I knew a woman who immigrated legally to the United States from Romania after the collapse of communism there. The thing she liked most about the USA was free-market capitalism and the fact that people here strive for success through hard work. People in socialist societies strive for mediocrity and government dependency. Communism was so popular in Romania, this is how they thanked their tyrant leader...Conservatives play a proper diversionDemocrats want ever increasing taxes to create poverty....and then they use the money to buy votes in elections.Dem's keep minorities penned up in poverty. They spend all the tax money they rake in for the poor on themselves. How is that any different than forcing minorities to pick cotton??
They take everything and give us crumbs in return.
What is increasing poverty is the lack of a meaningful raise for the working class for the past 40 years, while management received pay increases which amount to 1000% of their wages 40 years ago. CEO pay has gone from a few hundred thousand dollars to $20 million or more for corporations who pay their workers minimum wages. Taxpayers have to foot the bill for the shortfall.
The USA is the ONLY nation on earth where the working and middle class are expected to subsidize the poverty level wages for the lowest paid workers. Other nations require employers to pay their workers. Walmart pays $14 an hour in Canada, plus health care, mandated vacations and maternity leaves - all the things big American corporations say they can't afford, and yet Walmart still manages to be the most profitable company in Canada.
You're being conned by the owner classes. When you have the highest profits in American history, it's a total lie that you can't afford to pay your workers more.
When workers complain about why their standard of living is decreasing, they point to poor people on welfare and illegal immigrants as the cause of their woes
Meanwhile.....the wealthy get richer
There is no "free market capitalism" in the USA or anywhere else in the world. What you have is a mix of regulated capitalism, and a social safety net. The social safety net is NOT, to "support mediocrity and government dependence" as conservatives like to opine, but as an acknowledgement that a capitalist economy is subject to periods of growth and retraction (recessions), and that during recessions, the weakest and lowest paid workers are the ones most harmed.
This is true of all first world countries, which mix capitalism and social responsibility, including the USA. The difference is that Republicans have skewed the tax code to benefit ONLY the top classes, at the expense of the middle class. A strong social safety net is a requirement of a capitalist economy, to protect the most vulnerable in a recession.
The bald fact is that we can't all be "chiefs". We need workers as well. And those workers need to be paid a living wage. The idea that the middle class has to provide income supports for workers at the most profitable companies in America is laughable. If McDonalds is making enough money from the sale of hamburgers to be one of the most profitable companies in America, and to pay their top executives more than $20 million dollars per year, then the kids making and selling those burger should be paid a living wage FIRST and foremost, and then distribute the rest to the top. Otherwise, the corporation exists to milk consumers and pay executive and shareholders more than they deserve.
Workers should be paid first, and owners last. That's the risk you take. When I ran my own business, if the business didn't make enough money to pay the workers, my suppliers and me, I was the one who didn't get paid. I was the one who took the risk.