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Ignore the Wall Street-Funded "Science" Attacking Rent Control
We’ve seen that corporate landlords—and the economists who do their bidding—will do anything to generate billions and billions in profits by charging excessive rents year after year to vulnerable tenants with no ability to fight back.
Sep 12, 2024
If you tune into CNBC on any given morning, you will hear various economists proclaim with confidence wildly different interpretations of economic events. The same goes for what market indicators will mean for the 2024 election.
Many an investor has lost a fortune following the advice of "expert" economists. Despite its lofty claims, economics is not a “science”; it is a social science which relies on interpretations of human behavior with a subjective component. It is about as reliable as seismology: Have you noticed that most earthquakes occur on faults previously unknown?
Economists have a lousy track record at predicting recessions, which should be a source of humility. How many economists warned us of the Great Recession? Almost none.
Sure, economists are smart people, and their academic work can help to steer the ship of state and industry. However, they have no business wading into the political realm to influence voters based on their "expert" opinions.
If a lack of precision wasn't enough to expect economists to act with caution, there is the matter of corruption. Economists are paid by corporate interests to bless their profit motives. There is an inherent conflict of interest in being paid by an industry to provide the best opinion and supposed objectivity that only big money can buy. Economists are routinely paid vast sums by the highest bidder to render opinions in anti-trust lawsuits.
When the pre-purchased masters of dismal science tell you that helping renters put food on the table will destroy affordable housing, look closely at who is footing the bill for the "scientific" research.
Unlike writing for a major medical journal that rigorously investigates potential conflicts of interest, economics is an accountability-free zone. You seldom hear disclaimers that a particular economist is paid to have an opinion that supports a selfish motive. The public is rightly cynical or just flat-out ignores economists. Case in point: Tens of millions of people didn't get the memo that the U.S. economy is thriving because it isn't thriving for them. Economic terms like "pricing power" mask that the true meaning is price gouging.
A basic flaw in most economic thinking is that it begins with this premise: Maximizing profits benefits everyone. This is glaringly false when it comes to housing. In recent years, a massive wealth transfer has taken place, squeezing money from the poor and the working class and transferring it to billionaires. Some of these very same well-heeled economists are telling us that rent control is inherently disastrous economically. Yet some of the greatest cities in the world, such as New York, regulate rents.
In reality, there are many economists who believe that rent control helps keep people in their homes. Rent control is much like the minimum wage—the sky doesn't fall when the minimum wage goes up. And the real estate market won't tank because of rent control. When workers or tenants have more money in their pockets, it keeps them afloat and generates more economic activity.
In fact, a group of 32 top economists wrote a letter to the Biden administration last year, supporting rent control. They wrote that rent control will “protect tenants, stabilize neighborhoods, promote income diversity in regional economies, and improve the long-term outlook for housing affordability.” They also added, referring to predatory landlords, that “we have seen the devastating impact of a poorly regulated housing market on people’s livelihoods, as already unaffordable rental prices outpace wage growth.” They understand that only rent control will rein in the greed of corporate landlords.
That’s important. We’ve seen that corporate landlords will do anything to generate more billions by charging excessive rents year after year, and the RealPage scandal is the perfect example. Using a RealPage software program, a cartel of corporate landlords—many of whom are the largest landlords in the country—wildly inflated rents in cities across America. Now, the Department of Justice—along with numerous state attorneys general—has sued RealPage, while dozens of tenants have filed anti-trust lawsuits against RealPage and corporate landlords. It’s yet another reminder that rent regulations are glaringly needed.
So, when the pre-purchased masters of dismal science tell you that helping renters put food on the table will destroy affordable housing, look closely at who is footing the bill for the "scientific" research. Use your horse sense to determine what you know to be best for helping people in need: Rent control.
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NYT Gives 'Whining' Megadonors a Platform to Push Harris Against Taxing the Rich
"I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you that Wall Street billionaires and Silicon Valley tech bros are trying to convince a presidential candidate to abandon her commitment to tax them," said the chair of the Patriotic Millionaires.
Aug 30, 2024
The United States' "paper of record" gave ultra-rich investors and corporate executives a platform on Thursday to sound off against Vice President Kamala Harris' support for a tax on unrealized capital gains, a popular proposal that has stirred howls of complaint from Silicon Valley elites whom Harris used to represent in the Senate.
The New York Timesstory—headlined "Donors Quietly Push Harris to Drop Tax on Ultrawealthy"—quotes billionaire investor Mark Cuban; Aaron Levie, CEO of the cloud storage firm Box; Charles Myers, the founder of Signum Global Advisors; and others who have backed Harris' presidential bid.
"In my interactions with them, the key is she focuses on her values and is not an ideologue about any particular program," Cuban told the Times, which described him as one of the donors close to Harris who doesn't "believe she is that committed" to taxing billionaire wealth.
"From what I've been told," said Cuban, "everything is on the table, nothing's been decided yet."
Levie, who has donated $30,000 to Harris' campaign, said Silicon Valley leaders he has spoken with about the proposed tax on unrealized capital gains see the idea as "quite punitive."
"There's optimism that this can't possibly be real," said Levie. "Most people are waiting to hear from the Harris campaign. Is this a real proposal that is actually being pushed for—or was this something that was inherited from Biden?"
"The only thing at stake here is the remarkably fragile egos of billionaires who are on the verge of realizing they might not be saving civilization for anyone, including themselves."
The Times noted Friday that a group of wealthy Harris supporters known as "VCs for Kamala" found in a survey of its members that "roughly 75% of respondents agreed with the statement 'taxing unrealized capital gains will stifle innovation.'" The group includes billionaire LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman and billionaire investor Chris Sacca.
The Patriotic Millionaires, a group of rich Americans who support higher taxes on the wealthy, issued a statement Friday criticizing both the "whining" megadonors and the Times for handing them a megaphone to attack efforts to rein in billionaire tax dodging.
"I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you that Wall Street billionaires and Silicon Valley tech bros are trying to convince a presidential candidate to abandon her commitment to tax them, and using their own alleged brilliance to justify it," said Morris Pearl, the chair of the Patriotic Millionaires. "I admire their chutzpah in claiming that taxing unrealized capital gains will stifle innovation!"
"Claiming that making a billionaire pay taxes on their second billion will reduce innovation is as absurd as the rooster claiming the sun won't rise without his crowing," Pearl added. "The billionaires I know were all highly motivated to earn their first billion. The only thing at stake here is the remarkably fragile egos of billionaires who are on the verge of realizing they might not be saving civilization for anyone, including themselves."
The Patriotic Millionaires also suggested some adjustments to the Times headline:
Some (Silly/Misinformed) Donors Quietly (although not actually all that quietly; it was reported on the front page of the NYT after all) Push Harris to Drop (Modest Compared to What it Should Be) Tax on Ultra-Wealthy While Other (Much More Sensible and, yes, More Patriotic) Donors Loudly Push Billionaires to Drop Opposition to Common Sense.
The Harris campaign has voiced support for the tax proposals outlined in President Joe Biden's most recent budget blueprint, including a tax on the unrealized capital gains accumulated by individuals with net worths exceeding $100 million—a portion of the nation's upper class that contains fewer than 11,000 people.
Under the nation's current tax structure, billionaires are able to dodge taxes by never or rarely selling stock positions, which are not taxed until they are "realized."
Gabriel Zucman, an economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley and a leading advocate of a tax on billionaire wealth, has applauded the Harris campaign for embracing the proposed levy on the unrealized capital gains of the ultra-wealthy.
In a May op-ed in the Times, Zucman noted that U.S. billionaires paid a lower effective tax rate than working-class Americans for the first time in the nation's history in 2018.
"The idea that billionaires should pay a minimum amount of income tax is not a radical idea," Zucman wrote at the time. "What is radical is continuing to allow the wealthiest people in the world to pay a smaller percentage in income tax than nearly everybody else."
"In liberal democracies, a wave of political sentiment is building, focused on rooting out the inequality that corrodes societies," the economist added. "A coordinated minimum tax on the superrich will not fix capitalism. But it is a necessary first step."
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'Very Bad Sign for Democracy': AIPAC Has Spent Over $100 Million on 2024 Elections
AIPAC's billionaire-funded super PAC has helped defeat two of the most vocal opponents of Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip.
Aug 28, 2024
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a powerful lobbying group widely known as AIPAC, has officially spent more than $100 million in the 2024 election cycle so far, pouring staggering sums into Democratic primary races in an effort to unseat progressive opponents of Israel's war on the Gaza Strip.
Citing new Federal Election Commission filings, Sludgereported Tuesday that AIPAC's political action committee had spent $44.8 million as of the end of last month, mostly on donations to political campaigns and party organizations. The United Democracy Project (UDP), AIPAC's super PAC, has spent $55.4 million so far, bringing AIPAC's total spending this cycle to just over $100 million—surpassing its reported spending target for 2024 races.
AIPAC money has already made a significant impact, helping a pair of pro-Israel Democrats defeat progressive Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and Cori Bush (D-Mo.)—two of Congress' most vocal critics of Israel's assault on Gaza—in recent primary contests.
"Supporting Palestinian rights is becoming so popular among American voters that pro-genocide groups have to spend over $100 million to hold on."
Sludge noted that UDP's financial support for Bowman's primary opponent, George Latimer, "set a record for spending by an outside group on a House election."
"A very bad sign for democracy that MAGA billionaires are spending this much money to shape our politics," the youth-led Sunrise Movementwrote in response to the new spending figures, referring to the Republican megadonors who have fueled spending by AIPAC-aligned groups.
Politicoreported in June that AIPAC has been "the biggest source of Republican money flowing into competitive Democratic primaries this year."
Sludge pointed out Tuesday that billionaire Jan Koum, the former WhatsApp CEO who helped bankroll Nikki Haley's failed presidential bid, is the top donor to AIPAC's super PAC.
"Other UDP donors in recent months have included the following: David Messer, CEO of Freepoint Commodities, who gave another $250,000 on July 1; Martin Geller, CEO of financial firm Geller & Company, who gave an additional $268,000 on June 25; and Frank Blair, equity portfolio manager at Capital Group, who gave an additional $200,000 in May," Sludge reported.
While lamenting the outsized influence that UDP and other billionaire-funded groups are able to wield in the U.S. political system, some observers have argued that AIPAC's aggressive spending is a sign of desperation in the face of growing public opposition to Israel's mass atrocities in Gaza. A majority of Democratic voters view Israel's war on Gaza as genocide, according to one recent survey.
"Supporting Palestinian rights is becoming so popular among American voters that pro-genocide groups have to spend over $100 million to hold on," said Beth Miller, policy director at Jewish Voice for Peace.
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