How to Fix the Phony Budget Crisis

[Midnight Marauder]

There is wealth and there is excessive wealth. Those of us who incline toward socialist controls over the Nation's material resources have no problem with wealth. But the kind of greed that fosters excessive wealth is the poison that is slowly killing all that is and was good about America.

The rub is, who is to say what wealth is "excessive" and what is not? And how many times will that goalpost be moved?

Dunderhead.

 

[asterism]

Wanna know something?

I wouldn't mind all the rhetoric about the rich paying more in taxes if it was not formed in the manner of "blame the rich". "It is all the rich people's fault. Make them pay their fair share."

Turn it around and present it like this, "Hey you wealthy people, we the poor and middle class of the United States of America need your help. We're going to have to raise your taxes because there just is not enough in our coffers left to fix this problem."

I really hate the whining about how terrible rich people are for actually succeeding in life. Which of us wouldn't like to be in their shoes?

Immie

I don't think they're listening, Immie.

Over the last half century tax rates for the lowest 80% of workers have remained virtually static while the richest 0.01 % have seen rates slashed from 70% to 35%.

Only in marginal rate with deductions that existed then but don't exist now.

That's about 10,000 Americans and many of those pay taxes at a capital gains rate of 15%. A small minority are calling publicly for their peers to pay more taxes; however, the amount of money flowing into Republican AND Democratic campaign coffers from the richest 1% of Americans seems to trump any genuine desire to share the nation's tax burden.

Finally, I think it's possible that some of the most terrible psychopaths on this planet are filthy rich AND will never get enough money.

Until they hear the cell door CLANG shut behind them.

Good luck with that. If they go, so does their money.

 

[Midnight Marauder]

Those of us who incline toward socialist controls over the Nation's material resources

Are insane maniacs. Pushing a system that is long proven NOT TO WORK. Are idiots who want a really large entitlement, welfare class.

You're a simpleton DOLT.

 

[asterism]

Wanna know something?

I wouldn't mind all the rhetoric about the rich paying more in taxes if it was not formed in the manner of "blame the rich". "It is all the rich people's fault. Make them pay their fair share."

Turn it around and present it like this, "Hey you wealthy people, we the poor and middle class of the United States of America need your help. We're going to have to raise your taxes because there just is not enough in our coffers left to fix this problem."

I really hate the whining about how terrible rich people are for actually succeeding in life. Which of us wouldn't like to be in their shoes?

Immie

I don't think they're listening, Immie.

Over the last half century tax rates for the lowest 80% of workers have remained virtually static while the richest 0.01 % have seen rates slashed from 70% to 35%.

That's about 10,000 Americans and many of those pay taxes at a capital gains rate of 15%. A small minority are calling publicly for their peers to pay more taxes; however, the amount of money flowing into Republican AND Democratic campaign coffers from the richest 1% of Americans seems to trump any genuine desire to share the nation's tax burden.

Finally, I think it's possible that some of the most terrible psychopaths on this planet are filthy rich AND will never get enough money.

Until they hear the cell door CLANG shut behind them.

Actually, I am not so sure that they are not listening. I don't want to dig up the links for it, but I remember reading that Warren Buffet has stated that he has no problem with having his taxes increased. Same for Bill Gates if I am not mistaken. I imagine that there are an awful lot of the well to do in this country that would not have a problem with their taxes being increased.

Truthfully, I think the big issue that is interfering with such a thing is that politicians use this as a wedge issue like they do abortion and immigration among others.

I may be wrong, but that is my opinion.

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

And yet you'll notice that neither Bill Gates nor Warren Buffett willed their estates to the US Government. In fact, they gave a huge boost to private charities. I think we should follow their examples.

 

[asterism]

I don't think they're listening, Immie.

Over the last half century tax rates for the lowest 80% of workers have remained virtually static while the richest 0.01 % have seen rates slashed from 70% to 35%.

That's about 10,000 Americans and many of those pay taxes at a capital gains rate of 15%. A small minority are calling publicly for their peers to pay more taxes; however, the amount of money flowing into Republican AND Democratic campaign coffers from the richest 1% of Americans seems to trump any genuine desire to share the nation's tax burden.

Finally, I think it's possible that some of the most terrible psychopaths on this planet are filthy rich AND will never get enough money.

Until they hear the cell door CLANG shut behind them.

Actually, I am not so sure that they are not listening. I don't want to dig up the links for it, but I remember reading that Warren Buffet has stated that he has no problem with having his taxes increased. Same for Bill Gates if I am not mistaken. I imagine that there are an awful lot of the well to do in this country that would not have a problem with their taxes being increased.

Truthfully, I think the big issue that is interfering with such a thing is that politicians use this as a wedge issue like they do abortion and immigration among others.

I may be wrong, but that is my opinion.

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

You're right about Buffett and Gates, but I'm not so sure about GE?

From Phil's Stock World:

"Warren Buffett, the third richest man in the world (behind Gates and Slim) paid 17.7% tax and made a point of checking and found out his employees paid an average of 32.9%.

"God bless Buffett becuase he made this point in a speech that was given to 400 of the 10,000, who were gathered at a Hillary Clinton fund raiser in 2007. It got a little attention at the time but then was swept under the rug – as if that didn’t matter.

"But it DOES MATTER and it matters a lot – the life of this country depends on it!

"If this were just a case of 10,000 people not paying $100Bn in taxes, maybe we could move on and forget it but it’s not.

"US corporations, who are (according to to the Supreme Court) also citizens of this country, paid just $300Bn in taxes last year on $6 TRILLION in income (5%).

"That’s right, if US corporations simply paid the same amount of tax as Mr. Buffett – that would, by itself, be enough to wipe out our deficit.

"But, things have gone decidedly the other way in the past 30 years:"

So why didn't he give extra to the government?

 

[asterism]

Fix the budget? Easy.

Put taxes back to where they were in 1995. (a very good year)

Cut the defense budget in half. (Then we would be spending no more than the rest of the world combined).

Remove the cap on social Security tax.

Presto!! 95% of your fiscal problems are solved.

Ok. Same AMT limits too right? Same pre Sarbanes-Oxley rules too? Same limits on SEP-IRAs? Can I roll back my property tax rates to that level too?

 

[MikeK]

[...]

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

"Rich" is a very relative term. To those who are homeless and live on the streets with none of the comforts and conveniences you and I take for granted, we are "rich" by comparison. So in order to impart some productive purpose to this discussion it is important to have some specific idea of just what "rich" is and why "rich" has become such an issue within the past decade.

In the decades between the 1940s and 1980s there were plenty of "rich" people in America. They lived in Park Avenue penthouses and lavish estates. They rode in chauffered limousines and/or drove the finest cars. They had servants, owned yachts and private planes, vacationed on the French and Italian Rivieras, shopped in the finest stores and dined in the finest restaurants. Yet they were neither a common topic nor the focus of resentment. They were in fact largely ignored. Why?

That period of time was the most prosperous period in American history. The middle class was flourishing and the income tax rate progressed to ninety-one percent for the upper brackets. The effect of that tax rate, along with some other control regulations which have since been disposed of, was a more equitable distribution of America's exceptional bounty. While there were quite a few multi-millionaires there were very few billionaires and the vast majority of ordinary working class Americans were financially comfortable. There was no reason for resentment of the rich.

At the present time the American middle class has been significantly diminished. While the wealth of the upper class has increased exponentially the wages of the average worker has either decreased or has remained stagnant since Ronald Reagan introduced the ruinous "trickle down" economic policies. Today what we're seeing is a pitiful vestige of the once-thriving middle class and the rise of a super-rich class in a situation which increasingly resembles that which existed during the infamous "Gilded Age."

So the bottom line is it's not the "rich" who are the focus of resentment but the super-rich. Wealth is not the issue -- excessive wealth is.

Vast fortunes have been accumulated by Wall Street manipulators, crooked mortgage bankers and industrialists who have bribed legislators to remove regulations that prevented them from giving American jobs to foreign workers.

 

[georgephillip]

That's essentially what you're proposing, buttnozzle. Confiscation of wealth, just because they have wealth.

You didn't answer the question, Bleeding Heart.

Much of their wealth was obtained through fraud.

Is that any less of a crime than wealth obtained by force?

Your OPINION that "much" of their wealth was obtained by fraud doesn't hold water. It's just class warfare bullshit, you can't back it up or even begin to try.

Imbecile.

Rhymes With Rich:

Do the names "Enron", "WorldCom", "Tyco", "Ken Lay", "Jeff Skilling", "Bernie Ebbers" and "Dennis Kozlowski" ring any bells?

If you're really as stupid/ignorant as your posts indicate, maybe you should try harder.(or just shut the **** up)

 

[georgephillip]

Much of their wealth was obtained through fraud.

You're stupid and gullible enough to send a free forum board your money, and want to preach to the rest of us about fraudulent gaining of wealth?

It's idiot suckers like you who GIVE your wealth willingly to the Madoff's of the world. Why not put your money where your mouth is, and just send it to the IRS? ******* dolt.

USMB is a massive ponzi scheme targeting RICH parasites?

Got links?

While you're at it, shit stain, there are no "free" lunches or message boards.

Maybe you should stick to bridge and beer?

 

[georgephillip]

“'Such a wealth tax…would raise $191.1 billion each year (one percent of $19.1 trillion), a significant attack on the deficit,' Leon Friedman writes in The Nation. 'If we extended the tax to the top 5 percent, we could raise $338.5 billion a year (one percent of 62 percent of $54.6 trillion).'”

Tell the rich to pay up or pack up.

But the annual deficit is 4-5 times as great as what you could raise taxing the richest 5% a 1% tax on their wealth.

So should we tax the richest 5%, 5% on their wealth every single year? Or should we simply make them pay the ordinary 14% FICA tax that everybody else pays on their entire income?

Because if we did that we could have a $trillion budget surplus.

We should also consider driving a stake through Wall Street's "heart" in the same way North Dakota did in 1919:

"While Wall Street is reporting record profits, local banks are floundering, credit for small businesses and consumers remains tight, and local governments are teetering on bankruptcy.

"There is even talk of allowing state governments to file for bankruptcy, something current legislation forbids.

"The federal government and Federal Reserve have managed to find trillions of dollars to prop up the Wall Street banks that precipitated the credit crisis, but they have not extended this largesse to the taxpayers and local governments that have been forced to pick up the tab.

"In January, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced that the Fed had ruled out a central bank bailout for state and local governments.

"The collective state budget deficit for 2011 is projected at $140 billion, a mere 1% of the $12.3 trillion the Fed managed to come up with in liquidity, short-term loans, and other financial arrangements to bail out Wall Street..."

Public banking may work better on a state as opposed to a national level; however, state banks could provide mortgages at 2% interest and cap credit card interest at 6%.

It's at least worth asking why Republicans AND Democrats refuse to offer taxpayers this option? When I posed this question to my State Senator last fall, I got this answer: "The people want less government; not more."

The conclusion I came to is that Democrats AND Republicans need Wall Street every day and voters one day every two - six years...

 

[georgephillip]

Actually, I am not so sure that they are not listening. I don't want to dig up the links for it, but I remember reading that Warren Buffet has stated that he has no problem with having his taxes increased. Same for Bill Gates if I am not mistaken. I imagine that there are an awful lot of the well to do in this country that would not have a problem with their taxes being increased.

Truthfully, I think the big issue that is interfering with such a thing is that politicians use this as a wedge issue like they do abortion and immigration among others.

I may be wrong, but that is my opinion.

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

You're right about Buffett and Gates, but I'm not so sure about GE?

From Phil's Stock World:

"Warren Buffett, the third richest man in the world (behind Gates and Slim) paid 17.7% tax and made a point of checking and found out his employees paid an average of 32.9%.

"God bless Buffett becuase he made this point in a speech that was given to 400 of the 10,000, who were gathered at a Hillary Clinton fund raiser in 2007. It got a little attention at the time but then was swept under the rug – as if that didn’t matter.

"But it DOES MATTER and it matters a lot – the life of this country depends on it!

"If this were just a case of 10,000 people not paying $100Bn in taxes, maybe we could move on and forget it but it’s not.

"US corporations, who are (according to to the Supreme Court) also citizens of this country, paid just $300Bn in taxes last year on $6 TRILLION in income (5%).

"That’s right, if US corporations simply paid the same amount of tax as Mr. Buffett – that would, by itself, be enough to wipe out our deficit.

"But, things have gone decidedly the other way in the past 30 years:"

Well, I didn't say everyone would agree! But, we have to pay taxes. My point was not that I felt that the rich would just jump on the bandwagon to pay more in taxes.

My point was more personal. I just hate everyone's whining and blaming the rich when most of us would love to be in their shoes no matter how we got there. I do not believe taxes are too high on the rich, not if you look at historical rates, but the thought of the left blaming people for succeeding is... well, just plain nauseating! Yeah, that's the word.

Immie

Nauseating is a good choice to convey my feelings about how the rich and government have conspired against the working class over the last 2-3 years.

Professor Richard D. Wolff

"The economic crisis has bitten hard and deep.

"Millions of people have been impacted by high unemployment and home foreclosures, by decreased job benefits and job security, and by the realization that none of these afflictions will end soon. A sense of betrayal is settling into the popular consciousness. People are coming to believe that despite their hard work and 'playing by the rules,' a long-term decline is placing the American Dream increasingly out of their reach. And neither the major parties nor the resurgent far right (the Tea Party movement) offers anything like an adequate response to or program for offsetting that betrayal.

"The economic crisis activated, intensely and very publicly, the hegemonic alliance among big business, the richest 5 percent of citizens, and the state. Business and the rich insisted on (and the federal government complied with) corporate bailouts costing huge sums of public money.

"The state borrowed that money rather than taxing big business and the richest 5 percent of citizens.

"Indeed, it borrowed a good deal of the money from big business and the rich who had funds to lend because 1) those funds had not been taxed, and 2) the depressed global economy offered less attractive alternatives for those funds."

(My emphasis)

For some individual among the richest 5% of Americans there will NEVER be enough money to satisfy their desires. They buy elected Republicans AND Democrats the way you and I buy newspapers.

At some point they will make the class war too personal for you to ignore. Possibly after the US Dollar no longer functions as the world's reserve currency and the Fed inflates away our debt by turning every $10 bill in the country into a $5?

 

[skookerasbil]

Can you say Norway?

How about Wealth Tax??

"Times are tough. Someone has to pay. Why not start with those who can most afford it?...

"In Norway, for example, you pay one percent of your net worth in addition to income tax.

"What if we imposed a Norwegian-style wealth tax on the top one percent of U.S. households?

"We’re not talking upper middle class here: the poorest among them is worth a mere $8.3 million.

"This top one percent owns 35 percent of all wealth in the United States.

“'Such a wealth tax…would raise $191.1 billion each year (one percent of $19.1 trillion), a significant attack on the deficit,' Leon Friedman writes in The Nation. 'If we extended the tax to the top 5 percent, we could raise $338.5 billion a year (one percent of 62 percent of $54.6 trillion).'”

Tell the rich to pay up or pack up.

fAiL s0n......this kind of thinking only resonates in the far reaches of the internet. Fringe thinking FTL..................

Morons on the left still havent hit the re-set button. I have to post this map up at least 3 or 4 times a week................

Hellllllllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!

 

[georgephillip]

You want the government to redistribute the wealth more "fairly." You want "social justice."

Never mind that you're supporting a whole welfare society, that's entitled to others wealth without earning a dime of it, and never mind that after all the fraud and waste within the government, you still won't solve the problem OR meet your desired goal.

You wish only to see the equal distribution of misery, not success. And want to see the government get bigger, and bigger, more intrusive and more powerful.

The welfare society lives large on Wall Street.

How many dimes did America's FIRE sector and richest individuals actually earn of the $12.3 trillion that the Fed came up with in liquidity, short-term loans, and other financial transactions to bail out Wall Street?

Wall Street grows richer by increasing your misery, and Republicans AND Democrats have no interest in changing the "fairness" of that dynamic.

Who do you trust to administer "social justice" in this country?

Wall Street or Government?

 

[Midnight Marauder]

Much of their wealth was obtained through fraud.

You're stupid and gullible enough to send a free forum board your money, and want to preach to the rest of us about fraudulent gaining of wealth?

It's idiot suckers like you who GIVE your wealth willingly to the Madoff's of the world. Why not put your money where your mouth is, and just send it to the IRS? ******* dolt.

USMB is a massive ponzi scheme targeting RICH parasites?

Got links?

While you're at it, shit stain, there are no "free" lunches or message boards.

Maybe you should stick to bridge and beer?

You are really stupid. How is there not a "free lunch" on this board, or most any other free board?

Wait, you're stupid enough to PAY to see the adverts gone, when smart people such as myself just block them with AdBlock program?

You are a gullible, blithering idiot.

Do the names "Enron", "WorldCom", "Tyco", "Ken Lay", "Jeff Skilling", "Bernie Ebbers" and "Dennis Kozlowski" ring any bells?

You dodged the question: HOW MUCH of their wealth is obtained via fraud?

 

[Midnight Marauder]

Who do you trust to administer "social justice" in this country?

Wall Street or Government?

Neither.

BECAUSE THERE SHOULD BE NONE!

 

[georgephillip]

Can you say Norway?

How about Wealth Tax??

"Times are tough. Someone has to pay. Why not start with those who can most afford it?...

"In Norway, for example, you pay one percent of your net worth in addition to income tax.

"What if we imposed a Norwegian-style wealth tax on the top one percent of U.S. households?

"We’re not talking upper middle class here: the poorest among them is worth a mere $8.3 million.

"This top one percent owns 35 percent of all wealth in the United States.

“'Such a wealth tax…would raise $191.1 billion each year (one percent of $19.1 trillion), a significant attack on the deficit,' Leon Friedman writes in The Nation. 'If we extended the tax to the top 5 percent, we could raise $338.5 billion a year (one percent of 62 percent of $54.6 trillion).'”

Tell the rich to pay up or pack up.

fAiL s0n......this kind of thinking only resonates in the far reaches of the internet. Fringe thinking FTL..................

Morons on the left still havent hit the re-set button. I have to post this map up at least 3 or 4 times a week................

Hellllllllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!

Less than 41% of eligible voters are represented by your map, and, THANK YOU, OBAMA, most of the no-shows would likely have voted blue.

Nothing will change the economic fundamentals of this country by "choosing" between Republican OR Democrat. (red or blue)

 

[Immanuel]

I don't think they're listening, Immie.

Over the last half century tax rates for the lowest 80% of workers have remained virtually static while the richest 0.01 % have seen rates slashed from 70% to 35%.

That's about 10,000 Americans and many of those pay taxes at a capital gains rate of 15%. A small minority are calling publicly for their peers to pay more taxes; however, the amount of money flowing into Republican AND Democratic campaign coffers from the richest 1% of Americans seems to trump any genuine desire to share the nation's tax burden.

Finally, I think it's possible that some of the most terrible psychopaths on this planet are filthy rich AND will never get enough money.

Until they hear the cell door CLANG shut behind them.

Actually, I am not so sure that they are not listening. I don't want to dig up the links for it, but I remember reading that Warren Buffet has stated that he has no problem with having his taxes increased. Same for Bill Gates if I am not mistaken. I imagine that there are an awful lot of the well to do in this country that would not have a problem with their taxes being increased.

Truthfully, I think the big issue that is interfering with such a thing is that politicians use this as a wedge issue like they do abortion and immigration among others.

I may be wrong, but that is my opinion.

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

And yet you'll notice that neither Bill Gates nor Warren Buffett willed their estates to the US Government. In fact, they gave a huge boost to private charities. I think we should follow their examples.

I wasn't aware that they had died. How do you know what is in their wills with any reliability or what will be in their wills? Also, that was not my point. In fact, my point is very simple.

What bugs me in this whole debate is the attitude that liberals take in reference to the rich. They seek to punish the rich for no other reason than that they are, in fact, rich. I really do not have a problem with raising taxes on the rich if it is done for the right reasons, just as I am not opposed to having my own taxes raised for the right reasons, but this excoriation of the rich because they are rich is lame to say the least.

Immie

 

[Immanuel]

[...]

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

"Rich" is a very relative term. To those who are homeless and live on the streets with none of the comforts and conveniences you and I take for granted, we are "rich" by comparison. So in order to impart some productive purpose to this discussion it is important to have some specific idea of just what "rich" is and why "rich" has become such an issue within the past decade.

In the decades between the 1940s and 1980s there were plenty of "rich" people in America. They lived in Park Avenue penthouses and lavish estates. They rode in chauffered limousines and/or drove the finest cars. They had servants, owned yachts and private planes, vacationed on the French and Italian Rivieras, shopped in the finest stores and dined in the finest restaurants. Yet they were neither a common topic nor the focus of resentment. They were in fact largely ignored. Why?

That period of time was the most prosperous period in American history. The middle class was flourishing and the income tax rate progressed to ninety-one percent for the upper brackets. The effect of that tax rate, along with some other control regulations which have since been disposed of, was a more equitable distribution of America's exceptional bounty. While there were quite a few multi-millionaires there were very few billionaires and the vast majority of ordinary working class Americans were financially comfortable. There was no reason for resentment of the rich.

At the present time the American middle class has been significantly diminished. While the wealth of the upper class has increased exponentially the wages of the average worker has either decreased or has remained stagnant since Ronald Reagan introduced the ruinous "trickle down" economic policies. Today what we're seeing is a pitiful vestige of the once-thriving middle class and the rise of a super-rich class in a situation which increasingly resembles that which existed during the infamous "Gilded Age."

So the bottom line is it's not the "rich" who are the focus of resentment but the super-rich. Wealth is not the issue -- excessive wealth is.

Vast fortunes have been accumulated by Wall Street manipulators, crooked mortgage bankers and industrialists who have bribed legislators to remove regulations that prevented them from giving American jobs to foreign workers.

So, we are in fact talking about class envy? Never mind, that has always been what this is all about and that is what I find so... I'm trying to find a good word for it, but the only word I can come up with is perverted.

I'm not anywhere near being rich and never will be. I'm almost positive that I don't really want to be. But, quite frankly, I don't give a shit if Warren Buffet has so much cash on hand that the only thing he can think of to use it for is TP. I'm happy with my life and if I become dissatisfied then it is up to me to get to work to change that.

This country needs some help right now. We're financially strapped. But, increasing taxes on the rich will not change that. It is not the fault of those who happen to be rich or even super-rich, with one exception that I will mention shortly. The fault lies in the hands of Congress and only in the hands of Congress. The exception that I mention is in that many of those rich happen to be or have been Congressmen.

Until Congress gets it through its frigging skull that they must be fiscally responsible, nothing will change. Nothing at all. You can tax at 100% all income in the nation and still we will be right where we are today, because Congress will spend more than they have.

Don't blame the rich or super-rich for our troubles. Blame Congress.

Immie

 

[asterism]

[...]

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

"Rich" is a very relative term. To those who are homeless and live on the streets with none of the comforts and conveniences you and I take for granted, we are "rich" by comparison. So in order to impart some productive purpose to this discussion it is important to have some specific idea of just what "rich" is and why "rich" has become such an issue within the past decade.

In the decades between the 1940s and 1980s there were plenty of "rich" people in America. They lived in Park Avenue penthouses and lavish estates. They rode in chauffered limousines and/or drove the finest cars. They had servants, owned yachts and private planes, vacationed on the French and Italian Rivieras, shopped in the finest stores and dined in the finest restaurants. Yet they were neither a common topic nor the focus of resentment. They were in fact largely ignored. Why?

That period of time was the most prosperous period in American history. The middle class was flourishing and the income tax rate progressed to ninety-one percent for the upper brackets. The effect of that tax rate, along with some other control regulations which have since been disposed of, was a more equitable distribution of America's exceptional bounty. While there were quite a few multi-millionaires there were very few billionaires and the vast majority of ordinary working class Americans were financially comfortable. There was no reason for resentment of the rich.

At the present time the American middle class has been significantly diminished. While the wealth of the upper class has increased exponentially the wages of the average worker has either decreased or has remained stagnant since Ronald Reagan introduced the ruinous "trickle down" economic policies. Today what we're seeing is a pitiful vestige of the once-thriving middle class and the rise of a super-rich class in a situation which increasingly resembles that which existed during the infamous "Gilded Age."

So the bottom line is it's not the "rich" who are the focus of resentment but the super-rich. Wealth is not the issue -- excessive wealth is.

Vast fortunes have been accumulated by Wall Street manipulators, crooked mortgage bankers and industrialists who have bribed legislators to remove regulations that prevented them from giving American jobs to foreign workers.

If things were so great for the middle class in the 40s and 50s why was there a need for the Great Society programs? Also, you said that the wages of the average worker has either decreased or remained stagnant. That's just not true.

Nonfarm Business Sector: Real Compensation Per Hour (COMPRNFB) - FRED - St. Louis Fed

 

[asterism]

Actually, I am not so sure that they are not listening. I don't want to dig up the links for it, but I remember reading that Warren Buffet has stated that he has no problem with having his taxes increased. Same for Bill Gates if I am not mistaken. I imagine that there are an awful lot of the well to do in this country that would not have a problem with their taxes being increased.

Truthfully, I think the big issue that is interfering with such a thing is that politicians use this as a wedge issue like they do abortion and immigration among others.

I may be wrong, but that is my opinion.

I just get so sick of hearing that all of our troubles are because of those evil rich people and I hear that mostly, if not entirely, from liberals.

Immie

And yet you'll notice that neither Bill Gates nor Warren Buffett willed their estates to the US Government. In fact, they gave a huge boost to private charities. I think we should follow their examples.

I wasn't aware that they had died. How do you know what is in their wills with any reliability or what will be in their wills? Also, that was not my point. In fact, my point is very simple.

What bugs me in this whole debate is the attitude that liberals take in reference to the rich. They seek to punish the rich for no other reason than that they are, in fact, rich. I really do not have a problem with raising taxes on the rich if it is done for the right reasons, just as I am not opposed to having my own taxes raised for the right reasons, but this excoriation of the rich because they are rich is lame to say the least.

Immie

It bugs me too, especially when certain "very rich" people are lauded for their political views instead of their actual actions.

Warren Buffett and Bill Gates publicly announced where their money was going:

The $600 billion challenge - FORTUNE Features - Fortune on CNNMoney.com

Private charities.