dupe 'em (4.00 / 1)

The genius of American capitalism of course is how statistics like this can be brushed aside merely by pointing out how, "Amercians don't care about class".

Even more pointedly the very rich and the very powerful have been particularly ingenious at creating a political ambiance in which the working class [and many in the middle class] are far more incensed at the possibility the government might be giving money to the "welfare queens"....to them....than that they created systemic and impregnable revolving doors between New York and Washington to funnel more and more and more money into the vaults of those on the one foot line.

If Marx and Engels were around today they would simply be astonished at how effectively they pull this off. American exceptionalism indeed. Has there ever been a more duped electorate in all of human history?      

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by: george walton @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 11:11:34 AM CST

More duped (0.00 / 0)

Poor southern whites allied with wealthy whites to keep down blacks, circa (at least) 1896-Present.  For a few years after the Civil War there was a whiff of populism (aka self intersest).  Then came Jim Crow.  The last black voters in the south for a long time were in LA around 1896 IIRC (see C Vann Woodward, The strange Career of Jimk Crow").

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by: David Kowalski @ Sat Nov 28, 2009 at 04:09:58 AM CST

[ Parent ]

Reverse math (4.00 / 2)

I've been told for 40 years that 10 percent of the population has 90 percent of the wealth.

But it's only in the past year that I've seen the math reversed.

If we take away only 10 percent of THEIR wealth, our share DOUBLES.

(And conversely, to get another 5 percent, they have to squeeze half of ours out of us.)

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by: dhatch999 @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 11:16:33 AM CST

Once again... (4.00 / 1)

a demonstration of why the most just taxation is:

"TAX WEALTH, NOT WORK."

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by: nasrudin @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 11:24:39 AM CST

Summers and Geithner think three card monte was a better fix. (0.00 / 0)

As long as bankers keep the public guessing where the money is, we'll never figure our way out of worldwide bankruptcy. Obama is to be credited for evenhandedness in this panic.

Credit default swaps would have been completely worthless if TARP money had been directed to U.S. consumers as a mortgage bailout. And it wouldn't have worked. It would have necessitated massive bank bailouts anyway to avoid bank runs, so the Fed went directly to the banks and drowned the problem in mystery money. This was the better way to stave off worldwide mortality, real starvation.

The international credit hazard that was purposefully created by AIG derivatives should have come right off the top of the wealthiest - the top 1/3 of one per cent worldwide, but even this wouldn't have been enough to compensate for the 150 trillion dollar loss of the world's GDP which went up in AIG's smoke and mirrors CDS, MBS, etc.

And Obama can't create US jobs yet or we'll find out the money really is gone...gone to imaginary futures. Goldman's mobsters would have sunk us into a Galt-like mire without their bonuses.

And the puny Bush tax cuts don't expire until January 2011. We'll only start to see daylight in US joblessness before the 2012 elections. Let's not talk about futures yet.  

They only call it class war when we fight back.

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by: ezdidit @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 11:31:44 AM CST

The Consumer Economy Stopped Being Sustainable Some Time Ago (4.00 / 7)

We have reached a breaking point where a consumer-based economy can no longer be sustained.  But this has not led to any loosening of the grip that money has on our political system.

The consumer-based economy stopped being sustainable some time ago.  That's why we've had this enormous accumulation of debt, along with a series of asset bubbles.  Consumers can't keep the economy going any more because they just don't have the income to do it.

And so the loan sharks stepped in to keep things going for a little while longer, just to make sure that consumers were in too deep to ever get out alive.

We've been out of the consumer economy and into the loan shark economy for quite some time now.

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 12:10:56 PM CST

#1 Problem (0.00 / 0)

Wealth distribution in this country is our #1 problem.  Nothing else even comes close, because most of the rest can be considered symptoms this.  However, there is no silver bullet solution.  Yes, we should have a 50% top marginal tax rate that kicks in at $1 million, but the real solution isn't on the tax side, it is on the spending side.

Anytime you spend money on everyone, you flatten out the wealth distribution.  Health care for all, good public transportation and education, high minimum wage, strong labor laws and security net, etc., etc.  Even if they are paid with a flat tax or, as in Europe, a VAT tax, the result is to flatten the curve.

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by: Mark Matson @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 14:26:03 PM CST

Higher, please (0.00 / 0)

50%?  You're such a wuss.  90% at the very top, please!  Maybe 50% at $1 million like you wrote, but up to 90% at maybe $5 or 10 million.  That way hedge fund managers will take home "only" $300 million a year or so.

While we're at it, this is sort of related: how about a very, very high carbon tax, but most of it gets distributed equally back to the public.  You pay a lot for gasoline and electricity but everyone gets a really nice check back and most of us come out ahead -- but big polluters don't.  

This way most people will want that tax to go higher every year.

The govt takes out what it needs, then divides the amount collected by 300 million and sends everyone an equal check.  (Maybe no check to any more than 2 children so this isn't an encouragement to have kids.)

--

Seeing The Forest -- Who is our economy FOR, anyway? Twitter: dcjohnson

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by: DaveJ @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 14:39:23 PM CST

[ Parent ]

Regular People vs 99.5% (0.00 / 0)

DaveJ, I'd humbly suggest contrasting 'regular people' against the wealthy than saying '99.5%'. The latter is more accurate and more difficult to refute and dismiss. The fact the needs of over 99% of Americans are sacrificed to the selfish needs of hundreds, maybe low thousands, of ultra wealthy Americans, that is what makes current policy outrageous and unsustainable.

To the point about campaign finance reform, surely there are ways to restrain private financing of politicians without violating free speech. Progressives should refine and get behind one or more specific policies that pass judicial muster, then build public support. Average people I speak to get that politics is corrupt, that money talks while our needs get the shaft.

What's missing are solutions. Let's have a practical discussion here at Open Left about different ways to finance campaigns. Then let's do something to make it happen.

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by: TSlavin @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 18:28:24 PM CST

There is no "speech" from a business (4.00 / 1)

Corporations are not here to speak.  As I said in an earlier comment to another post, We, the People allow corporations to exist because pooling resources and distributing risk is a good way to accomplish large-scale, capital-intensive projects.  THAT is the only why we enable corporations to exist.  Not to take those resources and use them to influence our politics and especially not to influence our decision-making about how corporations should operate.  A business corporation exists to do business ONLY.

There should be jail time for anyone who steals money from a corporation and uses it to influence our democracy.  I say that because ANY use of corporate funds for any purpose beyond what the company is supposed to be in business to do is theft from the stockholders.  (Note the contradiction -- if a business lobbies or gives money to a politician without expecting a return it is wasted money.  But if they do expect a return it is necessarily a bribe, which is illegal.)

--

Seeing The Forest -- Who is our economy FOR, anyway? Twitter: dcjohnson

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by: DaveJ @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 22:07:14 PM CST

[ Parent ]

another eye opener (0.00 / 0)

Thanks again Dave J.

Business spending money to lobbie the government is NOT advancing business technology or upgrading production facilities, distribution, or any other necessary activity. Just gaming the system for unfair advantage.

Seem like that should be illegal under current law, rather than just unethical.

Like the way your mind works, please post here more often.

Government by organized money is no better than government by organized mob..... FDR

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by: reggiewhitefish @ Sat Nov 28, 2009 at 13:04:04 PM CST

[ Parent ]

a "decamillionaire" tax (4.00 / 2)

     Who are the wealthy? According to Joe the Plumber, a guy who makes only $40,000 is (or could quickly and easily become) "wealthy". Horatio Alger stories continue to be popular with right-wingers, because they are such effective propaganda.
    So to help ordinary Americans understand that they are not "the rich" when a progressive proposes higher taxes for "the rich", we should be very careful to name a specific dollar amount. And as Dr. Evil points out in the Austin Powers movie, "one million dollars" is NOT an impressive amount of wealth anymore; it is actually a fairly modest amount to retire on.
    For the reasons listed above, I reccommend a new top tax bracket, for decamillionaires. A "decamillionaire" is one who has 10 million dollars or more. A decamillionaire is truly wealthy. A guy who earns $40,000 a year might retire at age 70 with a million dollars or so, but very few people will ever have a fortune of over 10 million dollars. So, a tax on decamillionaires will flatten the income distribution, and even though Joe the Plumber will fight tooth-and-nail to "save" Bill Gates from paying a fair share of taxes, even Joe the Plumber will recognize that he, personally, is not and never will be a decamillionaire.

1 Corinthians 13:1 (KJV) - "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal."/ GOP = Greedy Old Privatizers or Greedy Old Privateers?

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by: Christian_Dem_NY @ Sat Nov 28, 2009 at 01:49:21 AM CST

[ Parent ]

this is a little misleading (0.00 / 0)

Once you start splitting at less than 1%, you're warping the actual "volume" of the income.  For example, Bill Gates making $50B in one year should be graphed in such a way that it's a microscopically thin line.  For example, if you're putting a stack of bills on each yard line, that line represents the income of 300k people, so Bill Gates's line should be in incredibly high, but it should also be 0.0003% as wide as the line at the 50-yard line.

Also, it's sort of cherry-picking a great year for Bill Gates -- he'd also have some incredibly negatives lines, losing billions of dollars of worth, on other years.

Income distribution is a huge problem, but we should be focusing on the top few percentiles, not the top few people.  Focusing on the ultra-outliers like Gates might make for a more impressive graph, but it's misleading.  The real data is bad enough without being intentionally misleading.

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by: ccarollo @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 19:45:53 PM CST

Taxing Wealth (0.00 / 0)

I would argue we should heavily tax wealth above a reasonable amount as return on investment of taxpayer funds that make wealth possible. What Bill Gates or Warren Buffett makes one year versus another is irrelevant. That we tax Bill Gates and not John Doe also does not matter. It should simply be the case that great wealth in any year means that person or family must repay taxpayers In their role as investors.

The fact this sort of ROI taxation leads to greater income equality is a bonus. Taxpayers sacrifice alot to make wealth possible. We deserve the same returns, or better, as any investor. Especially since it appears that 99% of people will not be wealthy this year or any year.

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by: TSlavin @ Fri Nov 27, 2009 at 21:34:32 PM CST

[ Parent ]