Entitled professionals should stop whining about tax reforms

I'm getting a little impatient with all the well-paid doctors and lawyers who are complaining so vociferously about the federal government's plans to close up tax loopholes that these people have been exploiting for years.
The Liberal tax reforms are aimed at clamping down on the kinds of shell companies that allow self-employed to pay lower corporation and dividend taxes, rather than the income taxes everyone else has to pay, as well as making further tax savings by "sprinkling" their incomes around their extended families (unless those payments are reasonable compensation for actual work done). It also clamps down on the practice of using private corporations as a means of making (and protecting from tax) passive investments not related to the business, as well as converting income into (less taxed) capital gains. In short, it aims to treat business owners just like any other salary- earner.
The tax plan, which is still a work in progress at the moment, has generated near panic in some quarters, although there is also a lot of misunderstanding and confusion, even among financial advisors. However, it is expected to only affect top-end professionals earning over $150,000 anyway, those who have already exhausted org we tax-saving methods like RRSPs and TFSAs: how much can they have to complain about?
Furthermore, it only applies to Canadian-controlled private corporations (CCPCs), and studies show us that richer individuals are much more likely to have a CCPC than the middle- and lower-income individuals that much of the media complaints seem to focus on. According to the Canadian Tax Journal, among tax-payers in the bottom half of the income spectrum, less than 5% have a CCPC, as compared to almost half of the top 1% of earners. So, the focus of the tax measures seems well-placed, and it is unlikely to affect the proverbial mom-and-pop corner store owners that so many reports and conservative commentators talk about with such outrage in their tone.
A Canadian Federation of Independent Business survey suggests that, although over two-thirds of business owners pay family members compensation from their businesses, and a similar proportion hold passive investments within their businesses for tac purposes, nearly two-thirds say that the proposed changes will actually have no effect on them.
These outspoken doctors and lawyers have such a culture of entitlement that they have come to see the current system as the norm and the planned reforms as unfair incursions on their cozy little schemes, complaining that they would no longer be able to save for their retirements and maternity leaves.
Well, how do they think other people manage it? Other people who earn the same as them pay a normal, reasonable amount of income tax. Other people who don't get maternity leave or pensions provided have to make their own arrangements. Other people have to pay off substantial student loans: that's life.
The average gross billings of doctors is a massive $339,000 a year. But, the medical profession argues, a good third of that goes on business-related overheads. Well, that still leaves a net taxable income of well over $200,000 (and this is the average remember), much more than most people have to play with, and surely more than enough for them to factor in maternity pay and repay student loans. It's hard to feel too sorry for them.
The tax reforms seem eminently reasonable to me, even long overdue. The whining of a bunch of entitled upper middle class professionals has no place in this discussion.

UPDATE
A new study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives confirms that the proposed new rules on income sprinkling would mainly affect male professionals (like doctors and lawyers), with spouses or adult children who don't work, and who make over $216,000 a year. It is unlikely to have any affect on family-run businesses like restaurants, stores or farms.
77% of small business owners do not benefit at all from the current tax break on income sprinkling, and another 10% would not gain enough to make it worthwhile setting up such a scheme. Thus, only about 13% do currently take advantage of income sprinkling, and about half of the annual value of the tax break is claimed by the top 5% of earners.
So, I still say the tax changes are justified, and that the belly-aching by small business groups and accountants is not.

Gas price hike might lead to more hybrids and EVs

Now, I'm no Trumpian nativist or protectionist, and I do see the value of globalism (flawed as it is). But it still seems a bit perverse that Canada - a major oil producer and exporter - has just seen its gasoline prices increase by almost 25% because of a storm at the other end of the continent, which may or may not result in supply shortages.

Well, if there's a silver lining to these particular storm clouds, maybe a bunch more people will invest in hybrids and electric vehicles as a result of this latest gas price gouge. That is perhaps the best we can hope for.

Bangladesh flooding (and the war in Yemen) dwarf Texas' troubles

As you may have heard, there has been flooding in the south of the USA.

Indeed, you can't fail to have heard, even if you don't live in the US. It has received blanket coverage in newspapers, on television, and all over the internet. And, yes, it is certainly a major event, with at least 44 dead, and 32,000 people still in shelters. Hurricane Harvey was the most powerful hurricane to hit Texas in over 50 years, before it faded to a tropical storm, and 132cm of rain fell in just a few days (a record for continental America).

But I was a bit taken aback when I heard, just yesterday, that there has been much greater flooding happening at the same time in Bangladesh, northern India and Nepal. I first heard about this on CBC Radio report, although the Guardian also covered it (and pointed out the disparities in media attention) a couple of days later.

Now, Bangladesh is no stranger to flooding, but this is something on an unprecedented scale. Over 1,200 people have died, and an estimated 40 million are directly affected by this particularly vicious monsoon season. Many thousands of homes have been washed away, and farmland destroyed, and there have been any number of landslides, downed electricity towers, damaged roads, etc. Clean drinking water is always an issue in the region, but the flooding has pushed it to critical proportions, and widespread disease in the aftermath is a distinct likelihood. And the rain continues to fall.

We always pay more attention to events in our local neighbourhood; that is perhaps to be expected. We also pay more attention to events affecting people that look like us, which is less explicable and less justifiable. But the almost complete absence of coverage of a humanitarian crisis of this magnitude is just extraordinary. Perhaps the most shocking fact I heard was that the main English language newspaper in Bangladesh ran a detailed report on the flooding in Houston just the other day! Now, I don't mean to play down someone else's natural diaaster, but some perspective is definitely needed here.

The Guardian goes even further to point out that even the Bangladesh disaster pales in comparison with the biggest humanitarian crisis at the moment, Yemen, where an estimated 10,000 people have been killed in the last couple of years, and about 7 million made homeless, under a constant barrage by Western-armed Saudi Arabia. Yemen, for various reasons, has received much less media attention than either Texas or Bangladesh (or Syria for that matter).

Mayweather-McGregor: hype gone crazy

I really couldn't be less exercised about the upcoming Fight of the Century (I'm talking about the Floyd Mayweather - Conor McGregor match-up in case you weren't sure which Fight of the Century I was referring to).

Now, full disclosure, I have always hated boxing. I watched it as a kid because my Dad watched it; I have never watched it as an adult. It is brutal, animalistic and has little in the way of "sports appeal" in my view. My feelings towards UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship, also known as mixed martial arts) are even less positive.

But this fight is even less about the sport than most boxing matches. Two brash, obnoxious, rich, loud-mouthed entertainers are coming together to squeeze every last dollar (or every last million dollars) out of gullible, blood-crazed, testosterone-driven fans. It is the equivalent of a gratuitous mash-up of two previously chart-busting pop songs, and has little or no intrinsic value.

There is no championship or belt on the line: this is just for bragging rights (and, man, are these guys good at bragging). It's not even guaranteed to be a good fight: Mayweather (40 years old, and coming out of retirement for this match-up) is unbeaten in a professional career of 49 bouts and McGregor (29, and a dominant figure in his own field) is competing in a sport, traditional boxing, that is not his own. If you understand American-style betting odds, the odds for Mayweather are around -400, (although they were as low as -2250 at one time), and apparently more than one 7-figure bet has been laid by confident punters.

But that hasn't stopped the hype machine from doing its job. Watching the fight on pay-per-view or any number of other streaming options (or even on PlayStation) will set you back around $100. Given that around 50 million people are expected to watch the bout, estimated total revenue is in the region of $700 million, of which around $300 million will be shared by the fighters (probably split about $225 million for the winner - Mayweather - and $75 million for the runner-up. Not bad for an evening's work. Live tickets have not been selling as well as expected but, at $1,000 a pop, that is perhaps understandable.

So, why am I even writing about it? Good question. Schadenfreude, perhaps, or just an admission that no-one is safe from hype at this level.

 

UPDATE

The fight went pretty much as expected, with Mayweather beating McGregor on points in the tenth round, although perhaps McGregor acquitted himself better, and lasted longer, than many had expected.

Let's train police officers to use non-lethal force

I have never understood why our police force ends up killing so many people. I'm not saying these people are entirely innocent of wrong-doing, nor am I saying that the police are a bunch of out-of-control thugs.

But, as Andre Picard pointed out recently, about 40% of those shot to death by police are mentally ill (Sammy Yatim, Andrew Loku, etc, etc), and not in complete control of their actions and reactions. Of the rest, most have some control over their anti-social or dangerous actions, and a certain percentage are probably out-and-out career criminals who just don't care about the consequences of their actions or lifestyles.

Police officers dealing with these kinds of violent cases, are on a hiding to nothing. They are supposed to engage these misanthropes, while all the time trying to defuse the situation, only resorting to violence themselves when all else has failed and the risk of injury or death (either to the police officers or to other standers-by) appears imminent. It is a near impossible position to place someone in, and mistakes are likely in such charged and high-stress circumstances. In very few cases, though, is a lethal police response the correct one.

After every such death, studies are carried out and papers are written, almost all of which conclude that police officers need more training to deal with such situations. But surely a big part of the problem is the very fact that the officers are carrying a lethal weapon that they are told to use only in the most desperate of circumstances. Are there really no alternatives?

In the movies, the good guys (and often the bad guys too) regularly shoot with non-lethal tranquilizer guns. The victim is incapacitated almost immediately, but is not killed. Do the real-life police not have access to such a solution? Well, from what I can glean from the internet, apparently not. Tranquilizer guns or darts are used with animals, but they are not instantaneous, especially when the adrenaline is pumping. Then there is the added problem that the dosage used needs to be customized to the size and weight of the assailant (which is clearly not practicable in the circumstances of a live situation), and that reloading, if required, is slow. Some people may also have a fatal reaction to the kinds of tranquilizer drugs that are available.

So, what about tasers? Well, tasers are indeed used on a regular basis, probably more than we think, but tasers too have their drawbacks: they are very slow to reload, they require a good connection of both electrode barbs (something even a partial miss or some thick clothing might prevent), their range is limited to about 6 metres, some people might have a fatal reaction to the charge, etc, etc.

Well then, why can't police officers shoot, but not to kill? Apparently, shooting an assailant's gun or knife out of their hand is the stuff of movies and fiction, and even an experienced marksman cannot achieve such a feat reliably. But I see no reason why they need to aim for the chest or head, when a shoulder or leg would serve just as well (certainly in the case of a knife-wielder, and probably even with a gunman).

But surely there must be other non-lethal options? Well, there are. One website lists several, ranging from "bean bags" (sock-shaped pouches filled with lead, silicone or rubber pellets, fired from a specialized gun), blunt-impact projectiles (silicone- or foam-tipped plastic bullets, also fired from a specialized gun), "pepperballs" (round plastic balls filled with capsaicin powder, fired from a paintball-type gun), "The Alternative" (a metal attachment that fits onto a regular gun that effectively slows down the bullet, making it non-lethal), "The XREP" (a longer-range, more effective, wireless version of a taser), the "ML-12 Less-Lethal Launcher" (a specialized handgun that can fire a range of non-lethal ammunition, including bean-bags, rubber balls, pepper balls, etc), even the military-style "Active Denial System" (a kind of wide-range heat ray that causes instantaneous debilitating pain).

Yes, police officers need more training on asessing and defusing situations and in dealing with the mentally ill. And maybe the good old nightstick or billie club still has a place in a police officer's kit. But if, for these and other reasons, a gun altercation is unavoidable, then let's try shooting to main instead of shooting to kill. At least that would be a step in the right direction. And a serious consideration of some of the available non-lethal options mentioned above might also be a good thing. There is certainly no time like the present to act on this.

Total eclipse generating mass hysteria - just like centuries ago

I am somewhat bemused by the mass hysteria that seems to be holding sway south of the border regarding today's total solar eclipse.

Viewing glasses have been sold out for weeks now - as indeed they at here in Canada for our paltry partial eclipse, and every welder is probably enjoying unprecedented popularity right now. The interwebs are rife with advice on how not to fry your cellphone (amd ylur eyes) during this Event of the Century. There are probably more pinhole cameras being hastily constructed right now than ever before.

But the event is also being accompanied by sold-out motels and campsites anywhere the path of the full eclipse; catastrophic traffic jams are being predicted for some of the smaller towns along the eclipse's path; and there are warnings of Wi-Fi outages as excessive Facebook and Instagram uploads occur.

I guess I should happy be that a natural event is garnering so much attention and interests in all walks of life, but it does all seem a little de trop, wouldn't you say. Back in the Middle Ages, such an event used to generate any amount of panic and hysteria - it seems like we have not really progressed so much today.

Trump's lies about Charlottesville cannot be allowed to stand

Yes, I know it's been covered ad nauseam on the internet and elsewhere, but this cannot be repeated enough. In Donald Trump's return to his own original script two days ago, in which he condemned the "alt-left" equally with the "alt-right" for the riots, injuries and deaths in Charlottesville this last week, he ... well, he lied.

Trump claims that the anti-white supremacist protestors came with their own violent agenda, that he watched the footage from the day ("very closely, much more closely than you people watched it"), and that "they came charging, with clubs in their hands, swinging clubs".

But, in fact, as eye witnesses confirm, the clubs (and the lit torches and the fists and the pepper spray and the lighter fluid) were being swung by the chanting neo-Nazis. The counter-protestors were almost completely peaceful and defensive in their actions, the only possible exception being a few desperate protestors who were hemmed in around the statue who used fists and pepper spray (sorry, no clubs) in their attempt to escape the melée.

I hate to give Trump more coverage than he deserves, but this needs to be made very clear. The man is shamelessly lying in his attempts to protect the fascists (and, make no mistake, these people are not "alt-right", they are neo-Nazis, white supremacists and Ku Klux Klan adherents), and he needs to be called out on it, and indeed he has been by both the right and the left.

Incidentally, if you missed it, check out the impressive eulogy made by the mother of slain protester Heather Heyer. Then compare it with Trump's rant.

The weird and wonderful world of electric eels

Here's another in my occasional series about weird and cool animals (see the entry on tardigrades, for example).

Electric eels, it turns out, are not actually eels. They are eel-like in shape, but they are technically a type of knifefish (they have actually been reclassified several times since Linnaeus first classified them back in 1776). What else do we know about them?

• They grow up to 2 metres in length, and a full-grown adult may weigh up to 20 kilograms. 
• They can be purple, grey, blue, black or white in colour, and do not have scales like most fish. 
• They are only found in the Orinoco and Amazon rivers in South America. 
• They have poor eye-sight but an acute sense of hearing. 
• They live in water and have gills, but actually breathe air (they surface about every ten minutes or so to breathe). 
• They are carnivores and eat other fish, small mammals, birds and amphibians (very young electric eels are quite happy to eat unhatched eggs and other eels).
• They live for around 15 years in the wild, and up to 22 years in captivity.
• They use three different organs in their abdomens to create electricity (which together make up most of their body mass). Two of these organs are used to shock their prey, the other is used for "electrolocation" (they have frequency-sensitive receptors on their skin that can sense electromagnetic fields).
• A shock from an electric eel is enough to knock over, but not kill, a human, although it can cause heart attacks in those who are prone to them. The eel itself is insulated, and so immune to its own electricity.
• There are about 500 other species of electric fish, including electric rays and several species of electric catfish.

Cool or what?