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Soak Wealth, Not Income?
Two big problems America faces are that there is not enough tax revenue, and income is skewed to the top 10%. These issues will define the 2012 election. Obama wants to lower the taxes that middle-income earners pay at the expense of those bastards who are in the lofty top 10% of income. Romney wants to lower taxes across the board, but his plan heavily favors the shit heels that are at the top of the pile. This chart compares the two candidate's proposals: .
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The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) wrote on this topic last week, presenting the following chart to describe what is happening:
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The CBO used the actual IRS tax data from 2009, so this info is an accurate description of who made what and what taxes were paid. The results confirm the problem. The top 20% of income earners make 51% of all income. This same group pays fully 68% of all Federal tax dollars. So who are these “fat cats” who are on top of the income pile and how much are they making? The results are surprising, the following shows the incomes for those in the top 20%:
So who are these "wealthy" people in America?
Nearly half of those “rich folks” are a husband and wife who each make $65,000 a year. I understand that there are plenty of folks who don’t earn this much, but if those same people think that the households that bring in $132k a year are “rich”, they are wrong.
The people in this group are not fat cats, they are not rich and they are not bastards. This is your Dr., Dentist, accountant, small business owner. This group is what fuels the economy. Take half their income away and you have a big fall.
If you’re wondering who fits into this income group (91st to 95th percentile) consider that every Senator and Congressman is in this bracket.
We get up to the stratosphere of income when household income averages $272,000 a year (96 -99%). The folks in this group have nothing to complain about; they are doing fine. But I ask the question, “Are they truly getting rich?”
Then you get to the top of the pile. The average salary for the top 1% is a whopping $1,220,000. So the reality is that the top 1% includes:
- Damn near every pro athlete.
- Any face that you see on the silver screen.
- The bozos you see on TV every day (including the “names” on CNBC).
- Paul Krugman (His book sales this year will make him a 1%er.)
- Mitt Romney. But we shouldn’t forget that Obama is also in the 1% group. In 2010 the Prez made nearly five times the average income of those top 1% earners.
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Now lets see who is paying federal income taxes. This chart from the CBO report includes transfers from the federal government: .
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- The negative tax rates for the bottom 40% (minus 9.3% for the lowest quintile, and minus 2.6% for the second lowest quintile) includes payments of Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid and other government transfers.
- The middle 20% has an average income of $64,000 but pays only an average of 1.3% in Federal taxes.
- Those who make $93.5k (the fourth highest quintile) are still only paying 4.6% of their income in federal taxes, on average.
- The highest 20% of income earners pay 13.4% of their income on average. The breakdown of tax rates among this group are:
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Many people are advocating raising taxes on people who are making the "big bucks". What would happen if there was a giant increase in taxes? Assume that those "fat cats" that earned more than $250k had to pay 50% in income taxes and the “super rich” (top 1%) had to pay 75% of their income in Federal taxes.
Would that solve the problem? The answer is yes and no.
If taxes had been 50% for the 96-99% group and 75% for the top 1% in 2009, it would have generated addition tax revenues of $770B. A very big chunk of change. Projected deficits as far as the eye can see are in excess of $1 Trillion. Raising taxes on the top 5% would eliminate three-quarters of the shortfall. This result would be close enough to a balanced approach to take most of the budget pressure off of the table.
If we truly sock it to those with high current incomes, we can solve one problem. But another one is created. If we raise income taxes to levels that now exist in France, the result will be that 5% of the working population will be paying 80% of all income taxes! A large percentage of American’s might like an outcome like this. A manageable deficit; paid for by soaking the rich. I’m sorry to tell them that it won’t work. A plan where 5% pay 80% is not going to work. A plan that sucked $3/4 of a trillion of income out of the economy would result in a near immediate depression.
I look at the information provided by the CBO and conclude that there is no way out of the revenue hole the country is in by raising income taxes. While tax increases are part of the fix, cutting expenses has to provide the heavy lifting. But that is a joke, as there are very few places to cut expenses without also cutting entitlements. So cutting expenses is another political dead end.
There is no combination of cutting expenses and raising income taxes that would actually be effective. There is an additional option.
The only alternative is a wealth tax. Anyone who has a net worth over $5m (or $20m, or chose a number) has to pay 1% (or 2%) of that amount, every year. It would be like a death tax, except you paid it while you were alive. Think - pre-paid estate taxes.
Warren Buffett is always complaining that he doesn’t pay enough in taxes. The guy has a net worth of about $40b. If there was a 2% wealth tax he would have to cough up an extra $800m a year. That would shut him up quick; it would also solve all the fiscal problems.
Bill Gates would be forced to come up with an extra $1.2B. The Walton family would have to pony up $1.6B. And the good old Koch brothers would toss in a $1b.
If a 2% wealth tax was applied to everyone who had a net worth in excess of $5m it would add up to about $700B a year. That’s just about the right amount to get the budget to where it starts to make sense. This tax increase would not come out of current income, therefore the consequences to the economy would be muted versus a similar sized income tax increase.
Hopefully, I've convinced some readers that raising income taxes is a dead end. It may sound like a politically “smart” thing to say, but it doesn’t mean spit when shown in the light. Taxing income does not get the job done without too many adverse consequences. Only a wealth tax can make a dent.
I’m amazed that Team Obama has not proposed a tax on America’s wealthy. They must have concluded that there is no other option to balance the books. Maybe Buffett is blowing smoke in Obama’s ears. He should be. Buffett is going to get fleeced if something like this were to happen.
Note: I doubt we will hear talk of a wealth tax before the election. It would be very bad for Obama’s fund raising efforts if he brought it up. That does not mean he will not propose this if he is re-elected. I don’t see another away around the budget problems.
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And what will you eat the day after? Hump.
Transition won't be easy, but you have to start somewhere. The trajectory we're on, where corporate lobbyists write laws that help their bottom lines, isn't democracy and isn't sustainable.
your collectivist fantasy has failed whenever and wherever it has been tried. Give it up and go away. When the govt proves it can spend wisely, then we can worry about how much we should give them.
"I’m amazed that Team Obama has not proposed a tax on America’s wealthy" ... These are the very people that retain the lobbyists who write the laws, influence (control) their passage, and discourage dissent via the media. We can't even mention a means (wealth measure) test to limit social security outlays. There is no political solution that can happen. Money printing is the only option left that contains no political consequence ... for now anyway.
Quote via TruthInSunshine:
— Andrew Jackson (7th US President, when forcing the closure of the Second Bank of the US in 1836 by revoking its charter)
Com'on Bruce, why this harsplitting, just confiscate all wealth and income. Problem solved!
you convinced me. but the problem is greater than that. even with a wealth redistribution we still face oil depletion and ecosystem disruption etc. but your plan, if it didnt cause people to go postal, would be a start
Bruce, I thought you were kidding about this shit, but you're satellite serious! This is just stupider than Jupiter, BK, and so was your global warming solution from the other day. It is all now in context and I fear you must have suffered a blow to your head within the last week.
Oh sure, let's not cut the perpetual Trillion $$ deficit spending by the marxistologist-in-chief and just shake down 30 million people, the top 10%, for everything they've got. Then, let's ship them to Singapore where those useless, greedy people will be tolerated. All of us can smugly stay here with the poor, noble people of the streets and those uneducated illegal fruit pickers knowing that they can easily step up and replace all the engineers and brain surgeons that had previously cheated them out of their rightful places, or something. All the problems of the 90% will be solved...
Except that nobody with any talent or means will ever wish to step foot in the USSA again. And the next top 10%, now only 27 million, will already have their bags packed pronto! Lowering the ceiling does not raise the floor, unless you pray at the church of progressivetology.
Recall: When Jimmy Carter's top tax rate was 70% the richest only paid 19% of total revenues. When the top rate was cut in half, the % of revenues doubled from the top people. More rich people means more revenue, and that is what counts.
BK, see a fruit picker about the head condition. We want our old Bruce back again, the one who wants to hate-rape the greedy baby boomers.
I agree with gwar5, something has happened to Krasting, and those of you that know him, and can mount a rescue attempt need to make ready. Friends of Krasting need to do an intervention. Even when you take into account the intended level of chaos and anarchy that is ZeroHedge, a post like this one just does not make any sense. I am all about new ideas and hearing the "other side" to any debate, but this one is just another form of bullshit I would expect to see from any Democratic hack on the Sunday morning talk shows. Since Marx, we have had plenty of well-intentioned megalomaniacs and sociopaths trying to create utopia by forcing some new scheme of wealth/income redistribution on society. None have worked and none will ever work, and Krasting needs to check himself in somewhere for rehab.
It is a spending problem, it is not a taxing problem.
Support the Fair Tax, or better yet...
Secession anyone?
So we'll shake down the 10% progessively. Hit the 1% hard, let the others off easy peasy lemon squeezy. Too many of "us" down here in the 99% would like to see those banksters & friends get soaked. Lotta talent being left undeveloped in this country, left to die in a crappy educational system. Thats where we should put a big chunk of the proceeds.
Swapping out one elitist for another.
The education system gets crappier as the govt gets more involved. No amount of evidence would make you understand that though, would it?
Why not just enforce the laws against fraud and convict the crooks instead of putting every successful person in the same basket as the crooks and taxing the crap out of them. Libs aren't interested in fairness unless it is as they conceive fairness to be, redistribute the wealth of anyone who has more than they do! AS Obama says, those who are successful are not any smarter, do not work any harder and therefore do not deserve what they have, and besides, its more than they need. And he's not a socialist! He's just trying to help the little guy! We can't create wealth, we can only distribute it and while those of us who have our ill gotten gains not due to our smarts or efforts, we should bow to those greater, of a much higher moral plain than ourselves, to decide how our efforts and intelligence are to best be spread about. Laws are being selectively enforced at the whim of our government and there are those who think all we need to do is tax the rich. It should be apparent that the laws, what ever they might be, are only being used to benefit those in power who enforce them.
Not every successful person. I would specifically target the 1% for the soaking. I love small business and would reward them with deregulation and lower taxes. Multinationals need the opposite treatment to even the playing field. See, I'm for fairness in commerce too. And Obama is just a tool of the duopoly that is trying to preserve status quo and power for the elites. He gives guys like you sound bites to work with.
Multinationals are just so because of tax policies. You want US jobs but you want to tax corporations that are exporting to tax advantaged countries? Consumers pay every damn tax that businesses pay or the business fails. They must pass forward all costs to remain in business. Taxing business taxes us, and taxing businesses that export kills them or pushes them off shore. And just so you know, there are a lot of small business types that are in the 1%. Taxing is anti liberty, but i does liberate us from our money, even if the money isn't real and we wouldn't have anything without our government to provide. I guess when you are a babe in the woods, everything looks like a predator. Fight for yourself instead of demanding Big Brother to do your taking for you!
Nooooo!! Let's not shake down anybooody!! Let's take the country back from the sociopath politicians who spend our money just to get themselves reelected and make the banks rich.
Instead, let's double the tax revenues by creating conditions that will double the amount of small businesses and rich people. Eating the rich is crazy stupid and will just result in a self-inflicted amputation.
Re education: The USA already spends more on education per student than any country in the world (except tiny Luxemburg) and it's all being wasted. The unions are stealing the money. Example: WI teachers were generously given 100% health coverage and allowed to choose any plan in the state -- so they created their own network plan, made their members join, and fiercely gouged the state taxpayers on the rates. Hundreds of millions went into union coffers. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
Small is beautiful. Lets give those guys all the tax breaks an deregulation. Time to stop the big guys from hitching a ride on the little guy's agenda.
The educational system needs a lot more than money, I agree. But cutting budgets certainly isn't going to make things better. Health care should be universal so people can stop pointing fingers at the cost of union benefits. There are too many special interests soaking up our health care dollars now. for And the cost of higher education works as a regressive tax on the middle class and poor, who are forced to go into debt for their shot at the withering American Dream.
Spooz go back to academia, where idiots with answers multiply in their own pathology. What you weep about was brought about by your intellectual forebears and what you want is more of it - only like you, they all want to name the winners and losers - like all fascists. Die.
No, we don't need more money for education. We need the unions to stop taking it from the kids and taxpayers. We need to cut back on public employee union theft. Our private sector employees only earn 1/2 what our union teachers earn.
We spend more than anybody else in the world on ED and our kids still can't read. For what we spend per child in the USA they all ought to be fucking rocket scientists.
Teacher: "At $10,000 per child/year, and with 20 kids, that's $200,00 for my classroom size per year. The reality is, I'd have trouble spending all $50,000 buying books and pencils. So, if you told me I could keep the other $150,000 if all the kids could just read, I guarantee you they would all be able to read, without all the school infrastucture. And I would be back begging for much larger class sizes the next year."
Better to get a stout tree limb and a rope with two nooses- one for the relatively small number of outright corrupt politicians and financial types, the other for the smaller but far more numerous parasites who want to rip off everyone else to support them.
Yes, there are some big fat leeches on this society- but the horde of two legged ticks and fleas drain every bit as much and need to be smashed equally.
Too many of "us" who actually worked for what we have (whatever that may be) and are or now successful people who got that way by busting their tails and sacrificing are increasingly sick to death of both groups of oxygen theives.
Screw more taxes, let it fucking burn and let both groups take heavy casualties. Without this system to sustain them their survival rate will be very low.
Plenty of good people lost jobs through no fault of their own and are now working two part time minimum wage jobs to get by. If it helps you sleep at night to put all of them in the same "leech" category, go for it. Do you realize the un/underemployment problem our country is facing? Feel lucky if you have a job that makes enough money to pay taxes. Maybe you need a dose of reality. Hopefully worsening economic conditions will give you a taste of it so you can develop some compassion.
Many good people lost jobs because greedy unions in league with politicians promised pensions no one could afford to pay. I'm 45 and I have heard many people brag over the years about their exhorbitant benefits and pensions. They are(were), to use a term you probably like to throw around, Unsustainable.
Well, there's plenty more sob stories about unemployed people coming soon if the Bruce Kastings and his marxists BFF succeed in distracting the people with enough class warfare so they do not act to stop the banksters and theft of their freedoms. Bashing job creators will only make more jobs disappear.
Some Facts about the "poor": The "poor" are a dynamic group that changes all the time. Societies throughout history have never achieved much less than 10% poor for several reasons.
Only about a 5% are "permanent" poor who are either disabled, the criminal class, or who choose to live alternative life styles. The majority of the poor are really the rest of us from different points in our lives -- when we were 18 and just starting out, or when we had a bad setback, and again, when we turned 65 and retired. Being "poor" is mostly just part of the lifecycle.
But the socialists are hell bent on taking away the opportunity for upward mobility. This will trap everybody in poverty with no hope. With no hope comes desperation. With desperation comes a repressive police state to keep the lid on things.
Balancing Liberty and Democracy
The problem with most contemporary political partisans is that they never developed an ability to perform the heuristic analysis that would allow them to grasp that liberty and democracy are eternal enemies. Democratic states may profess to venerate liberty and even pass laws making it sacred, but in practice democracies simply cannot tolerate it. In order to preserve the perception of adhering to the governmental process, to prevent the anarchy of free thought and action, the democrat must try to suppress the free expression of opinion by derision and criticism and failing that by law. In part, it seeks that end by mere propaganda or by the naked force of authority. In essence by attempting to make contrary doctrines officially unacceptable, politically incorrect as it were. To this end it then resorts to force, i.e., to law. The main purposes of such laws in a democratic society is to put burdens upon free thought and analysis to try and reduce it to impotence.
Ostensibly, their aim is to penalize, to define the contrary opinion as anti-social; actually their aim is to penalize what to the democrat regards as heretical opinions. Unfortunately most Americans believe that such a process is honest or even commendable. It has become practically impossible to convince them that there is anything corrupt or the antithesis of liberty in it. In other words, they simply cannot grasp what the concept of liberty really is.
All to often they condition it with the idea that the state, the transitory majority, has some sort of right over the ideas and acts of individuals, that the state, the democratic majority, is free, whenever it is so inclined, to forbid a man or group of men to say what they honestly believe. Whenever an individual’s notions start becoming "dangerous," i.e., being heard and considered by others, then the state should be free to exercise that prerogative. And then far to many citizens will support the state in it feigned outrage.
This is especially true of the liberal, who pretends and often honestly believes, that they are promoting liberty. Not really, because deep down they know, as doctrinal democrats, that liberty is anathema to, if not fatal to democracy, that a government based upon transitory majorities and shifting and often irrational opinion must be kept within bounds, bounds that only they are allowed to define. To do otherwise would be, to them at least anarchistic. They only believe in and advocate for certain narrow kinds of liberty, liberty for the persons they happen to be in favor of or who they agree with. The rights of others are of no consequence or interest to them. If a law were passed, as with the GM bailout, that takes away the property of a large group of presumably financially well off individuals (bondholders) without compensation and without even justifiable reasons, they would not, could not oppose it; they would promote it as fair and democratic. The liberty to have and hold property is not one they recognize. The only liberty they believe in is the liberty to envy, to covet and to hate and loot those who have it.
Maybe its you that can't grasp what the true concept of liberty is. Could be the ability to write programs (hueristic analysis) doesn't help with the critical thinking skills. In any case, freedom of speech is still in the bill of rights. Or did the Patriot Act make some inroads there? Who is this "state" you speak of that is free to exercise its perogative over free speech? What am I missing?
Dunno about liberalism being fatal to democracy. Looks to me like democracy ends up with monopolies and plutocracies, which deal the fatal blow. Most libs are only looking for fairness, something sorely missing these days. Too many cheaters winning the game. These gamers think they have the right to be kings. I think not.
Also, GM filed Chapter 11, and bondholders took a hit. Thats the breaks with risk assets. Not that a little gaming by credit default swap holders couldn't have happened.
Maybe you should look back away from your computer centered world and actually look up the meaning oh heuristcs. The word has been around a lot longer than yor computer algorithms.
GM's bond holders didn't just take a hit, they got wiped out. If you understood the structure of law and not just your self defined "fairness" you would know that under bankruptcy law the bond holders would be the first ones paid.. But Obama and his socialist minnions stepped in and abrogated the law and made sure his Union pals got moved to the front of the line. For liberals law is what they say it is today and if the circumstances change tomorrow well so does the law.
"Most libs are only looking for fairness"
No . . . It's about using government to consolidate their power not about fairness. One third of "libs" are marxists, the other two thirds are well meaning, useful idiots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DioQooFIcgE
The United States was is and always will be a Republic. A Democracy is just a highway to hell and the tyranny of the oligarchy we're being treated to now.
LVMI www.mises.org
We would all like to think that our current broke ass circumstance can be solved with the simple application of math skills but the equasion has one variable that can never be reconciled and that is government's need of cash. We have always been told that all problems can be solved with but a small amount of someone else's money. I seem to recall that the income tax was to be only a small percentage of only the super wealthy. And social security was only to be 1% of the first few thousand of income. Any rational person would have to accept that everything our government seeks to fix or protect us from only gets worse with ever greater funding. A rational person would have accept that the only way to fix it is the same way we would fix a drug addict, stop giving it money to do the things its doing. O sure they will make it painfull for us as they always do, but we created this mess by giving them the money in the first place. The last thing we need is to create a new tax that will be levered from a 2% on the .01% to 10% of the top 50% because afterall they need it and you really don't. And instead of worrying about what the top 1% are doing with their money how about we worry about how the rest of us are going to earn some!
You "seem to recall"? Was it in a dream? Top rate in the 1950s and 1960s was 90+%. Good times.
I'm talking early in the century, when the damn tax was started. The congress passed the amendment that allowed income tax and didn't see fit to impose limits on it, thinking that it was never going to be increased. Hah!
50's yes ... In 60's Kennedy wisely lowered top rates ... then good times rolled
so here's a chart showing top rates over time. Kennedy did lower top rates, but they were still very high by comparison to today's ridiculously low rates for top earners. Oh, and be sure to check out the chart showing the share of income going to the 1% over time.
http://visualizingeconomics.com/2010/02/04/historical-marginal-income-tax-rates/
Your deceptive chart/obama propaganda conveniently starts after the fed reserve was formed. What were the tax rates five/ten years before this chart? Before the fed, we were the richest country in the world and the govt could provide all that it was constitutionally mandated to do. Why do they need more now, and what have they done to show they deserve it?
"they are not rich and they are not bastards. This is your Dr., Dentist, accountant, small business owner. This group is what fuels the economy."
Really? Two breadwinners EACH making $65,000 isn't rich?
This is what makes me laugh. Yeah, they aren't Buffet rich or Lotto-winning rich.
But the median wage in America is $26,000. That's the TOP of 50% of people with jobs.
So when you have not just one but two breadwinners that make 2.5 times the median wage.....you're rich.
This is why it makes me laugh. Even Romeny doesn't consider himself rich. Chris Rock said he wasn't rich.
I tell you what, maybe you can try living on $9/hr, with no health care, no car, no paid vacation, and tell me you aren't FUCKING RICH.
As for "they make the economy go"? Funny all those people you mention fucking suck me dry.
You seem to be itching for something slackers don't have the stomach for, fighting is hard work. You already have my local Gub'ment stealing from me based on my wealth of home ownership. Let sleeping dogs lay, turn on the productive and they will turn on YOU.
Rich is a releavtive term.
Most of the those making $150k have a decent house and a car but after covering expenses and trying to pay for their kids education and save for retirement they have little cash left. Are the better off then many, sure, but rich no.
Rich is not living in a decent suburb. Rich is having enough $$ in the bank that you can do what you want and not have to work, which is a subjective measure. Living off the grid and don't want to travel, $150k is huge. Live in a major city, 150k might last you a few years if yuo want a decent life.
It this post some kind of joke? Yeah, let's take some more money from the OTHER guy. It's always a plan to take from the OTHER guy. What a pile of bullshit. This is no different from the scum bankster cheats gaming the system or the welfare donkeys fishing around in their gucci purses for this month's batch of food stamps. Stop devising bulshit ways to take money from someone else and do something with your own life.
If the other guy is the 1%, why not? Most of it came out of gaming the financial system. If we can't claw it back, why not tax it? It will make for a more sustainable economy, which is in the interest of all.
Yep, everyone with money has rigged the system, and we should take more of their money and give it to someone who has shown a willingness to spend wisely and honestly...the government. LMAO...stop this nonsensical thought now before you become another pathetic burger-flipping big brother loving clone who honestly thinks that if somehow the government gets their greedy hands on a little more of someone else's money...they will keep their promise to throw you a few of the leftover scraps.
No, not everybody, but enough hitched a ride. And living large is obscene.
Never said our government wasn't fully invested in the elite's enterprise. We need a third party. No more giant douche v turd sandwich choices.
There are more than two parties. Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul et. al. have run for POTUS in parties that were not GOP or Democrat. There have simply not been enough votes in any one "third party" to elect someone POTUS.
Living large? You mean like eating $30,000 dinners in support of your political candidate?
I skimmed this, was there sarcasm in it I missed? Anyone who advocates giving 1 CENT more to the government [actually, with respect to income taxes, to the federal reserve] is a moron. To think for 1 second, for that matter the existance span of a freakin' Higgs boson, that the government will actually pay down the "debt" with additional revenues is just stupidity. Or else you think the tooth fairy isn't your mom/dad but really a second job holder from a high end strip club who dispenses Seated Liberty quarters and smoking oral when you lose a crown at age 40...
BTW, as for the government having enough money to do all that necessary shit, they make MORE than enough to carry out their CONSTITUTIONALLY MANDATED DUTIES and then some though tariffs and excise taxes. They also have a SHITLOAD of surplus land and other stuff they could be selling to the citizenry to boot.
Also, if gold rose to it's monetarily imbalanced REAL value, the government could pay off the FED with its stash (if it actually still has it), and tell them to go pound sand, which I think might be the actual reason the price is suppressed...
so you are perfectly okay as the 1%, really the 400, extract all wealth from our economy and leave the rest to be worker drones? Oh, you have enough that you will be able to last a little longer than the rest of the worker drones, is that it? The elites have cemented their status and the American Dream is a lottery. Nepotism and special treatment in the educational system, from private schools and tutors to test preps for the elite spawn, who game the meritocracy, while the 99% make do with less funding and dumbed down curricula resulting in undeveloped critical thinking skills and brains more programmable with propaganda. It keeps the plutocracy in place and the 99% down. Tax the fuck out of the 1%.
But you're right about the embedded corruption in our government. That comes first before we can work on a fair and sustainable economy. The gaming has to end.
You build a case against the top 400, but then want to take it out on the top 1%. You realize that there are more than 40,000 people in this country, don't you?
Yeah I noticed how the author left off the top 0.1%. The ones that take in 40% of income.
It's a typical form from right wingers to demonstrate that the rich really are holding up society, that the poor are nothing but welfare cases, and that even people making $250,000/yr are really poor people.
It's so fucking laughable. Does anyone really buy this shit?
I mean, being poor myself I don't even know where to find welfare. Mainly because I don't qualify for any.
In my state you get 4 years of welfare then are left to live in abandoned houses in Detroit....and that's when you have no money in the bank.
But of course, some clowns that work in a suit and bank serious money for playing golf wouldn't know that, right?
I mean they wouldn't know people that work 60 hours per week for $7/hr with no health care. So why not demonize the poor? Right?
"I'm not rich, I can barely afford my vacation home in the Hamptons"
So many "let them eat cake" moments on this site.
Bruce:
Evidently you haven't read though the entirety of the Obama-care bill. That is, you seem to be suffering from anal-cranial inversion.
'cuz the Obama-care is the largest tax-increase in the world's history.
don't cha' know.
- Ned
This article is just a trial baloon to get you used to the idea of "wealth" confiscation. It means they aim to STEAL your 401K and IRA savings to prop up SS and BOTH public and private union pensions.
http://whatthecrap.wordpress.com/2008/10/28/dr-teresa-ghilarducci-on-abolishing-401k-plans-audio/
LVMI www.mises.org
I hate Obamacare because I hate having insurance companies soaking up profits out of our health care dollars. But without Obamacare, I still have to pay for insurance and for the uninsured who decide to use our health care system with no way of paying. Universal health care is the most efficient and humane way to go.