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Record Social Inequality And Its Violent Aftermath, Explained By A Three Minute Cartoon
With the new medium of mass communication in all matters financial and economic having been recently discovered to be cartoons (as the penetration of written text discussing such arcane topics as the Fed, debt and addition ends up being trapped within a very narrow echo chamber), we present the latest and greatest 3 minute summary, which even a third grader will understand, of what is gradually becoming accepted as the most troubling social, economic and political development in America - record social, income and wealth inequality... and its very disturbing consequences, which at last check have resulted in some form of social upheaval in almost every situation.
Courtesy of John Lohman
And some demographic commentary from Harry Dent:
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"God gave humans the truth and the Devil came and he said, 'Let's give it a name and call it religion.'."
Just to give you an idea of how ignorant you are: Allah is simply the arab name for "God". As in the exact same God the Christians and Jews worship.
worship is a spiritual abomination
There is enough pimpin' going on for all the major religions to lay some claim to...
Just sayin'.
Ah, look to the muzzies to cure our income and social inequalities....Brilliant!
I'm all for freedom of religon, but the term "muzzy" is one of my all times favorites! Cracks me up every time.
Call it what you want, its still taking it in the ass.
So I hired a guy who has been out of work for a long time. He says he is drawing down his retirement - sure, whatever, if you say you aren't colelcting UE bennies, then i believe you. Says he will be here at 8 am sharp. Shows up at 8:20 am and then leaves at 9:08 am b/c he has a 1pm job interview 15 miles away (yes he has a car). Calls at 2:45 pm - not coming back today... tell him he needs to at least get boards down on the deck so tenant will not break leg and sue owner (me). He grudingly comes back for a bit... shows up late the next day, but works pretty much all day.... I check from time to time, when he leaves I see he damaged a rotten board in the deck and the small hole is dangerous....
Go to Lowe's buy DAP and do it myself - its just easier... and cheaper too. I ain't giving guys like him shit.
The supreme court defines income as the "ascension to wealth" so that change would not make a difference.
Income tax is an excise tax, which is a use tax on the transfer of wealth from one party to another.
The easiest way to defeat the income tax is to endorse your cash as maker. In that way the endorser is taking the liability to pay in the event it is ever redeemed for "lawful money" Which of course it never is.
Look at the FED balance sheet. FRN's are a liablity and coinage is an asset.
get a magnifying glass and look at the "line" where one is to sign a check.
bring it on. I'll redistribute a few bullets your way. No problem. I guess you think stealing is ok?
Haven't you heard, BDJr, it isn't stealing, its just right. Cause you have and we don't and we want and we need. Doesn't matter how you got it. Doesn't matter how hard you work or how critical that is. Doesn't matter what portion of the nation's tax burden you currently bear. Doesn't matter that most of us don't do shit in terms of any sort of civic duty, all that matters is numbers and heartbeats, baby. We outnumber you and in Merica the wonder of Democracy means 4 wolves get to eat the 1 sheep, every time, majority rules. Yep, the Land of Ain't It A Bitch To Be A Minority, and if you rich, you way out numbered.
</sarcasm>
This opinion brought to you by the uneducated rabble that have been manipulated by politicans giving out free shit going all the way back to, oh, say, Rome and Julius Caesar.
</sarcasm for real>
oh, CRY ME A RIVER about your fucking money "doesn't matter how you got it"??!! Sure like to see some bonafide stats on inherited wealth, lucky breaks and exploitation of the fucking tax code. You pricks get more breaks than the rest of us will ever dream of.
You plain black and white world, where one characteristic can paint the world "guilty" on a complete stranger with total conviction on your part, must be extremely banal...
There will be no -0- violence in 'MeriKa.
An effeminate culture submits to its masters...
Welcome to the New Feudalism, same as the Old Boss.
you are right about the no violence in america, or at least the violence will be minimal, sporadic, and unorganized from the disenfranchised and they can't afford decent weapons anyway. That's why I get tired of all the armchair anarchists on this site. None of you people hoping for a revolution would dare participate if you thought you might get a booboo out of it. none of you people hinting at violence as a just solution have the balls to do anything.
oh wait. some of you have the balls to junk people for having a different opinion. Brave souls!
I happen to agree with you.But then i walk barefoot, grow my own food and like sleeping outside. If i had never been in the Army i am certain i would be softer now.
Have an extra junk for being a pussy.
Trolls and pussies...
scoshi johnson (got the jr part right): are you employed by SEIU?
perhaps you've seen the "organized" protests for tuition "assistance" in GB? How were they organized?
Wonder what Lady Maggie would have done? (...sh...sh..I'd bet it would have been a different response.)
- Ned
Are you sure you aren't just doing what shrinks call "projecting"? I know plenty of people with "decent weapons" who are not pansies, although I am not "hoping for a revolution". Most people do not understand the issues well enough at this point to have any hope of effectively motivating them to fight for their rights.
You're joking, right?
I grew up transversing the country with my Grandad (Bonded Owner-Operator) in the 60s/70s, and I witnessed the pussification of 'MeriKans first-hand.
Stripmall from Sea-To-Shining-Sea, debt to the eyeballs and rolling over for the (D) & (R) Kleptocracy at EVERY turn...
Became part of the *patriot* movement after the torching of 80+ men, women & children @ Waco woke me the fuck up...
Volunteered to travel around the country trying to make a difference;
> Speaking at churches with researchers, politicians and just regular ol' conspira-addicts.
> Was an active part of Dr. Eugene Schroder's Common Law Grand Jury...
http://www.constitution.org/pub/nam6205a.htm
I discovered the Sons of Liberty had virtually disappeared in the USofA, everyone scared shitless by the .GOV and politically correct talking heads.
USA R.I.P. 1776-1933
dicky dicky try thinking with the big head for a change.
it only takes a few good men to create havoc.
do you forget the dc sniper dudes?
that meets all your criteria.
it's a hoot when someone says there WILL BE no violence in america.
we are already the most violent country on earth.
As to the weapons , well I recall a lot of cops I know complaining about being outgunned.
You are thinking the "poor" dark inner cities are where the violence is coming from it seems.
Check Katrina, they were the ones getting killed.
guess who?
The film is thin and voluntary.
Yep, always a few hooligans and whackjobs losing it - LEOs, clean-up in District 9...
BTW, the OP/YouTube vid was implying Civil uprising.
To have that you need:
> A unified culture
> Courageous *freedom* fighters led by some sort of leadership.
Ain't gonna happen in dumbed-down-to-succumb, politically correct, multi-cultural, post-Christian 'MeRiKa.
The funny part is, no violence is needed to take back the country from the Kleptocrats.
All that is need is for at least 1/3 of the electorate to understand and embrace the following:
EOM
Hell yeah! Great posts.
... er ...
Our Dear Leader has his panties in a twist, so he'll go back to ol' Billy's point of view:
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/s/sept_11_2...
below the fold.
"we didn't do enough ..."
- Ned
effeminate culture? where YOU livin? gotta love broad generalizations....
Yes I would love to see violence. It's time to burn more than green bud.
Took my family deep into the countryside for a Sunday picnic. Found a lovely grassy area and set about our task. Placed our lunch items on a blanket and we sat and talked and laughed and ate.
Along came man who barked "Get off my land".
I explained what we were about and meant no harm.
" It's my land. Get off."
I remarked on the lovely scenery and inquired how how he got the property.
"I inherited it from my father!"
"How did he get it?"
"He fought the indians for it!"
"Oh", I said. "Then I'll fight you for it."
[hat tip Robert Frost, Amer poet]
Unearned wealth...
Easy come, easy go.
"the expense of defending the society, and that of supporting the dignity of the chief magistrate, are both laid out for the general benefit of the whole society. It is reasonable, therefore, that they should be defrayed by the general contribution of the whole society, all the different members contributing, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities."
"When the toll upon carriages of luxury, upon coaches, post-chaises, &c. is made somewhat higher in proportion to their weight, than upon carriages of necessary use, such as carts, waggons, &c. the indolence and vanity of the rich is made to contribute in a very easy manner to the relief of the poor, by rendering cheaper the transportation of heavy goods to all the different parts of the country."
(The Wealth of Nations)
No, say it ain't so! Not Adam Smith!
He spent too much time tutoring that spoilt French kid.
right at the end, there was a graph of the tax rate of the wealthy
at the end there was a suggestion that we need a better educated and more highly skilled work force
we'll have the best educated 7-11 clerks in the world, the productive wealth creation, manufacturing has been and continues to be outsourced.
I knew a man with a masters degree, who could not change a flat tire, without help
Agreed -- the video looks at the symptom, not the problem.
The problem: Increased leverage; increased fraud; captured regulators; disconnect between the "leverage industry" and all other industries. Quite simply, growth in GDP over the past 30 years is merely growth in debt, *not* due to productivity, and this benefited the finance sector (e.g., "Wall Street") at the expense of everyone else.
In short: The problem is NOT the "rich". Rather, the problem is very specifically the "Finance Sector Rich".
Everyone should be very careful to *not* engage in simplistic class warfare.
Similarly, we have logarithmic growth in the finance sector that is absolutely parasitic: Rather than allocating capital to productive activities, it performed ponzi operations to shovel cash (through fraud) to a few insiders.
So, the video is incorrect: It is NOT "class warfare" between "rich v. poor". Rather, it is sector warfare between "Wall Street" and "Main Street". (Wall Street has merely been rewarded through fraudulent accounting, leverage, and ponzi, including fault by captured regulators, incompetent central planners, bad public policy, and both political parties.)
I like your reply better then mine... :)
yes, excellent. The key is how much the financial sector has grown relative to all others. And exactly what do they make?
They create wealth. Or, more precisely, debt. But everything is debt anyway, and we all use it - directly or otherwise.
....nice charts. # 1 and #3 look like gators opening wide to swallow up somebodies.
Absolutely fantastic post. My point to the gentleman above. It's not the Rich, they are next on the chopping block. It's the financial rich and central bankers. They want the whole enchilada.
First they disempowered the masses, the rich had to be last. So you are right not to engage in class warfare but that goes both ways. The rich need to start being there for the poor as far as rights go. Don't just sit back and watch while the poor are stripped of everything. A force that rapacious will look to feed on the only source left, the rich. Rich people need to start speaking out like TD has done.
However, the non-financial sector rich have benefited mightily from the policies lobbied by the financial people. And I haven't seen too many of them protesting.
I absolutely agree with that. They need to pick their teams wisely. Thus far their "allies" sure have done a number on everyone else.
Spot on mikla.
We need to change the tax code. Taxes should be raised on the FIRE sector of the economy and on passive income and taxes needed to be reduced on earned income.
IMHO it's not fair that someone could be retired with a multi-million dollar portfolio of munis and pay nothing in taxes whereas a minimum wage earner is paying 15.3% of their wages in taxes (FICA).
But the rich own the politicians who write the tax code which allows this to happen. Eventually this greed will reach a tipping point, though the question is do we resolve this peacefully or through violence?
It's not about the tax code, per se. It's the whole system. The bigger issue, besides the point made above about the FIRE system and its parasitic nature, is that corporate managers/executives have virtually unlimited compensation powers - at the expense of the common shareholders. HP execs are forced out and still get 8-figure severance and then get a signing bonus elsewhere. It's not about re-distribution through taxes. It's about a whole lot of other things that start with the income structure itself.
That's exactly right. Until the tax system or some other government entity addresses this, Fortune 500 corporations can effectively be looted not by the stockholders, but by the hired hands who manage them, especially at the top. That's been the most important factor in the incredible redistribution of American wealth upwards to the top 10,000 or so Americans.
far more accurate "until"...2008 represents an actual "gifting" of money directly from the taxpayer to Wall Street "with more on the way" according the Ben "the maniac" Bernanke. The irony of course is "too much of a good thing may be bad for Wall Street." By monetizing the debt (thereby debasing it) Ben is driving down growth rates by causing an irrational "flight to the perceived quality of debt." Worse yet "the market could call him out" making him the greatest phuck up in monetary history. With all the clowns on the street "larding up on the sure thing" called debt "making the switcheroo to equity" just doesn't work to well. I think the technical term is "penalty on early withdrawal." And of course "should equities suddenly pop higher" that could most definitely cause the treasury complex to "pop dowards" with rates soaring higher due to "fear of a Fed induced bubble bubble now BURSTING" since "as we look at the history of the Fed over the past 20 years that appears to be all the Fed knows how to do." That and "invert the yield curve so hard for so long it causes Wall Street to be brought to its knees." What if Mr. Market instead of mere Alan Greenspan decides to invert the yield curve? Can't happen you say? Well as Greece and Ireland found out "it can't happen until it does" and then....
Rich vs Financial Sector Rich
Whats the difference? If the football players and movie stars get looted, so what? Are the rich a bunch of inventors going door to door selling products?
The difference is *huge*.
A "Mom&Pop" S-Corp or LLC will gross $5M in a year, to net a "salary" of $60K, after working 100-hour weeks with no vacations. On paper, they are "rich". However, they did *not hurt anybody*: They have no power to tax, nor force you to buy their product, nor coerce you into doing *anything*.
In contrast, Goldman executives are paid 2x-3x book value, directly by the taxpayer. The COMEX market is price-fixed organized crime. JPM orchestrates colluded raping of the retail investor. Fannie&Freddie used the Taxpayer as their personal piggy bank. All of these executives make 8- and 9- and 10-figure salaries, and these people are the problem.
You can throw in some politicians that go from negative net worth to +$5M net worth in a year, if you want, as *also* part of the problem.
You make it sound like the Mom&Pops are all sainthood. How many benefit from illegal aliens, for example? They don't give a shit about labor any more than Goldman.
Of course not all Mom&Pops are the same. However, that is irrelevant:
If you punish Mom&Pops for existing, they won't exist.
If you get rid of Mom&Pops, you have no economy anymore *at all*. (That also happens to mean you no longer have anything to tax -- good luck with that.)
Mikla wins.
Your idea of an economy is so last decade....don't you know, we don't need mom and pops anymore, all we need is Ben Bernanke and the Feds.
WOW, mikla you just keep nailing it. +10
The difference between Jay Z and Mark Cuban? One wants to own a professional sports team.
double unjunk hat tip to milka, thank you for providing us appropriate ammo to argue and win this point. . .
read "Bad Money" by k.phillips.
anyone with a brain knew where we were going
several years ago.
+1 spot on! I would venture to say that most ZH don't have a problem with making money, the complaint is the fucking system is on tilt.
bingo. Now where's our manufacturing?
+1
Although it's true the FIRE folks deserve a great deal more opprobium at this point than some groups, it's important not to forget that there is still a significant population whose wealth depends on blowing shit up and burning lots of oil to do so.
In other words: while we can all agree the banksters suck, don't forget that Big Oil and Big Weaponry interests are not doing the country any favors either.
If it hadn't been for those other interests, we wouldn't have shit all over the Mid-East for the past decade. That turned out to be a losing investment.
It was a losing investment for most but not for all.
every day Dick Fuld remains free, Timmay remains our TreasSec, Bernank as chancellor and the vampire squid is 90 for 90 in the black trading puts an additional exclamation to your point.
The Wall Street bosses are the new Robber Barons, and their employees are the new gangstas and thugs.
HOWEVER - In the past, the government didn't necessarily help the Robber Barons steal more. In fact, the entire U.S. system of financial laws was overhauled back then to stop the Robber Baron's from accumulating more wealth unscrupulously.
The SHERMAN ANTI-TRUST ACT OF 1890 is a prime example.
I think it is much, much deeper then tax rates.
Globalization is merely labor and regulatory arbitrage that suppresses labor rates. Distributed corporate ownership means corporate managers can increase their compensation without any checks and balances (through self-serving compensation studies). Regulatory capture means the playing field is no longer level/even for smaller players. Increasing tax and regulatory complexity favors larger and larger firms. GE has a 30,000 page tax return and pays NO US taxes. The FIRE economy skims wealth from the system with fees, interest, commissions, etc.
No, not really. The rich in the USA do not pay their fair share and they hold the keys to power so it's not gonna change anytime soon.
"The rich in the USA do not pay their fair share..."
Define rich.
...and which angels will define "fair" ?
I was trying to take it one step at a time ;-)
If you have to ask, you're a complete dumbshit.
rich ain't the 200,000 a year income the apparatchiks define it as, phuckstick.
that's what, in the TOP TWO PERCENT of salaries?
Fuck me if that ain't rich. And I earn it.
I'm not sure why everyone is so caught up in salaries... I would be more concerned with net wealth... hell, an idiot making 200k a year that ends up with zero retained earnings at the end of the year is probably keeping up quite a few lesser paying jobs with those consumption habits... These aren't the folks to worry about... it's the concentration of wealth that ultimately matters.
"an idiot making 200k a year that ends up with zero retained earnings at the end of the year is probably keeping up quite a few lesser paying jobs with those consumption habits."
Exactly so.
We have dumbed down the definition of "rich" to mean someone who has at least one toy more in their garage than their next door neighbor.
When I was growing up a millionaire was "rich"...now, apparently, it's a couple with two kids, a dog, a cat, who can still afford to pay on a mortgage...LOL.
"These aren't the folks to worry about..."
Indeed.
But maybe a better way to point out the lunacy of this 200k wage number is this.
If 200k is "rich" then why do Senatorial Staff positions average 174k?...average means average of course...a Senator can afford (at our expense of course!!!...screaming, now!!!) to hire five coffee fetchers at 45k to knock down the 275k staffers salary to "average" out to 174k on the ledger.
http://www.legistorm.com/member/85/Sen_Chuck_Schumer_NY.html
Now this begs the question...how is it that we allow staff members of Senators (and House members) to stand on the cusp of becoming "rich"? We are talking staff members here...not rocket scientists.
I would love for one our resident statist lovers to defend this ;-)
But we all know what the truth is...to even "hope" to afford all the government expenditures at these current levels they had to redefine "rich" downward.
Downward to the point of being absurd.
I find it useful to treat rich as a relative value and define it to be anyone that makes 5000 times more than the other person.
I spend an ounce they spend 5000 ounces.
So their is no absolute amount one should or should not make, but it is only relative amounts that matter.
Therefore poverty is not an absolute amount but only relative. And the only way you can cure that is redistribution.
Equal outcomes for all. Workers unite. State redistribution of wealth.
Could have sworn we spent a few decades fighting that ideology -- thought we won, but apparently not.
Rich is when you can live off compound interest (other peoples sweat)-the traditional term of being a gentleman.
You know, this is a far better question than is generally recognized.
A definition that I'm pretty happy with is:
It makes for a pretty small set of people these days, but I think it's one of the better ways of thinking about how to place the bar. One of the things I rather like about this definition is that it is not *essentially* tied to possession of money.
You are absolutely right trader joe.
Going to quarterly earnings sheet for GE, it looks like they have paid $1,500,000,000 in taxes so far this year.
Earlier this week I saw a Bernie Sanders video where he said Exxon paid no taxes last year. In fact they paid $15,100,000,000 in income taxes last year.
Some people don't let facts get in the way of ideology.
http://money.cnn.com/2010/04/16/news/companies/ge_7000_tax_returns/
Right back at ya... :)
I doubt that we'll ever see a redistrbution of wealth other than what was shown on the video. However, when this whole ponzi scheme of the upper crust collapses, it won't be a redistribution, per se, but an equalization. The bottom 70% don't have much to lose.
Poverty is a great equalizer -- just go back and study the '30s.
I'm in complete agreement. The local communities will go first as almost all costs are paid-in by lower income classes. Without fairer income distribution you won't have functioning economy: households can't even afford to buy food.
"fairer" being equal? More equal? The same as 1967? What made 1967 the right distribution of income? What makes 2010 the wrong mix of income?
Central planners unite.
So is Sam Colt...
I believe that was the point of the video... if you watched it before tapping away at Glenns "talking points" you would see there has been decades of "re-distribution of wealth"... from all classes to the top 1%.
FUCK your clueless, pathetic rant!
and what can a trader or investor do about it right now? rather than getting angry and tilting at windmills do something constructive. Buy some puts or something and go long the spx.
Yea, and how much of those "taxes" actually are spent for the "people" and how much is stolen back by the wealthy thru "our" government. Milestones
A very relevant point.
Spot on Miles.
Riddle me this Captain dipshit: did the rich obtain their wealth via a free market? Or does the current fiat/ponzi system enable the rich to exponentially grow their wealth via political connections, FED policy (see: inflation, fractional reserve banking), carry trades and bailouts? Google paid a weighted average federal tax rate of 2% last year, my brother the CPA who makes $55k/year paid about 15% - fair you say? The inteligent folks around these parts do not want re-distribution of wealth, they want an even playing field, a true free market. The current system is designed to keep the rich richer and the poor poorer - that's not capitalism, it's crony-capitalism. Open your eyes to this FACT.
Well Spoken Sir!
Well said.
Riddle yourself, pin brain. In YOUR world is EVERY "rich" man connected to politicians and finance and spooning from graft and born with silver spoons up thier asses?
I'm technically rich and certainly under the fucking "Bulls-eye" as far as the masses are concerned. Never mind that when I left high school I went straight into the nearest Community College cause at that time that's what a stock clerk at a drug store could afford. Never mind that I busted my ass 7 years setting curves way out of reach for nincompoops like you, and ended up EARNING a scholarship for my graduate work at Stanford (degrees #4 and #5). Never mind that I'm a fucking Aerospace Engineer who can make robots dance in ways well fewer than 1 in 10,000 in this country could ever hope to do; to YOU, none of that matters.
God freaking save us from idiots that never made it past 2 non-intersecting circles on Venn diagrams.
Edited to add (after about an hour): Ah. I feel better now for venting!
I'd like to (half) apologize. The first part of your post hit one of my triggers: lumping all rich into a "guilty" bucket.
The end of your post suggests exactly what I hope for. The world is kaleidoscope of shades of grey, with pure white or black being extremely rare. Situations are almost always complex and interleaved, and simplistic solutions to complex problems are often brutal when they spill over onto people that shouldn't have been impacted at all.
For many, a level playing field is all that is desired.
I personally think that taxation is trying to fix the problem from the back end, after the damage has been done. That damage occurs from a whole mess of mucked up systems, that are biased to put money into select occupations unfairly, a few being:
Start fixing the original drivers of our tax needs like the things in this list, and the first thing you'll notice is the overall tax need dropping. Hey! Novel idea: maybe what we are currently collecting is enough to support a government centered on individual freedoms and level playing fields, as opposed to a nanny state of entitlements. We need a world where poor boys can work their butts off and one day be rich, and where rich boys can grow up and blow fortunes and end up destitute. Darwin would be proud.
"I personally think that taxation is trying to fix the problem from the back end, after the damage has been done."
Well said.
now you carry water for the plutocrats on ZH?
The people most interested in taking away what YOU have earned are your OWN EXECUTIVES.
They are RIGHT NOW trying to figure out how they can replace you with an Indian so that THEY can divide up your former paycheck amongst themselves.
They don't give a FUCK about your story, your work ethic, your skills. You are a human resource to them with a cost point that they are looking to shrink. Because that is the SUREST way to increase their own bonuses, is to reduce the cost of the human resources.
they're probably underfunding your pension too
So fight back. RIGHT NOW start your own business and become your OWN EXECUTIVE. Then you can appropriately care for every employee and not think about shrinking costs or those pesky shareholders. It is all very easy.
Alternatively become an EXECUTIVE of an evil corporation and hire lots of people at top dollar.
We all need to do our part to solve the problems we see instead of just complain. The easier place to start may be to start by sharing your paycheck with those who make less than you or do not have a job. That's what I do.
Never mind that I'm a fucking Aerospace Engineer who can make robots dance in ways well fewer than 1 in 10,000 in this country could ever hope to do; to YOU, none of that matters.
It matters to me!
When you can make one Lap Dance gimme a call.
Good post - one of the few ive seen here that wasn't immediately junked simply because a mention of a higher education is acknowledged (apparently college education is uncool for ZHers).
Concerning:
I would have to agree, and add, its not only the financial services industry and other execs that are the ones who are making the big $$$. Look at the ridiculously paid movie/music/pro sports stars. And not even stars - even a decent rookie out of college in the NHL (or NBA if this hits closer to home for my American friends) gets a starting salary way above $90,000k their first year. Are these NOT part of the problem? Or is it because we enjoy their antics on the TV that we can look past their salaries?
And what about Canadian escorts porn (sucking) stars that make in a day what the average Joe makes in a month? They can reach the top if they fuck enough (I know one that even owns some gold and silver maple leaf bullions after sucking more than a thousand dicks).
We will soon hit the web with our
MAKEGOODUSEOFYOURPUSSYDOTCOM
Agreed. Any escorts for that matter.
Though at least their services are quite tangible indeed.
+1 Chick
+1
"Never mind that I'm a fucking Aerospace Engineer"
Well I'm proud of you dude but working in Aerospace you are in a career field that is financed and highly protected by the US government.
Hey Croaker
When Hank Paulson stands up in Congress and says "we gots ta give my pal Croak $700 billion ta SAVE the SYSTEM" then I will despise you.
Until then you have my admiration.
Thank you.
SWC,
Great story (really), and I congratulate you, and anyone else capable of fighting the inertia of poverty. I was born dirt poor and managed (after many years) to retire as President of a mid sized Aerospace business (special processing), so I know it's a hard row to hoe.
Don Miguel Ruiz's wonderful book, The Four Agreements, may be of interest to you (I believe Oprah is a big fan). These four simple agreements form the basis of a way of life with less stress and angst, and the most powerful (IMHO) is the Second Agreement... "Don't Take Anything Personally."
You seem to have taken the growing resistance to the inequality in America personally... but it's not about you, or anyone else for that matter. It's about a system (a culture) that builds barriers, making the kind of success you've been able to achieve even more difficult for "them that's not" (who "shall lose"). It's those that firmly believe it is their right to hold on to their privileged position at any cost, that make the best schools (almost) an impossible dream for those without (they are "for profit" and are effective tools in the war for status quo... any hint of straying from the plan is attacked as "socialism," and the masses fall in line like good little soldiers); that attack funding of the public school system as unproductive and lobby for private schools... that of course only the privileged can afford; that attack any assistance to the collateral damage of these (and and so many other) policies as "communist" and "nanny state" initiatives.
I'll stop here, but assume (Agreement # 3 is "Don't Make Assumptions" but in this case I will) you get my point... it's not about you, it's about giving more people (that simply do not have your ability or drive but are capable... and not lazy) the opportunity to achieve, and much more important (and, oh my, I will pay for this) to give hope to so many that have none, given the current situation.
That's a canned, and frankly stupid, response. If anything, the video lends itself to accepting the obvious: The game is rigged. It's not that we didn't know that for a while but the uber wealthy have slicked it up nicely.
I don't see any mention of "redistribution of wealth" or even a hint of that idea.
What we need, however, is a level playing field whereby our elected officials are basically hung and we start over. Start back with the Constitution and run the game again.
You no longer "live a life" in America--it's all designed for you. You now live it according to a strict set of rules or lose. That has resulted in what we see in the video.
The average American cannot even understand the rules or the premise of the game.
The game is rigged and what are you going to do about it?
Good question. Wish I had a good answer.
You keep asking what people are going to do about it.. Are you prompting people for a certain reply?
I've wondered that as well. 1 week 1 day membership and already on auto-junk for many if his prior posts are any indication. Maybe "provoking" as in provocateur might be a better verb.
i got out. Cant pay taxes cause i am no longer in business. I refuse to use the dollar as much as possible. I now own nothing, no titles, ins. etc. Until folks go to jail i withdraw, downsize and dissappear. Growing my own food and staying home. As a hobo i may go hungry, it may be cold but i will have myself, i wont be owned.
I can't believe he got 4 spam flags for simply telling the truth.
I'm seeking confirmation that Hillary C. will do a blow job to anybody willing to give her a silver bullion. Just need her phone. Please help.
They didn't go into why the super rich are getting richer. If they did, they would have found that those who are making so much more than everyone else are on the receiving end of government payments and subsidies (including those benefiting from being the first to get freshly printed money). Those who's wealth did not increase, but fell as a share of the total did not.
The video said nothing about taxes.
BINGO.
Those at the top are at the trough. The regional labor unions opposed NAFTA, for obvious reasons.
The national union leadership, owned and bought, told them to shut up and supported it. Ross Perot was not lying.
Now, here we are, you "own" a company, you don't share in the profits as a shareholder bc dividends are low as shit. You work for a company, executives are right now salivating as to how to replace your human resource with a cheaper resource so that THEY can take the difference and pocket it!
So, if you're born into the plutocrat class, congrats. I know a few people who found their way into this. The richest people I know are connected to the government tit like a starving hog. Times have never been better for them. So far as for one to say that they didn't believe there was any kind of housing crisis (in 08)
Help me out Trav what was the Italian gentleman's word for the merger between state and corporations?
It is more about demanding a fair and level playing field ... which would mean there would be no need or desire for "wealth redistribution"
This siphoning of the wealth to the top didn't happen because they are all so much smarter than the rest of us .... the game is rigged and people have every right to be pissed.
Of course it is too late for that now and is a case of "the means justifies the end....."
YES, asshole, redistribution.
This situation is created through SYSTEMATIC efforts BY the very top of the 1% to capture income from the other strata for themselves.
The executives never LIKED sharing corporate profits with rank and file workers. They don't LIKE that you are allowed to fly on the same planes as they do and stay in the same hotels or that your kids could go to the same schools.
So they came up with shit like NAFTA and outsourcing in order to make the corporation more profitable and drive their own bonuses through the fucking roof. They bribed whichever Congress they needed to in order to systematically repeal every protection.
Now we have a parasite class looking to remove every job other than their own to fucking China or Vietnam and, no, not pay a dividend, but pay a bigger BONUS. Every laid off worker's salary went into some executive's pocket as a bonus.
I love how each and every idiot who defends this crap has some jiminy cricket fucking dream that they can "work" their way up into this plutocracy. DREAM ON, morons. Those seats are already reserved for the plutocrats' kids.
The top 10% should pay less taxes because they EARN LESS and the other 90% should pay more due to EARNING MORE.
Oh, and on my way out, fuck you.
Trav,
(just in case you come back) your post wreaks of a defeatist mindset. You have a unique ability to express your firm grasp of our current environment in a most unpalatable fashion, but then this ain't no disco. Throw me a bone, what's your solution? Are you strapped? Off the grid? Pimpin on the East Side?
Trav's not so much a defeatist as he is a realist. We need to realize what were dealing with before we figure the correct method to solve it. As he points out, it's mostly criminal and political
The underlying cause, by consensus:
"SYSTEMATIC efforts BY the very top of the 1% to capture income from the other strata for themselves."
Politicians and executives mostly (primarily in finance), maybe a couple of owners and two or three families in particular who don't need repeating seems to be the perpetrators, indictable evidence withstanding (forthcoming?). I'm happy a previous poster mentioned to not divide a class war focused generally on 'the rich'. Perhaps some of them came to prominence through good old fashioned ingenuity. I agree in part with the opinion that the hallowed halls of absolute power are limited to those already in the know yet I also feel improving ones standing in this world is possible and necessary if 'we' are to shake this funk.
Agreed DJ, its REALITY. Don't know how in hell this could be viewed as defeatist...
Pretty much. An impressive amount of people on ZH see the gravity of the situation we are in. There are a few different ideas on who's fault it is. Solutions though seem to be in scarce supply due to the enormity and complexity of the problems created by the globalist push (putsch?). Been quite a few folks who seem to crave licking a jackboot as well recently. ZH has become quite big recently. Still, the comments here are incredible. The exchange of ideas and no-holds barred rhetoric is awesome. Seems most are begining to form a similar big picture. Hopefully that clarity will bring about more solutions.
I've been meaning to ask is the Cthulu in your avatar? That's what I always think about when I see it. Lovecraft, lol.
Trav, you talk a lot of sense almost always, good man.
to anyone still around, my point is...
in more recent times the periods after both world wars have co-incided with rises in standards for ordinary people.... hospitals in the hamptons are now being turned back into millionaires row after being claimed after ww2
does it just boil down to healing after war or is it loss of population ...and is it immigration that causes the elites to divide and conqer
coi i am an immigrant who left shithole uk
Trav, you talk a lot of sense almost always, good man.
to anyone still around, my point is...
in more recent times the periods after both world wars have co-incided with rises in standards for ordinary people.... hospitals in the hamptons are now being turned back into millionaires row after being claimed after ww2
does it just boil down to healing after war or is it loss of population ...and is it immigration that causes the elites to divide and conqer
coi i am an immigrant who left shithole uk
Trav, you talk a lot of sense almost always, good man.
to anyone still around, my point is...
in more recent times the periods after both world wars have co-incided with rises in standards for ordinary people.... hospitals in the hamptons are now being turned back into millionaires row after being claimed after ww2
does it just boil down to healing after war or is it loss of population ...and is it immigration that causes the elites to divide and conqer
coi i am an immigrant who left shithole uk
and i'm totally baked
That's pretty astute.
Quit complaining and buy off your own d@mn Congress(wo)man already!
Follow the yellow brick road. Apply all of the facets of constitutional clauses to all the halls of bureaucracy. Simple, fair, beautiful.
Great clip.
Soooo we're becoming a two tier society...
Becoming? There have only ever been and ever will be two tiers; Producers and Paracites.
Move along...
Now I wish David Stockman would reindoctrinate us as to why he thought " trickle down " was a lot of bullshit 25 years ago. A nice shot of vindication for him.
I have to agree with that.
everyone knew it at the time , were you of age?
,,
were you of age then?
it was well known then.
it was a means to an end and well here we are.
do you like it?
While it might make people feel better, at this point even a 33% increase in the top marginal tax rate would do little to stem the tide in a wealth bubble backboned by inflated asset values.
There is no right move to avoid social unrest.
social unrest certainly may occur. If you are an investor, no matter how little you have, just remember when blood is on the streets it is the best time to go long. However we will not tolerate what the Brits tolerate. At least in the south I don't think we will have real british style riots because everyone knows here that the police will shoot.
A 24-hour sustained violent protest would result in one thing for certain: The police going home.
Yes, we have created a coast to coast paramility police state; however, they are what most of them have always been: Public dole cowards.
The difference in America is that we simply have more to lose as individuals. Once few have much to lose then the entire equation changes drastically.
True, but off point... admitting they have far too much, and certainly do not need more in this environment, is a start.
Landed gentry or rabble?
Was not aware that income equalization / smoothing was a stated US goal (understanding it is unstated by many). We did fight against that ideology for a few decades (and thought we won, but maybe not). If the video authors were truly enlightened and want to show compassion to all, they would have run those same statistics on a global basis. Probably would have found the bottom US quintile in the top global decile. (not sure if the numbers presented included all of the taxpayer paid assistance the bottom half receives, but guessing not).
I do not believe education and training per se is the solution -- it is reasonably available now and we still have problems and unequal outcomes. One can take the available free-cheap education that is available to nearly all Americans and advance themselves considerably. But if you do not work hard (starting in elementary school and through college), it will be an uphill grind. So your parents should be constantly nagging you about your performance in school (tough love). Now you can not take up any area of college education (German classic literature for example) and expect to find plentiful gainful employment. Need to pick a practical area of study, get good grades and work very hard upon graduation - compete like you want to win. Then you have a shot at making an OK living and might be fortunate and do better than average.
Other relevant factors for the video would include how the makeup of each of the income quintiles does not remain static (there is more movement among quintiles than one might expect). Also, the top 10% of earners pay 70% of all federal income taxes (bottom 50% pays approx 2% of all federal income taxes) - so there is a fair amount of smoothing going on (not that that's a stated goal).
See mikia's post above.
The real problem is the transfer of wealth from all other sectors of the economy to the financial "industry" - which by all accounts should be an acting middle man in a properly functioning economy and not in a resource command role.
A healthy financial sector in a properly functioning system grows with an economy by facilitating resource allocation, not off of it by over leveraging assets and creating synthetic assets based on the future rate of return on those - and on and on.
Education leading to increased earning potential based on ones ability to add value to the economy is the answer - in a properly functioning economy.
This is not a properly functioning economy.
Excellent points!
Education leading to increased earning potential based on ones ability to add value to the economy is the answer
Most of the educated (eg physicists) trying to add value to the physical economy could not do so, therefore, they ended up in the FIRE sector. The never ending pipedream: GET EDUCATED in a world of labor arbitrage with 6+ billion people. At least the fucking MBA's grasped long ago that that pathway was career suicide.