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Thomas Jefferson famously said, "All men are created equal." ...we believe that people whether they're rich or they're poor, whether they have lots of property or not, whether they're in, on Wall Street or off, they should have equal potential to influence what government does.
Anybody who looks around at our government today cannot believe that's the case or that we're even close to that.
PAUL PIERSON: Well certainly you just have to look at recent headlines to see a Washington that seems preoccupied with the economic concerns of those at the top and is resistant in many cases to steps that are clearly favored by a majority of the electorate such as wanting to increase taxes on the very well-to-do, letting the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire as if you want to do something about the deficit. That’s the single most popular proposal for doing something about the deficit would be to let the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire. And yet that gets nowhere in Washington.
JACOB HACKER You know, there is an organized, powerful constituency for deregulation, for high end tax cuts, for policies that are neglecting some of the serious middle class strains. And there just isn't anything of comparable size or power on the other side.
PAUL PIERSON: Yes, they do. And we describe that period after World War II, which lasted for about 30 years as being a country which we labeled Broadland. And—
BILL MOYERS: Broadland?
PAUL PIERSON: Broadland. And I think it's most clearly captured by that old idea that a rising tide lifts all boats. Everybody's income is going up at the roughly the same rate, slightly faster actually towards the bottom of the income distribution than towards the top, but everybody's incomes were going up. And it's important to understand, so this wasn't some egalitarian fantasy world. It wasn't Sweden. It was the United States, recognizably the United States with significant inequalities of wealth, but everybody was participating in prosperity and seeing their incomes rise.
And then after the mid 1970's we start moving towards a distribution of income that looks more like that of a third world oligarchy. It looks more like Mexico or Brazil or Russia. Income inequality that statistics on income inequality now suggest that inequality is higher in the U.S. than it is in Egypt. And that’s quite a journey from where we were when I was growing up.
Originally posted by Observationalist
reply to post by newcovenant
Thanks for the article, I will check it out tonight.
Seems we have a pre plan course for economic collapse. No one going to do anything about it. While everyone who is really effected gets angry. The media does a good job telling people who to be angry with.
Soetimes it feels like we're in this big experiment to see how much they, TBTB can get away with, how much the people can handle, and who will survive.
Tax Cuts or Tax Redistribution?
When all was said and done, the total tax burden imposed on the American people from all sources—state and local taxes, federal income and capital gains taxes, and payroll taxes—remained basically unchanged throughout the 1980s.
In the end, Reagan's reputation as a tax-cutter far outran his actual performance.
Reagan's tax policies did, however, redistribute the tax burden significantly, even if they failed to reduce it overall.
By cutting income taxes, which are paid at a higher rate by the wealthy, while increasing payroll taxes, which are paid at a higher rate by the working poor and middle class, Reagan shifted the tax burden down the income scale.
During the 1980s, the total effective federal taxation rate for the poorest one-fifth of American families actually increased by more than 16%.
By contrast, the effective taxation rate for the wealthiest one-fifth of families fell by 5.5%, and the richest one percent of Americans saved even more: their tax rate fell by 14.4%.25
To his great credit, however, Reagan stuck by Volcker even when it would have been politically expedient for him to pressure the Fed Chairman to expand the money supply to provide a short-term boost to the economy. Both men's patience paid off after 1983, when—with inflation under control at last—the economy began growing again. That growth continued, unabated, through the rest of Reagan's two-term presidency, marking the longest peacetime period of unbroken economic expansion yet seen in American history. (An even longer boom would occur a decade later, during a Bill Clinton presidency that largely followed Reagan's lead in economic policy.) Overall, between 1981 and 1989, real GDP per capita increased by nearly 23%; in the same span of time, the value of the stock market more than tripled.20
Reagan's presidency produced huge annual federal budget deficits of more than $100 billion —the equivalent of about $200 billion today. It was an ironic result for a man who had spent his entire political career criticizing deficit spending by the government. "For decades we have piled deficit upon deficit," he said in his first inaugural address, "mortgaging our future and our children's future for the temporary convenience of the present. To continue this long trend is to guarantee tremendous social, cultural, political, and economic upheavals."27 Yet the national debt tripled under Reagan's watch, reaching a staggering $2.7 trillion by the time he left office. Ironically, the government's gargantuan deficit spending during the 1980s ended up providing exactly the same kind of Keynesian stimulus to the national economy that Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal had provided during the Great Depression.
Originally posted by Summerian
reply to post by Observationalist
Yes - 2. A very hostile congress will paralyze USA.
Last 4, republicans said that their #1 job was to sabotage EVERYTING Obama was trying to do - WHATEVER.
These 4, republicans will sabotage EVERYTING Obama tries, even if it kills USA. That's how much they love their country!
rep.
2. A very hostile senate that will paralyze congress