Thread: Tax Credit deal financed on the backs of mortgage holders

"Hidden" mortgage fee paying for payroll tax cut - CBS News

The new fee is a minimum of one-tenth of 1 percent on Fannie Mae- and Freddie Mac-backed loans, and is likely to go much higher.
It will be imposed for the next 10 years on most mortgages and refinancings and it lasts for the life of the loan.

For every $200,000, it amounts to an extra $15 dollars a month.

Anderson will save a couple hundred dollars from having her payroll tax cut extended but her mortgage broker told her the new fee would cost her almost $9,500.

The $35.7 billion collected in fees won't go into the Social Security fund to replace the lost payroll tax. It goes to the general treasury where Congress can spend it however they please.

Why is it, apparently, physically impossibly to make a real reduction in spending as opposed to playing funny money and fuzzy math and magic budget buckets?

Because rupubs and dems dont want to give an inch or take any cuts. So they play games and fight tooth and nail over every dollar. Of course this foolishness is just costing us money. We need to cut military spending, stop being the world police, spend MORE on education, enforce rules so children cant have cellphones out at all during school, same with Ipads or any other mobile "Study" device.

Redo our tax code so we simplify it, actually enforce the current tax code, I heard that in a certain part of the US there is 13 employees for checking that tax offices arnt commiting fraud, and at any given time about half of them are in the Philippians keeping track of all the money sent there. So you have 4-8 people for a few states.

I say we cut all political salaries until they decide to do the job.

Originally Posted by deathgodusmc

I say we cut all political salaries until they decide to do the job.

How about instead of term limits, the salary goes down each term.

Does this help? No. BUT (shit... there's always a but)... each year they're eligible for a performance bonus. Every constituent can send them a dollar (or not send them a dollar) with a check-box on their income tax form.

If very few people give them the bonus, then they won't keep running - they won't be able to afford it (their salary goes down each year).

The happier you make the actual voters, the more money you get. That is - they get money from the voters. It's not a bribe. It's not swag. It's not a yacht you can "borrow" every weekend. It's not something they have to hide or be embarrassed about. It gets reported each year in a public record. And it's cash, free and clear (it's also income, and taxable).

Instead of being someone who looks for wedge issues to flog (hoping to discourage voting, and still be on the good side of the 51% of people who still give a fuck on election day), you'll be desperately looking for ways to make 75% or 80% of your constituents happy.

Hmm. Might need to adjust a few details...

Cheers,


AetheLove

Originally Posted by AetheLove

How about instead of term limits, the salary goes down each term.

Does this help? No. BUT (shit... there's always a but)... each year they're eligible for a performance bonus. Every constituent can send them a dollar (or not send them a dollar) with a check-box on their income tax form.

If very few people give them the bonus, then they won't keep running - they won't be able to afford it (their salary goes down each year).

The happier you make the actual voters, the more money you get. That is - they get money from the voters. It's not a bribe. It's not swag. It's not a yacht you can "borrow" every weekend. It's not something they have to hide or be embarrassed about. It gets reported each year in a public record. And it's cash, free and clear (it's also income, and taxable).

Instead of being someone who looks for wedge issues to flog (hoping to discourage voting, and still be on the good side of the 51% of people who still give a fuck on election day), you'll be desperately looking for ways to make 75% or 80% of your constituents happy.

Hmm. Might need to adjust a few details...

Cheers,


AetheLove

The problem here is you are just trying to put a bandaid over a hole on a sinking ship. What you are seeing is the direct result of a two-party system and a system with too much individuality, and the only way to fix it is to blow it up and start from scratch. Until that happens, problems like this will remain.

Originally Posted by Fovezer

The problem here is you are just trying to put a bandaid over a hole on a sinking ship. What you are seeing is the direct result of a two-party system and a system with too much individuality, and the only way to fix it is to blow it up and start from scratch. Until that happens, problems like this will remain.

Agreed. Is be inclined to support a reset for much the same reasons. It's far to corrupt, and that corruption is far too entrenched, at this point to correct. Imo.

Sent via highly charged bolt of electricity.

As for political officials and their pay and donations to them I have this to say.

In addition to my term limits idea I posted several months ago (i can get a link later if anyone is interested) I think the following:

1) federal elected officials make 1/4 of the President annually. Period.
2) they do not control their own pay scale.
3) the president's salary receives cost of living increases once each term.
4) elected officials can receive NO donations (either public, private or corporate)
5) they all receive an campaign "stipend" from the FEC which is dependant on the size of the district or area they will be running for.
6) all over the air broadcast networks are required to grant them 1 hour of airtime a month for free (and the networks can write the cost of the time off as a charitable donation)

Sent via highly charged bolt of electricity.

Originally Posted by Alundil

As for political officials and their pay and donations to them I have this to say.

In addition to my term limits idea I posted several months ago (i can get a link later if anyone is interested) I think the following:

1) federal elected officials make 1/4 of the President annually. Period.
2) they do not control their own pay scale.
3) the president's salary receives cost of living increases once each term.
4) elected officials can receive NO donations (either public, private or corporate)
5) they all receive an campaign "stipend" from the FEC which is dependant on the size of the district or area they will be running for.
6) all over the air broadcast networks are required to grant them 1 hour of airtime a month for free (and the networks can write the cost of the time off as a charitable donation)

Sent via highly charged bolt of electricity.

Why are we still going off the belief that every official must be elected individually? That individuality is what breeds corruption. Instead, I believe we should elect parties and give them seats based proportionately on the votes. By doing that, you remove the ability of corruption to slip easily as it does now and open the door to far more parties. Right now, politicians are bought off one by one, but with a party system, you'd have to try and by the whole party off. If you were to accomplish that, though, it would be far easier to throw them out of power by voting for a different party next election instead of trying to vote out each person individually. Obviously my idea needs to be more thought out, but I would much rather vote for a party which is represented by an individual in Congress versus an individual who claims to represent a party in Congress.

Originally Posted by Fovezer

Why are we still going off the belief that every official must be elected individually? That individuality is what breeds corruption. Instead, I believe we should elect parties and give them seats based proportionately on the votes. By doing that, you remove the ability of corruption to slip easily as it does now and open the door to far more parties. Right now, politicians are bought off one by one, but with a party system, you'd have to try and by the whole party off. If you were to accomplish that, though, it would be far easier to throw them out of power by voting for a different party next election instead of trying to vote out each person individually. Obviously my idea needs to be more thought out, but I would much rather vote for a party which is represented by an individual in Congress versus an individual who claims to represent a party in Congress.

That is the most absurd thing i have read in a while. I dont like your idea at all.

Originally Posted by deathgodusmc

That is the most absurd thing i have read in a while. I dont like your idea at all.

This is how most Parliaments work. It has a few major advantages, the biggest being that you don't have to be in the majority for your vote to count. If an idea only has 5% of the voters, then they can still form a party and get 5% of the seats. It's much more conducive to multi-party systems.