Free Republic

Vladimir Putin is preparing to hit wealthy Russians with higher taxes to fund his war in Ukraine. The Russian president announced this week that the Kremlin was considering “reasonable” measures on the rich, such as increasing levies on dividends or raising tax rates on luxury goods. He said: “In the United States during the Vietnam War and the Korean War, that’s exactly what they did. They raised taxes specifically on people with high incomes.” It comes as Putin struggles to bankroll his war in Ukraine, with the most recent figures showing that the country’s national wealth fund stood at $36.4bn...

Donald Trump’s first budget recommendations help pay for a bigger military with lower expenditures for other promised programs. His recommendations for infrastructure disappointed local officials across the nation, and his plan to revive Nevada’s Yucca Mountain also received limited funds. Trump’s plan calls for $1.5 trillion in infrastructure projects, with just $200 billion supplied by the federal government. It was widely assumed, including in conservative circles, that the program would force local governments to raise taxes. In the Unification Church publication Washington Times, economist Peter Morici wrote, President Trump’s infrastructure plan puts a heavy burden on the states and will...

Zohran Mamdani’s recent victory in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary has drawn widespread attention for his affiliation with the Democratic Socialists of America and what some see as antisemitic rhetoric. But beyond the headlines, it’s the education platform Mamdani champions that could pose the greatest threat to New York City families — especially those striving to access better schools and brighter futures for their children. At the core of Mamdani’s approach is an unambiguous rejection of school choice. He opposes vouchers, charter school expansion, and even co-location policies that allow high-performing charters to operate in underutilized public school...

A Long Island suburb voted to wallop homeowners with a 87% property tax hike— with local officials saying the insane increase was necessary because of a years-long administrative goof. Atlantic Beach’s village board of trustees told residents the big number was needed because of how taxes were assessed by the county in recent decades but officials refused to give The Post further information or answer any questions. The Nassau County assessor said it was the village government that was improperly billing commercial properties. ... Though village officials blamed assessment quirks, some residents said part of the hike is to cover...

The new leftist Labour Party government in Britain announced plans to slash winter energy benefits for around 10 million pensioners while preparing massive tax hikes to fund soaring spending driven largely by mass migration. ... Rachel Reeves — the head of the Treasury Department — claimed that she “did not want to have to do this” but asserted that the previous Conservative government of Rishi Sunak had left a £22 billion “black hole” in Britain’s finances... This deficit was exacerbated by illegal immigration and the asylum system, the overspend on which rose to £6.4 billion this year alone. The chancellor...

Russian President Vladimir Putin promised a planned tax overhaul would increase inflows to the state budget, benefit low-income families and provide long-term stability for Russian corporation -snip- Now the government is looking to raise taxes for almost the first time since Putin took over in 2000 -snip- But with a war to fund, the Ministry of Finance (MinFin) intends to slowly move towards a more progressive system of taxes to boost revenues. At the same time Putin made expensive spending pledges to the population in March as part of the 12 National Projects that were launched in 2019 and need...

Pesident Biden is pushing for trillions in tax hikes during an election year, despite experts warning it would reduce economic output and have other dire effects. It may be popular with the anti-corporate elements of potential voters, but tax experts say it's a mistake. "The tax increases would substantially increase marginal tax rates on investment, saving, and work, reducing economic output by 2.2 percent in the long run, wages by 1.6 percent, and employment by 788,000 full-time equivalent jobs," according to a recent Tax Foundation analysis. "On a gross basis, we estimate Biden’s FY 2025 budget would increase taxes by...

President Biden’s Fiscal Year 2024 budget proposal contains nearly $4.7 trillion in new tax hikes on American individuals and businesses. Biden’s proposed tax hikes come just months after Democrats passed more than $700 billion in tax increases in the so-called Inflation Reduction Act.Biden’s budget proposal is a direct violation of the President’s campaign pledge to not raise taxes on small businesses.Below is a list of tax hikes included in Biden’s budget proposal. This list will be updated as more details of Biden’s Budget become available.Highest Personal Income Tax Rate Since 1986. Biden’s budget calls for a top combined federal tax...

Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party has faced a raw deal as Tory voters leave the party, while a poll has revealed they may be headed elsewhere. A YouGov poll on voting intention showed a spike in Reform UK’s support now at nine points - up by four. This follows the Tories dropping three points to 22 per cent and Labour dropping one point to 47 per cent, a change apparently in favour of Reform UK. The Liberal Democrats have seen no change, with nine per cent of the vote. The poll, from November 29 to 30, also saw Keir Starmer’s lead...

A lot has been made of Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s stock sales, but Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella recently sold a chunk of stock that is a much larger portion of his total holdings. Nadella sold about half his stake in Microsoft (ticker: MSFT), according to recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The CEO unloaded 838,584 shares on Nov. 22 and 23, netting him about $285 million. He has about 831,000 Microsoft shares left, worth roughly $280 million. It isn’t clear why he sold. Microsoft didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the sales or to make...

You know, I'm beginning to suspect that someone who broke his promise not to strand thousands of American citizens, legal residents, and allies in a terrorist-controlled country may not be scrupulously committed to upholding mere campaign pledges about tax policy. And if he's willing to claim that trillions of dollars in new spending costs "zero dollars," his connection to reality and fealty to truth are manifestly not, shall we say, rigid. Nevertheless, this is shaping up to be a prominent breach of a high-profile vow. As a candidate, Joe Biden insisted that his planned tax increases would exclusively hit "wealthy"...

Congressional Democrats can’t quite cobble together the votes to pass a mammoth $3.5 billion-plus social-spending bill, which for now means the political system is working to reject dangerous radicalism. The few remaining Democrats who at least claim to lean to the center are in a game of legislative chicken with the more numerous left wing of the party, with the would-be centrists wanting to pass a separate $1.2 trillion “infrastructure” bill before being asked to commit to a final social-spending package. The extreme left wing wants just the opposite, saying they will block the infrastructure bill until they have a...

Social Security’s latest report on the status of the trust funds on which it relies to pay benefits has both good and bad news. The good news is that the funds have not been as hard hit by the Covid-19 as was initially feared, due the economic recovery that has taken place. The bad news is that the funds’ depletion dates have moved up sooner, prompting a chorus of calls for Congress to act swiftly to correct the problem. “If this report does not trigger a pretty serious and swift discussion on Capitol Hill among lawmakers about what needs to...

Senate Democrats have assembled a laundry list of possible tax hikes to help finance their $3.5 trillion spending bonanza, according to an internal committee document obtained by The Post. Many Democrats are eager to implement the host of corporate and individual tax hikes to fund the $3.5 trillion plan, but Beltway insiders are dubious the more controversial plans — like taxing share buybacks and hefty executive payouts — will make the final bill.... ...Sen. Mike Crapo, a Republican of Idaho, said in a statement to The Post that he had “serious concerns” about the Democratic “tax-and-spending spree.” He said the...

President Joe Biden’s proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year assumes that a hike in the capital-gains tax rate took effect in late April, meaning that it already would be too late for high-income investors to realize gains at lower tax rates, according to a Wall Street Journal report out Thursday citing people familiar with the proposal. Biden plans to increase the top tax rate on capital gains to 43.4% from 23.8% for households with income over $1 million, though Congress must OK any hikes and retroactive effective dates, the report added. Some analysts predicted any rise in capital-gains taxes...

Across Missouri, about 900 state road and highway bridges are rated in “poor” condition by Missouri Department of Transportation inspectors. In Southwest Missouri alone, that number is a little more than 200. MoDOT officials say the problem — money, or the lack there of — is not anything new. Without a big infusion of new money coming into the state’s road budget, the number of bridges with a “poor” designation likely won’t improve much. and while sources for new revenue are on state and federal tables, they still have obstacles that would have to be overcome. MoDOT officials say being...

What would happen if Biden got the tax hikes he seeks? A big set of questions and answers follows.Net Capital Gains Tax Would Approach a Whopping 60% As I noted on April 23, under Biden's proposal Net Capital Gains Tax Would Approach a Whopping 60%.Four Comments By Shortsighted ReadersI'll complain when I'm the one being taxed.Mish, tell me if it impacts someone with $60K in annual income and $12K in short-term capital gains. If it doesn't, go screw yourself!Great if the plan is passed! Party time for the Top .3% is over! Why should investment be advantaged over labor?The first...

Stocks erased earlier gains to trade sharply lower after Bloomberg report Thursday afternoon that President Joe Biden would propose increasing the corporate tax rate on wealthy individuals. The Dow dropped 250 points, or 0.7%, following the report, after trading just slightly lower earlier. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq erased gains to trade at session lows. Biden's plan would involve increasing the capital gains tax rate on the wealthy to 39.6%, according to the report from Bloomberg citing people familiar with the matter. This would apply to those earning at least $1 million. The current base capital gains tax rate is...

The Biden administration and some (but not all) of their Democratic allies in Congress want to raise the corporate tax rate to 28 percent. They say this would help the working class and hurt Big Business, finally making corporations “pay their fair share.” But if that were true, giant corporations like Amazon wouldn’t be endorsing the change. Yet that’s exactly what Jeff Bezos just did.A message from Jeff Bezos. https://t.co/ZAcpnaRu6zpic.twitter.com/81AkgVyQke— Amazon News (@amazonnews) April 6, 2021“We support the Biden Administration’s focus on making bold investments in American infrastructure,” the Amazon CEO wrote in a public statement. “We recognize this investment...

Joe Biden on Wednesday delivered a speech on his Socialist “American Jobs Act” and less than 2,000 people watched him mumble on the White House YouTube live feed. Joe Biden has spent his entire adult life fleecing people and selling out his public office in countless international pay-to-play schemes but he pretended to be old middle class Joe from Scranton. Joe Biden is proposing the first major federal tax hike since 1993 to fund a plan to tackle climate change, infrastructure and other Socialist pet projects. Biden’s tax hike is unpopular but since we have no real media, he gets...