15 Quick Fixes Make The World Better (chad)

That's what the July /August issue of "the Atlantic" offers or at least claims to offer. Some of the fixes are stupid - Redesign the dollar, End the Vice Presidency, and Pay the artists in my opinion, but most deserve some serious consideration.

Among them:

Rent your own home - Require or strongly encourage banks to banks to allow the current resident to remain in recently foreclosed homes as long as they remain current in fair market rent. The goal is to stop an artificial race to the bottom of home prices.

Privatize the seas - Improve fishery management by auctioning off permits that can be used year round instead of having short open seasons. The concept has already been proven in Alaska's halibut fisheries as well as in Australia and New Zealand and a study by the University of California has shown that fisheries privatized in this manner are much less prone to collapse. (Normally I would link to this study rather than accepting the articles word for it but I can't find it. I have heard the results reported on BBC and I believe CNN previously however)

End all taxes except the property tax and End the corporate income tax - Instead of punishing success by taxing it while rewarding people who happend to buy land in the right place at the right time reverse the formula. Only tax property while eliminating the income tax. If taxes are to remain then stop punishing job creators (corporations) and tax those who recieve the benefits. Different takes on the same issue. Both are worth consideration. According to the author of the property tax proposal Milton Friedman was an advocate of such an approach.

I'll let you read the rest of the suggestions for yourself. Amazingly Andrew Sullivan's suggestion for immediate disclosure of Trig Palin's birth records didn't make the cut in this article. Maybe there is hope for the world after all.

posted by xgenghisx at 12:15 PM

| Access Comments