My thoughts on Alternative Energy subsidy by the Government

homecomfort wrote:it was sure nice of Henry Ford to build all of those roads we drive on now adays

He didn't wait for the government to build infrastructure or demand that they do, did he?

That is why I burn Anthracite Coal It is all me It works Our government has no clue at our level

jpete wrote:A subsidy to me is direct money from the government for a particular company or industry.

Most subsides are tax breaks.

rberq wrote:P.S. When you drive your car into the city, be aware that government roads are a way of subsidizing the auto industry at the expense of trolley cars.

Paid for with user fees, e.g. fuel taxes both state and federal which are also used to subsidize other transportation projects.

Richard S. wrote:

jpete wrote:A subsidy to me is direct money from the government for a particular company or industry.

Most subsides are tax breaks.

Many are. No doubt the tax code needs to be rebuilt.

But things like Solyndra and Fisker turn the taxpayers into venture capitalists and I just don't think that's the intent of the tax code.

Here's an article on Fisker for you to disbelieve.
http://www.autoweek.com/article/2012012 ... /120129936
http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2011/06/ ... are-plant/
Some of you may live or travel out that way, is the plant being rebuilt & retooled or not?

It's all vaporware until the first car rolls out.

Curt Schilling just took RI for $100+ million on hopes and promises. Two years later, we got handed the bill, an empty building and a few hundred people out of work after they got shorted their last paycheck.

Show me something besides fantasy land and then maybe I'll believe it.

Your living it Jpete, it's keeping your family fed & a roof over your heads while you go to school.

The entire Industrial Revolution was accomplished without any government subsidies.

Are you saying there was no Gov. involvement in building the railroads which were really the backbone. That's where many made their money & so much so that they jumped into the large ventures since they had more money & were afraid someone else would make money without them. Ford had plenty of investors & takes credit for many things that others started just like many others, don't forget way back then we were on our way to mostly if not all electric cars.

There may have been government involvement in determining where RR tracks could or could not be laid, or in determining which RR could consolidate with which RR, but the government wasn't subsidizing the RR companies. It was however thereby hindering and strongly corrupting their ability to advance the industrial revolution. If anyting, government was doing the very opposite of subsidizing the RR industry. The railroad magnates had to buy off politicians (and sometimes even entire houses of government) in order to accomplish literally anything. The politicians of the day (just as today) were merely parasitic leaches feasting heavily off of their capitalistic hosts, the members of whom were in return declared to be evil "Robber Barons" by the very same politicians. The real robbers and leaches calling the capitalists 'Robber Barons' is sort of ironic, no?

http://www.scribd.com/doc/26234142/Note ... e-Ayn-Rand

The Bush tax cuts, would they not be considered a subsidy? if used in the energy business?

homecomfort wrote:The Bush tax cuts, would they not be considered a subsidy? if used in the energy business?

Only to those of a socialist and/or fascist mindset. All direct taxation is counter-productive. That is why the Founders added the apportionment clause to the Constitution so we would never have (so they thought) direct taxation of income. Direct taxes must be imposed by force, whereas indirect taxes are voluntary since (for example) you are not being "forced" to purchase an item that has a sales tax riding upon it.

It sort of reminds me of how the government quite often saves us money by working long hours and fighting hard on the floor of Congress and then ultimately taxing us (for something previously taxed at say 5%) at only a new low level of 6% instead of the legislations originally proposed 8%, and then telling us how they should be praised for all of their hard work in finding the cuts that are saving us money.

But this time something radical happened. They really saved us money. And being the evil twisted parasitic leaches they are, they now consider it to be robbery (of the people of course).

I guess then that the 30 year bonds & land grants are just another lie? http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/databa ... m?HHID=177