Category / Government

by Hoosier Econ

The Marijuana Spin is Mind Boggling To Watch

Smoking marijuana is a big topic of the day. While the use of this product doesn’t offend me the talking points are downright absurd. I have more respect for people if they just say they want to use it to get high than some of the things I’ll comment down below.

My [Insert Person I Know] Got Multiple Years in Prison for Just Having Marijuana

This is the most common thing I hear in the legalization of marijuana debate. I can tell you from my past and current experience in the law enforcement arena that having a small quantity of marijuana never puts someone in prison for 50 years. In the year 2000 I was a rookie cop and riding along with my FTO. We pulled a car over and smelled marijuana with the driver fully intoxicated from marijuana. (LEGAL NOTE, marijuana field tests were evolving by the minute during this time period) I asked if they had been smoking and they said yes. Upon search of the person we found two marijuana joints. I looked at my FTO in trying to judge how we were to precede. He told the driver to put both joints on the ground and stomp on them. The guy obliged. We had him call for a ride and had his vehicle towed. Please note we didn’t send him to a maximum security prison. I asked my FTO why we didn’t make an arrest. He explained the courts were already swamped with wife beaters and bad check writers, a judge wouldn’t want to deal with “two joints”.
police marijuana

I do come across the stories of people knowing someone who went to prison over marijuana. The stories are compelling and usually critical parts are left out. Most of the time it takes a very basic search of someone’s criminal past to understand why they went to prison for just having marijuana. “But my uncle having marijuana is a non-violent crime and now he sits in a prison”. Well, after looking up your uncle I found he also did multiple stints in prison for robbery, car theft and selling drugs within a school area. I guess the whole “following your parole/probation criteria” is thrown out because selling weed is a non-violent crime.

Marijuana Will Bring in Tax Revenue

Bringing tax revenue to the church of government absolves a lot of sin in American society. When the marijuana debate took off and Colorado instituted legalization, the tax revenue claims were touted by Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper of $100 Million year tax revenue (read “COLORADO’S POT REVENUE GOES UP IN SMOKE”) colorado governor

Some would see this as just a financial prediction, but it really was a societal claim that all the marijuana smokers would come out of the shadows and purchase weed in a proficient way. Through many conversations I had with people who believed this I emphatically stated that if you’re currently getting good weed from Frank the dope dealer, what would compel you to drop him and go to a marijuana shop to purchase it at a higher price?

Marijuana supporters usually come back with a defensive posture of some tax revenue is better than none, even if the financial analysis is way off. So be it, but just remember, government doesn’t make tax revenue projections for nothing. They usually make the projection and already spend the money and let the chips fall for when revenue actually comes in (surplus or deficits).

MEXICAN DRUG CARTELS

These guys are the main players of supplying most of the drugs in America. They control the entire country of Mexico, have supply routes that make UPS and FedEx blush and are deliberately let in on a constant basis by the United States Federal Government through lax border security. So how does this relate to the legalization of marijuana? Because many Americans believe once you legalize, these drug cartels will simply disappear. No they won’t and will only get more brutal and switch to different drugs (heroin is going into Chicago and being dealt right here in Indiana). The cartels operate in almost 1,300 cities and in sworn testimony September 2014 the DEA said Colorado legalizing only make them send more drugs. The cartels sent more weed there because the black market on marijuana would grow due to prices skyrocketing in legally approved shops. Cartels are also beginning to shakedown shop owners. Just like a scene out of Sopranos collecting neighborhood taxes, the cartels are walking into the shops and saying, “Monthly fee will keep the fires away”. Mexican-gang-and-drug-cartel-routes

What is the solution? Marijuana activists should become friends real quick with the philosophy of the US Military enforcing the border. You set up an aggressive strategy of the military standing on the border and you cut off easily 80% of all drugs coming from Mexico and South America. State and federal governments are coming with regulations on the selling and chemical makeup of marijuana, once this happens legal marijuana sellers will be undersold by the cartels. They are much more organized than Johnny the dope dealer with a permit. Only way to give legal sellers a chance to survive and lessening violence law enforcement see with cartels will be closing off the border.

Edited by SJ Himes

by Hoosier Econ

New Name for Obamacare Tax

I filed my taxes this past weekend online through H&R Block and stumbled upon the Obamacare tax. The sly government gurus have gave it a warm fuzzy college theory name of “Shared Responsibility Payment”.

Remember, under collectivism, shared responsibility also involves shared misery.

image

by Hoosier Econ

Robots Being Trained to Fight Fires

image

Via The Washington Free Beacon:

The US Navy has begun to test the firefighting abilities of a humanoid robot it has been developing for several years. The Shipboard Autonomous Firefighting Robot (SAFFiR) walks on two legs, operates a fire hose, and even wears a track suit. The Navy is hoping SAFFiR can one day supplement its traditional human firefighting teams.

“This is a program that’s been going on for about five years basically to develop a humanoid capable of fire suppression,” Thomas McKenna said in an Office of Naval Research (ONR) video about the project. “There’s substantial losses incurred when you have a major fire and you can’t suppress it at an early stage.”

John Farley of the Naval Research Laboratory said that he sees the robot’s quick learning curve as a likely lifesaver.

by Hoosier Econ

Illinois Facing Debt Payments

Illinois is starting to get hit with rising interest payments on debt borrowed. Illinois Policy points out how compound interest is a vicious beast once it takes hold:

According to the fiscal year 2015 budget summary from the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability the cost of debt service in fiscal year 2015 is nearly $4 billion on outstanding bond debt of nearly $32 billion. The debt service amounts to more than 11 percent of the state’s anticipated revenues for the fiscal year – 11 percent that can’t be used for essential programs.

Illinois will not be the only heavy spending state to start getting hammered on debt payments. But here is how a debt situation gets out of control:

Primarily as a result of these nontraditional uses of bond debt, the state began fiscal year 2015 saddled with $32 billion in bond debt requiring $4 billion, or 11 percent of its general funds budget, to pay the annual debt service. This represents nearly a 400 percent growth in debt service, more than 300 percent growth in outstanding bond debt, and more than 200 percent growth in debt service as a percentage of general revenues since 2002.

by Hoosier Econ

Federal Government Spending For the Next 10 Years

Economics 21 had an interesting graph in their article titled “How to Fix the $960 Billion Budget Deficit”.

Here is how federal government spending will be broken up the next ten years.

image

Almost two-thirds of additional spending will be driven by entitlements, primarily Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare. America’s aging population is the primary contributor to the growth of Social Security and Medicare, while the Affordable Care Act substantially expanded the scope of Medicaid.

Adding interest payments to the budget brings the total increase in the debt from mandatory spending to 85 percent. Spending is projected to grow by $2.3 trillion annually by 2024.

by Hoosier Econ

Indiana in Top 10 for Tax Climate

Via The Payroll Blog

10 best business tax climates can be found in:

Wyoming
South Dakota
Nevada
Alaska
Florida
Washington
Montana
New Hampshire
Utah
Indiana

The worst tax climate states for small business, according to the report, are:

New York
California
Minnnesota
Wisconsin
North Carolina
Maryland
Rhode Island
Connecticut
New Jersey
Vermont

by Hoosier Econ

Prison Economy: Cell Phones

prison cell phones
Cell phones in prisons and jails are a hot commodity. Finding national numbers was hard to do, but to give you a perspective of how big it is, California prison guards found 9,000 in 2013.

State police officer told me one time while working on a tip they busted a female during visitation at a prison with 3 flip phones. They were wrapped up and “inside her”. That is is an example of great lengths to get these phones inside a prison. But why? Because the price it goes for.

In Texas, a deathrow inmate paid $2,100 for one phone.

In 2011, the NY Times found that

“payments for cellphones range from $300 to $1,000, depending on the type of phone and the service plan. Monthly fees are generally paid by inmates’ relatives.”

Prison guard in Las Vegas was paid $2,000 by an accused murderers family to smuggle in 2 cell phones.

Prison guard in New Jersey was set up in a sting and thought they were getting $1,000 for a cell phone from an inmate.

An unmeasurable financial aspect is when two Indiana prisoners had cell phones smuggled in to run their drug business while on the inside. Indiana prisoners are paying up $1,600 for a phone.

by Hoosier Econ

How Federal Tax Dollars Were Spent in 2014

The Tax Foundation put together a chart showing how federal tax dollars were spent.
image

Compare that to 1962 federal spending
image

by Hoosier Econ

Mental Disorders Rising for Social Security Disability

This blog has chronicled how lawyers get rich taking in Social Security Disability claims.

Now CNSNews has come out with some new SS disability data that raises some doubt if this program has any control:

One in three, or 35.2 percent, of people getting federal disability insurance benefits have been diagnosed with a mental disorder, according to the latest data from the Social Security Administration (SSA).

Washington, D.C., the seat of the federal government, ranked in the top-ten list of states where disabled beneficiaries were diagnosed with mental problems.

In 2013, the latest data from SSA show there were 10,228,364 disabled beneficiaries, up 139,625 from 2012 when there were 10,088,739 disabled beneficiaries.

Disabled beneficiaries have increased 49.7 percent from a decade ago in 2003 when there were 6,830,714 beneficiaries; and the number is up 14.3 percent from the 8,945,376 beneficiaries in 2009, the year President Obama took office.


ss2

Here is another chart showing how big the disability fund has grown in the last ten years.
ss1