We've been told that lower taxes and more "growth" equates to higher wages and more jobs (known as "trickle-down economics"). But since the depth of the Great Recession, even though stock prices and corporate profits are much higher, a lot more people are "not in the labor force" (and just aren't being counted in the official unemployment rate) — and wages are still down (not to mention, more people are also working part-time and temp jobs).
Unlike politically incorrect journalists in the mainstream media (including Fox News), one can't accurately report on bloody budget cuts — and then, just to appear non-partisan, say it's "Congress" who's proposing the cuts — not when it's the Republicans within Congress who are the ones proposing all these bloody budget cuts.
Is it passive aggression? Is it cruel antagonism? Is it overt animosity? Is it open hostility, bordering on outright hate? Or it's much less evil that; maybe it's just apathy, ignorance or indifference.
It didn't take long before the new GOP House began passing a series of deficit-hiking tax cuts that will primarily help the rich at the expense of everybody else. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the new chairman of the Ways and Means Committee (which writes tax legislation), wants to make some previous tax breaks permanent — arguing that Congress has previously extended certain tax breaks before.
But without raising taxes on anyone earning more than $118,500 a year. The only thing that was not said at the Senate Hearing on Social Security disability today was: "Read my lips."
Representative Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on the Budget Committee, proposed a plan to tax Wall Street financial transactions and raise taxes on the top 1 percent of earners ——> to pay for a “paycheck bonus credit” of $2,000 a year for couples earning less than $200,000.
Here's Charles Krauthammer (the Fox News pundit) writing for the Washington Post -- "Some in Congress are talking about a 10- or 20-cent hike in the federal tax [on a gallon of gasoline] to use for infrastructure spending. Right idea, wrong policy. The hike should not be 10 cents but $1. And the proceeds should not be spent by, or even entrusted to, the government.
Everybody is picking on the multi-billionaires. The beggars (aka "the takers") are always holding out their hand and constantly demanding more — a living wage or a minimum wage, healthcare insurance, paid sick days, vacation days, safety regulations, equal pay for women, pension contributions ... the list goes on and on. When will it ever stop? And can multi-billionaires even afford these unreasonable demands without tanking the entire economy?
The ultra-wealthy uses the tax code as a weapon in their class-war against the poor by paying less than their fair share of taxes, when in a progressive tax system, the most wealthy are supposed to pay a greater percentage of their incomes --- because they are more able to contribute more, which benefits the most.
Did you know the United States has the worst income inequality of any industrialized nation? So says the OECD in this study. Globally, income inequality has increased more from 2007 to 2010 than during the twelve years previous and America is sure enough #1.
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