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GRAS

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Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS), is the FDA’s way of allowing an ever growing number of food additives into the US food supply without specific FDA testing. It allows the vendor/manufacturer to certify an additive is GRAS rather than proving it.

It would seem that the GRAS approach is reasonable, given the the ever growing number of additives and and the minimal risk of true harm. But, there are other countries that do take the time to evaluate some additives in their food systems and then determine those additives are not safe by whatever standards they are using. This would seem to me to remove the additive from the Generally Regarded As Safe category and should require the FDA to certify the safety of the additive independently of the vendor certification.

The FDA may very well find that the additive is SAFE by our standards and allow it to be in our food supply, but it should not be on the GRAS list.

Geek Stuff, General, Liberating Thoughts, Politics, Preparing for the worst

Double Checking AI

Why can’t we run an AI check on AI output, asking it to evaluate the output for bias? It can review the output for racial, sexual, gender, socioeconomic, political, and any other number of potential biases, then put out a summary chart so you have overview of the inherent bias in the report.

You should be able to submit any article or post you are reading for this treatment.

Interesting, Word Press has added an AI Assistant to preview what you are about to publish. This is what it provided for this article.

The idea of using AI to evaluate the output for bias is intriguing. It could be helpful to:

1. Conduct thorough research on existing AI models for bias evaluation.

2. Collaborate with AI experts to develop a system that can detect and summarize potential biases.

3. Test the system extensively by submitting various articles and posts for evaluation.

4. Consider integrating the AI Assistant into the publishing process to provide users with a comprehensive overview.

5. Ensure transparency by clearly communicating the limitations and scope of bias evaluation to users.

The addition of an AI Assistant to preview content in WordPress is indeed an interesting development.

Economics, Politics

Partial Social Security Fix

The Social Security Trust Fund is running low and may not have enough income to to pay the expected outflow and it will then need to start reducing payments such that income and outflow balance. Sometime in the 2030’s is projected.

Currently an employee contributes 6.2% of income up to $160,200 (in 2023), with the employer matching that 6.2%. If they really can’t get rid of the cap on the employee’s side of the equation, why don’t they get rid of the cap on the employer’s side and let them continue to contribute 6.2% of income with no cap? That should put a bit more money into the trust fund.

Some Fast Facts & Figures About Social Security.

Economics, Politics

Tax the Tires!

I heard a story the other day about how states are looking at ways to tax EV to pay for the road taxes they no longer collect on the lost gasoline sales. There is also the issue of declining gas tax revenues because of improving fuel efficiencies without the reduction of the wear and tear on the roads themselves. Some of the ideas included charging an EV tax on annual registration renewal or taxing at the charging station (but if you charge at home and not at a charging station, no taxes?)

Why not just tax the tires? Add a certain tax based on the expected mileage of a set of tires. The actual usage of the roads will be captured by how often the tires are changed.

If we look at consider the average car gets @ 16 MPG and the gas tax is $.18 per gallon then the average tax is $.01125 per mile. So a set of 4 -40,000 mile tires would be taxed $450. A set of 60,000 mile tires would be taxed $675.

Heavy Duty Vehicles and their tires can be taxed at a different rate since the heavier vehicles put more where and tear on the roads.

It might be easier to collect the tax at the annual registration time and ignore the difference between the the folks that only put 3,000 miles a year on their cars and those that put 30,000 miles a year on them. If we assume the average car is getting 12,000 miles a year, then an average $135 a year can be collected in the registration fee.

All this is in lieu of the gasoline tax and could be applied to all types of vehicles. Although the registration tax could just be used for EV and gas taxes can stay until the last pump dies.

I forget though. The $.18 gas tax is the federal tax rate. The same process can be used for states gas taxes to add on to the figures above.

I see that the average State Gas Tax is $.31 per gallon. That comes to $ .019375 per mile additional state tax and a total of $.030625 per mile combined Fed and State Taxes. Tire taxes would be $1225 for a set of 40,000 mile tires and $1837.50 for a set of 60,000 mile tires. I can see that would cause a bit of sticker shot for the consumer. The registration cost, using 12,000 miles as the average, is $367.50 per year.

If there was a way to spread out the tire tax over a period of years, it may be a more appropriate way to tax for actual road usage. Those of us who only drive 5,000 miles a year will only be getting new tires every 10 years or so. (Do tires actually last that long?) Or maybe a combination of registration tax and tire tax such that it isn’t such a big hit at once.

Either way, the EVs do need to pay their way for road maintenance.

Economics, Politics

Let’s be progressive

Rather than trying to put caps onto salaries, in an attempt to prevent runaway wage growth, why don’t we just set up a progressive income tax such that: the more you make, the higher your tax bracket?

Everyone can start out with a base deduction plus social security insurance, health insurance and state/local tax costs, and then pay a flat rate at various steps thereafter.

My steps would be tied to the median household income (MHI) . For every multiple of the MHI, the tax rate would increase. The actual tax rate should be set such that the federal budget would be balanced i.e. the government will collect enough money to cover its expenditures for the year.

The base deduction for a single individual should be 40% of the MHI. For a household, the base deduction should be the MHI.

Politics

2025

I am starting to read through the Presidential Transition Project Plan for 2025. It is making for alarming reading.

In Federalist No. 47, James Madison warned that “[t]he accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the
very definition of tyranny.”

They argue that by distributing all the command and control of the Executive functions across wide and diverse groups of faceless bureaucrats who are writing, executing and adjudicating the rules that make our society work, that we are reaching that stage of tyranny. Instead, they want to consolidate all this into a more compact group of ideological political appointees and put the career bureaucrats out to pasture.

They are concerned that the “Radical Left” are running the bureaus, agencies, and departments with some sort of agenda to weaken America and it’s standing in the world. I believe Barry Goldwater is part of the Radical Left as well.

It will take a while get through all this. They have detailed breakdowns for the various Cabinet departments and independent agencies, and, how the incoming “conservative” president can fix it all.

Politics

Supreme Justice

I like the proposal to fix the term of a Supreme Court Justice to 18 years. A new Justice would be appointed every 2 years. In the event of a vacancy in the court, a new Justice would be appointed to fill the term of the vacated seat.

This would allow each President to appoint 2 Justices per term (minimum, for a 4 year term). This also allows Justices to achieve emeritus status while still able to enjoy life. Emeritus Justices may be called upon for other duties as determined by the Chief Justice.

A Justice can only serve one term.

Food Stuff

Bread Works

So, I have been driving myself crazy trying to come up with the number of calories in a cup of flour. The first problem is dealing with the American system of measurement. A cup is not a cup is not a cup. Weights range from 115 to140 grams per cup. I am trending to ~125 grams per cup, for flour. And then there are the calories per cup of flour. Again, they are flying all over the map.

I decided to try the 100 gram approach. How many calories are there per 100 grams? Things seem to stabilize a bit. Values aren’t fluctuating quite as much. Your strong flours seem to be in the 360-365 calorie range, the cake flours in the 300-340 calorie range. But, there still is some variety, even amongst the same type of flours, so I went looking for an authoritative source and found – The USDA.

https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/fdc-app.html#/?query=flour

Here they have a variety of flour types, all the nutrition information you want, and they serve it up in 100 gram portions. So I go and take a look at Flour, bread, white, enriched, unbleached (I am using King Arthur bread flour at the moment) and see lots and lots of nutrient information. They’ve got proximates, minerals, even vitamins; they even have TWO values of calories! I didn’t know about the two values of calories; I always thought a calorie was a calorie, except when it was a fiber. They list calories as energy, measured by the Atwater General Factors and the Atwater Specific Factors. These numbers are not the same. I will leave it to the gentle reader to chase the Atwater Factors down the “Google” or “Duck Duck Go” rabbit hole.

I shall move forward using the Atwater General Factor of 366 Calories for 100 grams of bread flour. I am still debating as to whether a cup of flour is 125 grams or 130 grams.

Politics

Why bother with a Wealth tax?

Looking at some figures, the median net worth of an American household in 2020 is ~$121,000. If you look at older households (65+) which have had a chance to build up equity, the median net worth is ~$266,000. So rather than imposing a wealth tax, let us impose a 90% estate tax on any amount of estate over, say, 100 times the median net worth of the older household. So, any portion of an estate over $26.6 million would be taxed at 90%. Under $26.6 million, that can be tax-free inheritance.

Presumably, there will be those out there who will figure ways to game the system. We need to be vigilant and find ways to block the gamers. The primary reason for such a severe tax on large estates is to prevent the build up of an entitled aristocracy through the accumulation of generational wealth.

As I was looking at the wealth figures, I noticed that while the median net worth was $266,000 for 65+, the average, or mean, net worth was ~$1.2 Million, 4.5 times the mean.

Here is a table showing that more than 99% of households won’t even be affected by the 90% estate tax I have proposed, since they are only at $11 million. Maybe we should use the median household of $121,000 as our basis?

The Thoughts and Luminations of Jack Heneghan