WhatFinger


Alan Joel

Alan Joel has been a practicing CPA in NYC for more than 40 years. He loves liberty and writes on the politics of taxes at his popular blog, AlanJoelNY.com

Most Recent Articles by Alan Joel:

The Rise of Prosecutorial Abuses

The Wall Street Journal had an excellent article a couple weeks ago calling out the egregious prosecutorial misconduct of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. In this farce of a case, Schneiderman is hell bent on going after Hank Greenberg (formerly with AIG) in an attempt to discredit his name in a state civil lawsuit.
- Thursday, March 5, 2015

A Letter to the Senate

The nomination of Loretta Lynch to the position of Attorney General is before you. Although her intelligence, experience, and poise may appear to make her a superb candidate, it is clear now that she would be an extremely poor – even dangerous — choice due to her strong position on civil asset forfeiture.
- Friday, February 27, 2015

Obama's Budget Contains a Federal Student Loan Bailout

A few days ago, Politico revealed a little gem hidden in the Obama budget: "In obscure data tables buried deep in its 2016 budget proposal, the Obama administration revealed this week that its student loan program had a $21.8 billion shortfall last year, apparently the largest ever recorded for any government credit program."
- Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Obama's Policy Proposals are the Opposite of "Tax Reform"

Obama has consistently talked about how he is for “tax reform” all during his presidency. But clearly, he has no idea what that even means. True tax reform is a mechanism that produces a cleaner and clearer tax code. A great example of this was the 1986 IRC reform, where Reagan set the highest rate at 28% in exchange for eliminating massive amounts of tax shelters and gimmicks.
- Thursday, January 29, 2015

Obama's Proposed Capital Gains Rate Hikes Will Hurt the Economy

President Obama just told the country during his State of the Union address that he is going to increase the capital gains rate again in order to raise revenue for new spending programs. Given that Obama already knows that raising the capital gains rate actually REDUCES revenue, we are left with a President who believes that we can pay for increased spending by reducing revenue.
- Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Is Executive Amnesty inexplicably tied to ObamaCare?

Is Executive Amnesty is inexplicably tied to ObamaCare?
On Monday of last week, the New York Times reported that Health and Human Secretary, Sylvia Burwell, projected 9.1 million enrollees in ObamaCare by the end of the year. This is in stark contrast to the original projections by the Congressional Budget Office, which "had estimated that 13 million people would be enrolled next year, with the total rising to 24 million in 2016".
- Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Thomas Perez, the "Disparate Impact" Man

Thomas Perez, the Disparate Impact Man
The idea of "disparate impact" is an abomination that has taken root in the business world and is being pushed into other sectors as well, such as housing and labor. This idea holds that "a defendant can be held liable for discrimination for a race-neutral policy that statistically disadvantages a specific minority group even if that negative "impact" was neither foreseen nor intended.
- Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Thomas Perez Calls for Shared Prosperity 20 Times in Speech

Thomas Perez Calls for Shared Prosperity 20 Times in Speech
Thomas Perez was Obama's Labor Secretary pick 15 months ago, and he's emerging as top contender for Attorney General as well. Is it any wonder that he gave a major speech at the National Press Club this week to share his vision of America? Entitled, "Calling for an Economy That Works for Everyone", Perez discusses the concept of "shared prosperity".
- Sunday, October 26, 2014

Michelle Nunn Doesn't Understand Basic Economics

Michelle Nunn Doesn't Understand Basic Economics
Michelle Nunn has been getting a lot of traction on the "shipping jobs overseas" rhetoric in an effort to paint her opponent, David Purdue, as unsympathetic to American workers. It's a tactic toward anyone who is in business to demagogue them for shipping jobs overseas, just like they did to Romney in 2012.
- Friday, October 24, 2014



Feds Celebrate $3 Trillion Tax Haul; Wallets Weep

Feds Celebrate $3 Trillion Tax Haul; Wallets Weep
This Washington Times piece did an nice overview of FY2014: The Treasury Department unveiled its Fiscal Year 2014 numbers, which showed that the government's revenue, for the first time ever, hit the $3 trillion mark. However, the government still overspent its revenues, leaving a $483 billion deficit.
- Friday, October 17, 2014

Anti-business Policies and the Liberty of Risk

Ben Casselman penned a piece a year agoin the Wall Street Journal, which documented the decline of risk-taking in business ventures. Hard data showed that both the number of new companies and the use of venture capital is waning. He rightfully suggested that this downward trend is a major contributor to the fact that the recovery from the recent recession is so painfully slow and anemic.
- Sunday, October 5, 2014


The Internet Tax is an "Unfair" Revenue Grabber

The Internet Tax is an Unfair Revenue Grabber
Discussion began heating up again about the "internet tax" last week when lawmakers pushed back the moratorium on Internet access taxes -- set to expire on Nov. 1 -- until mid-December during the lame-duck session. In the meantime, let's call it out for what it really is: a revenue grabber masquerading as "fairness".
- Monday, September 29, 2014

Chuck Todd is Officially Irrelevant

Chuck Todd is Officially Irrelevant
Whatever shred of actual relevancy Chuck Todd hoped to achieve as the new moderator of "Meet the Press" just collapsed yesterday during his MSNBC interview regarding the resignation of Attorney General Eric Holder. Chuck Todd eulogizes Eric Holder as "a non-political person":
- Saturday, September 27, 2014


More Abject Failure from Koskinen's IRS

More Abject Failure from Koskinen's IRS
John Koskinen has failed the IRS and the American people. IRS Commissioner John Koskinen testified last week about the missing emails lost forever due to computer failures. When questioned about any more crashes or computer issues recently, Koskinen told the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee that “Hard drive crashes continue as we speak.”
- Monday, September 22, 2014


Bernie Sanders Wants Rich People To Die

Bernie Sanders Wants Rich People To Die
At least you can say Bernie Sanders is ideologically consistent. The self-proclaimed socialist unabashedly declared on Saturday that “we need a tax system which asks the billionaire class to pay its fair share of taxes and which reduces the obscene degree of wealth inequality in America.” It was particularly fitting that the speech was at an AFL-CIO convention.
- Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Sponsored