The WSU Cougars may not have to pay that much money for a coach

WSU logo seen on farm silos near Pullman during my 2017 bike trip to Pullman.

Looks like the WSU Cougar Football Team won against Arizona State in last Saturday's October 30 game. They did it without the need for multi million dollar former Coach Rolovich.

I would like to say that a multi million dollar "star" coach may not be necessary. What about multi million dollar corporate executives? Same thing.

Admittedly I don't follow sports that much and just looked up last Saturday's game results today. As Pullman folks often say, Go Cougs.

About free college and other idealistic things

Some reservations I would have about Bernie Sanders tho I would vote for him, or any of the Democratic candidates who get the nomination.

Ideas, like free college seem far fetched unless the bulk of grass roots people get behind it. Back in my college days, college was, at least more affordable. Most of the cost of college was paid for by state taxpayers. At least at state run colleges where (I think) most students go. Around 70% of the cost was covered by the state. Today, the taxpayers pay only around 40% of the cost (here in Washington State at least) so tuition is much higher.

Washington is a "blue state," but we still have trouble raising taxes. Washington voters have turned down several initiatives to have a progressive income tax in this state.

Another problem is that the cost of college has gone way up since my college years. Much of that has to due with a growing gap of incomes between upper middle class "professionals" and average working people.

As for the salaries of upper income professionals, various institutions, including colleges, government agencies, private businesses and non profits have been in a bidding war to raise top level salaries as they strive to attract and retain what they consider to be their most talented staff. This bidding war drives up costs.

Spiraling property values for residential property has also driven up the need for the higher salaries due to rising costs of living.

We may be able to make college more affordable, but free college is a bit of a stretch.

Part of the problem is that people, like Bernie Sanders, try and blame everything on the 1%. The 1% may be the most to blame, but part of that money is tied up in the capital that runs business. A much bigger group of people is the top 20%, or so. Upper middle class. The gap between upper middle class and average workers has grown higher as well.

Upper middle class can be blamed for a lot of things like the NIMByism that makes it harder to build affordable housing.

It's true that the 1% is especially culpable in basically buying Congress. This has been made worse after the Citizen's United ruling.

Politicians don't like to blame upper middle class since that group has a lot of voters. In some ways, it seems more politically smart to blame the 1% because 99% can logically out vote 1%. The problem is, that logic has not worked. Much of the 99% still supports Donald Trump and other Republicans.

Not only is there big income gaps in our society, but there is also a cultural divide. Some of the 1% is liberal, culturally, while quite a lot of the 99% remain conservative.

Think of the liberal billionaires such as George Soros who support environmental causes. Think of what people often refer to as the "Hollywood elite." The cultural divide cuts differently than the income divide. We are dealing with both a cultural divide as well as the income divide, but they are somewhat different phenomenon.

Changes need to happen at the grassroots level. For things like free, or even just affordable college to work, the people have to be willing to pay for this.

Some say, just cut the military and pay for it via federal, rather than state government.

I am for cutting the military, but that is difficult to do also. It only takes a band of well organized criminals to create something like a 911. If that were to happen, fear would drive politics toward the military again. Even if a big military is not the best solution to the 911 problem (such as sending hundreds of tanks into Baghdad), people vote with their emotions all too often.

I hate to say it, but I think fear is a more powerful emotion than love. When it comes to emotions, fear trumps love. That could be a pun also.

I would say more head and probably less heart is needed in human culture. That may sound counter intuitive. We all have emotions (heart), but they don't often go in good directions. Greed, fear and so forth often prevail. Logic may not be perfect, but I think it is too often underrated.

More idealistic thinking is definitely possible, but it has to come from big cultural changes at the grassroots level.

Upper middle class, rather than just the 1%, needs to pay more taxes

I think it can be a mistake when the left just vilifies the 1% income bracket. In the culture wars, part of the 1% tends to lean left.

Income disparity is a big problem, but I think it goes beyond just the 1%. Ideally, we should strengthen the progressive aspects of our income tax system. That means higher income people should pay more including 1% paying the most. With a more progressive tax system, other higher income people would pay more as well. The 1% would be at the top so they would pay the most, but other upper income people would, most likely, pay more also.

Income discrepancy also means that upper middle class has gotten way ahead of most of the rest of society. Possibly the top 20% needs to pay more, but I don't have a definite figure. The goal wouldn't be to draw a line around a certain group of folks just to vilify them. It would be to have a more progressive tax system. Upper income people could still be a welcome part of our communities.

Taxes do generate revenue for government, but another effect could be to tame some of the inflationary forces in, for instance real estate, where prices can go way out of line with other things in the economy. Housing prices can go up around 10% per year while the overall inflation rate, including most wages, is around 2%, for instance. I'm not citing exact numbers, but more the concept.

The income of upper middle class is a big part of what drives the lack of affordable housing for lower income people; including what could be called most of the working class. Upper middle class has created an inflated market for housing as home values skyrocket in many locations. Other things like the high fees charged by many professionals, such as doctors, drives a lot of the problems with access to healthcare and so forth.

If I were to redo the tax code, I would make the graduated tax steeper, as it was before the so called Regan Revolution. I would also provide some relief for business. If wealthy and upper middle class wish to invest their money in job creating business, there could be deductions. One doesn't want to smother business with taxes. On the other hand, if the money is just kept as personal income and used to drive up already existing investments such as real estate, I would increase the tax on that. It wouldn't have to be too punitive, but migrating more toward a progressive tax system could help bring some balance back to our economy. A healthier and more balanced economy could bring benefit to all.

Maybe business and corporate taxes could be cut if fat cat individuals are taxed more

I can sort of see why some folks want to cut taxes on corporations. Don't worry, I'm not high on pot. US does have one of the highest tax rates on corporations in the developed world. Of course there are many loopholes so corporations aren't necessarily suffering seriously, but taxes on business is a disincentive for investment in business. A disincentive for investment in US business.

A main point I keep making is that there needs to be a differentiation made between business income and the personal income of wealthy people. Wealthy individuals are getting off way too easy on taxes in USA. There needs to be better incentives for people to keep their money invested in the business for legitimate expenses on operations and capital improvements. Fat cat executives and folks who keep the money for their personal mansions, and so forth, need to be taxed much more.

Few people talk about this differentiation. debate over taxes tends to always conflate business and wealthy individuals. Some people insist that we need a tax cut on corporations. If so, how about balancing that with a tax hike on wealthy individuals?

One problem with wealthy individuals is that their money can be used in ways that are harmful to society. Building a business can be beneficial, especially if it's environmental friendly and so forth. On the other hand, just having a bunch of rich individuals around can make life harder for the rest of us by inflating the residential real estate market, for instance. The problem of the billionaires chasing out the millionaires and the millionaires chasing out everyone else; like in Aspen, Colorado, or San Francisco, or even Seattle. In Vancouver, BC, I hear that a fairly large percent of the houses and condos, in that city, are going empty as wealthy people buy them up for investment adding to Vancouver's housing shortage. The places go empty as it's more bother to have tenants, in some cases, than it is to just leave it locked up and wait as it's value appreciates in the hot real estate market. There is now a new tax in Vancouver on buying houses that are left empty. This has cooled that hot real estate market a bit.

From feedback on Facebook.

Hell, some major corporations get huge refunds...didn't I see where GE got millions back? Will have to do some checking. But I don't see that our tax system is so burdensome on corporations...they've paid a lot more in the past. And why shouldn't they pay for the resources they use...I don't mean "natural" resources, but the infrastructure, the schooling of their workers, the basic research paid for by the government, etc. I don't see this as abusive. They, like the individual wealthy have a ideological opposition to taxes, as well as to paying workers. They have one purpose....maximizing their returns on investment.

My response.

Good points about corporations and ultimately the individuals that profit from them. Prosperity doesn't come for free. One has to pay for the roads, education, research, defense and basically the price of a civil society. It all boils down to individuals and greed. I heard about the GE not paying any taxes meme a few years back. Could be disgusting, but I'll need to looks up the details. The voting public often thinks people can have low taxes by just taxing corporations instead; like corporations wouldn't feel it so it's more like a free lunch. Problem is, corporations are slippery and they can just shift their way out of the taxes. They can pass the cost along in higher prices or lower wages. They can find the loopholes or they can just go offshore and leave the jurisdiction altogether. I think it might work better to tax individuals; especially the wealthy individuals. It may be easier for a corporation to get out of taxes by just moving production offshore taking the jobs with it. Taxing individuals; especially the wealthy, could have a good consequence. I would like to see some of those fat cats leave the country. If some of them leave the country I wouldn't miss their presence in the voting pool; not to mention the competitive market for living space on this planet.

A question the wealthiest one percent of Americans should ask

Is it better to have 5 vacation homes in a troubled world where you must have elaborate security to protect it all, or only 3 vacation homes in a healthy world where people can trust one another and feel safe?

The one percent can't really live in isolation from the rest of the population. The health of our entire community affects the one percent. If we allow the gap between haves and have nots to get too wide, the quality of life for everyone in society deteriorates; including the quality of life of the one percent. Having to live in fear and needing to hide behind the wall of gated communities doesn't seem very desirable to me.

Quality of life, rather than total number of assets, should be the bottom line.