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Snake-Oil Economics
The Bad Math Behind Trump's Policies
By N. Gregory Mankiw
Trumponomics: Inside the America First Plan to Revive Our Economy
By Stephen Moore and Arthur B. Laffer
All Points Books, 2018, 304 pp.
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When economists write, they can decide among three possible voices to convey their message. The choice is crucial, because it affects how readers receive their work.
The first voice might be called the textbook authority. Here, economists act as ambassadors for their profession. They faithfully present the wide range of views professional economists hold, acknowledging the pros and cons of each. These authors do their best to hide their personal biases and admit that there is still plenty that economists do not know. According to this perspective, reasonable people can disagree; it is the author's job to explain the basis for that disagreement and help readers make an informed judgment.
The second voice is that of the nuanced advocate. In this case, economists advance a point of view while recognizing the diversity of thought among reasonable people. They use state-of-the-art theory and evidence to try to persuade the undecided and shake the faith of those who disagree. They take a stand without pretending to be omniscient. They acknowledge that their intellectual opponents have some serious arguments and respond to them calmly and without vitriol.
The third voice is that of the rah-rah partisan. Rah-rah partisans do not build their analysis on the foundation of professional consensus or serious studies from peer-reviewed journals. They deny that people who disagree with them may have some logical points and that there may be weaknesses in their own arguments. In their view, the world is simple, and the opposition is just wrong, wrong, wrong. Rah-rah partisans do not aim to persuade the undecided. They aim to rally the faithful.
Unfortunately, this last voice is the one the economists Stephen Moore and Arthur Laffer chose in writing their new book, Trumponomics. The book's over-the-top enthusiasm for U.S. President Donald Trump's sketchy economic agenda is not likely to convince anyone not already sporting a "Make America Great Again" hat.
ECONOMIC TRIBALISM
Moore and Laffer served as economic advisers to Trump during his campaign and after he was elected president (along with Larry Kudlow, the current director of the National Economic Council, who wrote the book's foreword). From this experience, Moore and Laffer apparently learned the importance of flattering the boss. In the first chapter alone, they tell us that Trump is a "gifted orator" who is always "dressed immaculately." He is "shrewd," "open-minded," "no-nonsense," and "bigger than life." He is a "commonsense conservative" who welcomes "honest and fair-minded policy debates." He is the "Mick Jagger of politics" with a contagious "enthusiasm and can-doism."
The authors' approach to policy is similarly bereft of nuance. In Chapter 3, they sum it up by proudly recounting what Moore told Trump about U.S. President Barack Obama during the campaign: "Donald, just look at all the things that Obama has done on the economy over the past eight years, and then do just the opposite."
It is hard to imagine more simplistic, misguided advice. To be sure, Moore and Laffer can reasonably hold policy positions and political values to the right of those of Obama. (As someone who chaired the White House Council of Economic Advisers during the George W. Bush administration, so do I.) But the Obama administration was filled with prominent economic advisers who were well within the bounds of mainstream economics: Jason Furman, Austan Goolsbee, Alan Krueger, Christina Romer, and Lawrence Summers, to name but a few. It is not tenable to suggest that with all this talent, the administration made only wrong decisions, and that they were wrong simply because those who made them were Democrats.
The tribalism of Moore and Laffer's approach stems primarily from their devotion to a single issue: the level of taxation.
The tribalism of Moore and Laffer's approach stems primarily from their devotion to a single issue: the level of taxation. Obama pursued higher taxes, especially on higher-income households. His goal was to fund a federal government that was larger and more active than many Republicans would prefer and to use the tax system to "spread the wealth around," as he famously told Joe Wurzelbacher, known as Joe the Plumber, a man he encountered at a campaign stop in Ohio in 2008. By contrast, Moore and Laffer want lower taxes, especially on businesses, which in their view would promote faster economic growth.
The debate over taxes reflects a classic, ongoing disagreement between the left and the right. In 1975, Arthur Okun, a Brookings economist and former adviser to President Lyndon Johnson, wrote a short book called Equality and Efficiency: The Big Tradeoff. Okun argued that by using taxes and transfers of wealth to equalize economic outcomes, the government distorts incentives—or that, to put it metaphorically, the harder the government tries to ensure that the economic pie is cut into slices of a similar size, the smaller the pie becomes. Based on this argument, the main priority of the Democratic Party is to equalize the slices, whereas the main priority of the Republican Party is to grow the pie.
U.S. President Barack Obama and Larry Summers, chair of the White House National Economic Council, in Washington, D.C., June 2009
Yet Moore and Laffer aren't willing to admit that making policy requires confronting such difficult tradeoffs. Laffer is famous for his eponymous curve, which shows that tax rates can reach levels high enough that cutting them would yield enough growth to actually increase tax revenue. In that scenario, the tradeoff between equality and efficiency vanishes. The government can cut taxes, increase growth, and use the greater tax revenue to help the less fortunate. Everyone is better off.
The Laffer curve is undeniable as a matter of economic theory. There is certainly some level of taxation at which cutting tax rates would be win-win. But few economists believe that tax rates in the United States have reached such heights in recent years; to the contrary, they are likely below the revenue-maximizing level. In practice, the big tradeoff between equality and efficiency just won't go away.
LESSONS FROM ECON 101
Trumponomics is full of exhortations about the importance of economic growth. Why, Moore and Laffer ask, should Americans settle for the two percent growth that many economists have been projecting? Wouldn't every problem be easier to solve with a more rapidly expanding economy? The book quotes Trump as claiming, when announcing his tax plan in December 2017, that it would not increase the budget deficit because it would raise growth rates to "three, or four, five, or even six percent."
The authors offer no credible evidence that the tax changes passed will lead to such high growth. Most studies yield far more modest projections. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the Trump tax cuts will increase growth rates by 0.2 percentage points per year over the first five years. A study by Robert Barro (a conservative economist at Harvard) and Furman (a liberal economist at Harvard) published in 2018 estimates that the tax bill will increase annual growth by 0.13 percentage points over a decade. And that is if the changes are made permanent. Barro and Furman estimate that as the legislation is written, with many of the provisions set to expire in 2025, it will increase annual growth by a mere 0.04 percentage points over ten years.
It is conceivable that standard economic models underestimate the impact of tax cuts on growth. A research paper by the economists Christina Romer and David Romer published in 2010 examined historical tax changes and found that they had larger effects on economic activity than standard models suggest. (It is worth noting that these two authors' political leanings are left of center, so their findings are not the result of ideological taint.) One might reasonably argue that Trump's tax cuts will increase growth over the next decade by as much as half a percentage point per year. But that is a long way from the one- to four-percentage-point boost that the president and his associates have bragged of, and that Moore and Laffer quote without explanation, caveat, or apology.
For a politician seeking election, opposing free trade is a lot easier than supporting it.
The authors of Trumponomics do depart from the president on one piece of his agenda: his approach to international trade. Moore and Laffer are ardent free traders; as such, their views are well within the mainstream of modern economics. Ever since Adam Smith took on the mercantilists in The Wealth of Nations in 1776, most economists have come to believe that international trade is win-win. They reject the idea that a trade imbalance between two nations means that one of them must be the loser, and they applaud agreements, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and international organizations, such as the World Trade Organization, that reduce trade barriers around the world.
Moore and Laffer recognized early in the campaign that Trump rejects this consensus. To their credit, they do not back down from their views in Trumponomics. They acknowledge that the president is playing a "high-stakes game of poker" and that "if it doesn't work, the ramifications scare us to death." But they also give Trump the benefit of the doubt by expressing the hope that his belligerent approach toward U.S. trading partners will somehow lead to better deals and freer trade.
Hostility to globalization did not, of course, begin with Trump. It may be hard to remember now, but when Obama was a senator, he opposed many free-trade initiatives advanced by the administration of then U.S. President George W. Bush, such as the Dominican Republic–Central America Free Trade Agreement. When Obama ran for president in 2008, he spoke about the need to renegotiate NAFTA, although he quickly put that goal aside after moving into the White House. Similarly, during the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont made hostility to free trade a central tenet of his platform. So popular did that position prove among Democrats that he managed to pressure the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton into opposing the Trans-Pacific Partnership—the very trade deal she had backed as secretary of state during the Obama administration. The bottom line is that for a politician seeking election, opposing free trade is a lot easier than supporting it. Many voters are more likely to view foreign nations as threats to U.S. prosperity than as potential partners for mutually advantageous trade. Economists have a long way to go to persuade the body politic of some basic lessons from Econ 101.
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agriculture specialist checks imported broccoli from Mexico in Pharr, Texas, October 2018
Adrees Latif / REUTERS
To be fair to Trump and other anti-globalization zealots, amid all their mis-information and bluster is a kernel of truth. The United States produces a lot of intellectual property, including movies, software, and pharmaceuticals. The failure of countries, especially China, to enforce the copyrights and patents that protect intellectual property constitutes a loss to the United States similar to outright theft. The Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property puts the loss at up to $600 billion per year. If Trump were able to negotiate trade deals that solved this problem, the accomplishment would be significant. But in light of how much other nations benefit from not protecting U.S. intellectual property, a negotiated solution won't come easy.
GIVING THE PRESIDENT A PASS
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of Trumponomics is the long list of crucial issues on which the authors are largely silent. They offer no cogent plans to deal with global climate change, the long-term fiscal imbalance from growing entitlement spending, or the increase in economic inequality that has occurred over the past half century. Many reasonable Republicans would support a tax on carbon emissions, for example. Such a policy would slow climate change by incentivizing the movement toward cleaner energy, as well as provide revenue that could be used to close the fiscal gap or to help those struggling at the bottom of the economic ladder.
Rather than suggesting coherent policies, Moore and Laffer seem to hope that a much more rapidly growing economy will provide the resources to address all these problems, and they seem to believe that this growth will follow ineluctably from the lower taxes and deregulation that lie at the heart of Trump's agenda. It would be wonderful if that were possible. Maybe rah-rah partisans really believe it is. But more likely, it is just wishful thinking. Trump appears eager to avoid most of the economic problems facing the nation. By banking on so much growth from cutting taxes, Moore and Laffer are, in effect, giving him a pass and kicking the can down the road to a future leader more interested in confronting hard policy choices.
N. GREGORY MANKIW is Robert M. Beren Professor of Economics at Harvard University. From 2003 to 2005, he was Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under U.S. President George W. Bush.
More By N. Gregory Mankiw
Economics Trade Disinformation
Nations without Borders: The Gifts of Folk Gone Abroad
Myron Weiner
Rice Bowls and Dust Bowls: Africa, Not China, Faces a Food Crisis
Robert L. Paarlberg


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THE OLYMPIC & SPORT MUSEUM JOAN ANTONI SAMARANCH
The Olympic & Sport Museum Joan Antoni Samaranch is managed by the Barcelona Olympic Foundation and is located at the heart of the Parc de Montjuïc, a few minutes from Plaça d'Espanya.
SALA ÀMBIT CULTURAL – EL CORTE INGLÉS
The Corte Inglés is one of the Festival's leading patrons for the eight-year running and will be screening a series of especially selected competing films at their Auditorium, Sala Àmbit Cultural on the sixth floor of their store in Portal de l'Àngel.
BIBLIOTECA DE PONENT (SABADELL)
The Biblioteca de Ponent was opened on 27th February 2011 to serve the 4th District of Sabadell. One of the outstanding features of the building is its energy efficiency which has been achieved by the use of geothermal energy and solar panels (…)
BIBLIOTECA DISTRICTE 5 (TERRASSA)
The Biblioteca Districte 5 was opened on 4th July 1972 at 29, Carrer de la Salut. Subsequently, the library was relocated to the Xalet in the Olympic Zone where is was reopened on 29th October 1993 after the building hosted the press during the 1992 (…)
CENTRE CÍVIC ATENEU FORT PIENC
The Centre Cívic Ateneu Fort Pienc is a municipal district establishment that offers the neighbourhood a wide range of services and cultural activities for all: infants, kids, adults and senior citizens.
CENTRE CÍVIC SANT MARTÍ – AUDITORI DE SANT MARTÍ
The Auditori de Sant Martí de Provençals is a cultural facility which forms part of the Centre Cívic Sant Martí, and was re-inaugurated on 11th September 2014 after extensive refurbishment. The establishment is charged with the goal of strengthening and revitalising (…)
CENTRE CULTURAL LA CASA ELIZALDE
This cultural centre is part of the City of Barcelona's cultural infrastructure – Eixample District – and offers a wide variety of activities to enrich and satisfy the cultural and creative aspirations of its citizens.
CINEMAS CAN CASTELLET (SANT BOI DE LLOBREGAT)
The Cinemas Can Castellet were built by the municipal authorities of Sant Boi de Llobregat who, when faced with the lack of a private initiative, decided finance a public project for the construction of the cinemas.
CINEMES GIRONA
A 25-year old disused cinema in Carrer de Girona, right next door to the District of Gràcia, were refurbished and reopened in 2010 as Cinemes Girona. The three reformed theatres, with a capacity for 600, aspire to offer a programme of quality cinema (…)
MAP OF THE VENUES
THE BCN SPORTS FILM 2017 WILL ALSO BE SCREENED IN SEVERAL PRISONS IN CATALUNYA
Some sessions will be held in several prisons around Catalunya in an effort to widen our audience to cover as varied a public as possible.
Their mission is to promote sport as a universal language and an instrument for social integration. Using State-of-the-Art equipment, the Museum provides a global vision –historical, ethical, cultural, recreational and educational– of sport, in all its disciplines and forms and divulges the values of sport in an amusing and easily assimilable manner.
ADDRESS: Avinguda de l'Estadi, 60 · 08038 Barcelona
TELEPHONE: (+34) 93 292 53 79
WEB: www.museuolimpicbcn.cat
E-MAIL: info@fbolimpica.es
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Espanya (L1, L3). - Bus: 150, 55. - Tourist Bus: red route (bus stop: Anella Olímpica). - Bus Montjuïc turístic: (bus stop: 5). - Funicular de Montjuïc. - Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat: S33, S8, R6, S4, R5, L8 (station: Espanya).
The Sala Àmbit Cultural is an Auditorium of reference in Barcelona where many cultural events are held.
ADDRESS: Av. Portal de l'Àngel, 19-21 – 6a planta · 08002 Barcelona
WEB: http://ambitocultural.es
E-MAIL: ambitculturalbcn@elcorteingles.es
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Catalunya (L1, L3) & Passeig de Gràcia (L2, L4). - Bus: 14, 22, 24, 41, 42, 47, 50, 55, 58, 59, 62, 66, 67, 68, H12 & H16. - Bicing: Pl. Carles Pi i Sunyer, Duran & Bas & Pl. de Catalunya. - Tourist Bus: red and blue routes (bus stop: Plaça de Catalunya). - Renfe Rodalies: R1, R3, R4 & R7 (Station: Catalunya). - Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat:S1, S5, S55, S2, L6 & L7 (Station: Catalunya).
The Biblioteca de Ponent was opened on 27th February 2011 to serve the 4th District of Sabadell. One of the outstanding features of the building is its energy efficiency which has been achieved by the use of geothermal energy and solar panels. This led to it being awarded the Catalonia Social Building Award of 2012.
The library is to be found in a district with a large number of sports clubs and a tradition for sport dating back a long time in history. One of these is the Sabadell Sports Council which works in education. These factors have contributed to the library's diligence in building up an extraordinary collection of more than 1000 sports related documents including DVDs, magazines and books.
ADDRESS: Plaça d'Ovidi Montllor, 5 · 08206 Sabadell
WEB: sabadell.cat/ca/biblioteques/biblioteca-de-ponent
E-MAIL: bibliodeponent@ajsabadell.cat
HOW TO GET THERE: - Bus (Sabadell): 4, 5, 14 & 55. - Renfe: R4 (station: Sabadell Nord).
The Biblioteca Districte 5 was opened on 4th July 1972 at 29, Carrer de la Salut. Subsequently, the library was relocated to the Xalet in the Olympic Zone where is was reopened on 29th October 1993 after the building hosted the press during the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games.
It is to be found right alongside the Club Natació Terrassa a historic Sports Association in Terrassa.
ADDRESS: Carrer dels Jocs Olímpics, 7 · 08225 Terrassa
WEB: terrassa.cat/bd5
E-MAIL: bd5@terrassa.cat
HOW TO GET THERE: - Bus (Terrassa): 7. - Renfe: R4 (station: Terrassa). - Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat: S1 (station: Terrassa Estació del Nord & Terrassa Nacions Unides).
Events organised there include: cultural courses and workshops, classical concerts, film sessions, exhibitions of contemporary art and activities for infants and young people.
ADDRESS: Plaça Fort Pienc, 4-5 · 08013 Barcelona
WEB: fortpienc.org
E-MAIL: fortpienc@fortpienc.org
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Arc de Triomf (L1) & Marina (L1). - Bus: V21, 6, H12, 7, 54, 62, 19, 51, 55 & 39.
The Auditori de Sant Martí de Provençals is a cultural facility which forms part of the Centre Cívic Sant Martí, and was re-inaugurated on 11th September 2014 after extensive refurbishment. The establishment is charged with the goal of strengthening and revitalising cultural activities in the district of Sant Martí in Barcelona.
It is to be found tucked in between two secondary schools, Joan d'Àustria and Infanta Isabel. This privileged location and the fact that it is the only institution of this nature in the district makes it a key element in the cultural dynamics in the neighbourhood and the attraction of new audiences.
The Auditorium programmes regular musical, art and cinema events for the general public, but with especial emphasis on productions for young people and families.
ADDRESS: Plaça Angeleta Ferrer, 2 · 08020 Barcelona
WEB: ccivics.bcn.cat/auditorisantmarti
E-MAIL: auditorisantmarti@bcn.cat
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Bac de Roda (L2). - Bus: 33, B24, H10 & N8. - Bicing: Rambla Guipúscoa.
Their guiding mission to to make culture available to all by offering the ways and means to interpret the world around us and to enjoy contemporary artistic activities.
At La Casa Elizalde one can find stable programmes of music, scenic arts, exhibitions and documentary films to encourage the advancement of knowledge and the creative use of leisure.
ADDRESS: Carrer de València, 302 · 08009 Barcelona
WEB: casaelizalde.com
E-MAIL: casaelizalde@casaelizalde.com
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Passeig de Gràcia (L3, L2, L4) & Diagonal (L3, L5). - Bus: 7, 16, 17, 20, 22, 24, 39, 45, 47, B-24, H10 & V17. - Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat: L6, L6, S1, S2, S5 & S55 (station: Provença). - Bicing: Bruc, 102 (Bruc/Aragó).
The citizens of Sant Boi, who had been demanding facilities of this nature for many years, have seen this scheme fulfil their expectations.
The Cinemas Can Castellet have a total capacity of 559 spectators and each of the 5 theatres is equipped with the latest in audiovisuals technology.
ADDRESS: Carrer de Jaume I, 32 · 08330 Sant Boi de Llobregat
WEB: cinemessantboi.com
E-MAIL: info@cinemessantboi.com
HOW TO GET THERE: - Bus: L70, L72 & L79. - Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat: S8, S33, S4, R6 (Station: Sant Boi de Llobregat).
A 25-year old disused cinema in Carrer de Girona, right next door to the District of Gràcia, were refurbished and reopened in 2010 as Cinemes Girona.
The three reformed theatres, with a capacity for 600, aspire to offer a programme of quality cinema not easily found elsewhere.
Cinemes Girona forms part of the Europa Cinemas Network which was created in 1992 within the framework of MEDIA and with the goal of offering a select programme of, mainly, European films to a wider audience.
Cinemes Girona have their sights set on becoming a multicultural venue of reference by offering a selection of European and international films together with cinema in Catalan, festivals and private viewing and last, but not by any means least, programmes for younger viewers.
ADDRESS: Carrer de Girona, 175 · 08037 Barcelona
WEB: cinemesgirona.cat
E-MAIL: info@cinemesgirona.cat
HOW TO GET THERE: - Underground: Verdaguer (L4, L5) & Diagonal (L3). - Bus: 6, 33, 43, 47, 15, 34, 44, 55, 20, 39 & 45.
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What Price Hollywood?
Like the 1932 George Cukor classic – a behind the scenes look at life in Tinseltown.
Robert Osborne (1932-2017)
For those of us who eat, sleep, and breathe anything Turner Classic Movies, yesterday was an especially sad day. TCM host Robert Osborne passed away at the age of 84.
I've been reading many of the obituaries and tributes that have been published in the past 24 hours or so (including an especially nice piece in the Los Angeles Times that includes quotes from his long-time partner, David Staller) – and there is definitely a through line. He seemed to have been just what we saw on the air – a kind, friendly, sophisticated, urbane gentleman with a passion for classic film.
I was lucky enough to have met Robert Osborne once years ago, and I have to say that my experience mirrors what I've been reading in his tributes. He could not have been more kind and generous with his time. He seemed to truly enjoy talking with us – and I truly loved the conversation we had. It was at a special event held at The Grove in Los Angeles. TCM was trying out a retail store, and they opened a large splashy space for the holidays in 2004. (It really was a great store – I guess the concept didn't work out as well as they had expected, but I thought it was fantastic!) One of the events they held was a meet and greet with Robert Osborne and Jane Russell. They were selling copies of a book that TCM had just published, and had other memorabilia there as well. My husband, Nick, and I bought a copy and a reproduction of the movie poster for "The Outlaw". To our surprise, there were a lot of people standing around on the perimeter, but not that many waiting to actually meet them (maybe it was because it was basically a book signing, and not that many people wanted to shell out for the book?). But we were thrilled to be able to have them both sign the book (and Jane signed our poster as well), and because it wasn't very busy, we chatted for a bit with them. Robert asked us a couple of questions about who we were, and what brought us there. And I tried to explain to Jane that I had just finished a film about a famous photographer who had taken some fantastic (and very famous) photographs of her back in the late 40's – she didn't really seem to remember, but Robert knew what I was talking about and jumped in to bail me out of the conversation. We chatted for a little bit – and I remember thinking how truly nice he was. He was just a regular guy – that friend you enjoyed talking to about your mutual obsession for the movies. And he seemed almost as interested to meet us and talk with us, as we were with him. It was definitely a memorable experience.
I have been lucky to have attended many screenings over the subsequent years at the TCM Film Festival in Hollywood that Robert Osborne hosted. I especially loved the interviews – Eva Marie Saint and Martin Landau for "North By Northwest"; Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner for "Imitation Of Life" – including an extraordinarily awkward moment with Lana Turner's daughter that Robert handled with ease and grace; and my favorite… his hilarious interview with Maureen O'Hara at the last festival he attended in 2014 (if you haven't seen it, check it out on YouTube!). And as fortunate as I feel for having had the opportunity to attend these events and more, none will ever top the first time when I felt that I got the chance to converse, even for just a few minutes, with one of my idols.
TCM will never quite be the same. He will be missed.
Posted in: Uncategorized | Tagged: classic film, classic hollywood, movies, obituary, tcm
'Tis A Sad Day – Maureen O'Hara Dies At 95
One thought on "Robert Osborne (1932-2017)"
Marguerite Guineheux says:
Jane Russell had very interesting handwriting! So neat and arty.
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About MJS
Michael J. Sonntag
Michael J. Sonntag is a stage & screen producer, casting director, and acting coach living and working in Los Angeles, CA. In addition to owning and co-founding Studio C Artists, Michael is the President & CEO of the non-profit, One World Stage & Screen. He lives with his family in the thriving West Adams neighborhood, and enjoys his volunteer work as a community organizer.
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Letter of Recommendation: Turner Classic Movies – NYTimes.com


Ancient folklore features in my latest posts for the website A Dorset Year.
For the first one, in which we ponder the fate of the 2,000 year old yew tree in Lush Places, I'm joined by my new neighbour, the lovely Natamagat, who is helping me with photographs. You can tell which ones are hers. They're much better than mine, but then she is a photographer.
In the second post, I'm surrounded by rooks and a solitary raven. Nevermore.


Carpet and Seat Wipes provide an easy way to clean all your car fabric upholstery, carpets and mats. Can be used for removing tough stains. These extra-strength wipes are specially formulated to clean dirt and grime safely and effectively while protecting against spills and stains. They are quick and easy to use and contain no harmful alcohol. Supplied in a handy tub, with 24 wipes per pack.


I recently used LiteDB to save data for my current prototype, "Bypass" , and, although I eventually removed it from the prototype, I expect that the skills and knowledge I have gained will be useful the next time I use LiteDB. As a complete beginner with LiteDB (and generally inexperienced with NoSql), I had quite a bit to learn (often through my own mistakes) and I thought I should document some of it here, in case it is useful for anyone else.
Note: this sample is simpler than what I actually wrote at the time - for example, I didn't realize that GetCollection<T> automatically uses nameof(typeof(T)) for the name - so I kept writing it by hand until I eventually found that out.
The third lesson I learned with DBLite was that I would paint myself into a corner if I kept thinking relationally. This is best illustrated with an example (specifically what I experienced that taught me this lesson): Since each room is filled with RoomItems, I added a List<RoomItem> to the RoomData object. This immediately worked and gave me the expected results, but, since I still thought about problems relationally, I assumed that I would need an Id on each RoomItem so that I could individually update the records. That led me to creating a separate collection and using DBRef to connect the two collections together. The result, unfortunately, was broken code and workarounds. Using DBRef caused the code to require that I specifically include the relevant properties from the RoomItem. Any property that was not included would be left at the default value (so at first I was working with a list of empty RoomItem objects.) IncludeAll() proved to be inadequate, as it only populated the Id for each record. After coding numerous workarounds (including manually querying for all the RoomItems and merging them into the existing collection) I finally realized that I didn't need to update RoomItems by Id at all: I can (and should) persist a reference to the RoomItem on the GameObject it applies to (so that I can make changes to its properties), and then bulk update all the items in the room by performing an update using the original RoomData object (which should reflect any modifications made using object references).
Applying this pattern (GameObjects containing object references to parts of the object I will later save) will require a bit more discipline and caution than I ordinarily use. My typical pattern treats objects as externally immutable (for example, a GameObject would create and maintain its own copy of the data, rather than modifying a reference it received from somewhere else), since that allows me to reap many of the simplicity benefits of associated with functional programming. As a result, I don't usually consider whether modifying data at any given moment will have consequences beyond the GameObject I am currently working on. Considering all of this, I expect that, at some point in the future, I will find myself debugging some kind of race condition, on account of this change to retain and reuse object reference.
As an added bonus, using a unit test means that I now have an automated test, so even if I refactor the code I know this query will continue to behave correctly. While I generally don't write unit tests for my prototypes, I expect developing this habit will be useful once I am using LiteDB in a larger project.


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Trade Buzz: In its third week, the dominance of URI continued as the movie managed to collect just over 36 crores which is a phenomenal feat. The movie has made major records in Mumbai and Delhi-UP centres as well which is once again a great showing. The movie can now push for a 200 crore lifetime total but might just fall short of it eventually.


text:
Social justice is for everyone
Discusses ideas about social justice and power relations from a perspective that is secular and political (but not party-political).
Workplace bullying or worker abuse?
February 17th, 2013 | Published in Bully power, Favorites
Bullying is a busy term, and people use it to describe all sorts of behaviour between all sorts of people in all sorts of situations. It is spread very thin, but at the same time does not convey enough about the operation of power, obscuring direction in hierarchical structures, and blurring distinctions between formal and informal sources. In other words, it needs to be contextualised.
These are not trivial shortcomings, and in this post I am going to look at some of the fuzziness of the concept, and some of the consequences of that fuzziness, and suggest an alternative way of describing part of what goes down in workplaces, particularly the part involving abuse of hierarchical power.
Bullying at City Council
One recent situation that stretched the meaning of bullying beyond credibility for me involved allegations and counter-allegations between public figures at a City Council: the Mayor accused a Councillor of bullying the CEO; the Councillor accused the Mayor of bullying her. I was curious enough to try to find out more. I didn't find much except that the Mayor and Councillor appear almost on a par at the peak of the organisational pyramid, and the CEO is slightly below both.
This situation does not fit my images of bullying, although these three are undoubtedly out to discredit each other (two of them were on competing teams for Council elections). Self-interest, sabotage, ruthlessness, and treachery might be more to the point.
Good luck to whoever has to adjudicate, I thought, and who would that be anyway? Who is in a position to discipline three such people at the top of an organisation? And, while they are busy deflecting attention from themselves by accusing each other of bullying, you might wonder how they are treating those below them in the hierarchy. Some of the toxicity would surely be spilling downwards. Is that also to be called bullying? Whatever; the chances seem slim of it being dealt with effectively, at least by appeal up the line – which is where workers are usually expected to take their grievances. Rough justice if that is the source of the problem.
Workplace bullying elsewhere
While pursuing the Council story, I came across other stories about workplace bullying, including reference to a report that 95% of school staff experience bullying, as well as more than seventy percent of health professionals, large proportions of public servants, police, and the armed forces. Goodness, I wondered, who can possibly be doing all this bullying? Following the trail a little further, it appears that a high proportion is seen to occur between colleagues, as well as being perpetrated by students towards teachers, or staff towards more senior staff.
No doubt colleagues can behave badly towards each other, and students and workers can obstruct authority, but to call all such behaviour bullying, alongside what is happening at City Council, is stretching the meaning towards meaninglessness. These examples are all over the place in terms of hierarchical power; upwards, downwards, sideways – no matter, it is all generically labelled as bullying.
Definitions of bullying are often couched in terms of relationships, or as repeated, unacceptable, deliberate behaviours that may cause harm. If they mention power, it is of the form of social influence rather than the structural variety embedded in workplace hierarchies. In other words, the concept does not differentiate between the CEO's treatment of the receptionist and the receptionist's treatment of the CEO even though, in the event of dispute between these two, the CEO is much more likely to have access to legal advice, paid for by an organisation that predictably closes ranks around its highly paid executive. The interests of the CEO are more likely to prevail.
Blowing the whistle on those at the top can be a fast route to unemployment, most likely on some pretext other than the whistleblowing. I have, however, come across one story in which a group of industrial laundry workers acted collectively against an abusive manager (who was referred to in court, and in the media, as a bully). The end result has hopefully been good for the workers, although a lot of damage might have been avoided if the manager had been held to account much earlier.
Worker abuse is directional
Describing a situation as workplace bullying does suggest something is not quite right in a workplace but, as previous examples illustrate, it is vague – too vague when the problem is abusive management. In such cases, it would be clearer to use a different term, one embodying the concept of abuse of hierarchical power.
One such alternative is worker abuse. This concept has appropriate directionality – downwards in hierarchical structures, not upwards or sideways – and shares that directionality with concepts like racism, sexism, and ableism. I know white people sometimes believe they have experienced racism, and men sometimes feel they are at the receiving end of sexism, and the boss may feel abused by a subordinate (although I have never heard any ablebodied person claim to have experienced ableism, which is interesting in itself) but I would argue that these terms (racism, sexism, ableism, and worker abuse) need to be put into social context and understood in relation to divisions of structural power. At the broader social level, white people, men, the ablebodied, and bosses (as classes or groups) occupy positions of relative privilege compared with nonwhite people, women, those with disabilities, and workers.
I will come back to this knotty issue of who can be at the receiving end of what in a subsequent post, but for now my shorthand position can be expressed by example: a CEO is in a position to abuse the power held over a worker, but the reverse does not hold; the CEO cannot claim to be a victim of worker abuse by someone lower on the organisational chart.
The issue of directionality is central to my rationale for introducing worker abuse as a formal concept. Compared with bullying, it is precise in its implication of directionality, thus making the operation of hierarchical power more visible, and ultimately, I hope, more accountable. If the situation at the laundry had been identified in its early stages as worker abuse, the manager may have been dealt with in a timelier manner.
Making hierarchical power visible and accountable
The greater the hierarchical power a role entails, the more potential there is for abuse, but the less accountability there may be in behavioural, ethical, and moral terms. Plenty of people are happy to tell kids, or workers, what they should and shouldn't do, but fewer are in a position to tell the Mayor, the Bishop, the General, or the CEO to take a good hard look at the way they exercise power. As a general rule those at the top are left to get on with the job of running the show – unless they are caught with their hands in the till.
One-size-fits-all concepts of bullying make it easier for relatively powerful personnel to define situations to suit their vested interests. So, for example, trouble might be pre-empted or deflected by turning the tables and problematising workers instead. A whole raft of terms becomes available for such purposes including finding workers to be uncooperative, unreliable, difficult, insubordinate, unprofessional, unethical and, of course, poor team players and troublemakers. Once the situation has been defined in such terms, it becomes more difficult for workers to get a fair hearing within or beyond the organisation. I have felt much frustration seeing rank and file workers lose jobs on the basis of tired tactics from the top.
If hierarchical power is part of the context of workplace disputes it also needs to be built in to attempts at resolution. Worker abuse, as a concept, makes the operation and direction of power visible and open to challenge, thus levelling the playing field, or at least making it obvious that it was not level to start with.
Raising awareness of victim-blaming
It still seems remarkably commonplace to blame the victim in workplace situations in ways that would be largely unacceptable if the issue was sexual abuse or domestic violence. Provocation-style narratives are still trotted out in rape cases, but they are, in my experience, more likely to be recognised and confronted than if the abuse is located in a workplace. A rapist who described his victim as leading him on, or wanting it, for example, would not remain unchallenged for long. That is as it should be – and as it also should be in relation to worker abuse. My guess is that the inconsistency reflects relative lack of awareness about abuse of power in workplaces; my argument is that this needs to change. I would like to see zero-tolerance of all forms of victim-blaming, including in workplaces, and broad commitment to developing and refining ways of achieving this goal.
Workplace bullying is not specific enough to convey abuse of power in hierarchical workplaces. Worker abuse is a more useful concept in such situations. It is (downwardly) directional, making power more visible, and hence potentially more accountable. It invites challenge to dominant narratives that blame the victim and prop up the vested interests of those at the top. A first step in creating change would be to raise awareness about abuse of hierarchical power in workplaces, and start referring to it as worker abuse. Worker abuse contextualises a significant component of what is normally referred to as workplace bullying.
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8 comments on "Workplace bullying or worker abuse?"
Joan Beckwith says:
Additional link of interest, sent to me by Abby Shovlin, who contacted me in April 2019 expressing interest in "Swimming with Sharks" that she learnt of through my comment on the article. Hard copy of book posted to her. https://www.theguardian.com/money/us-money-blog/2014/jul/06/bullying-at-work-political-experiences-bullies-solutions
joanbeckwith says:
Thanks, Lorraine, and yes, my main interest in this piece was to start deconstructing the term 'bullying' rather than to replace it in any blanket way. Clearly, not all bad behaviour/bullying in workplaces can be described as worker abuse in the sense I am using that term (with its implication of abuse of structural power), but it is one category that I think warrants particular attention. Also, if you have a link to your thesis, it would be good to have so that people can follow up. I could also include it on the Resources page of the website, which is an area I have not paid nearly enough attention to yet.
Lorraine Harrison says:
Thought provoking term 'worker abuse'. I see the merit in discussing power relationships in the work place and the top down power of managers, representing the employer, over workers as employees. My recent PhD research found more bullying from managers than colleagues. However my thoughts about the term workplace bullying is that it still has a place in an OH&S framework as one cannot start from the premise that all bullying is top down.
Ruth Miller says:
I agree, that it's time to dig further into our workplace culture and question accountability (or lack thereof?); the hierarchical management model (what level-playing field?); victim-blaming (could that be "projection"?) and redefine the parameters, so thank you Joan for your well-formed and well-informed post, tackling this abusive yet commonplace, even socially accepted behaviour.
Dominating characters commonly referred to as bullies, have been around since I can remember, yet in my naivety I thought (and hoped) I'd left them behind in the school ground. But alas, I was wrong, and the longer I have been part of the workforce, the more I realise that the adult version of self-glorification is alive and well, screaming for attention to be taken seriously. So herewith a few lines from my book The Other Side of the Ledger where a one-directional "abuser" lurks in the background.
P28 – "The inevitable buzz and hum of the day rises as the "team" arrives and says their good mornings. It's Virginia's turn today to warn them that their leader is in one of those moods and that it's going to be one of those days. One of those days where everyone feels as though they're walking on eggshells; waiting for inevitable cracks and slippery yolks to coagulate and congeal like an ugly shadow; an ugly shadow that casts doubt in the individual, creates disharmony in the team, and undermines the corporate structure" …
To read another excerpt from my book, visit
http://www.palmerhiggsbooks.com.au/index.php/the-other-side-of-the-ledger.html
Thanks, Ruth. It does actually seem there is a bit more activity and interest in this area than I thought. You are coming from a somewhat different perspective and I've also just been watching a YouTube video of a professor, Richard Wolfe, in the USA talking about what he calls "Democracy at Work" and arguing it's essential as a response to the global financial crisis. All very interesting, and feels like a valuable conversation to be having.
Good stuff Joan and agree that the "power dynamics" that operate in contemporary workplaces need to be defined and deconstructed if we envisage and aspire to working in democratic workplaces. In Australia we all get to vote every 3 years but how many of us can actively participate in the decisions that affect our lives everyday at the workplace? What then is democracy?
I think that's an excellent point, Rui, about voting rights. I have had related thoughts about things like performance appraisals. That is, why is it that it they only go in one direction – down the hierarchy, and not upwards? Staff surely have legitimate things to say about management that could improve the quality and health of workplaces, but nobody seems to take that seriously as an idea. Keep working on it, I guess.
TOKEN ATTEMPT AT BALANCE
The linked article is written from an employer perspective, and I don't think much of any of it, but thought to demonstrate at least token recognition of the concept of 'balance' having recently put my own perspective in this post. Perhaps the one point of agreement is that bullying is a fuzzy concept, which means that it can be coopted by vested interests. The vested interests I am most concerned by, however, are those with the power to hire and fire.
http://www.theage.com.au/small-business/bogus-or-not-bullying-claims-are-costly-20130224-2ezgi.html
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text:
De vilde svaner er en amerikansk stumfilm fra 1917 af J. Searle Dawley.

Medvirkende
 Marguerite Clark
 William E. Danforth
 Augusta Anderson
 Edwin Denison
 Daisy Belmore

Referencer

Eksterne henvisninger

Stumfilm fra USA
Amerikanske film fra 1917

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people commute to different places such as New York to go to work. This small sacrifice isn't anything compared to the peace of mind they have when coming back home to the quietness this town offers. Whether you want to built your own home or move into a brand new home, Sussex county has a place that will cater to your every need.A great deal of people are commuters by train.This would be a great option for those who can't drive or just don't feel like driving. Since most people travel to work this way, it gives the impression that there are very little noisy industrial plants and big commercial real estate properties. Thus giving the residents a full, peaceful and quiet life that is desired by most of us.
Sometimes starting something new can be difficult when making decisions on where to live. Let ocean view become your first stop when deciding on that new home. Maybe then you wont have to roam for too long.


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Guinea holds successful elections after six-year delay
September 29, 2013 Kevin Lees	Leave a comment
Though we don't have any election results yet, Guinea successfully held long-delayed parliamentary elections on Saturday, which in itself marks a milestone in the west African country's democratic development as the first direct parliamentary vote since independence from France in 1958.
Originally scheduled to be held in June 2007, and then allegedly to be held following Guinea's first direct presidential election in 2010, the elections were rescheduled time after time until earlier this summer, when the government of Guinea's president Alpha Condé finally agreed to a UN-brokered deal with supporters of his rival Cellou Dalein Diallo (pictured above) to provide for a peaceful, free and fair set of elections — the vote will clear the way for around $200 million in financial aid from the European Union.
Politics in Guinea, a country of just 10.25 million, largely falls on ethnic lines. Condé counts on the Malinke ethnic group (around 30% of Guinea's population) in the northeast to support his Rassemblement du Peuple Guinéen (RPG, Rally for the Guinean People). Diallo counts on the Fula group (around 40% of the population) in the northeast to support his Union des Forces Démocratiques de Guinée (UFDG, Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea), with Condé consolidating support from among the coastal Susu group (around 20%) in the 2010 election to defeat Diallo.
This weekend's vote to determine the members of Guinea's Assemblée nationale (National Assembly) will set the stage for the next direct presidential election scheduled to take place in 2015.
Despite relative mineral wealth — chiefly through bauxite, an aluminum ore that constitutes over three-fifths of Guinean exports — the country's GDP per capita is almost one-half of neighboring Senegal's. There are a lot of historical and institutional reasons for that disparity — Guinea was the only country in west Africa to elect independence in 1958, which severed the links between Guinea and France, even after African independence became a fait accompli two years later. That meant that Guinea took a turn toward an authoritarian, socialist economy under the aegis of the Soviet Union through the Cold War under its first post-independence leader Ahmed Sékou Touré. Economic reform and a somewhat less harsh political environment under the rule of Lansana Conté between 1984 and 2008 improved the lives of Guineans, but the country lags behind its potential output.
Conté's death allowed Guinea's turn, after a half century, toward democracy, though it's been a difficult transition. Saturday was the four-year anniversary of the killing of around 150 pro-democracy activists in Conakry, the Guinean capital, and around 50 activists have been killed in the leadup to Saturday's elections.
Though Condé fought for years to bring democracy to Guinea, Diallo has challenged his government for ruling the country as an autocrat, and there are fears that the progress, however fragile, of the past four years may already be unraveling, especially if the government and opposition cannot agree whether the election was fundamentally fair, exacerbating historic ethnic tension between the Fula and Malinke groups:
However, the perception among ordinary Guineans is that both those in power and opposition politicians stand accused of shady economic deals. Impunity for past crimes is in fact an issue that should be dealt with carefully to prevent the impression of a witch-hunt against certain political groups. In this context, there seems to be a real fear among the opposition and those in the ruling coalition that a new National Assembly might pass laws that target key individuals for economic and political crimes committed in the past.
Sadly, these disputes have kept Guinea from jumpstarting much-needed economic reforms. Poverty remains a huge problem and often those masses seen at opposition rallies are there in protest at the rising cost of living, joblessness or power cuts, rather than because they are inspired by the ideological stance of their political leaders. What has been referred to as 'the instrumentalisation of poverty' and the personalisation of politics in Guinea is in fact what is preventing the country from making a necessary and urgent transition to peace and political stability.
Results are expected by next Wednesday, October 2. The 114 deputies of the National Assembly will be elected with a mixed system — 38 selected in single-member districts on a first-past-the-post basis and 76 deputies are chosen pursuant to party-list proportional representation. The last elections for the National Assembly were held in 2002 during the Conté regime.
Photo credit to Aminata.com.
africaconakrycondecontedialloelectionsfulaguineamalinkeRPGUFDGviolence
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The state of our governance
by Mahbub Husain
By the time the third elected government in power since 1991 has come to govern the country, a record of poor affirmation of human rights, increasing violence and decreasing performance of officials maintaining law and order, and ascending degrees of corruption have become matters of grave concern within the country and in international forums. Most recently questions were raised at the Paris Consortium meeting about whether the state of our governance will be able to further the economic welfare and reforms in our country. The Human Rights Report of 2001, formally released by the State Department of the United States on March 5 finds a poor record of human rights and the government's weak commitment to this. According to the Report the year 2001 saw three governments – that of the Awami League, the Caretaker Government and the government of the newly elected BNP and Four Party Alliance.
In summary, the report lists incidents with dates of police excesses, crimes against women and children and other human rights violations. There was widespread police corruption and lack of discipline in the force. Violence and terrorism, often guided by political opportunism, have increased. There have been extra-judicial killings, custodial deaths and tortures. The rights of the free press have been hindered by attacks on journalists and efforts to intimidate them have increased. Though the higher levels of judiciary have shown a significant degree of independence from the political and bureaucratic executive, the lower judicial officers, such as magistrates, being within the ambit of the bureaucratic structure of the executive arm of the government, have been reluctant to challenge government decisions and directives. Despite promises of the new government to repeal the Special Powers Act and the Public Safety Act in the present form, no concrete move has yet been taken, and abuse of the Acts are still being observed.
In the face of such reports and allegations the ruling party's initiative to establish a National Human Rights Commission has been put on hold. The government is now seeking more time for the separation of the Judiciary from the Executive. It has also gone slow on the proposal for establishing Ombudsman. Coming hard on the heels of the government-promoted euphoria about the success of the first one hundred days of governance of the ruling party, the disappointment felt by the people of our country, and the queries of the international forums including the international banks who would be assisting us in our programme of economic reforms, spell a gloomy socio-economic scenario in the near future.
Most of all, we have not been able to brush aside our reputation of being one of the most corrupt countries in the world. The many faces of corruption have now become a familiar experience for the people who are involved almost daily with the structure and functionaries of the government machinery. Whether in the mainstream bureaucracy, or in the semi-government public and autonomous corporations, or in local government bodies, the spreading bane of corruption is engulfing all of us, public persons and public officials. A comprehensive definition articulated by Dr. Saadat Husain (now Home Secretary to the government) covers the context of Bangladesh now: "Corruption for a public servant may be defined as intentional use of his official position or influence or allowing it to be used with the object of obtaining for himself or others he is interested in, some benefit – economic or otherwise – illegally undermining the system, and the public servant not being ready to explicitly justify on moral grounds such actions."
In recent months and weeks, there have been instances of public exposure of corrupt practices. The case of purchase of defective frigates by the Ministry of Defence, whose exposure is due to political reasons, has, in any case brought to light a controversial matter to public knowledge. Very recently, the death of an industrialist from the falling slab of a footbridge has highlighted the corrupt awarding of contract and the ineffective supervision system. The public corporations such as Bangladesh Biman, and the Bangladesh Shipping Corporation have been set up to operate commercial organisations keeping in view our national interests. But here also instances of corruption abound, though the pay and privileges of the professional staff in these organisations compare favourably with the pay and privileges of similar staff in other countries of the world. In an incident involving the national flag carrier Bangladesh Shipping Corporation, it is alleged that the Corporation has incurred a loss of over US one million dollars due to a shady deal of chartering out its larger ships to a Singapore-based company.
The best defences against such corruption are maximum competition, solid performance contracts a good system to track performance information and complaints, a capacity to investigate problems, and the threat of prosecution. The competition and performance information will expose and penalise firms whose contracts were not awarded for the right reasons, and the threat of speedy investigation and prosecution will discourage fraud.
As 'information age' democracies have loosened their bureaucratic systems of control, they have shifted to other forms of control – performance measurement and rewards, competition based on results, information systems that track financial transactions, careful auditing, and rigorous prosecution of illegal activity. Many developing democracies do this as well, leapfrogging decades of the bureaucratic era. Singapore has introduced many elements of entrepreneurial government, including performance budgeting, activity-based costing, and empowerment of organisation through a step-by-step process. Malaysia has initiated a management system in which public managers are held accountable for producing results and rewarded for excellent performance.
The government in power will now have to buckle down to the task of introducing administrative and judicial reforms. The question of enforcing human rights cannot be shelved and the good intentions of the government to establish a Human Rights Commission have to be translated to something much more tangible than election promises and pious wishes. The solution to the problems inherent in the bureaucratic syndrome in government and public agencies is now in the hands of the executive and legislative branches of the government in power. In recent times the legislature has been weakened by the decision of the opposition to resign. That decision has to be politically combated to bring back the opposition to the Sangsad. Solution is essential if our society is to transform into a society with a humane agenda for social and economic salvation of the people. As this is being written, time here is very short, action too long delayed.
Source: The Daily Independent, Dhaka, March 25, 2002
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I recently came across Listia, an online auction site that uses points instead of money.
Listia works very much like Ebay, but you bid on auctions with points instead of money. You can earn points by posting things that you want to give away, and spend those points on things other people are giving away. Some auctions include free shipping or free local pick-up, while others charge for shipping.
As a buyer, Listia is very cool. I earned 600 points in the first half-hour just by signing up, watching a tutorial video, and listing an item for sale. There are many other offers you can do to get more points — like signing up for (and then immediately canceling) the free trial for Lumosity, or signing up for Spotify, which I've been meaning to do anyway.
If you are a parent or teacher, there are lots of items with free shipping that you can win for around 100 points, such as stickers and other small rewards.
For an extra 100 points, you can sign up here.
I have account, but I've never used it.
I saw people "selling" coupons on there though!
Yeah, they can "sell" coupons because they are technically free. So there are lots of free product coupons! I've gotten coupons for a free pizza, free popcorn, 5 free bags of Riceworks chips, free pasta sauce… it's really been great. A search for "free coupon" brings up the options, and most have free shipping!
I have used Listia myself and have "bought" several things for free too! It's definitely something everyone should try out!
How do you find the tv trivia game?
Listia is great, I've been using it for over a year now and got tons of free stuff.


text:
 Constructor for Publishing class

**Namespace:** [OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model](OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.md)
**Assembly:** OfficeDevPnP.Core.dll
## Syntax
```C#
public Publishing(AutoCheckRequirementsOptions autoCheckRequirements, DesignPackage designPackage, IEnumerable<AvailableWebTemplate> availableWebTemplates, IEnumerable<PageLayout> pageLayouts)
```
### Parameters
#### autoCheckRequirements
  Type: [OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.AutoCheckRequirementsOptions](OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.AutoCheckRequirementsOptions.md)
  AutoCheckRequirementsOption object

#### (optional) designPackage
  Type: [OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.DesignPackage](OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.DesignPackage.md)
  Design Package for publishing

#### (optional) availableWebTemplates
  Type: System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable<OfficeDevPnP.Core.Framework.Provisioning.Model.AvailableWebTemplate>
  Available WebTemplates for publishing

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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Tax Administration And Procedures (Amendment) Act Restores Lower Late Filing Penalty
Hon. Dr. Timothy Harris Leader of Team Unity
BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, APRIL 27th, 2016 (PRESS SEC) – The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Bill, 2016, which had its first reading on March 23rd, 2016, was passed today in the National Assembly.
Prime Minister Dr. the Honourable Timothy Harris, in his capacity as Minister of Finance, moved its second reading in Parliament today.
The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2016 further amends Section 37 of the Tax Administration and Procedures Act, bringing it into closer alignment with the Value Added Tax Act of 2010.
"Presently, the Tax Administration and Procedures Act (TAPA) provides for the imposition of a penalty on taxpayers who file their taxes after the due date, but there are no consequences for the late payment of taxes," Prime Minister Harris said during the National Assembly. "This, however, is not the case in the VAT Act. Penalties are imposed for both late filings and late payments. The amendment that is being put forward today is intended to rectify this discrepancy between both pieces of legislation. The proposed amendment that is before this Honourable House therefore seeks to bring some consistency in our tax legislation with respect to the application of penalties for the late filing of tax returns and the late payment of taxes," the Prime Minister added.
The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2016 adds a new subsection (subsection 6) to Section 37 of the TAPA. The new subsection seeks to deter taxpayers from paying their taxes after the due date, with the introduction of a late payment penalty equal to 10% of the owed amount.
Additionally, the Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2016 restores the penalty for a person who files a return late to the Inland Revenue Department to 5% of the owed amount. This is a 50% reduction from the higher figure of 10%, which had been raised by the Douglas-led administration from 5% in August 2014 and enacted into law by the Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2014.
The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2014 also introduced a $100.00 late filing penalty per month that replaced a 1% late filing penalty per month "or part of the month during which the failure to file continues." The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2014 introduced, too, a $1000.00 late filing penalty per month "or part thereof during which the failure to file continues" for persons with tax exemptions who failed to file their returns on time. The Tax Administration and Procedures (Amendment) Act, 2016 leaves those two late filing penalties from 2014 in place.
"We, of course, would like every taxpayer to adhere to the law by not only filing their returns on time, but paying their taxes by the due date," the Honourable Prime Minister said, adding, "It is common practice for provisions to be built into the law to deter people from paying late."
(Press release courtesy of the Office of the Press Secretary)
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