The Thriller
Well-Known Member
Sigh. I knew someone like you would jump to conclussions and just go with the typical Glenn Beck vomit reaction by calling Americans spoiled or excessive spenders and saying that the middle class is a buzz word. I'll define it better in just a few sentences.I don't meant to ignore the morals of living within your means. But I don't believe in wasting America in teach everyone that lesson.
Actually, my thesis is based on simple economics. The cause and effect is that because of huge changes to our tax structure (and other things as well) inequality has increased greatly. Because much more of the wealth is being possessed by such a small minority, the middle class (which, btw, I'm not pulling out of my ***. For argument's sakes, I'll define it as 40 percent above the median income and 40 percent below. Sound fair?
Yes, Americans do have a spending problem, but that's not the root of the problem. We have several villains that we can blame. Americans living beyond their means, Bankers lending to people they shouldn't have, deregulated markets, and legislation that allowed people who couldn't make payments get loans. These are all factors but not the ultimate reason why I believe we need to adopt more "progressive" policies and redistribute wealth than continue with conservative policies and grow the inequality gap.
When the middle class lacks purchasing power (wealth) they react by working more (just look at how much more Americans have worked over the past few decades, more women in the workplace, smaller families, etc) and live off credit. When this dries up, recession/depressions hit. After this, we can either redistribute wealth to jump-start the economy and expand industries or swallow the painful pill of living with a lower standard of living.
Do you really think it a coincidence that the richest 1 percent of Americans peaked in both 1928 and 2007 at 23 percent? The top 10 percent owned 50 percent of the nations wealth at *gasp* the same years, 1928 and 2007. Is it really just a coincidence that just prior to market collapses that wealth became top heavy?
The redistribution of income from the top heavy rich back the spread across all other classes were brought on by new legislation and WWII. In the 30's, the top 1 percent went from owning 23 percent of the wealth to 16 percent. Then to 11-15 percent in the 40's. To 9-11 percent in the 50's. Then to 8 percent in the 60's.
Is it really just a coincidence that the golden economic age of our country was when wealth was most equally distributed? Is it really any coincidence that the darkest economic years of our country have been when wealth has been concentrated in so few hands?
As far as Americans "spending too much" this is hogwash. From 1947 until 1975 personal consumption stayed near 62 percent of the GNP. Prior to 2007, it had increased slightly to 70 percent. Hardly much to jump at.
True, lets not go overboard and kill the incentive to start your own company and get rich. But without demand for products, unemployment will remain (or increase), salaries stagnate, and companies cannot expand. As Keynes said, "measures for redistribution of incomes in a way likely to raise propensity to consume may prove positively favorable to the growth of capital."
As far as the argument that, "well capitalism by nature concentrates wealth into the hands of few" that's only partially true. Capitalists have had the great help of government to help redistribute wealth FROM the middle class/poor classes to the rich. Funny how redistributing wealth to the rich isn't seen as unconstitutional, unethical, or counterproductive like redistributing wealth from the rich. Why is that? Is it perhaps because he who has the gold makes the rules?
the old argument of "higher taxes on the rich hurts the economy while lower taxes helps" is bull. In the 1940's to the late 60's income tax rates for the top 1 percent of Americans ranged from 94-71 percent.
Using Foxnews's logic, the 40's-60's must have been decades of economic slump and hell.
Today, they're at all time lows. Are we experiencing good times economically?
In order to keep the economy moving and a demand on products and services, the majority of Americans need wealth (not just the top 1%). We will either need to redistribute wealth (by any means necessary. I can only think of government redistribution honestly. But ifyou have others please suggest) or accept the fact that America is on the decline and that we'll have to live with less (and a lower standard of living).
