Materials: Rektangel vase
Description: The REKTANGEL vases are used as glassblocks in the design of a distinctive loft located on the first floor of a historic warehouse and monument on the Brouwersgracht in the center of Amsterdam. The apartment is designed by Marloes van Heteren of SOLUZ and Remco Wilcke of CUBE architecten.
IRS data suggests that, globally, U.S. nonfinancial companies hold at least three times more cash and other liquid assets than the Federal Reserve reports, idle money that could be creating jobs, funding dividends or even paying a stiff federal penalty tax for hoarding corporate cash.
Do the ‘Job Creators’ really need more cash? – Ed.
Typically, eminent domain has been used to clear property for infrastructure projects like highways, schools and sewage plants. In this case, supporters say, the public purpose is served because communities battered by foreclosures have seen tax rolls decimated and services gutted and have suffered economic blight.
THIS WEEK’S HEADLINES:
The only alternative is a wealth tax. Anyone who has a net worth over $5m (or $20m, or chose a number) has to pay 1% (or 2%) of that amount, every year. It would be like a death tax, except you paid it while you were alive. Think – pre-paid estate taxes.
Warren Buffett is always complaining that he doesn’t pay enough in taxes. The guy has a net worth of about $40b. If there was a 2% wealth tax he would have to cough up an extra $800m a year. That would shut him up quick; it would also solve all the fiscal problems.
Bill Gates would be forced to come up with an extra $1.2B. The Walton family would have to pony up $1.6B. And the good old Koch brothers would toss in a $1b.
If a 2% wealth tax was applied to everyone who had a net worth in excess of $5m it would add up to about $700B a year. That’s just about the right amount to get the budget to where it starts to make sense. This tax increase would not come out of current income, therefore the consequences to the economy would be muted versus a similar sized income tax increase.
Doesn’t Obama have that same expression that Princess Liea had at the end of ‘Star Wars’? – Ed.
A more effective model for Angel investing is long overdue. If Angels want to win — they want to lower their risk, create better returns, and help entrepreneurs more they’ll do the following: fly lower heights (avoid trying to fund the next 5 Facebooks) and take shorter flights (avoid riding each investment out all the way to the end).
“We want to remove the label stuck on divorce as being complicated, bureaucratic and costly, and to make it as easy as going to a supermarket and buying a card,”
I read Parmy Olsen’s ‘We Are Anonymous’ over the weekend. It is the story of the infamous hacker collective that brought down the Church of Scientology, Pay Pal, Master Card, Visa, Sony, the FBI and CIA among their numerous conquests. It’s a fascinating read about a group based on a contradiction: A few very talented, capable, creative people performed truly heinous acts because they thought their lives were pointless. This nihilistic perspective drove them until they were caught.
The participants were young. The oldest was 28, the youngest 16. Uniformly, they were the socially awkward. They were bullied and marginalized for most of their lives. Most left the education system in middle school because they were bored or mistreated. All of them lived with parents or relatives, reeking havoc on some of the largest organizations in the world from their bedrooms.
Anonymous was more of accident than a movement. The book details how the hacker collective transitioned from a chaotic, leaderless group looking for lulz (fun at other people’s expense) to very small team that stole the private information of millions of people only to give it away to secure fame and respect from the hacking community. Without recounting the book, because it’s worth reading to understand hacker culture and the underworld of the internet, I was struck by several points:
Continue reading “10 Things I Learned from ‘We Are Anonymous’ | Peter Mehit”
