Maya Angelou, age 86, passed away today in Winston Salem, North Carolina. Though she is gone we have not lost her voice. Angelou once said "When you get, give, when you learn, teach." The world was her classroom, humanity her student. She taught us that although our world is ugly our existence can be beautiful. She did more than create art: She was living, breathing expression. May the caged bird which once sang now spread its wings and fly to peace. -515
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Much has been made of the one percent; from tax battles on capitol hill to protests on Wall Street there has been a massive amount of scrutiny from both the right and the left on the wealth debate. I decided to finally take a look into the wealth saga in our country and the scope, if any at all, of its impact. I must say that the numbers are mind blowing. First, the top one percent of the country own about 40% of the wealth in our country. That is income and assets. They also accure nearly one quarter of the income in the country. The bottom 80% of the country owns only 7% of the wealth in the country. Now to put those numbers in perspective in 1976 the top one percent of income earners only brought in 9% of the country's income. That means that in the last 40 years or so the income of the top one percent has nearly tripled. This graph shows growth of different sectors from 1990 to 2005 adjusted for inflation. It tells us that CEO's i had increased their income by nearly 300% (shown in blue), and Corporate profits, shown in green, had increased by about 107%. In that same time period the average workers wages, shown in red, only increased by 4.3%, and because of inflation those working at minimum wage, shown in yellow had their income decrease at a 9% clip. The wealth disparity gap in 2007 was at its highest point since the year before the great depression: coincidence? What exactly does this mean for our society? Well first it means that as the rich get richer the middle class and poor laborers are getting left behind. From 1996 to 2011 the number of people who were considered to be in extreme poverty ($2 a day before government benefits) more than doubled from 636,000 to 1.46 million. Wages have stagnated for the middle class while staple costs for families such as health care and college continue to rise which means that it is becoming harder and harder for the average families. As prices rise more and more families are resorting to using debt to pay for the way of life they have come to expect, which is a dangerous economic tendency. The graph below shows how little most workers have gained, notice how dynamic the disparity gap becomes after 1981. Its most important that we ask ourselves why this has happened. First, we've seen a sharp rise in the price of college as shown by the graph on the left. Since the mid seventies our government has spent more and more money subsidizing large business and less and less on the other things that are necessary for our civilization. As our institutions receive fewer government subsidies they make up for that money by raising the cost of tuition. In our world education is the single strongest tool we possess for social change and mobility in our society. College is also a way for average citizens to be able to compete in a new hyper-competitive global economy. Other than germany the United States has had the lowest growth in the percentage of poplation earing degrees from 1978-2008. This means that other countries are becoming more skilled than we are at a rate far greater than ours. In other words, we are falling behind when it comes to education. This affects our wages. As our skills become more diminished it also diminishes the value of our work. Now workers in Sweden, Australia, and Japan are just as skilled if not more than we are, which means that we have to compete with their labor, lowering our value and the amount of wages we can be paid. That is one factor. Union membership has also been down. In the graph to that there is a clear correlation between union membership and wealth disparity. That is; the more that people are a part of unions, the smaller the gap is between the rich and the middle-class. Which makes sense, unions fight for fair wages, benefits such as health care and pensions, scholarships for children of workers and reasonable working hours. However over the years the ability for Unions to bargain, or even exist has been undermined by the government. We can't blame the rich, and even the ultra-rich for being rich, its how our system works, there are rewards for working hard and taking risks. However we can blame them for corrupting and rigging the system so that the middle-class and poor have fewer opportunities so that they can protect their money. These people that have become super succesful have corrupted our political system with their money. Lobbyists who are paid large sums literally write legislation that will ensure that big money interests are protected and in return for passing the legislation they promise funding for our politicians campaigns. In short our politicians are trading their own job security for being servants to big money. In the 2012 election cycle alone their was over $567 million spent for various campaigns. In return the wealthy have seen a government that caters to their interests. The end of the estate tax which only applies to super rich, government abandonement of unions, relaxed regulations, lower capital gains taxes, loopholes for millionaires and billionaires to retain their money. There are two great examples of this. First is the Tea Party, which although it operates under the guise of a grassroots movement was funded and launched by billionaires, namely the Koch brothers. The Tea Party pushes for almost the complete absence of government from business, wouldn't that be convenient for the rich and the corporations. The other example is also a Koch brother consequence. In 2012 when Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker was recalled for trying to end public unions in his state the Koch brothers spent $81 million to keep him in the state house thereby ending public unions in the state of Wisconsin. The cost of winning a congressional seat has doubled in both the last 30 years because money is continually being poured onto capitol hill. It is becoming clear that our democracy is being put on the auction block.
Many on the right have continued to pound into our heads that is the wealthy business owners and CEO's that create jobs, and we have to free up money for them to invest. If that were true, as Nick Hannauer who is one of the countries most succesful entrepreneurs says, "We would be drowning in jobs." "Hiring people is what we do if, and only if, consumer demand requires it." Consumer demand comes almost entirely from the middle class. Yet instead of protecting the middle class from the bullies on wallstreet and in corporate corner offices our government has bowed to their mass of money. Today as a result upward mobility, the chance of being able to move out of your current econmic class, is as low today as it was during the great depression. Capital has defeated labor. How then do we get our beloved American dream back? What countries model to we try to emmulate? The answer is America's. In the 1930's the progressive populist movement by American citizens addressed the same problems we had today. They demanded an equal share in prosperity and democracy. Under FDR we saw enormous change with the New Deal; monopolies were broken up under the NRA, the first ever minimum wage, the tennessee valley association, social security, protection of unions, a huge investment in education. We have reclaimed our American dream before, but it took the worst recession in our history. We've now experienced the second worst recession in our history and although there has been outrage their hasn't been an organized effort to truly change the make up of our current system which continues to rot with corruption and greed. In the end we truly hold the power in a democracy, now it is a quesstion of whether or not our resolve is strong enough to use that power to do what is right. -515 The only constant in this universe is change. Change is the most powerful tool the universe has to mold the world as we know it. It is the medium through which we improve and evolve ourselves. If there is any one goal in this blog it is that it changes something in the world. If I can change the way one reader looks at a subject, an idea, or the world I can rest knowing that I have touched the world in a way that can never be reversed. I look forward to posting again, soon: so stay posted and thank you for reading
-515 |
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