Tuesday, July 12, 2011

An update on America's wealthy.

America's wealthy just got wealthier. A report out today tells us that America's CEO's will receive, on average, 23% more than they received last year!

It is of interest to know that the average American worker received a pay raise of one half of 1% last year!

So CEO's, some of America's wealthiest individuals, received a pay raise that was 46 times as much as the average American worker received! Their "compensation", as they like to call it is 343 times the pay of the average worker in their company! (in 1980 they made 42 times their median workers salary.) This is the most unbalanced ratio to be found anywhere in the industrialized world.

Companies were required to report their CEO to worker pay ratio, but last month the GOP voted to repeal that provision. Doubtless their "Friends" on Wall Street asked for that to avoid too much embarrassment. And of course they, Congress, obliged.

The US Congress, the best Congress that money can buy! Exxon spent $28 million "lobbying" Congress last year. (I call it bribing) And Lo and Behold they ended up paying NO tax at all - in spite of making $53 Billion in profits!

I made $39,000 last year and paid hundreds of times more in taxes than Exxon paid! In fact my tax bill was hundreds of times more than at least 25 HUGE US companies COMBINED, they paid NO taxes at all. GE for example received a $1.1 Billion tax credit. The Bank of America received a $1.9 Billion tax credit. And yet we keep hearing from places like Fox "News" that the tax rate on US Companies is confiscatory. That we can't compete with the rest of the world because of our "high" tax rate!

Not only is the tax rate on US Companies laughable, so to is the top tax rate on our wealthy. At 35% it is the lowest in about 60 years, and is also the lowest of any industrialized country in the world. Not that the tax rate affects the rich much anyway, while the average American worker pays 30% of his income in taxes the average tax hit on the top 2% of American is just 16%!!! (Don't forget the GOP mantra - "Lets cut taxes on the rich." "They create Jobs.") And if you believe that I have this bridge in Brooklyn that I would like to sell you! They, the rich, did not get rich by creating jobs, they got rich by laying off their workers which increased the "Profit" of their company and gave them a nice multi million dollar bonus. Then they sent jobs overseas, which cuts their companies costs even more, and gets them another multi million dollar bonus. Then they use some of that money to bribe Congress to fight for tax cuts for the rich! Doubtless it does not hurt that most of our Congressmen and women, are rich too.

Talk about putting the fox in charge of the hen house!

Monday, July 11, 2011

I am SO upset.

I am so upset that I can hardly see straight. I completely fail to see how our "Leaders" can justify asking the poorest of our citizens to sacrifice, while asking nothing of our richest, wealthiest. It is beyond belief that the Republicans want to cut Social Security and Medicare and cut jobs everywhere that the poor and hardworking members of our society are, while refusing to ask anything at all of the rich. They still want to cut taxes even more to the wealthiest Americans!!!! The top 1% of Americans already own 50% of all the wealth in the country, leaving the other 99% to share the other 50%!!! How can anyone, even those unbelievably rich want to have even more?

Another quick comment

- from a news article that I just read. The top 1% of Americans own 50% of the total American wealth!

This is the largest inequality EVER, and also ANYWHERE - anywhere in the world that is!

To repeat one of my favorite often repeated facts - the income spread now is the biggest that it has ever been, at any time, any where. (And we still want to cut taxes to the rich!)

Oh yes, I forgat to mention it is also widening fast, faster than it ever has.

In case you are not good with math, if 1% of Americans own 50% of all its wealth that means that the other 99% of us have to share the other 50%. And yet STILL, at least 50% of Americans (Just about all Republicans, and even some Democrats!) want to cut taxes to the rich! No one has been able to explain this to me. In fact no one has even tried to explain it to me.

Putting it another way, there are 100 people in a boat, starving, a pizza is delivered, ONE of the 100 people takes half of the pizza. The other 99 people share the other half! Would you be happy with that? Probably not, but you ARE happy that 1% of Americans own half of everything. (And pay less tax than us! They average 16% tax on all their income wheras the average American averages 30% tax on their income! But not only does no one have a problem with that, they don't even want the top tax rate raised!)

I give up.

Sunday, July 10, 2011

A quick comment.

There seem to be a lot of people who think that cutting taxes will somehow miraculously get us out of our un-balanceed budget and create jobs.

Going back to my blog of a couple of days ago when I tried to equate the way I operate my budget with the way the USA operates it's budget.

One of the things That I pointed out is if I run short of money I borrow from savings (USA can't do that as it has none) OR I borrow from a bank, and pay it back as quickly as possible to reduce the interest I pay. (The USA borrows but does not pay back the loan) The third option was to get another job, to generate more income. This works for me. (The equivalent for the USA is to collect more taxes - for some reason they don't want to do this) The fourth option, for the USA, is to cut taxes! The equivalent for me would be to cut my income! Drop my extra job? Ask my employer to cut my pay? Now, can ANYONE explain to me how this would help me with my "Balance of payments"? How would it help me to pay my bills? How would it help me to pay off my loan?

(In case someone says that by cutting taxes to the rich - most of who pay hardly any tax compared to the average American - they, the rich, will create jobs, I have to ask, "Are you mad?" If they would create jobs, HOW, why are they not creating jobs?? Their tax rate is the LOWEST that it has been in at least 60 years. With such a low tax rate - the lowest the USA has had in 60 years, AND the lowest in the WORLD - WHY are they not creating jobs?? As the rate of job creation is the lowest in 60 years and the tax rate is the lowest in 60 years, common sense says that by lowering taxes we will lower the rate of creating jobs. At every point in the last 60 years our tax rate has been higher and our job creation rate has been higher! Reagan 50% top tax rate, Nixon 70% top tax rate, Eisenhower 91% top tax rate. And in every instance higher job creation rate. I say, raise the tax rate on the rich. - and thus create jobs!)