Grafton H. “Cap” Wiley IV

May 2, 2016May 2, 2016

Time for progressives to Bern down Mattiello’s estate tax reform

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As the results of last Tuesday’s primary show, RI Speaker of the House Nicholas Mattiello is seriously out of step with Rhode Island voters. Progressives in this state demonstrated the kind of change they want, yet instead of course-correcting, the speaker is doubling down on policies Tuesday’s vote clearly rejected.

One key reform Mattiello has his eye on is lowering the estate tax, the tax levied exclusively on dead millionaires. In the ProJo, Mattiello said he is “‘hearing from successful folks in Rhode Island pretty regularly lately’ that, without assistance, ‘they will be forced to leave the state,’ adding that he is going to ‘work hard to get [this] done in the budget.’”

This isn’t a new idea for the Speaker. Back in January, at the 2016 Rhode Island Small Business Economic Summit, Grafton H. “Cap” Wiley IV told Governor Gina Raimondo, Speaker Mattiello and a room full of government officials and small business owners that “it would be great if we had enough revenue to get rid of the estate tax” or if we don’t have enough revenue, “look at an increase in the exemption.”

“That’s something I’ve got my eye on,” said Mattiello.

Here’s the problem: Lowering or eliminating the estate tax does nothing for the economy. It doesn’t lead to greater entrepreneurship, doesn’t create jobs and doesn’t put money back into the economy. It’s a straight up giveaway to the 1 percent. And lest we forget, the care and comfort of the 1 percent has always been Speaker Mattiello’s primary concern. Remember his comment last year that his “well-to-do” neighbors don’t see any tax relief?

The suggestion that “successful folks” are being “forced to leave the state” because of the estate tax is frankly idiotic. This economic hokum has been debunked time and again, yet our speaker clings to this lie to justify giving more money to the already rich.

To quote the speaker, “that discussion has to stop.”

Let your legislators know that you oppose these tax cuts for the rich. Tell them what their priorities should be. Remind them of the results of Tuesday’s primary, and let’s start using our newfound progressive political power to effect real, positive change.

January 15, 2016April 30, 2016

The Estate Tax is a solution, not a problem

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At the 2016 Rhode Island Small Business Economic Summit (Summit), Grafton H. “Cap” Wiley IV told Governor Gina Raimondo, House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello and a room full of government officials and small business owners that “it would be great if we had enough revenue to get rid of the estate tax” or if we don’t have enough revenue, “look at an increase in the exemption.”

“That’s something I’ve got my eye on,” said Mattiello, offering to collaborate with the business community to do something about it.

The idea of reforming the estate tax came out of a previous Summit, said Wiley, and the important thing, he continued, looking towards Raimondo and Mattiello, is that, “you guys are listening.”

“Rhode Island ends up at the bottom of a lot of the ratings of taxes and business climate,” said Wiley, and though he did not specify to what ratings he was referring, two annual business climate rankings, the SBEC (Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council)’s Small Business Policy Index and ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council)’s Rich States, Poor States, include the mere existence of a state level estate tax as a negative in their questionable formulas for determining a state’s ranking.

The problem, says economist Peter Fisher, is that “the estate tax – which is paid only by the ultra-wealthy – doesn’t affect economic growth.”

Fisher says that Rich States, Poor States author Arthur Laffer, “and his co-authors devote an entire chapter to estate and inheritance taxes, incorrectly tagging them as ‘job killers’ that ‘strangle economic growth.’”

Laffer and company assert that states with an estate tax are losing ‘enormous amounts of accumulated wealth,’ and that this wealth would have created jobs, alleviated poverty, and increased tax revenue, but they fail to explain how this would happen. The wealth held by retirees typically is not the kind of capital normally used in job creation. The wealth that drives prosperity consists of real assets: natural resources, plant and equipment, public infrastructure, human capital, technological knowledge. By contrast, large estates typically consist of real estate, stocks and bonds, mutual funds, and other financial assets which could be located anywhere in the world. The future use of those assets is unaffected by where the person who owned them died.”

So why would Mattiello be so eager to look at an idea that amounts to both failed tax policy and a giveaway to the mega rich? As Bob Plain showed, the last time RI messed with the estate tax, the burden of public services and infrastructure was shifted onto poor and middle class Rhode Islanders, allowing the rich and the mega rich to become richer still. These policies contribute to our ever increasing wealth inequality and pervert our democracy, tilting us ever faster towards an oligarchy represented by the likes of “Cap” Wiley, if we aren’t there already.

Citing an Economic Progress Institute (EPI) fact sheet, Plain wrote, “The clear winners are a small number of wealthy taxpayers whose estates will pay less in taxes and in many cases, nothing at all starting next year. The clear losers are tens of thousands of low- and modest-income Rhode Islanders who will pay more in taxes next year. Unemployed homeowners and renters are among the biggest losers, because they will no longer qualify for property tax assistance and are not eligible for the earned income tax credit (EITC). Many of the lowest-wage workers will also be negatively impacted by the loss of the property tax refund, even with an eventual boost in the EITC.”

“SBEC’s stated mission, says Fisher, “is to ‘encourage entrepreneurship and small business growth,'” but “its lobbying activities reveal a very conservative, anti-government agenda.” ALEC, “is a mechanism by which corporations pay substantial sums of money to draft legislation benefiting them.” Neither group has the interests of state economies or average citizens in mind when they advance their agendas under the guise of “economic research.” These groups are made up entirely of the oligarchic prosperous and their servile, deluded sycophants.

Our gullible state leaders are not searching for real economic solutions to our state’s budgeting issues, they are instead looking for the excuses they need to pass the legislation their corporate masters demand.

To truly help our economy and budget, instead of eliminating the estate tax we should be increasing it.

Also, do yourself a favor and familiarize yourself with Peter Fisher’s website:

January 14, 2016January 14, 2016

State leaders demonstrate their priorities, and it’s not you

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Our state leaders seem to care more about a handful of dead millionaires than they do about over a thousand living seniors and disabled people. Here’s a video, “Dueling Concerns,” that I think best illustrates the priorities of our elected leaders in state government.

The first person you will see in the video is Grafton H. “Cap” Wiley IV, speaking at the eighth Rhode Island Small Business Economic Summit last Friday. Our state leaders were there, on stage or in the audience, to listen attentively and take notes. One of the many tax policy ideas Wiley suggested was to eliminate the Estate Tax, the tax that only dead millionaires pay. House Speaker Nicholas Mattiello, responding to Wiley’s idea later in the program, promises that he will take a serious look at this idea.

The next person in the video below is Maxine Richman, co-chair of the Rhode Island Interfaith Coalition, speaking at the eighth Rhode Island Interfaith Coalition to Reduce Poverty vigil at the State House, held two days earlier. This event has been occurring at the State House for about the same amount of time that the Small Business Summit has been taking place at Bryant University. Richman also has a series of proposals for government leaders, including funding the free bus fare system for seniors and disabled riders. In response to Richman’s ideas, Governor Gina Raimondo shrugs her shoulders and asks, “That sounds great, but where will we get the money?”

Richman was advocating on behalf of some of the poorest people in the state. Instead of promising to really grapple with these ideas, Raimondo and Mattiello essentially said, “Sorry, the cupboards are bare.”

But in truth, this has nothing to do with how much money the State of Rhode Island has to spend, it has to do with government priorities. Dead millionaires count for something in the eyes of our leaders; the poor, the elderly and the disabled do not.

For years now, for instance, the Rhode Island Interfaith Coalition to Reduce Poverty has asked that the General Assembly do something to reign in the usurious PayDay Loan companies, all to no avail. Mattiello dismisses the harm such companies do to our communities as ideological in nature without irony, unable to see that it’s his own ideological fixations that are responsible for enormous suffering in our state. The PayDay loan companies fund a powerful lobbyist who happens to be a close friend and mentor to Mattiello.

Lowering or eliminating the taxes on dead millionaires is a policy that flows naturally from an ideology that Mattiello and Raimondo embrace. This ideology, that has no basis in economic reality, says that lowering taxes on the moneyed classes will “trickle down” to the rest of us, and magically fund RIPTA and increase the fixed wages of the poor and elderly. The fact that it doesn’t work this way, never has and never will, threatens the deeply held beliefs, ideologies, of our government leaders and those they are beholden to, who were aptly represented at the Small Business Summit.

At one point in his presentation “Cap” Wiley told the crowd of small business owners and politicians that “businesses don’t vote,” implying that such a state of affairs denies business people political power.

That’s a crock of self-serving shit.

Businesses don’t need to vote as long as they are able to buy the attention and loyalty of elected officials.

Here’s my suggestion: Raise the estate tax. Use the money to not only fund the free bus fare system, but to also raise the earned income tax credit for low income families to 30 percent. That will do more to get our economy cooking than lower taxes for dead millionaires ever could.

Here are some of the unedited videos.

Previous coverage of the 2016 RI Small Business Economic Summit:

Business leaders decide issues elected officials will pursue at economic summit

Previous coverage of the Rhode Island Interfaith Coalition to Reduce Poverty:

Interfaith Vigil at State House proposes ambitious poverty agenda