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State income taxes are ridiculously high in California. I did a comparison with neighboring state Arizona a few years ago, and the state spending per resident was about 40% more in California. The gap is probably more today. Schools, roads, state police force, and all the other state services are about the same in those two states. Salaries and wages are roughly 10 to 15% higher in CA, but the other 25% is all unnecessary bureaucracy and even higher spending on illegal immigrants than in AZ. And yet the people of CA actually voted for even higher taxes a few years ago. There are a lot of neurotic crazy people living in CA now.

The super high-income people like Steyer in states like CA and NY actually lost about 80% of their SALT deductions way back in 2013. The Tax Act of 2012 included language that starts to limit the SALT deduction beginning at $300K of income for married taxpayers. So the Silicon Valley billionaires really got nailed by the tax bill passed at the end of 2012, but because democrats voted for that bill and Obama signed it, we didn’t hear all the bitching and moaning about lost SALT deductions. Also, that bill didn’t affect people with incomes below $250K. But it’s very telling how the news media has basically ignored the truth that many democrats voted for a big cut in SALT deductions way back in 2012 and yet they now say they’ve always opposed cutting the SALT deduction. Another bunch of BS from democrat politicians.

https://www.bakerdonelson.com/The-American-Taxpayer-Relief-Act-of-2012-Some-Tax-Certainty-in-an-Uncertain-World-01-08-2013

What did you say Ben? I couldn’t hear you. I had the Cone of Silence deployed.

Well I think if we had to, we and our NATO allies could produce all the steel we need within a couple of years, and while we’re expanding production we could import the remaining steel from our Asian allies, Japan and South Korea. Within a few more years, the US could produce all the steel we use domestically. Most steel is just a commodity product produced with a process that we’ve been using for decades.

It’s more the high-strength specialty metals, used in military hardware, that we need to make sure we can produce in ample amounts here in America—titanium and aluminum for aircraft parts, and specialty high-strength steels. I don’t know what the regulations are for defense contractors, but they should be required to buy all those specialty metals from domestic producers.

The whole thing is surreal. That’s like a court case about whether the state can force people to be accessories to criminal activity.

Interesting that they’re all in Southern California. You’d think some cities in the Central Valley would want to opt out also. Maybe that will happen soon. Major constitutional law issue will be decided on this question about whether the state can force cities to spend tax money on facilities specifically intended for use by illegal immigrants.

Interesting development today—Trump directs Lighthizer, Kudlow to study re-entering TPP:
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-directs-lighthizer-kudlow-to-study-re-entering-tpp-2018-04-12

It’s not a self-promoting link. It’s a link to a thread about corporate tax cuts.

A pro trader is a professional trader.

How could you possibly know how much I know about financial markets? What ARE you talking about?

Then how would you define the term “educated”? Take a look at this post sometime:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3547417/posts

Well it’s all just threats and talk right now. No tariffs have actually been implemented by anyone. Promises by China to open markets are just talk at this point, but the uncertainty created is real to business people. The right way to do trade negotiations is away from the media, as I described in post 53.

Can you please chill out on the insulting personal attacks. That stuff is not constructive...just annoys people.

Just for the record, I’m highly educated, and I have a BS in Chemistry from the University of California, and an MBA in finance from the University of Chicago.

At time time, I’m basically a pro trader in the financial markets, and I have many years of business experience in corporate finance. I’m real familiar with the financial markets and what actually makes them move. So how have Trump’s tariffs helped our economy?

So like the True Karate Master, if we negotiate with our allies the right way, we only have to threaten to impose tariffs, away from the news media. We never have to actually impose a tariff because they know we’ll actually do it, and so they’ll make concessions first.

Let me tell you a true story. I was driving through Ohio on the day before the election and I prayed silently twice for a low turnout among democrats in the swing states so that Trump would win. That’s exactly what happened. Now we need to make sure we keep control of both houses of congress in November and reelect DJT in 2020.

The right way to do trade negotiations is the way the US and Europeans handled negotiations with China around 2010, only tougher this time. They met with the Chinese trade negotiators and basically just told them “you have to start buying more products from us, or we’ll have to restrict imports severely from China.” It worked, of course, and China started importing Ferraris and BMWs from Europe, and more semiconductor products, farm products, and SUVs from America. The negotiations were out of the public arena, didn’t rattle the financial markets and corporate guys, and we got results. Now it’s way past time for round two of the same kind of group negotiations with China and Japan.

It’s like the old saying about the True Karate Master, who never has to use karate (because he’s so tough nobody wants to fight him). We need to go in there with our allies, quietly, away from the media, and tell them what we’re going to do, if they don’t open their markets and buy more products from us and cut the trade deficit. That will work again if it’s done the right way, and then we don’t rattle the financial markets and cause middle class people to take losses in the stock market, and we don’t cause delays in capital projects by business.

I don’t like the tariffs China is putting on farm products, which could cost jobs and farm income in states like North Dakota. All the uncertainty could also slow down GDP growth and hiring, which gives ammo to the democrats to use in campaign ads. That’s why I’m concerned about the midterm elections. One of the reasons I posted this article was to get a read on how much support there is for tariffs. Looks like there’s much more support among conservative activists than I expected to see. That’s interesting and important politically, but corporate guys and institutional investors are really bothered by tariffs and trade disputes.

Well you have to include health insurance benefits, which have been inflating much faster than general inflation for the last 20 years, especially since the disastrous Obamacare law was jammed through the Senate (against all the polls and the will of the people). When you add in the value of health insurance benefits, then total compensation has kept up better with GDP growth. But whether you like corporate America or not, trade disputes create a lot of uncertainty and risk, and that causes delays and cancellations of capital projects, which costs people their jobs (or lost business income).

Yeah, but when China puts tariffs on soybeans and that cuts exports from America, that retaliation then feeds back into companies that manufacture farm equipment and repair shops that service farm equipment, and jobs get lost in those places. I’m concerned about lost farm income in North Dakota, for example, where we have a very winnable senate election in November.

Here’s some commentary about trade wars from a distinguished economist named Robert Shiller. He thinks a trade war with China could trigger a recession:

https://www.barrons.com/articles/robert-shiller-trade-war-will-trigger-recession-1522083397

I don’t think it’s going to go that far, into a full-scale trade war, but the uncertainty created by this tariff dispute could slow down economic growth significantly this year, and it’s already taken a lot of momentum out of the stock market.