catzmeow
Gold Member
- Banned
- #1
Romney
Us versus them? It never existed. It's just us and us. Many of you are operating off of a false dichotomy conveniently created and maintained to stoke partisan emotions.
Ninety-six percent of Americans have benefited from government help at some time, including from breaks in the tax code, according to Suzanne Mettler, a professor of government at Cornell University and John Sides, an associate political science professor at George Washington University.
The remaining 4 percent? Most are young adults who dont qualify for most government programs, they say.
You might get to a point in midlife where you think, Im one of the earners, not one of the takers, Mettler said in an interview. In fact, your life has long been affected by the social policies you were able to use early in life, such as a Pell grant.
While Medicare and Medicaid -- which covered more than 100 million Americans combined last year -- are the most obvious government benefits along with Social Security, there are many other policies and programs available.
These include the tax credits or itemized deductions used by more than 70 percent of filers; Pell grants, which in the 2010-2011 school year aided approximately 9.3 million low-income people, or 36.3 percent of all U.S. undergraduate students, in paying for college; and the G.I. bill, which has been used for educational benefits by 21.9 million veterans from the programs inception through Sept. 30, 2011
Us versus them? It never existed. It's just us and us. Many of you are operating off of a false dichotomy conveniently created and maintained to stoke partisan emotions.