Charting Obamacare’s history, part 1: Cost of Healthcare.gov

The Affordable Care Ace (ACA) was signed into law on March 23, 2010 and launched in 2013.  It is not living up to its promises.

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.How Obamacare has worked the last six years                                                            TheDailySignal / Melissa Quinn / March 23, 2016 / Excerpts

Six years ago Wednesday, President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law. Since then, Americans have seen their premiums increase, a dozen nonprofit insurers have closed their doors and the number of people

1) The Cost of HealthCare.gov                                                                        Obamacare’s implementation in October 2013 came with the launch of HealthCare.gov, the federal health insurance exchange.

Though the Obama administration hasn’t formally said how much HealthCare.gov cost the taxpayers, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell said last May that the website cost $834 million. Similarly, a report from the Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General put the cost of the exchange at $800 million.

An analysis by Bloomberg Government, though, put the total cost at $2.1 billion. Bloomberg Government took into account budgetary costs for the Internal Revenue Service and other government agencies, as well as contracts reworked to pay for the website.

Graphic: Kelsey Lucas/Visualsey

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$2.1 billion is a lot of money to spend setting up the federal exchange, a bureaucratic monstrosity with layers upon layers of red tape, multiple millions of dollars in ongoing embedded costs, restricted access and surging costs for consumers, and  reimbursement cuts and electronic headaches for providers.

And that cost layer doesn’t include the $4.4 billion cost in setting up state exchanges along with billions of dollars in additional costs for insurer subsidies, healthcare navigators, advertising, and on and on.

Costs are rising, enrollment is shrinking, and according to the CBO, it is costing a lot of Americans their jobs:                                                                                                    Obama care’s cost per beneficiary explodes with shrinking enrollment               NCPA January 28, 2016

There is a better way.

Decentralized health care is the solution, with U.S. citizens allocating health care resources in accordance with their own needs and desires:

The U.S. Health Care Freedom Plan – the one clean and affordable, comprehensive alternative to ObamaCare

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 –  $75,000 per U.S. citizen                                                  The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 (1536)

 

 

When government runs the health care show, you can expect prices to rise – substantially

And here we go….

The Affordable Care Act pounded the big insurers over the past three turbulent years, and they are now seeking to further stabilize their business plans.

Big health plans, at least the ones that managed to survive the past three lean years, are filing their 2017 premium proposals with regulators, and those proposals include robust rate increases.

The 2017 proposed increases follow in the steps of the hefty 14.9% average increase that hit consumers across America between 2015 and 2016.

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2017

Insurers Seek Big Premium IncreasesWALL STREET JOURNAL  5-25-16

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Big government is not providing health care solutions.  It is expanding America’s health care problems.

Decentralized health care is the solution, with U.S. citizens allocating health care resources in accordance with their own needs and desires:

The U.S. Health Care Freedom Plan – the one clean and affordable, comprehensive alternative to ObamaCare

Banks, criminal enterprise, and rescue packages…

The Leviticus 25 Plan is based upon the presumption that U.S. citizens deserve nothing less than to be granted the same access to liquidity that the Federal Reserve so generously provided to the Wall Street financial sector during the Global Financial Crisis (2007-2012).

Take HSBC, for instance. This U.K. banking titan (formerly the Hong Kong Shanghai Banking Corp) and current Fed-approved Primary Dealer, had purchased billions of dollars in credit default swaps from AIG by the fall of 2008 – not bothering to employ any serious risk assessment on the creditworthiness of AIG Financial Products and the reserves behind their potential CDS obligations.

The housing bubble popped that fall and AIG went into financial meltdown as their counterparties (HSBC and numerous other multinational banking concerns) sought to collect on the supposedly gold-plated AIG-backed hedges. .

The U.S. government immediately stepped in to fully fund (100 cents on the dollar) a $90 billion payout (“collateral postings”) to the major AIG counterparties involved.

HSBC Holdings received a pass-through payment, courtesy of U.S. taxpayers, of $3.5 billion.

For at least a half-decade prior to their $3.5 billion rescue package, HSBC had also been running “the largest drug-and-terrorism money laundering case ever”uncovered by the Justice Department.Their penalty – a slap on the wrist.  

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REUTERSHSBC among banks that received AIG payouts (03-16 12:59)             American International Group has disclosed that US and European banks such as HSBC have been among the biggest beneficiaries of the up to US$180 billion (HK$1.4 trillion) taxpayer bailout of the insurer.

AIG disclosed that more than US$90 billion has been paid to banks through collateral postings under credit default swaps, payments to CDS counterparties and payments to securities lending counterparties from September 16 to the end of December. Based on data provided by AIG, the largest recipients of funds were:

Goldman Sachs Group US$$12.9 billion                                                                     Societe Generale US$11.9 billion                                                                              Deutsche Bank US$11.8 billion                                                                                  Barclays US$8.5 billion                                                                                                    Merrill Lynch US$6.8 billion                                                                                               Bank of America Corp US$5.2 billion                                                                                UBS US$5 billion                                                                                                                BNP Paribas US$4.9 billion                                                                                           HSBC Holdings US$3.5 billion                                                                                     Dresdner US$2.6 billion

REUTERS  http://www.thestandard.com.hk/breaking_news_detail.asp?id=13217

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(Excerpts from Rolling Stone)

TOO BIG to JAIL –  by Matt Taibbi

February 14, 2013 8:00 AM ET

The deal was announced quietly, just before the holidays, almost like the government was hoping people were too busy hanging stockings by the fireplace to notice. Flooring politicians, lawyers and investigators all over the world, the U.S. Justice Department granted a total walk to executives of the British-based bank HSBC for the largest drug-and-terrorism money-laundering case ever. Yes, they issued a fine – $1.9 billion, or about five weeks’ profit – but they didn’t extract so much as one dollar or one day in jail from any individual, despite a decade of stupefying abuses.  

For at least half a decade, the storied British colonial banking power helped to wash hundreds of millions of dollars for drug mobs, including Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, suspected in tens of thousands of murders just in the past 10 years – people so totally evil, jokes former New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, that “they make the guys on Wall Street look good.”  The bank also moved money for organizations linked to Al Qaeda and Hezbollah, and for Russian gangsters; helped countries like Iran, the Sudan and North Korea evade sanctions; and, in between helping murderers and terrorists and rogue states, aided countless common tax cheats in hiding their cash.

“They violated every [sic] law in the book,” says Jack Blum, an attorney and former Senate investigator who headed a major bribery investigation against Lockheed in the 1970s that led to the passage of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. “They took every imaginable form of illegal and illicit business.”

In April 2003, with 9/11 still fresh in the minds of American regulators, the Federal Reserve sent HSBC’s American subsidiary a cease-and-desist­ letter, ordering it to clean up its act and make a better effort to keep criminals and terrorists from opening accounts at its bank. One of the bank’s bigger customers, for instance, was Saudi Arabia’s Al Rajhi bank, which had been linked by the CIA and other government agencies to terrorism.

According to a document cited in a Senate report, one of the bank’s founders, Sulaiman bin Abdul Aziz Al Rajhi, was among 20 early financiers of Al Qaeda, a member of what Osama bin Laden himself apparently called the “Golden Chain.” In 2003, the CIA wrote a confidential report about the bank, describing Al Rajhi as a “conduit for extremist finance.” In the report, details of which leaked to the public by 2007, the agency noted that Sulaiman Al Rajhi consciously worked to help Islamic “charities” hide their true nature, ordering the bank’s board to “explore financial instruments that would allow the bank’s charitable contributions to avoid official Saudi scrutiny.” (The bank has denied any role in financing extremists.)

For more than half a decade, a whopping $19 billion in transactions involving Iran went through the American financial system, with the Iranian connection kept hidden in 75 to 90 percent of those transactions. HSBC has been headquartered in England for more than two decades – it’s Europe’s largest bank, in fact – but it has major subsidiary operations in every corner of the world. What’s come out in this investigation is that the chiefs in the parent company often knew about shady transactions when the regional subsidiary did not. In the case of banned Iranian transactions, for instance, there are multiple e-mails from HSBC’s compliance head, David Bagley, in which he admits that HSBC’s American subsidiary probably has no clue that HSBC Europe has been sending it buttloads of banned Iranian money.

By that time, numerous agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, had crawled all the way up HSBC’s backside, among other things examining it as part of a major international narcotics investigation. In one four-year period between 2006 and 2009, an astonishing $200 trillion in wire transfers (including from high-risk countries like Mexico) went through without any monitoring at all. The bank also failed to do due diligence on the purchase of an incredible $9 billion in physical U.S. dollars from Mexico and played a key role in the so-called Black Market Peso Exchange, which allowed drug cartels in both Mexico and Colombia to convert U.S. dollars from drug sales into pesos to be used back home. Drug agents discovered that dealers in Mexico were building special cash boxes to fit the precise dimensions of HSBC teller windows.        

Former bailout inspector and federal prosecutor Neil Barofsky, who has helped secure numerous foreign money-laundering indictments, points out that the people HSBC was doing business with, like Colombia’s Norte del Valle and Mexico’s Sinaloa cartels, were “the worst trafficking organizations imaginable” – groups that don’t just commit murder on a mass scale but are known for beheadings, torture videos (“the new thing now,” he says) and other atrocities, none of which happens without money launderers. It’s for this reason, Barofsky says, that drug prosecutors are not shy about dropping heavy prison sentences on launderers. “Frankly, our view of money-laundering was that it was on par with, and as significant as, the traffickers themselves,” he says.

Barofsky was involved in the first extradition of a Colombian national (Pablo Trujillo, a member of the same cartel that HSBC moved money for) on money­laundering charges. “That guy got 10 years,” says Barofsky. “HSBC was doing the same thing, only on a much larger scale than my schmuck was doing.”

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American citizens deserve the very same regard from their own government that major banking conglomerates have received in their times of need, particularly those engaging in blatant criminal activity.

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 –  $75,000 per U.S. citizen                                                   The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 (1505)

The big Wall Street financial sector bailout and historical foreclosure activity (2008-2012)

Wall Street’s financial sector, in its quest for ever greater ‘yields,’ locked itself into high octane leveraged speculation strategies during the years leading up to the great housing bubble.

The rating agencies gave the underlying assets their ‘Triple-A grade’ kiss of approval (on what proved out to be sewage-grade quality mortgage assets).

Finally, Wall Street’s hedging strategies evaporated when AIG revealed that it did not have the reserves to cover the credit default swaps it had written.

Massive default waves hit the housing market, and the banking sector quickly found itself with gaping capital holes in balance sheets.

Enter the Federal Reserve and U.S. Treasury to re-liquify banks and insurers with trillions of dollars, courtesy of U.S. tax-paying citizens, to rescue the financial system.

In the meantime, the very banks which were ‘rescued’ by taxpayers, turned around and foreclosed on millions of homes.

11.75 million foreclosures during the 2008-2012 period.

Historical Foreclosure Activity

Also in the meantime, the U.S. Homeownership Rate has slumped all the way back down to a level not seen since 1996.

And according to RealtyTrac’s most recent Market Summary, “There are currently 912,073 properties in U.S. that are in some stage of foreclosure (default, auction or bank owned)…

It is time now to restore the financial health of American families with the same direct access to liquidity that was provided to Wall Street during the financial crisis.

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The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens.  It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.

The inspiration for this plan is based upon Biblical principles set forth in the Book of Leviticus, principles tendering direct economic liberties to the people.

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 –  $75,000 per U.S. citizen                                                  The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 (1369)

 

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2016: Wallet-busting health care on the move…

U.S. citizens are beginning to feel the ‘big financial pinch’ from big-government health care. And it is likely to get a lot worse….

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ObamaCare’s Wallet-buster Health Plans                                                WallStreetJournal 2-1-16 – Excerpts:

[Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce analysis]                                                        The findings: Nationally, premiums for individual health plans increased by an average of 14.9% between 2015 and 2016.

Consumers in every state except Mississippi faced increased premiums, and in no fewer than 29 states the average increases were in the double digits. For a third of states, the average premiums rose 20% or more.

Health-insurance premiums rose by more than 30% in Alaska and Hawaii; Oregon’s average rate increase was 23.2%. California’s premiums on average rose by a modest 1.5%.

Consumers in Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Illinois faced increases exceeding 20% on average. The East Coast north of Maryland was the least hard hit (New York’s average premium increase was 6%), although Pennsylvania and New Jersey consumers faced premium increases of 14.6% and 13.1% respectively.

In 11 of the 16 states defined as southern by the U.S. Census Bureau, premiums rose by more than 10%. Premiums rose on average by 13.9%, and by more than 20% in Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, Alabama, North Carolina and Oklahoma. In Texas, where data was only available for 98.5% of individual-market health-care plans, premiums rose by 14.1%.

Average premiums in Tennessee rose 35.2%—mostly because of the state’s largest individual-market insurer, BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, which sold 82% of all exchange plans in 2015. After losing $141 million on these plans last year, the company had little choice but to request average premium increases of 36.3%. The state insurance commission approved this request, lest the company leave the exchange altogether and leave 231,000 Tennesseans in the lurch.

Minnesota holds the dubious honor of having the highest year-over-year premium increases, 47.7%. Why? Because that state’s BlueCross BlueShield, the largest insurer, with over 90% of the market, lost tens of millions of dollars during the Affordable Care Act’s first two years. The company requested an average 49% rate increase, which was approved by state regulators.

Remember: These premium increases are only one piece of the health-care cost puzzle. Deductibles are also rising under the Affordable Care Act. Silver plans—the most popular on the exchanges—had average deductibles of nearly $3,000 in 2016, according to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. This represents an 8% increase over last year.

Millions of Americans are coming to believe that the Affordable Care Act’s costs far outweigh its benefits. In 2014, the latest year for which data is available, roughly 7.5 million Americans paid the IRS penalty rather than purchase the law’s insurance. This penalty is rising to an average $969 per household in 2016 in an attempt to force people onto the exchanges. Yet even a $1,000 fine is cheap compared to thousands—and sometimes tens of thousands—of dollars for an Affordable Care Act-compliant plan.

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Big government is not providing health care solutions.  It is expanding America’s health care problems.

Decentralized health care is the solution, with U.S. citizens allocating health care resources in accordance with their own needs and desires:

The U.S. Health Care Freedom Plan – the one clean and affordable, comprehensive alternative to ObamaCare

2008: The Fed rescued the big banks – NO spillover effect for the economy.. but now there is hope.

In 2008, the Fed began ‘fire-hosing’ trillions of dollars into the financial system, specifically to ‘rescue’ major banks and insurers that were teetering on the edge of their self-made massive capital holes.

The banks were resuscitated.  Excess reserves propelled stock prices higher and higher, while the economy merely crawled…

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The Chart That Explains Everything

Excerpts:

Screen Shot 2016-01-14 at 12.06.21 PM

What the chart [above] shows is that the vast increase in the monetary base didn’t impact lending or trigger the credit expansion the Fed had predicted. In other words, the Fed’s madcap pump-priming experiment (aka– QE) failed to stimulate growth or put the economy back on the path to recovery. For all practical purposes, the policy was a flop.

QE did, however, touch off an unprecedented 6-year bull market rally that pushed stocks into the stratosphere while the real economy continued to languish in a long-term slump. And the numbers are pretty impressive too. For example, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which bottomed at 6,507 on March 9, 2009, soared to an eye-popping 18,312 points by May 19, 2015, an 11,805 point-surge in just five years. And the S&P did even better. From its March 9, 2009 bottom of 676 points, the index skyrocketed to a record-high 2,130 points on May 21, 2015, tripling its value at the fastest pace in history.

What the chart shows is that the Fed knew from 2010-on that stuffing the banks with excess reserves was neither lowering unemployment or revving up the economy. The liquidity was merely driving stocks higher.

It’s worth noting, that the Fed knows that credit does not flow into the economy without a transmission mechanism, that is, unless creditworthy borrowers are willing to to take out loans. Absent additional lending, the liquidity remains stuck in the financial system where it eventually creates asset bubbles. And that’s exactly what’s happened. Instead of trickling down into the economy where it would do some good, the Fed’s monetary stimulus has cleared the way for another catastrophic meltdown.

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[Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke – November 2009]: “As a scholar of the Great Depression, I honestly believe that September and October of 2008 was the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression. If you look at the firms that came under pressure in that period. . . only one . . . was not at serious risk of failure. So out of maybe the 13 of the most important financial institutions in the United States, 12 were at risk of failure within a period of a week or two.”

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There is now a new liquidity “transmission mechanism” that will complete the story, reigniting economic growth power for main street America.

A Citizens Credit Facility, within The Leviticus 25 Plan, will serve as the conduit for  direct liquidity extensions to U.S. citizens – eliminating massive debt burdens and restoring financial health at the family level in America.

The Leviticus 25 Plan will help get millions of Americans off government social welfare programs and free them from dependence on government and over-stressed charity-based organizations.

The Plan will produce something else that the Fed’s 2008-2010 multi-trillion dollar financial system bailout could not do: millions of financially healthy, “credit-worthy” customers for U.S. banks.

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 –  $75,000 per U.S. citizen                                                         The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 (1306)

Fed hands out billions in IOER “riskless profits” to foreign banks each year. It is time now for U.S. citizens to be granted equal access to Fed liquidity flows: The Leviticus 25 Plan.

Foreign banks with U.S. subsidiaries currently have $1.15 trillion parked with the Fed, earning what is called “interest on excess reserves” (IOER).

Over the past three years,the Fed has paid out $15 billion in IOER “riskless profits” to foreign banks.  And with the Fed’s December rate the IOER will effectively double, and foreign banks will pocket a cool $6 billion in additional IOER payments in 2016.

And if the Fed hikes three more times in 2016, as they have intimated, these handouts to foreign banks will top the $11 billion level in the year ahead…

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The Federal Reserve Will Hand Out $11 Billion In Riskless “Profits” To Foreign Banks In 2016  – ZeroHedge 12/21/2015 –  Charts / Excerpts:

The chart above shows that between early 2013 and today, foreign banks received another $9 billion in cumulative interest payments from the Fed, a grand total which now amounts to just shy of $15 billion.

And now, with the IOER doubling to 0.50%, it means that foreign banks will collect interest from the Fed at double the pace. Indeed, assuming all else is equal such as total excess reserves parked with foreign banks remaining flat at the current $1.15 trillion level, it means that just over the next 12 months, foreign banks will pocket another $6 billion, increasing the cumulative Fed cash payment from $15 billion currently to $21 billion.

[And… if the Fed raises rates one-quarter point three more times in 2016, the result will be] a riskless “profit” handout for foreign banks, subsidized by the most famous US “public” institution – the Federal Reserves – amounting to approximately $11 billion in just one year.

And since there is no plan in sight for unwinding the Fed’s gargantuan balance sheet and soaking up the trillions in excess reserves parked at both domestic and foreign banks, this handout of risk-free cash will continue indefinitely.

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The U.S. Federal Reserve is handing out billions of dollars in “riskless profits” to foreign banks – and is on course to provide even sweeter liquidity flows for those banks – with the Fed’s recent rate hike – thanks to millions of U.S. tax-paying citizens.

It is now time for millions of U.S. tax-paying citizens to receive liquidity flows of their own from that very same Fed:

The Leviticus 25 Plan is a dynamic economic initiative providing direct liquidity benefits for American families, while at the same time scaling back the role of government in managing and controlling the affairs of citizens.  It is a comprehensive plan with long-term economic and social benefits for citizens and government.

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 –  $75,000 per U.S. citizen                                                        The Leviticus 25 Plan 2017 (1256)

 

 

Prins: System rigged, favoring “politically connected US and European banks”…

Global central bank policies have explicitly favored the Wall Street financial sector.  It is time to level the playing field…

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Nomi Prins: Crony Capitalism & Corruption – An Entirely Rigged Political-Financial System

ZeroHedge 11/16/2015   –  Via Jesse’s Cafe Americain,

Too big to fail is a seven-year phenomenon created by the most powerful central banks to bolster the largest, most politically connected US and European banks. More than that, it’s a global concern predicated on that handful of private banks controlling too much market share and elite central banks infusing them with boatloads of cheap capital and other aid.

Synthetic bank and market subsidization disguised as ‘monetary policy’ has spawned artificial asset and debt bubbles – everywhere. The most rapacious speculative capital and associated risk flows from these power-players to the least protected, or least regulated, locales.

There is no such thing as isolated ‘Big Bank’ problems. Rather, complex products, risky practices, leverage and co-dependent transactions have contagion ramifications, particularly in emerging markets whose histories are already lined with disproportionate shares of debt, interest rate and currency related travails.

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Prins:  “I’m talking about an entirely rigged political-financial system.”

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It is time to get the system “de-rigged.”

That means direct liquidity extensions to U.S. citizens to eliminate vast tracks of debt obligations to the banking system, particularly the large, politically-connected banks.

And here is the one and only plan to make that happen – via a Citizens Credit Facility:

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 –  $70,000 per U.S. citizen                                                   The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 (1206)

 

U.S. on the hook to support $3 billion transfer to help make Valdimir Putin ‘financially healthy.’ U.S. citizens receive… ‘zilch’ for their financial needs.

Ukraine owes Vladimir Putin $3 billion, and Putin is demanding payment.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch maintains that the IMF will be stepping in to provide Ukraine with the requisite funds to make Vladimir Putin ‘whole,’ and to de-stress the situation:

The $3bn Russian bond is included in debt restructuring, but Russia will not participate in debt restructuring and will either be paid $3bn from reserves in December or there will be a political decision to agree on an extension, likely without haircuts. We believe the $3bn bond is likely to be classified as sovereign debt and the IMF would likely be forced to pay it (as a holdout) in order to continue the program in December.   Source:  ZeroHedge 8-28-15  Putin To Get $3 Billion From US Taxpayers After Ukraine Bond Debacle

And so, here we have the U.S. government, funneling U.S. taxpayer dollars through the IMF fire-hose to Russia’s Vladimir Putin … to help make Putin ‘financially healthy.’

It is now time to grant U.S. citizens the same access (to their own money) that has been provided to Vladimir Putin – to allow U.S. citizens to also become ‘financially healthy.’

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 –  $70,000 per U.S. citizen                                                  The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 (1104)

 

 

Big government ‘largesse’ for Wall Street banks – and it is now time for equal access to ‘liquidity’ for American families.

Wall Street’s big bankers are doing fairly well these days.

Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein is now worth $1.1 billion, with his 2.2 million Goldman shares having gained 123% over the past 3 years (CNN Money 7-26-15).

JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon’s total pay package hit the $20 million mark in 2014 (Reuters 1-22-15).  His net worth is a reported $1 billion.

In 2009, with the financial crisis winds blowing hard across the U.S., and major Wall Street getting billions of taxpayer dollars through TARP and billions more in ‘free money’ from the Fed’s emergency lending facilities and the Fed discount window, nine of these big banks also managed to lather up their bonus pay to the tune of $33 billion.

Those banks included Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Bank of New York Mellon Corp, and State Street. 

Here’s the story:

Bank Bonus Tab: $33 Billion – WSJ

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Meanwhile here is the status of millions of U.S. citizens – whose money, and future purchasing power, helped support the bonus pay initiatives for Wall Street bankers ‘in their moment of need’…

Maudlin Economics                                                                                                  August 18, 2015                                                                                                 Distressed American Workers Expose the Fallacy of Improving Unemployment Numbers

Job Growth but No Wage Growth. Job seekers may find it easier to find a job, but good luck trying to find a job that pays enough to support a family.

The lightly followed Department of Labor’s quarterly Employment Cost Index (ECI) is Janet Yellen’s favorite wage indicator for good reason: it most accurately reflects the true cost of labor to businesses.

Well… the ECI increased by 0.2% in the second quarter of 2015. That was not only way below what Wall Street was expecting, it was also the slowest pace of wage growth since 1982 when ECI record keeping started!

Those are bad numbers, but it is really worse if you dig below the headlines:

Devilish Detail #1: Government Worker Wages, Not Private Sector.

The overall ECI was up by 0.2%, but that is only because compensation for government workers increased by +0.6%.

What about the private sector? Change in compensation: 0%. Yup… ZILCH… NADA… ZERO… not a penny.

Devilish Detail #2: Benefits, Not Wages, Are Rising.

In the past 12 months, the ECI is up 2%. Sure, that kind of increase is nothing to shout about, but 2% is better than a sharp stick in the eye.

Hold on… not so fast!

Remember, there are two components of labor costs: (1) wages and (2) benefits like paid vacation, Social Security, workers’ compensation, and health insurance. Wages are roughly 70% of ECI, and benefits make up the remaining 30%.

Over the last 12 months, the cost of benefits has increased by +1.7%. My guess is that the lion’s share of that increase can’t be attributed to higher health insurance costs.

Moreover, the trend these days is for employers to pass on some or all of the higher costs of health insurance to employees, thus reducing take-home pay.

You know where else these measly wage gains are showing up? In homeownership.

Despite record-low interest rates, an increasing number of Americans are renting rather than buying. The Census Bureau reported that the US homeownership fell to 63.4%, the lowest level in 48 years.

The homeownership rate peaked in 2004 at 69.2%, but has been falling ever since.

Moreover, the rate of homeownership hasn’t been this low since 1967, when it was 63.3%.

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There is one economic acceleration plan that levels the playing field for U.S. citizens.  This plan does not ‘tax’ the big banks, like Elizabeth Warren proposes, to redistribute wealth to the lower classes.

This plan simply grants U.S. citizens the same access to liquidity that Wall Street banks received during ‘bailout mania.’

There is one economic acceleration plan that restores economic liberty, revives financial health for American families, reignites economic growth, shrinks the deficit, and pays for itself over 10-15 years.

The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 –  $70,000 per U.S. citizen                                                  The Leviticus 25 Plan 2015 (1087)