Hards facts and Simple Math Equal Tough Choices and Small Government

[OneOfTheseDays]

So,uhh, the basis of your rant is that you're inconvenienced by a lazy lender whose claims you believe? A pay stub is only one way to verify income- an employment contract is another.

Here's a synopsis of the rules you reference-

http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/bcreg/regz20080714.htm

Not to mention you own apparent laziness & poor level of information peddling. New State, or new employer? there's a difference. If it's the same employer, you shouldn't have any issues at all.

There are a lot of options you apparently haven't explored, being content to throw up you hands & Blame the Gubmint!, martyr yourself on your defective belief structure.

Lending rules were changed in response to certain, uhh, *excesses* on the part of mortgage originators & underwriters that *crashed the whole economy*, remember? Or is that just some old wives' tale?

Millions of people who weren't even involved, who didn't buy a house, who didn't even have a mortgage were negatively affected when they lost their jobs in the Great Recession. That happened because your "small govt, self regulated banking, cutting red tape" idols were running things, "staying out of people's lives!"

Worked great, right?

So, uhh, drive to the store on the socialist! roads, paid for by taxes. Hopefully, you won't need any of the safety features in your vehicle, mandated by the evil Socialist! government. Select something to grill from the USDA inspected selection there, pay for it with govt furnished cash or govt regulated credit/debit card. Otherwise, you'd have to barter, & they might not want anything you have. Drive back home, avoiding govt interference like traffic signals, fire up your gas grill wit the govt approved propane bottle designed so you can hopefully avoid blowing your dumb ass to smithereens. Pour yourself a bourbon & branch, ignore the federal tax stamp on the booze, which certifies that it wasn't distilled in a lead soldered car radiator, and ignore the fact that the water out of the tap has to meet EPA guidelines, just so it won't poison or disease you or you children.

Have a nice meal, enjoy the features of your nice home that met govt building codes when it was built, refuel so you can bitch some more about the evil Gubmint and how they're just killing you. Do it over the internet, which likely never would have existed w/o Evil! Govt! Subsidies! up front.

Or just go piss up a rope, OK?

Damn talk about ownage.

 

[BarneyFife]

LOLOL!! Dude just got owned.

 

[Engineer]

I just did a quick calculation on CW's tax plan and I would have paid $4,000+ more under than plan vs current...."unless" his plan is including SS/Medicare (FICA) under which I would pay $3,000 less than current plan. Oh, and my wife's income is less than $100,000k for reference and we are a family of 4 (2 adults, 2 kids, no mortgage deduction. Simple standard deduction, 4 exemptions, 1 child tax credit and retirement deferments.). That does not included the extra $1,500 back from energy tax credits from last year either.

Need clarification as to whether FICA is included in the right column or not.

 

[CycloWizard]

So,uhh, the basis of your rant is that you're inconvenienced by a lazy lender whose claims you believe? A pay stub is only one way to verify income- an employment contract is another.

Here's a synopsis of the rules you reference-

http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/bcreg/regz20080714.htm

Not to mention you own apparent laziness & poor level of information peddling. New State, or new employer? there's a difference. If it's the same employer, you shouldn't have any issues at all.

There are a lot of options you apparently haven't explored, being content to throw up you hands & Blame the Gubmint!, martyr yourself on your defective belief structure.

Lending rules were changed in response to certain, uhh, *excesses* on the part of mortgage originators & underwriters that *crashed the whole economy*, remember? Or is that just some old wives' tale?

Millions of people who weren't even involved, who didn't buy a house, who didn't even have a mortgage were negatively affected when they lost their jobs in the Great Recession. That happened because your "small govt, self regulated banking, cutting red tape" idols were running things, "staying out of people's lives!"

Worked great, right?

So, uhh, drive to the store on the socialist! roads, paid for by taxes. Hopefully, you won't need any of the safety features in your vehicle, mandated by the evil Socialist! government. Select something to grill from the USDA inspected selection there, pay for it with govt furnished cash or govt regulated credit/debit card. Otherwise, you'd have to barter, & they might not want anything you have. Drive back home, avoiding govt interference like traffic signals, fire up your gas grill wit the govt approved propane bottle designed so you can hopefully avoid blowing your dumb ass to smithereens. Pour yourself a bourbon & branch, ignore the federal tax stamp on the booze, which certifies that it wasn't distilled in a lead soldered car radiator, and ignore the fact that the water out of the tap has to meet EPA guidelines, just so it won't poison or disease you or you children.

Have a nice meal, enjoy the features of your nice home that met govt building codes when it was built, refuel so you can bitch some more about the evil Gubmint and how they're just killing you. Do it over the internet, which likely never would have existed w/o Evil! Govt! Subsidies! up front.

Or just go piss up a rope, OK?

I'm moving to a new state to work for a new employer. Apparently, that's a crime against humanity! I'm also glad you're willing to throw the currently-unemployed under the bus, as they would be completely ruled out of buying a house in a new city if they took a job there. I called three separate banks and talked to realtors in two different states and all of them told me the same thing. This new rule took effect July 1 - well after I was approved for my loan and went under contract on a house, but before closing. In other words, it has absolutely nothing to do with your link, which mentions nothing whatsoever about requiring a paystub for mortgage approval. Nor can I find anything about it online, nor did any of the lenders know anything about it June 1 when I originally requested quotes. Surprise! But, rather than reading your own link and realizing that it has absolutely nothing to do with my situation, you employ your usual douchebaggery to take advantage of your like-minded idiots who can't be bothered to read even the shortest link and will just assume that you're right.

All this to solve a problem with illegal practices by other douchebags who will never be prosecuted because your humongous government is too busy screwing me over to do its damn job. More regulation means absolutely dick when the existing regulations aren't being enforced to begin with. All it does is get in the way of people who actually follow the rules. You're perfectly happy to sacrifice me on the altar of huge government because you think you're doing the right thing, thereby proving how pitiful your mental faculties are. Of course, none of this is news to me - just a rinse and repeat of your usual stupidity.

 

[CycloWizard]

I read through all your posts and still have no idea what you are doing, your math, or anything beyond 20% tax and no deductions. From what I can gather your strategy makes up all of 19 billion more than 2010? That's hardly effective since it's fallen well more then that due to job loss. Are you counting households, counting total people in those house holds, or what to come up with these figures?


Only real thing I've been able to deduce is that you want to cut government size back to something it was 100 years ago, which is quite simply a ridiculous ideology.

Then you didn't read all my posts. Go back and try again.

 

[CycloWizard]

I just did a quick calculation on CW's tax plan and I would have paid $4,000+ under than plan vs current...."unless" his plan is including SS/Medicare (FICA) under which I would pay $3,000 less than current plan. Oh, and my wife's income is less than $100,000k for reference and we are a family of 4 (2 adults, 2 kids, no mortgage deduction. Simple standard deduction, 4 exemptions, 1 child tax credit and retirement deferments.). That does not included the extra $1,500 back from energy tax credits from last year either.

Need clarification as to whether FICA is included in the right column or not.

FICA deductions are included in the "current" column only. The "proposed" column does not include FICA because I would get rid of that method of withholding. Total receipts from 2010, including FICA, still do not add up to what my plan would have brought in that same year per the math I showed earlier. In other words, the percentage shown is the total tax paid under both systems for the specified gross income. Deductions apply to the current plan but not the proposed plan.

 

[Engineer]

FICA deductions are included in the "current" column only. The "proposed" column does not include FICA because I would get rid of that method of withholding. Total receipts from 2010, including FICA, still do not add up to what my plan would have brought in that same year per the math I showed earlier.

So, based on what you say, no additional taxes other than the 20% above he poverty level would be taken out (no additional FICA, etc). If that were the case, then I would come out to the better of about $2,000 - $3,000 (or so) from your plan.

 

[CycloWizard]

So, based on what you say, no additional taxes other than the 20% above he poverty level would be taken out (no additional FICA, etc). If that were the case, then I would come out to the better of about $2,000 - $3,000 (or so) from your plan.

Yep, 20% on everything above the poverty threshold, no deductions.

 

[Engineer]

Yep, 20% on everything above the poverty threshold, no deductions.

When you used the 112 million households in your figures, how do you know that every household in that includes tax paying citizens? IIRC, there are 130 million (or lower now) workers and there are many 2 working people households (for example, 3 people work in my household including myself, wife and my 17 year old daughter).

 

[Darwin333]

Outstanding, someone who wants to discuss actual numbers instead of spouting the same bullshit ideology that their party tells them to.

If you don't mind I would like to add a few more numbers to the mix that I think are relevant to the discussion.

Total Fed expenditures FY2011: $3.82T (approx 25.5% GDP)
Total Fed revenue FY 2011: $2.173T (approx. 14.5%GDP)
Total GDP FY 2011: $150T


Historically the Feds have been able to consistently extract approx 18-19% of GDP in revenue. Lets assume that we can snap our fingers and magically get back to that historical average but before we I would also like to point out that we have never been able to sustain 20%+ revenue/GDP (3 years during WWII was the only time in recent history we could even get consecutive years). So our "hard cap" is 20% regardless.

Revenue based on 19% of GDP FY2011: 2.85T

So that is the absolute most that we can reasonably expect out of any and all tax increases. We might get another half percent or so but it doesn't make a spectacular difference. So after raising taxes to their historical average and close to historical max we are still roughly $1T in the hole for FY2011.

That means that after we raise taxes to their historical norms and very close to the historical max we still must cut spending by almost 25% in order to get to a balanced budget.

To add insult to injury, GDP must contract as the .gov removes the deficit spending which makes the numbers even worse but for the sake of this discussion it is probably best to deal with the raw numbers.

 

[CycloWizard]

When you used the 112 million households in your figures, how do you know that every household in that includes tax paying citizens? IIRC, there are 130 million (or lower now) workers and there are many 2 working people households (for example, 3 people work in my household including myself, wife and my 17 year old daughter).

The only way the number of households enters in is in the determination of the poverty level. Thus, I simply took the average number of people per household in the US (3.14) and computed the weighted average poverty threshold based on that number. In other words, I don't care how the household makes its money for tax purposes: capital gains, multiple incomes from multiple jobs, or what have you - all count the same. Having another kid gives you a slight bump in your poverty "deduction," but nothing else.

 

[Jhhnn]

Of course, none of this is news to me - just a rinse and repeat of your usual stupidity.

You got owned in that thread, too, and are apparently too ignorant to have realized it, then or now.

When you go back to your lender, ask them to show you that regulation in black & white, OK? Not an internal memo, but the actual statement from the govt. Chances are that they can't, which is why you can't find it, either. What they're telling you is their interpretation of what the govt actually said, which is, of course, subject to interpretation. 4 years ago, they'd lend to any warm blooded animal with a pulse- they were all guilty of it. Now that the govt has put them on notice that their ripoffs won't be tolerated, they're going entirely the other way, hoping that public inconvenience & sentiment will prompt the govt to let them go back to doing things the way they want, bamboozling both buyers & investors for fat profits in between.

It also seems likely that the lenders you've contacted intend to sell the mortgage to one of the GSE's, where it will be bundled into a govt guaranteed MBS with others. If that's the case, then the govt has every right to insist on whatever paperwork they want, to protect the taxpayers, something completely cast aside during the Bush years. the truth is that the modern self amortizing mortgage & the rules surrounding them were a creation of the New Deal, and actually worked rather well until Republicans had to mess with it- first the S&L collapse of the Reagan era, with bailout, now the wondrous glory of the Ownership Society, brought to us all by self regulated banking ideology made manifest.

What you seem to miss is that what lenders did during the Ownership Society bubble *wasn't illegal*, and if it was, it was only subject to civil liabilities, fines from the SEC, which never amounts to more than a slap on the wrist. They have big money for big legal teams, unlike the SEC whose budget your congressional idols want to cut.

Is the current system imperfect & seemingly unreasonable in your situation? Maybe so, but try to remember that you're not the center of the universe, OK? It's not like the Gubmint is out to fuck you over, personally, at all.

 

[JSt0rm]

cyclowizard got owned again.

Dont forget this is the guy who wanted to (instead of giving pay raises to sewage workers in nyc) run new piping throughout all of nyc to allow companies to compete for your shit. He also claimed in that scenario to be an expert on the subject and drew up a diagram in ms paint of multiple shit pipes on your toilet that can be turned on and off. It was epic.

 

[CycloWizard]

You got owned in that thread, too, and are apparently too ignorant to have realized it, then or now.

That's why you walked when I called you what you are: an evil bastard. Feel free to go back to that thread any time to tell me why I'm wrong.

When you go back to your lender, ask them to show you that regulation in black & white, OK? Not an internal memo, but the actual statement from the govt. Chances are that they can't, which is why you can't find it, either. What they're telling you is their interpretation of what the govt actually said, which is, of course, subject to interpretation. 4 years ago, they'd lend to any warm blooded animal with a pulse- they were all guilty of it. Now that the govt has put them on notice that their ripoffs won't be tolerated, they're going entirely the other way, hoping that public inconvenience & sentiment will prompt the govt to let them go back to doing things the way they want, bamboozling both buyers & investors for fat profits in between.

You realize that you blame everything on the private sector and assume that the government can do no wrong, all the while telling me that I assume the private sector can do no wrong and blame everything on government. Reality is, of course, somewhere in the middle. I recognize that and am just asking for you to do the same. The bank in question stands to lose a lot of money on a virtually risk-free loan to me. I'm a well-qualified buyer with over 20% down payment and am borrowing less than a third of what I qualified to borrow. You're certain that multiple lenders are willing to throw me and my sure money under the bus for some theoretical long-term payoff they might get back many years from now if the government were to actually rescind these regulations. That doesn't pass even the most casual sniff test.

It also seems likely that the lenders you've contacted intend to sell the mortgage to one of the GSE's, where it will be bundled into a govt guaranteed MBS with others. If that's the case, then the govt has every right to insist on whatever paperwork they want, to protect the taxpayers, something completely cast aside during the Bush years. the truth is that the modern self amortizing mortgage & the rules surrounding them were a creation of the New Deal, and actually worked rather well until Republicans had to mess with it- first the S&L collapse of the Reagan era, with bailout, now the wondrous glory of the Ownership Society, brought to us all by self regulated banking ideology made manifest.

What you seem to miss is that what lenders did during the Ownership Society bubble *wasn't illegal*, and if it was, it was only subject to civil liabilities, fines from the SEC, which never amounts to more than a slap on the wrist. They have big money for big legal teams, unlike the SEC whose budget your congressional idols want to cut.

Is the current system imperfect & seemingly unreasonable in your situation? Maybe so, but try to remember that you're not the center of the universe, OK? It's not like the Gubmint is out to fuck you over, personally, at all.

Blah blah blah. Every damn thing government does can be traced back to a Golden Age policy corrupted by Republicans, huh? Banks did what government told them they had to do - lend to people who couldn't afford to pay them back. Government even insured these mortgages. Republicans screwed the pooch and I've never said otherwise. You just don't have the stones/intellect to admit that the Democrats have done just as much damage. I realize full well the policies aren't designed to screw me personally, but when I take the brunt, I do take it personally. Ridiculous policies have ridiculous consequences. All I want is for your humongous federal government to get the hell out of my way and let me sell my condo and buy my house without interfering and tying up the process for months with no benefit to me except artificially higher real estate prices (which aren't really a benefit to me at all, but are a benefit for lots of other people).

 

[CycloWizard]

cyclowizard got owned again.

Dont forget this is the guy who wanted to (instead of giving pay raises to sewage workers in nyc) run new piping throughout all of nyc to allow companies to compete for your shit. He also claimed in that scenario to be an expert on the subject and drew up a diagram in ms paint of multiple shit pipes on your toilet that can be turned on and off. It was epic.

And you're the mouth breather who doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. Stay in school kid.

 

[JSt0rm]

And you're the mouth breather who doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. Stay in school kid.

aww I thought i was on your ignore list? The difference between me and you is that I know I dont know. You on the other hand are a expert on anything and everything under the sun and you look a fool for it.

 

[CycloWizard]

aww I thought i was on your ignore list? The difference between me and you is that I know I dont know. You on the other hand are a expert on anything and everything under the sun and you look a fool for it.

No, I'm an expert in the handful of things I've spent my entire life studying. Maybe if you stay in school long enough, you'll eventually know something as well. Until then, keep your comments to the peanut gallery.

 

[Demo24]

When you used the 112 million households in your figures, how do you know that every household in that includes tax paying citizens? IIRC, there are 130 million (or lower now) workers and there are many 2 working people households (for example, 3 people work in my household including myself, wife and my 17 year old daughter).

I was confused about this as well, until I realized it didn't matter because he averaged all this out. So according to him the income averages out to that 115k, and then after subtracting 18k for poverty threshold gets about 98k, takes 20k off that, then times it up to get that 2T number.


The biggest problem is that that 12.9T number includes untaxable items. Total wages paid would be 8.23T. So 73,000 per household (median income is around 50k, so about right), 55k after the 18k deduction. so 11k in taxes at 20%, and then when multiplying it back up 1.2T, or 1T less than what we are pulling in now.

 

[JSt0rm]

No, I'm an expert in the handful of things I've spent my entire life studying. Maybe if you stay in school long enough, you'll eventually know something as well. Until then, keep your comments to the peanut gallery.

You are the biggest idiot on here behind governmentworker777. Why should anyone take your word that you are a expert on anything?

 

[shira]

Also, can you explain how you can insure a vet for approximately $1,153 per year? So you can get insurance for vets for under $100 per month and it has good coverage? Really?

I was on a panel within the VA where this was studied. In a shocking move, the VA decided not to publish the findings of this study and cut funding for the study group. I should add that the $30 billion annual value was averaged over the next ten years, and that the number of veterans will decrease dramatically over that period. The number of veterans has been decreasing for a while now, but the VA budget has been moving in the opposite direction. Someone has to pay the valets, lease the parking garages, pay for construction of new research facilities, and all of the other non-healthcare-related things that the VA currently does.

The per-capita annual cost of health care in the U.S. is about $7200. And you're telling us that it would cost less than one-sixth that amount to cover veterans?

Wow, you're the magic man!!! Why don't we generalize your incredible health care miracle to the entire U.S. population and save $2 trillion a year!!?

Yeah, I'm a believer. CW FTW.

 

[JSt0rm]

The per-capita annual cost of health care in the U.S. is about $7200. And you're telling us that it would cost less than one-sixth that amount to cover veterans?

Wow, you're the magic man!!! Why don't we generalize your incredible health care miracle to the entire U.S. population and save $2 trillion a year!!?

Yeah, I'm a believer. CW FTW.

Dont forget he is an expert (he said so) so it must be true. He's also a expert on shit pipes in nyc and was also flown in by the mayor of nyc to talk about shit pipes

 

[CycloWizard]

I was confused about this as well, until I realized it didn't matter because he averaged all this out. So according to him the income averages out to that 115k, and then after subtracting 18k for poverty threshold gets about 98k, takes 20k off that, then times it up to get that 2T number.


The biggest problem is that that 12.9T number includes untaxable items. Total wages paid would be 8.23T. So 73,000 per household (median income is around 50k, so about right), 55k after the 18k deduction. so 11k in taxes at 20%, and then when multiplying it back up 1.2T, or 1T less than what we are pulling in now.

If you understood how averages worked, or what no deductions meant, then we'd be on the same page. What makes an item "untaxable?" Tax codes. Since we're talking about changing tax codes, it seems appropriate to use the system I proposed rather than making up a different one if you want to get my same numbers. The reason this problem exists seems to be the inability of the average person (or congressperson) to see beyond the current mess.

 

[CycloWizard]

You are the biggest idiot on here behind governmentworker777. Why should anyone take your word that you are a expert on anything?

You don't have to take my word for anything. You can evaluate my opinion on something for yourself. If you have reason to believe it won't work, you're free to state why it won't work. Your inability to do so doesn't mean I'm right, but it also doesn't mean I'm wrong. If you knew enough to even hold a meaningful discussion about the topic, you'd easily be able to ascertain whether or not I knew what I was talking about. Since you lack even the most basic knowledge, you are probably best served staying out of it altogether. The only reason you wouldn't is because you enjoy trolling, which should be obvious to everyone at this point. My eagerness to continue the conversation would indicate to someone of reasonable intelligence that I probably know what I'm talking about and want to avoid looking like an idiot.

 

[CycloWizard]

The per-capita annual cost of health care in the U.S. is about $7200. And you're telling us that it would cost less than one-sixth that amount to cover veterans?

Wow, you're the magic man!!! Why don't we generalize your incredible health care miracle to the entire U.S. population and save $2 trillion a year!!?

Yeah, I'm a believer. CW FTW.

What's the annual per capita cost of health insurance, genius? Pooling risk is what insurance is all about. The VA has very strict policies regarding annual physicals and other preventive healthcare which could be carried over if the vet wants to maintain his insurance. This translates into an average cost below the national average for an individual ($4800 in 2009 when this was studied). But you're right - your off-the-cuff reaction is really the expert opinion here.

 

[Jhhnn]

Banks did what government told them they had to do - lend to people who couldn't afford to pay them back.

I take it you're tlking about CRA loans. That's beyond ignorant- it's willful blindness & misattribution.

http://www.ourfuture.org/makingsense/factsheet/community-reinvestment-act

http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs...l-spreads-some-lies-about-the-economic-crisis

Democrats? Democrats are guilty of being naive & half blind, particularly when dealing with Wall St & their Republican allies. They're not the perps, not the driving ideology of the whole smaller govt deregulated finance sector to cut red tape so you can buy the house of your dreams using a teaser rate agency ARM, at all. Democrats are the guys who realized that the worst neighborhoods are all rentals, owned by absentee landlords, & that homeownership improves neighborhoods. They set out to encourage that with the CRA- have banks lend to people who could afford to live there, who had jobs & decent credit, who'd often pay less every month to buy a house in their neighborhood, mostly minority neighborhoods, rather than to rent one, if somebody would lend 'em the money. It's been going on for 30 years at a fairly constant rate, unlike ARM's, whose ascendancy delivered the collapse we're experiencing today.

Chanting "they're Just as Bad! They're Just as Bad!" doesn't make it so, no matter how much you want it to be that way...

It's unfortunate that having lenders in a halfway house inconveniences people who deserve better treatment. I mean that. OTOH, if the govt hadn't put 'em through rehab & sent 'em there, you wouldn't have anybody to borrow from, at all, but you'd still be paying the balance on your former dwelling, if only through the bankruptcy trustee... The only reason they're still in existence is because soft headed liberals knew they had mouths to feed & obligations to fulfill, lots of 'em.

As an aside to the central topic, you may be able to rent the house you've contracted to buy during the interim, if it's vacant. Too many variables to say, but that may be an option. If you have the right references, you may be able to get a house-sitting job, live rent free until the deal closes. Your new employer may be able to assist you. Maybe more possibilities, dunno.