Why so glum chum? US congress cut the Teamsters benefits to keep it out of the pension guarantee trust fund! Next time you want to pick on US workers, try to be informed. There is a difference between ignorance and stupidity.
OS
http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/congress-approves-pension-measure-that-could-cut-benefits-for-many/article_23217709-c99b-5dad-bb1b-8b1a76fbe6aa.html
Congress approves pension measure that could cut benefits for many retirees
By Jim Gallagher jgallagher@post-dispatch.com 314-340-8390 Dec 14, 2014
Updated to reflect Senate approval and to correct a figure.
Glenn Zichler worked 30 years driving a bread truck around St. Louis before retiring.
Now, he may be facing a sharp cut in his $33,600 annual pension. A provision just approved by Congress would let troubled multi-employer pension plans cut benefits for current retirees.
“It’s going to make it impossible to live. We may have to sell the house,” said Zilcher, who has a working wife, a son in college and a disabled daughter.
Thousands of retired truckers, miners, bakers and construction workers felt their financial security shaken as Congress considered the surprise move, which could reverse 40 years of pension law.
FULL story at link.
Secrets and Lies of the Bailout
The federal rescue of Wall Street didn’t fix the economy – it created a permanent bailout state based on a Ponzi-like confidence scheme. And the worst may be yet to come
BY MATT TAIBBI January 4, 2013
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/secret-and-lies-of-the-bailout-20130104
Snip: THEY LIED ABOUT LENDING
Once TARP passed, the government quickly began loaning out billions to some 500 banks that it deemed "healthy" and "viable." A few were cash loans, repayable at five percent within the first five years; other deals came due when a bank stock hit a predetermined price. As long as banks held TARP money, they were barred from paying out big cash bonuses to top executives.
But even before Summers promised Congress that banks would be required to increase lending as a condition for receiving bailout funds, officials had already decided not to even ask the banks to use the money to increase lending. In fact, they'd decided not to even ask banks to monitor what they did with the bailout money. Barofsky, the TARP inspector, asked Treasury to include a requirement forcing recipients to explain what they did with the taxpayer money. He was stunned when TARP administrator Kashkari rejected his proposal, telling him lenders would walk away from the program if they had to deal with too many conditions. "The banks won't participate," Kashkari said.
Barofsky, a former high-level drug prosecutor who was one of the only bailout officials who didn't come from Wall Street, didn't buy that cash-desperate banks would somehow turn down billions in aid. "It was like they were trembling with fear that the banks wouldn't take the money," he says. "I never found that terribly convincing."
In the end, there was no lending requirement attached to any aspect of the bailout, and there never would be. Banks used their hundreds of billions for almost every purpose under the sun – everything, that is, but lending to the homeowners and small businesses and cities they had destroyed. And one of the most disgusting uses they found for all their billions in free government money was to help them earn even more free government money.
FULL feature story at link.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jan/22/barack-obama/obama-says-automakers-have-paid-back-all-loans-it-/
Obama says automakers have paid back all the loans it got from his admin 'and more' (FALSE)
Snip: All told, the Treasury Department reported that the program cost taxpayers $79.7 billion, of which $70.4 billion was recovered. Under that estimate, the program lost about $9.3 billion. In April, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the program would end up costing about $14 billion.
The Obama administration, however, makes the case that only $57.3 billion of the investment came under their watch and therefore that should be all that they’re accountable for.
Let’s review the timeline, starting in 2008: Bush secured $700 billion to bailout the financial institutions under the Troubled Asset Relief Program in October 2008. In November of that year, Obama was elected and soon after met with Bush to discuss the transition. It was during those early meetings that Obama began to lobby Bush to provide some financial assistance for the auto industry, according to reports.
The New York Times wrote Bush had "balked at allowing the automakers to tap into the $700 billion bailout fund, despite warnings ... that General Motors might not survive the year."
FULL story at link.
Had enough or want more?
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