Here in Florida, public employees (teachers, firemen, police, many others) have collective bargaining contracts, but our retirement is often in a large fund managed by the state. This is the same as many other states.
That retirement is EARNED and BARGAINED. Every penny is deserved. Whenever there is a projected shortfall, it comes out of our paychecks! Either the state takes more or contributes less or goes to the bargaining table and we get lower salaries.
Bernie's Robin Hood tax directly affects that retirement fund, where hundreds of state agents invest billions just like a Wall Street investor. We don't want a poorly thought out tax (that likely would increase and be used for other purposes than tuition) to take money from our retirement.
Unions do NOT want a hit on their retirement - and Bernie's idea is a bad one to me.
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Why Free College is Really Expensive
Everyone knew Bernie Sanders would propose a tax on Wall Street. But spending that money on college tuition is a cynical handout to the upper-middle class.
Even Sanders himself, however, lists the Robin Hood tax as an afterthought; after all, if you raise a Robin Hood tax you can do a long list of things with the money you get from it (including cutting other taxes, or spending on other initiatives). The emphasis from Sanders’ statements is where the money will go: paying for tuition for public colleges.
The first problem with Sanders’ proposal is that a national tuition subsidy will be counterproductive even on its own terms. The proposal will cut the economic legs out from underneath innovations such as open online courses, which may be on the cusp of delivering low-cost, high-quality college education for all. Organizations trying to deliver radical new models will now have to compete against a $70 billion subsidy for the old system.
Additionally, directing that much guaranteed money into a system is a sure-fire way to accelerate cost inflation. The state may pick up the tab for tuition, but students will still have to pay for ancillary services (such as room, board, textbooks, etc.), and those services will go up in price. These costs are not trivial; for instance, although Sweden has abolished college tuition, students graduate with more debt than students in the United Kingdom, and only slightly less than students in the US. Through economic incompetence, Sanders’ proposal might hit the jackpot of reducing college quality while also increasing cost.
Economically bad policy design from Sanders is not surprising. After all, the man is a self-declared Socialist. His appeal was not policy wonkery; as a protest candidate, Sanders (we hoped) would at least identify the right issues, even if his solutions were unworkable. In this case, Sanders has pointed out the wrong problem.
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https://www.reddit.com/r/PoliticalDiscussion/comments/36vmm8/what_are_some_legitimate_arguments_against_bernie/
[–]DeadMonkey321 50 points 12 days ago*
Apparently (according to a tax lawyer who was running around one of the earlier threads), there was no exception for 401k's, meaning that every time the mutual funds in your retirement fund rebalance, which should be a few times a year, you're paying a tax and losing money from your retirement.
Edit: just used the calculator found here to calculate the costs of 0.5% over 40 years assuming you were investing just $5500/year (the max allowable to an IRA). Using these assumptions, this tax would cost you, the average investor, $157,000 over the 40 years you're investing. This is money that I'm sure you'd prefer going towards your retirement.
Note: this isn't 100% accurate as I'm treating this as an addition to the expense ratio which isn't totally correct, but it's a ballpark figure to give the tax some context
I just looked at NY, AZ, WI, CA, etc..these funds are often public employees represented by unions. This money is hard-fought. It's collected and invested for decades by whatever office each state sets up - in Florida it's almost 200 billion invested by a staff of 200 who are constantly buying, selling, and trading. Also, some funds are in the hands of large private investment companies. They clearly complete transactions everyday, which include stocks, bonds, real estate, derivatives, commodities. Most of the time, no type of investment is out of bounds unless the state or controlling board specifically limit them. Those investments would be TAXED by Bernie's transaction tax. That retirement money is earned by public employees, often union members: teachers, professors, police, firemen, city employees, social workers, park rangers, etc. Every penny that fund doesn't contain, is a penny that labor has to fight over.
For example, you can see in AZ the following allocation:
Equity/Stocks: 58%
U.S. Equity: 26%
Non-US Equity: 24%
Private Equity: 8%
Fixed Income: 25%
U.S. Fixed Income: 15%
Private Debt: 10%
Inflation Linked Assets: 12%
Real Estate: 10%
Commodities: 2%
https://www.azasrs.gov/content/asset-allocation
https://www.osc.state.ny.us/pension/overview.htm
http://www.calstrs.com/investments-overview
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http://www.sbafla.com/fsb/
The State Board of Administration (SBA) was created by the Florida Constitution and is governed by a three-member Board of Trustees (Trustees), comprised of the Governor as Chair, the Chief Financial Officer and the Attorney General.
The Trustees, in concert with legislative directives, have ultimate oversight. They delegate authority to the Executive Director/Chief Investment Officer to carry out the strategic direction in the day-to-day financial investments and operations of the agency. The Executive Director/CIO manages approximately 190 professional investment and administrative support staff.
The SBA is required to invest assets and discharge its duties in accordance with Florida law and in compliance with fiduciary standards of care. Under state law, the SBA and its staff are obliged to:
Make sound investment management decisions that are solely in the interest of investment clients.
Make investment decisions from the perspective of subject-matter experts acting under the highest standards of professionalism and care, not merely as well-intentioned persons acting in good faith.
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