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Judi Lynn

(160,076 posts)
Fri Mar 23, 2018, 07:48 PM Mar 2018

Puerto Rico rejects pension cuts sought by federal board

Source: Associated Press

The Associated Press
Danica Coto
March 23, 2018
6:15 PM EDT

Last Updated
March 23, 2018
6:44 PM EDT

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Puerto Rico government officials said Friday they will not bow to demands from a federal control board overseeing the island’s finances that they implement cuts to a struggling public pension system as part of an upcoming fiscal plan to help pull the U.S. territory out of an economic crisis.

Gov. Ricardo Rossello told reporters the biggest disagreement between his administration and the board is over a proposed average 10 percent cut to pensions of more than $1,000 a month paid by a system facing nearly $50 billion in liabilities.

Christian Sobrino, the governor’s representative to the board, defended the government’s revised fiscal plan and said it would generate a $5.5 billion surplus in upcoming years and help reverse the economic slump while avoiding the elimination of vacation or sick days and reductions in maternity leave, among other things he said the board has proposed.

“We’re not talking about business as usual here in Puerto Rico,” Sobrino said. “The fiscal plan recognizes the island’s fiscal and demographic spiral. If we don’t stop it, the game is over. Puerto Rico will be a footnote in the history of the Caribbean.”

Read more: http://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/puerto-rico-rejects-pension-cuts-sought-by-federal-board

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Puerto Rico rejects pension cuts sought by federal board (Original Post) Judi Lynn Mar 2018 OP
Just one more infuriating capitalist effort to strip yet another pound of flesh PatrickforO Mar 2018 #1
Puerto Ricans and Ultrarich Puertopians Are Locked in a Pitched Struggle Over How to Remake the Submariner Mar 2018 #2
This is the stunt that former Rep. Randy Neguebauer's son, Toby, did. TexasTowelie Mar 2018 #3

PatrickforO

(14,479 posts)
1. Just one more infuriating capitalist effort to strip yet another pound of flesh
Fri Mar 23, 2018, 08:13 PM
Mar 2018

from honest workers. Those people have worked hard for their pensions. They were promised that money would be there for them when they could no longer work and now the capitalist parasites of Wall Street and their Republican shills are trying to rip them off.

As Ross Perot would say, "You can hear the giant sucking sound..." as capitalist greed strips ordinary people of all the benefits it can. Anytime a working stiff seems to be happy and have some reasonable economic security, you can COUNT on a capitalist Wall Street weasel to come along and try to nickel and dime that security to death.

Because hey, profits are always more important than our puny lives, eh?

Submariner

(12,477 posts)
2. Puerto Ricans and Ultrarich Puertopians Are Locked in a Pitched Struggle Over How to Remake the
Fri Mar 23, 2018, 08:14 PM
Mar 2018

Island.

The hedge fund managers are going to fuck this island over bigtime.

https://theintercept.com/2018/03/20/puerto-rico-hurricane-maria-recovery/

Invasion of the Puertopians

Earlier this month, in San Juan’s ornate Condado Vanderbilt Hotel, the dream of Puerto Rico as a for-profit utopia was on full display. From March 14 to 16, the hotel played host to Puerto Crypto, a three-day “immersive” pitch for blockchain and cryptocurrencies with a special focus on why Puerto Rico will “be the epicenter of this multitrillion-dollar market.”

Among the speakers was Yaron Brook, chair of the Ayn Rand Institute, who presented on “How Deregulation and Blockchain Can Make Puerto Rico the Hong Kong of the Caribbean.” Last year, Brook announced that he had personally relocated from California to Puerto Rico, where he claims he went from paying 55 percent of his income in taxes to less than 4 percent.

Elsewhere on the island, hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans were still living by flashlight, many were still dependent on FEMA for food aid, and the island’s main mental health hotline was still overwhelmed with callers. But inside the sold-out Vanderbilt conference, there was little space for that kind of downer news. Instead, the 800 attendees — fresh from a choice between “sunrise yoga and meditation” and “morning surf” — heard from top officials like Department of Economic Development and Commerce Secretary Manuel Laboy Rivera about all the things Puerto Rico is doing to turn itself into the ultimate playground for newly minted cryptocurrency millionaires and billionaires.

It’s a pitch the Puerto Rican government has been making to the private jet set for a few years now, though until recently it was geared mainly to the financial sector, Silicon Valley, and others capable of working wherever they can access data. The pitch goes like this: You don’t have to relinquish your U.S. citizenship or even technically leave the United States to escape its tax laws, regulations, or the cold Wall Street winters. You just have to move your company’s address to Puerto Rico and enjoy a stunningly low 4 percent corporate tax rate — a fraction of what corporations pay even after Donald Trump’s recent tax cut. Any dividends paid by a Puerto Rico-based company to Puerto Rican residents are also tax-free, thanks to a law passed in 2012 called Act 20.

Conference attendees also learned that if they move their own residency to Puerto Rico, they will not only be able to surf every single morning, but also win vast personal tax advantages. Thanks to a clause in the federal tax code, U.S. citizens who move to Puerto Rico can avoid paying federal income tax on any income earned in Puerto Rico. And thanks to another local law, Act 22, they can also cash in on a slew of tax breaks and total tax waivers that includes paying zero capital gains tax and zero tax on interest and dividends sourced to Puerto Rico. And much more — all part of a desperate bid to attract capital to an island that is functionally bankrupt.

To quote billionaire hedge fund magnate John Paulson, owner of the hotel in which Puerto Crypto took place, “You can essentially minimize your taxes in a way that you can’t do anywhere else in the world.” (Or, as the tax dodger’s website Premier Offshore put it: “All the other tax havens might as well just close down. … Puerto Rico just hit it out of the park … did the best set ever and dropped the mic.”)

With just a 3 1/2-hour commute from New York City to San Juan (or less, depending on the private jet), all it takes to get in on this scheme is agreeing to spend 183 days of the year in Puerto Rico — in other words, winter. Puerto Rican residents, it’s worth noting, are not only excluded from these programs, but they also pay very high local taxes.


Manuel Laboy used the conference to announce the creation of a new advisory council to attract blockchain businesses to the island. And he extolled the lifestyle bonuses that awaited attendees if they followed the self-described “Puertopians” who have already taken the plunge. As Laboy told The Intercept, for the 500 to 1,000 high-net-worth individuals who relocated since the tax holidays were introduced five years ago — many of them opting for gated communities with their own private schools — it’s all about “living in a tropical island, with great people, with great weather, with great piña coladas.” And why not? “You’re gonna be, like, in this endless vacation in a tropical place, where you’re actually working. That combination, I think, is very powerful.”

The official slogan of this new Puerto Rico? “Paradise Performs.” To underscore the point, conference attendees were invited to a “Cryptocurrency Honey Party,” with pollen-themed drinks and snacks, and a chance to hang out with Ingrid Suarez, Miss Teen Panama 2013 and upcoming contestant on “Caribbean’s Next Top Model.”

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