Nation/World
University Daily Kansan / Tuesday. April 23. 1991
7
Nation/World briefs Johannesburg, S. Africa
Witness helps Mandela's alibi
A witness supported Winnie Mandela's alibi in her kidnapping and assault trial yesterday, saying he was with her the night she was accused of beating four vouchers.
Thao Motau gave a detailed description of the drive he said he and Mandela made Dec. 29, 1988, recalling a town where he said they stopped to check the car's oil and water. Under the drive motorau only vaguely remembered four other trips with Mandela to the same place, Brandon.
When Prosecutor Chris van Vuuren pressed Motau to explain why he only recalled the December 1988 trip in detail, the witness explained that it occurred about New Year's Eve and that he recently had concluded his final high school exams.
"That would be a major thing in my life," said Motau.
Earlier, Mandela concluded four days of testimony and said she could not explain the presence of a blood-stained whip found in her home after the alleged crime.
Mandela has testified she was in Brandfort, far from Soweto, from the evening of Dec. 29, 1988, until New Year's Eve.
Motau told the court Mandela telephoned him in December 1988 and said she needed him to go to the court.
Basel, Switzerland
Third World economy rated
Thailand, South Korea and Taiwan are expected to register the Third World's highest economic growth rates over the next five years, according to a survey published yesterday.
Economically beleaguered Argentina and the Ivory Coast figure to end up at the lower end of the survey that covers 36 Asian, African and Latin American countries.
The Basel-based Prognos Center said in the survey that the average annual growth rate of the 36 countries would be 4 percent until 1985, compared with a worldwide average of about 3 percent.
Export growth, averaging 5.9 percent from 1983 through 1989, will increase to an annual 10.1 percent until 1995, the survey said. It forecast that Taiwan and South Korea will be the leading exporters, followed by Singapore, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong and Malaysia.
The survey also predicted that the 36 countries would sell $500 billion worth of manufactured goods on the world market in 1995, with eight countries having an 80 percent share of the total.
Singapore will continue to have the highest gross domestic product among the 36 countries.
From The Associated Press
Poorest families might be taxed highest percentage
WASHINGTON — The poorest U.S. families pay 81 percent of their average $12,700 earnings in state and local taxes than do U.S. citizens making $875,200 a year, a private research group said yesterday.
The Associated Press
Middle-income families, with earnings that average $310, must turn over a one-third bigger share of their incomes to state, city and county government, the wealthiest 1 percent, said Citizens for Tax Justice.
In both cases, the disparity is worse than it was five years ago, said the organization, which is financed by labor. church and social groups.
"When all of the major state and local taxes are added together, virtually every state taxes its poor and middle-income families at rates significantly higher than those faced by the richest families," the study concluded.
"The biggest problem is over-reliance on regressive sales and excise taxes rather than on progressive, ability-to-pay income taxes," said McInelyn, director of Citizens for Tax Justice.
The report by the organization, which advocates higher taxes for the rich, was billed as the most comprehensive study ever conducted on the burden of state and local taxes.
"It's sad but true," the report stated. "Forty-four states and the District of California tax the
In the 10 states that the study deemed to have the worst tax systems, the poor pay nearly three times as much of their income as taxes as the rich. In five states — Nevada, Texas, Florida, Washington and South Dakota — the poor pay five times as great a share.
very rich at lower rates than they tax the poor."
Only six states — Vermont, Delaware, Hawaii, Minnesota, Maryland and Oregon — require the rich to pay a greater share of their income than the poor. Only Vermont and Delaware require the rich to pay a greater share than faced by both middle-income and poor families.
"The federal government still relies on the income tax for 90 percent of its revenue (leaving little income base for other governments to tax)." Zimmerman said. "If a state taxes wealthy people at a high rate, they can simply move across the border into another state."
Chris Zimmerman, chief economist for the National Conference of State Legislatures, who had not read the report, said it generally was more difficult for states, cities and counties to maintain a progressive tax system than the federal government.
The eight states viewed as having the worst tax systems - South Dakota, Nevada, Texas, Florida, Washington, Tennessee, Wyoming and New Hampshire - have no broad personal income tax. Pennsylvania and Illinois, also among the worst 10, have flat, low-income taxes.
White House says college grants should no longer pay for bar tabs
WASHINGTON — The White House proposed yesterday to limit the kinds of expenses that can be charged to the government by universities conducting federally financed research.
Administration officials have been concerned that some colleges and universities are billing the government inappropriately for overhead expenses related to federal research grants.
The Office of Management and Budget's proposal would rule out such expenses as those relating to entertainment, alcoholic beverages, or recreational living expenses and social club memberships.
The Associated Press
OMB Director Richard Darman said the proposed guidelines were intended to clarify policy and reduce uncertainty.
Robert Rosenweig, president of the Association of American Universities, said Darman's proposal was a useful and important step in restoring public confidence in the research system. The changes will cause some accounting problems on campuses, he says, but the costs are worth paying.
A recent audit at Stanford University revealed the school had charged the government for expenses related to a $1,200 antique commode, a $10,000 set of donated silverware and a university-owned shopping center.
As a result, the school withdrew about $700,000 in billings for expenses associated with government-financed research.
Harvard Medical School earlier this month announced it would withdraw $500,000 in expenses billed to federal research projects, including charges for maintaining the private home of the school's president, operating the medical school dean's office and a retirement party.
The expenses at which the guidelines are aimed are those charged off as overhead or indirect costs of research. Schools are allowed to bill the government for certain costs that are not specifically for a particularly sponsored project but result from combined or joint use. These include costs for utilities, library services and building depreciation.
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