Building on the existing work for a sustainable future in Northeast Iowa.
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John Franzen
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- Decorah, IA
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I am going to be meeting with Tom Latham on 4/14/09. Anything you are interested in finding out about?
Let me know.
Have a good day!
How did you come out with the BoS? As usual, we got killed again and it was like talking to a wall. My next door neighbor is on the BoS here and at least I got him and one other to see that they were killing economic development, but we are still one short of a majority. Maybe threats of bodily harm will work since nothing else seems to. Logic, reason and common sense appear foreign to them, Can't quite figure that out.
Let me know what is going on.
Have a good day!
Bruce
The short fall created by the elimination of the machinery and equipment tax will also be dumped back on the counties if the economy doesn't pick up in the next year. I also just read that farmland values have fallen from 6-15% in Iowa over the last 90 days and net farm income could be down 45% this crop year.
The state auditor also indicated that total revenues are down up to 6% and national statistics show an overall decline of 12.6%. Instead of having a budget increase of 1.8%, don't you think it would be a good idea to at least freeze spending on the state level?
What the state giveth with one hand, it taketh away with the other!
The state is also predicting a budget shortfall with the assumption that they will sell $700M in bonds for road improvements and that they will get approximately $600M a year for three years from the most recent "bailout". Do you find anything at all curious about that?
On the surface, it would look to me that they are really short about $2.72B, what do you think.
I couldn't help but read the comment below and my answer is that you can get your own 2Kw wind turbine with controls, wiring and tower for about $3,500.00 and you won't need to worry about the grid.
It's been awhile ago, but I remember when all the rural cemetaries around us E of West Union used to be taken care of by volunteers and they were reimbursed for gas for mowing. I don't remember when that changed, but perhaps we could go back to some form of that.
More later
Have a good one!
Bruce
Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. A good book for you to read would be I.OU.S.A. by Bill Bonner. He also has a daily e-mail letter called the Daily Reckonning you can get for free.
I know what you are talking about on office buildings. I have one that has gone down in real value about 50% in the last 3 years, which means the effective tax rate has more than doubled with the 8.5% annual tax increases we have been getting since 2002. During that same period though, my farmland real values have doubled and the property taxes have remained the same. Real equitable, right?
As for budgets, I have yet to see a budget I couldn't cut by 20%. Obviously that is not a real popular position, but I believe the excesses of the past have to be dealt with sooner or later and now is as good a time as any. My view, again very unpopular today, would be to cut salaries and benifits by 20% across the board. In my ultra conservative view, most(not all) government employees are under worked, over paid and have a big time management problem.
Decorah, Winneshiek county and other governments have to realize that money does not grow on trees. All tax dollars come from the population that generates the income that is taxed. The higher the tax, the lower the profit that is taxed and we have a vicious circle. Inflation on the other hand masks the effects of that circle as does the import of goods and services from outside the governmental area. That is, until a situation develops like we are currently in.
What we fail to realize is that (this is real touchy) when we bring in a labor force to do the jobs we no longer will do is that the low skilled, poorly educated and ill prepared labor force has a cost greater than their real benefit. The same goes for an economic leach like WallMart. The initial benefit appears great, but the long term drag created is very detrimental. The same goes on the higher end if those jobs are not filled first from within. All basic economic models in place today are based on ggrowth, yet many areas like Winneshiek county have had no real growth since the 1920's.
Will talk more later.
If you want, you can e-mail me directly at nesleksa@yahoo.com
I've been @ several recent,budget meetings held by our Winneshiek county Supervisors & things are gonna change for all of us very soon!! Here our guys(Winn-Co Supervisors) are raising our property taxes.Period! On the low side it will be .72 cents per $1000. On the high side .86 cents per $1000. So that means as a commercial property owner my little ol' (investment) building in Calmar,(if I'm real lucky I could get $50,000 for it) lets just round it @ .80 cents per thousand x 50,000 = $400 BUCKS PER YEAR divide that by 12 months per year = $ 33.33 per month MORE on my measly little ol' brick bldg in Small Town, USA!!!! NOW if you own any amount of land or property, do the math!!! Uh huh!!!!! We all will be paying more taxes!! That's how it works. Right??
NOW, in defense of our local elected officials(Supervisors, Decorah city council, & I'm sure other area councils have heard every reason to & not to, every reason why they should or shouldn't! They've been asked, & have asked Dept. heads to take a "CHAINSAW" to their already conservative budgets, BUT its ALL of us who are going to have to pay more taxes, in one way or another.
SORRY for rambling there, but we've heard all the problems & all about the difficult situation we are ALL in.......The question is....... what the hell do we do about it??? What are some solutions? What are some of the answers?? Who,what,when,where, why & HOW ???
More taxes, from the Fed,State,County & City levels that's how!! Right??
John
PS. I'm sure Bruce & I would love to hear your input as well. All ideas welcome.
My income tax has gone down from $60,000 x 28% = $14,400 plus state tax of $46,400 x 5% = $2,320 or a total of $16,720 (fed tax is deductable from state tax) to $23,000 x 15% = $3,450 plus $19,550 x 4% = $782 or a total of $4,232. My total tax contribution has dropped 74.69% or $12,488. At the same time, government spending has doubled.
Nothing has changed on my end other than the government has artificially lowered interest rates. The amount I have in CD's is the same.
Given that the stock market is actually below 2000 and interest rates are at or below 3% as of today, where is the incentive to invest? Most people I know are in lockdown mode on money, job security is on a day to day basis and our so called elected officials think the only answer is throwing more money at everything? It ain't a gonna work Jack!
The state has also come up with a new and unique Ponzi scheme as well. Take $700M in road repairs and roll that expense into 20 year bonds, pass $141.3 million in property tax relief back to the counties and $83.5M in unfunded school aid back to local school districts. That looks to me like about $924.8 million. If I remember correctly, the house and senate majority leaders said back in Aug., 2008 that we had a surplus of $623 million. Add to the $924.8M another $114M in increases in state spending as shown in the most recent budget and we are actually $1..0388B in the hole. Drop in another $480M in revenue shortfall on the state level and gee, we are $1.5188B
in the hole for one year or $505.76 per person. How does all that work?
Talk to you later!
www.prudentbear.com
www.dailyreckoning.com
www.implodeometer.com
Nuriel Rubini economist
Milton Friedman economist
John Maynard Keynes Keynesian theory of economics
As for the banker/farmer relationship, the moneychangers have called the shots for over 6,000 years, so if they haven't figured it out yet, the chances are slim that they will. Has anyone ever heard of saving money, downsizing, or not buying the toys with borrowed money?
Conversely, why should I pay taxes to bail them out? I can live quite comfortably on $15,000.00 per year and pay very little in taxes. If that income is capital gains, I pay 15% federal and 4% state tax and no Social Security or Medicare/Medicade rider. The $15,000.00 is below the poverty line and then makes me eligeable for all kinds of programs and would more than offset what tax I would pay in plus also probably cover a portion of my property taxes.
How would I do that you ask? First of all, let's say my house is worth $250,000.00, I sell that and take the one time deduction allowed by law which means I walk with the full amount in cash. Now, I can buy let's say 10 acres and build a small, energy efficient home on it with basic outbuildings, buy a few head of livestock, some used machinery, put in a garden, etc. I have a 1996 Ford Ranger pickup that just turned over 250,000 miles that has been well maintained and has no rust on which the license is $45 and the insurance is $86 per annum. My health insurance is $3,420 per year less a $210 discount for annual payments, or $3,210 net. Based on tax rates in Winneshiel county, my annual property taxes would be about $900 with homestead exemption and the fact that it would be verifiably an operating farm and meets the 10 acre minimum requirement for that. Under current IRS tax codes, any loss incurred in the farming operation could be deducted from other capital gains income.
Bottom line, it is possible to have let's say $1,000,000.00 in assets, pay no net tax and qualify for poverty program benifits. What a country we live in!
Why would you want or need to borrow money?
Talk to you later!
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