FY 2015 Budget (Passed)

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Nay
These tax rates are, well...

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I echo a Senator Polnut's comments, and would like to see the White House's proposal at first.

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I will need to look through this more thoroughly before I can say anything, but I will comment here to. It just may take some time, because Christmas and all.

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So, if I still may, these are the cuts as I understand them. Please correct me if I'm wrong:

4B - Military Retirement
2B - CIA
0.3B - various NR&E points
6.64B - Farm subsidies
1B - Highways
1B - Air Transport
0.61B - Community and Regional Development
2B - Elementary and Secondary Education
2B - Universities
+35B - Duke Scott & Universal Education
2.2B - Unemployment Insurance
11.4B - Elderly Insurance
2B - Housing Assistance
2.58B - Food Stamps

Are those cuts made from the Nix budget, or from a previous proposal?

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More or less, yes, and most are made from the Nix budget. The exception would be transportation, which I believe was in my initial basic proposal.

I'm actually supportive of Bore's amendment, and I am happy to see most of the cuts retained. I'm not sure if I am the actual sponsor here since I'm not a Senator, but the amendment is mostly friendly for me.

That said, I would like to see the possibility of increasing the NASA budget (I believe it's far too low if we can to get more ambitious things done in that front), and, if the proposal raises enough revenue, reverting some of minor cuts in the international area. I'm not sure if Bore's proposal actuall raises the Healthcare Payroll tax back to 8%, but if that was the case then the situation may not be as nearly as complicated.

Okay thank you.

I too think that Senator bore's amendments are sensible, and likewise as Senator Polnut, I can not approve of Senator TNF's tax rates. It just makes no sense at all just starting to tax people making more than 100K, we can in no way fund our budget with such a tax structure. (I better not start talking about Senator JCL's proposal)

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May I ask why the Northeast Community Health Partnership is third in overall funding even though it is second in population size, nearly tied with the Mideast, and larger than the other three regions by nearly ten voters each?

Probably relates to the actual population of the regions. It makes sense that then the Midwest has the lowest population=lowest funding sum; Pacific and Northeast with one big state/two states of about the same size (Califorina vs Penn and NY) the next highest; and so on and so on.
It would be interesting though to take 2014 Census Estimates for that, I'm sure the Pacific would get more then

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May I ask why the Northeast Community Health Partnership is third in overall funding even though it is second in population size, nearly tied with the Mideast, and larger than the other three regions by nearly ten voters each?

Probably relates to the actual population of the regions. It makes sense that then the Midwest has the lowest population=lowest funding sum; Pacific and Northeast with one big state/two states of about the same size (Califorina vs Penn and NY) the next highest; and so on and so on.
It would be interesting though to take 2014 Census Estimates for that, I'm sure the Pacific would get more then

Are you saying the allocations are based off of the US population estimates?

My concern is that in Atlasia, the Northeast has the second largest population, but comes in third with funding.

I would guess so. Otherwise, this seems not explainable to me.

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I'd actually rather see the FTT at 0.75% than 0.5%, as in the end, it does make a difference. Not necessarily that much on the revenue side, but such a tax can help combat speculating and stock market gambling.

Also, do we have an agreement with the EU and maybe also Japan/Singapore/China/Hongkong, that they have the same FTT as we have? Otherwise, this would just make no sense, instead of transacting then in New York, they'll do it in London or Frankfurt.

[Cranberry]

I'd actually rather see the FTT at 0.75% than 0.5%, as in the end, it does make a difference. Not necessarily that much on the revenue side, but such a tax can help combat speculating and stock market gambling.

Also, do we have an agreement with the EU and maybe also Japan/Singapore/China/Hongkong, that they have the same FTT as we have? Otherwise, this would just make no sense, instead of transacting then in New York, they'll do it in London or Frankfurt.

0.75% level of taxes are huge. Unlike other kind of taxation, raising just 0.25 of a Financial Transaction Tax ends up having a catastrophic effect in our economy. It will mean that every transaction will cost 50% under the next fiscal year. This will certainly lead investors to get out of our nation.

Furthermore, I'm also concerned about the international backing of our financial transaction tax. Even so, I believe that at least the Eurozone Countries might have already adopted a FTT as well since their major "competitor" (Wall Street) is already complying with those rules. Nonetheless, this can be a priority for our future Foreign Policy.

In the end, I would be just as okay with a 0.5% FFT as a 0.75%, if such an increase really has those effects.
Yes, the international banking is my biggest concern here as well. I guess too that the Eurozone will have adopted such a tax, as there is major backing for this in Europe; but it would certainly not hurt to see that each and every major financial hub introduce such a tax.

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Yes, Senator bore's comments are my thoughts as well. I'm on board with the cutting of taxes for the second and maybe also third bracket, but from the fourth bracket on, I'd rather keep it the way we have it...

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Nay

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I don't see why a tax break of 1% is necessary when we could use this money so that we won't need cuts for health care?

NAY

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The situation in the Pacific is similar:

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I'd propose we wait for the numbers still until January the 31st, after that, we need to get this in direction of a vote if we want to see this passed before the election.

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Wasn't Barnes serving as Deputy GM? Couldn't he offer some numbers?

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I won't support increasing taxes on alcohol or marijuana. If taxes go up, they should go up on the wealthy and the wealthy alone.

Quick calculation: we'd need 3% more on the highest tax bracket to get in the remaining 20 billion (actually ~27 billions)

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No, I will also not support tabling this. I will refrain from any further comments here until we get those numbers from Barnes Lumine was speaking of.

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NAY

bore summed up my views.

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And I was worried you'd finish this up while I'm away

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How long would these estimations take?

Yes, that's the question now, I guess.

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Echoing Senator TNF's comments, I am too supportive of increasing our funding for space programs, to the 30 billions if you want so. I will however not support any further increases in military or even secret service fundings, we have already increased them in this budget to the furthest acceptable to a large portion of Senators as well as the Atlasian public.

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Yeah, I am ready for a final vote as well.

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AYE

Let's get this thing passed, at last

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Oh, endlich!