11-1-2014
 Over 50% of the members of the US Congress are dollar millionaires. Hard to see how they relate to ordinary people.
8 Oct 2013 While the US government has $16 trillion of debts, the Japanese have run up $14 trillion, the UK $2 trillion and the Eurozone countries $12 trillion.
The average American earns over $70,000 a year. Against that, every American is liable for $131,368 of public debt, plus a further $1,031,131 to pay for all those unfunded promises their government has made. And that is before ObamaCare. Total debt payment on all American debt will be $50,000 per family by 2015.
In 2010, the USA spent $1,900 billion more than it collected in tax – borrowing more than the entire GDP of Canada or India just to pay the bills.
1 August 2012
Apple has became the world's most valuable-ever company; that means its market value of $624bn is greater than all the listed companies of Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain together.
Daily Mail
4-3-2012
 TAXATION IN THE UK - WHY TAXES SHOULD BE CUT
Telegraph
2-10-2011
 Greece has the highest rate of regulation among OECD countries, the least flexible labour market in the EU and 150 closed professions – even taxi drivers have their guild. It has huge tax evasion and the black economy is around one third of GDP.
Al Jazeera
20-9-2011
US public debt exceeded $14.6tn in July 2011, and it is increasing by approximately $4.2bn a day. And since the budget deficit for 2011 is projected to be $1.5tn, the public debt is expected to reach $15.4tn by the end of 2011, or some 105 per cent of US GDP.

"Under current spending and tax policies, the US is neither able to service its debt without going deeper in debt, nor reduce its size as a percentage of GDP"

Daily Mail
16-9-2011

FRANCE
  • only about 48 per cent of people in work in France make a net contribution to the state through income tax (because there are so many are poorly-paid public employees whose earnings are below the tax threshold)
  • France has half-a-million more public officials than Germany despite having only three-quarters of its population.
  • the French state employs 56 per cent of the workforce — only Sweden, of supposedly civilised countries, has a higher proportion on the public payroll
Telegraph
13-2-2011
 25% of Britain's income tax revenues are paid by ONE PER CENT of taxpayers.
The figure is in sharp contrast to 1978, an era associated with supertaxes, when the top one per cent paid 11 per cent of all the tax revenues.
Guardian
27-1-2011
 Venezuela: Under Chávez the government has built fewer than 40,000 units a year – some say only 24,000 – in contrast to previous governments, which averaged 70,000.
  UK - In 1997 when Labour took over from the Tories, manufacturing was 21% of GDP. After 13 years of Labour it has fallen to 12%.

"Business Insider" - 12/10 - The Rapid Extinction of the American Middle Class

Telegraph

12-1-2011
  • This year, Great Britain, the world’s sixth largest economy, has fallen from 11th to 16th in the world "Economic Freedom" rankings, significantly behind several European competitors, including Ireland, Denmark, Estonia and the Netherlands. This is the second year in a row that Britain has ranked outside the Top 10, which is currently dominated by former British colonies: Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Strikingly, out of the major Anglosphere nations, the UK is by far the weakest performer.
  • The most important factor driving Britain’s decline in economic freedom has been the relentless rise in government spending under Labour, which rose from 37.5 per cent of GDP in 1997 to 47.5 per cent of GDP in 2010.

IHT
19-12-2010

N Kristof

Independent
Blog
21-12-2010
 Gordon Brown sold up to 60% our gold reserves for $245 oz while gold is now at $1500 oz. Further, we have less gold than Lebanon at approximately 350 tons. France and Germany have 3500 tons each.

IHT

19-12-2010

 (Economic boom in Washington - for some .....) The decade also brought black employment in Washington, USA to a grim low: By 2009, only 49 percent of black adults in the city were employed, down from 56 percent in 2000, according to the institute. That was down from 62 percent in 1988.

Daily Mail

20-11-10
The Anglo-Irish trade figures are indeed astonishing. There are 4.5 million people living in Ireland, but United Kingdom trade with them is greater than our exports to China, India, Brazil and Russia combined. In terms of British exports, Ireland can be regarded as a superpower.

Sean O'Grady

Independent
9-11-10

In relation to the national income, debt is now at historically high levels. Total UK debt – public and private – was 540 per cent of GDP at the end of 2009, up from 200 per cent of GDP in 1987, and is projected to reach a total of £10,000,000,000,000 (TEN THOUSAND BILLION) by 2015. By that time the national income will still be less than £2,000bn.

The interest on the public national debt will be £63bn a year by 2014, according to the Treasury.

Nicolas Christof

IHT

8-11-10

The richest 1 percent of Americans now take home almost 24 percent of income, up from almost 9 percent in 1976. As Timothy Noah of Slate noted in an excellent series on inequality, the United States now arguably has a more unequal distribution of wealth than traditional banana republics like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guyana.
C.E.O.’s of the largest American companies earned an average of 42 times as much as the average worker in 1980, but 531 times as much in 2001. Perhaps the most astounding statistic is this: From 1980 to 2005, more than four-fifths of the total increase in American incomes went to the richest 1 percent.