would have to pay an environmental tax. This would both deplete the costs of production for companies and lower the prices of goods and services. Imagine an economy where prices could drop without the drawback of a shrinking economy. If we stop taxing companies, our economy will be allowed to grow and allow prices to decrease. The power of the dollar would go through the roof. It would easily surpass both the Euro and the GBP.

Next, we must offer the proper incentives to create the technology necessary so that we might actually have a comparative advantage over other countries on several goods or services. If we can do this, jobs in the production industry could actually be lucrative enough for people to be incentivized to work in these industries. Let me explain this a bit. If we drop taxes and have technology that enables each individual worker to produce more, then we could afford to pay each worker more. With this new efficiency, we would then see more businesses popping up everywhere offering employment to those who would otherwise be unemployed as well as a magnificent array of goods and services which will make the market even more competitive, effectively driving the prices even further down. If we can do this, we can reestablish ourselves as a competitive force in the world market. If we do that, our economy will see a boom and efficiency like it has never before seen in the history of the U.S.

Through this sort of policy we can not only help ourselves, but also possibly help those emerging nations around the world who are struggling to get a leg up. I am not one to support the big brotherhood of our current government, who sweeps in, attempts to build a political infrastructure, drops some food on the starving and flies back out. Instead, I would offer institutes and companies and individual investors tax abatements in return for their donations to institutes such as the J-PAL of MIT or similar institutions or programs, whose primary goal is the installation of mental and physical cabilities in the people of third world countries to produce for themselves. Instead of handing starving people food, teach them how to grow food in an efficient way, teach them how to make a profitable trade out of something that they can do well in the region they come from. If the growing of food is not a feasible option, teach them how to utilize the resources they have to create a comparative advantage that they can manipulate on the world market. If you do this, you have helped a nation to begin the journey to greatness. Once these nations have started to establish themselves, we can help them produce food for themselves through BioEngineering. There is now a “Golden Rice” that has been created by several scientists from the International Rice Research Institute, with great contributions from one of our own here at Penn State, Dr. Sairam, a professor in the school of science, engineering and technology. This rice has been genetically altered to provide all of the vital vitamins and nutrients necessary in a healthy meal. These foods are unfortunately unavailable to the starving, malnourished people of the world because of European governmental restrictions on genetic engineering. We need to change this. If we can show people the benefits of this rice and how every possible precaution has been taken in the development of this rice, we can make a difference in the starving nations of the world.

Moving on to my next point of poverty and its effect on violence here and around the world. Speaking in generalities, when people are prosperous, people are not violent. If we help nations who do not have the proper resources to teach themselves how to become prosperous, we can effectively eliminate most violence among these countries. If we can achieve these goals, we can have a world that trades among itself efficiently. We can have the highest quality goods and services for the least amount of money. Imagine living as a United World and not Just the United States. In the future, if this is achieved, everyone will have the opportunity and the cause to be prosperous and will not have to worry about their safety or whether or not they will be able to make their payments. If we have a world in which everyone can be prosperous, a true capitalist efficient system, there is no need for violence, for crime, for poverty. We can change the U.S. and we can change the world.

According to an article found on the Heritage Foundation’s website, called “How Poor Are America’s Poor” by Robert Rector, there are 37 million “poor” in this country. Of these 37 million, roughly 90% are on Welfare in some form or another according to the Dept. of Health and Human Services. Of these roughly 30 million, 9 million are capable and able bodied adults, who on average work 800 hours per week, which breaks down to 16 hrs per week according to the Heritage Foundation. Of these poor most own their homes, more than one color television, one or more cars and a computer, with the average living space per person of poor families adding up to 476 square feet. To further my policy, I vow to slowly but surely eliminate welfare except for those incapable of working. Also I will do away with Social Security before it dries up and leaves those of us about to retire and those of us who will retire in the future penniless. Instead I will support and promote the privatization of retirement benefits. Instead of paying for the retirements of our grandparents, the portion of our checks, which will be determined by us, will go into our own retirement. This, combined with the elimination of government-subsidized welfare, which in essence is tax payer subsidized, will push those who rely on government spending for their livelihood into the workforce. This will have multiple effects. First, it will make it necessary for everyone capable of working to be employed. The jobs will have made themselves apparent once we have eliminated the taxes on businesses. With an additional 9 million people in the U.S. workforce, the economy has nowhere to go but up. When all those who are reliant on welfare are put in to the workforce, we will be able to do away with subsidized housing and replace the eyesores of what would otherwise be beautiful cities with co-ops and privately owned buildings where the tenants and owners will actually have a sense of propriety and will keep up with the maintenance of their homes. If the government stops handing out money to those who ask, those who ask will turn to another source of money. With my proposed decrease on all taxes, the working market will be a lot more tempting for people, knowing that their hard work and labor will actually yield a livable gain. Again relating back to government revenue, if we rid ourselves of welfare and lower taxes, we will have far more people in the workforce contributing to the tax revenue, as opposed to 30 million depleting it, thus making it even more possible for us to eliminate the taxes I have stated.
As for our overly large central government, ghe state governments should be the governments that make the true decisions concerning what is good for the people of their constituency. This country was set up as a republic, consisting of many states, ruled by their local governments, united under a simple central government that provided protection for the people and helped make decisions between states that could not agree upon something. We were not set out to be a country where every aspect of our lives were dictated to us by the central government. This is not why people came to this country and this is not why people continue to come to this country. People come here for the offer of freedom of choice, of religion and the ability to pursue that which their heart desires.

If I were the president, I would not spend my time attacking issues of morality and the freedoms of our people. These are not the United States of What the president thinks. That is not my job as president. Decisions of that nature are up to our legal system and the people of this country and until they are deemed illegal or unconstitutional, there is nothing I, nor any other politician or single person can do to change this. This is not an issue I will debate on. I have my feelings, everyone else has their own. That is the foundation of this country, to allow people their own feelings and rights.

In terms of Foreign policy, I believe that there must be an economic cohesion between the countries of this world. We must all come together to make our world a better place, a place in which car bombs and protests are not necessary. A world where people are allowed to compete freely and utilize their advantages to help themselves and those around them. Violence is never the answer. Violence stems from ignorance and poverty and does nothing but breed more of the same. If we share with each other what we know in our respective areas, we can help failing nations succeed, we can bring prosperity to those places where poverty reigns. If we stop using boundaries as a means of propriety, we could have American Oil fields in the UAE, and the UAE could have sky scrapers in Tokyo and Bangladesh and so on and so forth. We harbor our greed to stay within the limits of our countries. If we expand our businesses beyond our boundaries, we can have a world of interwoven societies, in which every race and culture holds its own and is equally recognized as a power unto itself. If we want to, we as people, not as Americans, Asians, Africans, Europeans, Australians and whoever else we may be, but as humans living here on this planet, we can achieve a beautiful world where all can be prosperous without waste. We need to stop worrying about where we are from because when it comes down to it we are all the same and came to be in the same way and will cease to exist in the same way. Stop making wars based on religion. If you want to see what people truly believe, listen to them pray. Listen to the meanings of these prayers and then tell me how different we are, you and I. Change is up to you, and I believe I can help us move in that direction.

Bio Fuels and Genetic Engineering

I have spent a good portion of this semester looking at different Bio Fuels and the affects and processes of Genetic Engineering for my Biology class.  My professor, Dr. Sairam Rudrabhatla is one of the foremost Bio Engineers in the world.  His research at the moment is focused on Jatropha and Golden Rice.  

Jatropha is a plant whose seeds are comprised primarily of oil.  This oil, when yielded from the seeds, can be placed directly into your gas tank and will fuel your car.  As I sit here looking at this small brown seed I wonder how we are not growing these as a major crop in places where nothing would otherwise be grown.  Jatropha is capable of being grown almost anywhere.  In places where there is barren wasteland and desert, Jatropha can be grown.  From a single hectare of Jatropha crop, nearly 1900 liters of oil can be yielded for roughly 8 cents per gallon.  

There are many fears that because of the weed like nature of Jatropha, if not properly cared for, the plants could pose a threat to food staples.  This is where the work of Bio Engineers and Genetic Engineers comes into play.  The practice of genetic engineering is nothing more than plant breeding done in a more precise way with better, faster results.  There is so much debate on this topic and it baffles me.  With the help of genetic engineering, we are able to create foods that last longer, can be grown in conditions they would otherwise be incapable of growing in, can contain all of the necessary vitamins of a healthy diet in a single grain of rice.  Why would we shy away from this.  The only unnatural aspect of this practice is the speeding up of natural processes.  If there was less hype around this subject, we could be working on feeding the starving people of this world, but instead after 10 years of research and development, we have a super rice which could help effectively feed the starving nations of the world, in which 20 million dollars have already been invested and this rice sits and waits to be given to the people who are in such dire need of it all because Europe does not believe in genetic engineering.  

These genetic engineers have made it so that Jatropha can be safely grown anywhere without risk of the endangerment of other crops, and yet here we sit, being raped on a daily basis by the oil giants of the world because of our alphabet soup of regulatory commissions here in the U.S. and in Europe.  

We are to blame for our own stagnation and despair, and it is our responsibility to change these wrongs we have done ourselves.

Does Life Ever Make Sense

I ask myself this every day.  Why am I doing the things I am doing?  Why do I think the way I do?  Is what I think right or wrong?  Does it matter? 

I have a younger brother who is the beginnings of suave and debonair with a slight sense of dweeb and loser.  I say these latter parts not as an insult, but as a way in which he is sometime perceived by others.  Why are some people mean to him and others nice?  At the end of the day, this young man of 15 years old is one of the sweetest, obtuse, loving, vengeful, adorable, pimple faced shit to have ever graced this earth.  He'll kiss your puppy and take care of your kids as soon as he would strike you down with his ham-hock arms for insulting his family.  The child may be strange, beautiful, ugly, kind, mean and normal, but he is honorable, believes in chaste, will keep Chivalry alive until the day he dies.  And yet, he has no girlfriend and few friends.  But those who keep him, keep him in close company and cherish all that he has to offer.

I have an older brother, who at many times is like my kid brother who I have taught to grow.  To this day, there is an everlasting gripe between he and I, however small it may be.  Whenever we meet new people, whether it be because of our social interaction or my looks of maturity, I am always perceived as the older brother.  This has never really been a problem for us behind closed doors because as I have found with many people in my life, I can always be sought out in times of need or distress.  I can soothe those who may need it and rile those who are complacent. This is both a blessing and a curse.  I have found myself, many times, in situations that should have been well beyond my realm of maturity, but due to many mitigating circumstances, I fight my way out of them, bringing with me those that desire it.  In our childhood together, my older brother and I have found ourselves in many situations where my arrogance, combined with his insecurities have led me to act as the older sibling.  Whether it be teaching him to dance, to fight, to manipulate, to date, to hide or to reveal, I have always been there for him and in turn, he for me.  

I am really writing this post to give thanks at the beginning of this holiday season for my family.  My parents, without whom I would not be here, would not have screwed up, would not have succeeded, would not have tried and would not have sat lazily around when I could have been trying.  For my brothers, who have acted as my support and my pupils all at the same time.  To my father, who can wax poetic and roar like a wounded bear all in the span of a day, an hour a minute.  To my mother, who can be my greatest friend and my worst enemy in the blink of an eye.  

I could go on to my extended family who include my father's sister, one of my best friends in the world, but alas, classes call and if i want to persevere and survive, I must yield to her beckon.  

The Vestigial Mind

In an age in which more information has been available to more people than ever before inhuman history, should we not be embarrassed at how little we know about the decisions we makeand the values that we hold? This abundance of knowledge has cost us something veryimportant: intellectual humility. Why should any of us ever again admit to ignorance when ananswer (regardless of whose) is only a top of the iphone away. We have become increasinglyreliant on third hand information that comes from god-only-knows where, authored by god-only-knows who, bearing god-only-knows what prejudices. My point here is not to say that there isn’ta wealth of good and legitimate knowledge, only a few clicks of the mouse away; but rather, thatwith this enormous cache of facts, theories, opinions and criticisms (mine among them), we, asindividuals are slowly becoming little more than animate mouthpieces, through which theopinions and beliefs of others are allowed to speak.With the distractions of daily life as proliferous as they are, it’s very easy to leap from thebed to the shower to the Today show whit breakfast to talk radio on the way to work to your jobback to your home onto the couch watching TV into bed (also with TV) and back to sleepwithout ever having taken a moment to pause and really think about something (anything!). Atthis juncture, we’re now ready to take anyone’s idea and label it as an unimpeachable truism onwhich hangs the very fabric of the cosmos! How could it be any other way? We fill out headswith the views of the liberal media or the conservative media without pausing for a moment toexplore the consequences of the basis of these beliefs. Because of the unbelievable availabilityof both conservative and liberal ideologies (as can be found in the news, radio, comedicnews...for our entertainment, of course), we can effectively convince ourselves that there is noother proper ideology before our own. Our political ideals have become something bordering ona belief system; and of course, believing in something means that you don’t have to give it muchindependent thought. Like our religion, our political beliefs are something beyond reproach,discussion, and above all: alteration.If we could please take a more active and thinking role in our decision making process; ifwe could be willing to question, not only the beliefs and ideas of others, but those of our own;perhaps we can take the first small steps towards the recovery of our own individual reason andthe legitimacy with which it was originally vested.

~Authored by My dearest like minded older brother, Frank Zilinyi

I would like to add a small amount of my own thoughts to this beautiful analysis of the great american ignorance. What seems to be an issue ailing the political minds of many of the inhabitants of this country. We seem to find ourselves, these days, seeing our political system, at least from a laymen's point of view, as somewhat of a religion. We follow blindly and have faith in a system most of us have no idea of how it works. Let me give you all a little definition of faith, especially concerning religion. Faith means the belief in something that logically cannot be true. this is fine when it concerns things such as religion because religions are not tangible objects that we can truly manipulate or change through our ignorance. Faith is in fact a practice in ignorance. Do not get me wrong here, I am a practicing catholic, but I am a realist and if I follow something blindly, I want to at least understand why. It is fine to believe in such illogical things as God or whatever you may call him and whatever he may mean to you. The whole idea of God is that he is omnipotent, meaning all powerful. In order to have such powers, God must be able to do anything, including the going against the laws of logic. God can make 4 equal 5, he can draw a square circle, set a fire he cannot put out and then put it out and these are all things that we will never be able to see or understand. If we accept God in this sense, it is O.K. to believe, there is nothing that we will ever see to make us understand otherwise and we only have faith to go on. When it comes to a government, we cannot follow blindly. We must think for ourselves and make our decisions based on real information that we have looked into and considered carefully on our own. Voting is your civic duty, but please don't if you're not thinking beforehand. That's all for now, my brain is ready for sleep and I must oblige.

~Rob

the new socialism

not to be wasteful here, but i am tired and wanted to remind myself to write about this idea... more to come tomorrow maybe.

Supply Side Economics

Here I go again with my everlasting diatribe on the ignorance of the masses.  I want to now explain to all of you out there who may not truly understand the way in which taxes and the economy work today.  Their is an economic practice known as supply side economics.  In this practice, we see what the effect of taxes is on both consumers and producers as well as on international trade as it pertains to tariffs.  

I would like to explain to you who the "bad guy" in this nation is.  It is not big business.  It is the big government.  In the words of Ronald Reagan, "the government is not the solution to the problem, the government is the problem."  If we want to rely on the government as our source of guidance and strength as opposed to our own merit and achievement, that is fine.  However, you are in the wrong country if that is your idea of government.  

I digress, the point here is how taxes on the rich and on big businesses affects us and not them.  When we look at rich people, you have to take into account the fact that these rich people, with exceptions, were not born rich.  Note: those who were born rich, their parents before them probably were not.  The point being, they had to get rich somehow.  The government did not say, "o.k. you you and you are now rich and poof, they're rich"  They had to go to school, learn a particular trade, utilize that trade and then manipulate it to a point where they had the money together to start their own business.  From there on, they had to work harder than most of us will ever work in our lives to ensure that their business survived.  After working hard for many many years, they have finally gotten to a point where they can enjoy the fruits of their labor.  Along the way, unless they are some sort of super hero unknown to mankind, they had to expand their company and employ other people.  In this day and age, unless we own our own company we, generally speaking, work for someone else.  Whether this company be large or small, they are a company that employs people and chances are, whoever is at the top of that chain is rather well off, with quite a few success stories along the way.  You have to think when a politician tells you that the rich are keeping the poor poor and that we must take away their money because it is unfair.  This is propaganda at best.  The way that the poor are kept poor is by taxing the rich.  The key word here is rich.  If an individual is already independently wealthy, they do not really need any more money.  The people that the president elect talks about taxing are those who are most assuredly wealthy enough to retire and live for several lifetimes.  It is also a proven theory that when tax rates become confiscatory, government revenue decreases.  We can see this in the principles i have just explained.  If you are a rich person and you already pay more than 50% of your income in combined taxes, are you going to be more willing to create jobs when your taxes go up.  Those people who are wealthy enough to create jobs for others are far more willing to make an investment into more capital when they have more money to invest.  The idea that rich people will merely squander away the additional money they would have if the tax rates were lowered is not only ludicrous, but has been proven to be wrong.

Rich people don't need the extra money as i have said before.  If they have it and could do something philanthropical and get a tax break, or if they were incentivized by a government tax abatement to create more jobs, they will of course put their money their, because then they end up with more money and the economy ends up with more jobs.  

This is the whole idea of trickle down economics.  When the tide rises, so then do all the boats in the water, not just the yachts but the rowboats and the tug boats and the sail boats and the barges.  More money at the disposal of the rich equals a better and more prosperous economy for all.  

boredom reigns

Boredom reigns over the skulking, dark skies of these desolate plains. 

nowhere to go, nothing to do.  It scratches at the door to my brain, teeming with temptations of nothing.  The people here are pink and round, their children have no manners.  All they want is another burger, a milkshake perhaps.  What is this life that these people live?  It's a wonder to me that suicide isn't more prevalent round these parts here.  I hate it and yet I love it.  I love it for the mere fact that it makes me realize how wrong I was to leave you behind, oh city of mine.  Where would I be without the city that never sleeps.  Middletown, Pennsylvania is where.  That beautiful city where, any time day or night, you can find something to do.  I think we should install more cities into this country.  This kind of laziness and sense of nothingness are what breed idiocy in this country.  Build a real city in every state, i say.  That way these people have some chance of achieving something.  Situations such as these do not engender the people of the area to come up with new and brilliant ways to achieve things.  It is areas like these that keep a good portion of our nation lazy and poor.  if every rural bum fuck town like this was located near a major city, there would be constant trade of labor and ingenuity between the city and the suburbs that would benefit both.  Back and forth the cycle could go, increasing the local economies as so many people strive to do.  If there were a major metropolis in every state, we could decrease the overcrowding of the already established cities and have more cities which would have room for more people.  More people equals a bigger workforce, and more human capital equals higher productivity and better local economies and a better aggregate economy as well.  Changes must be made.  Mouthpiece signing off comrades.