What Trickle-Down Economics Has Done to the US: The Rich Get All the Money

[FreakinDJ]

What Trickle-Down Economics Has Done to the US: The Rich Get All the Money


That Improving Economy Is Further Away Than It Appears

Leisure and hospitality - the fastest growing major blue-skill industry - is the worst sector. The average leisure and hospitality worker makes just $18,900 a year (gross, before taxes). This is not even enough to keep a family of three above the poverty level ($19,790 in 2014). Similarly, retail, the largest blue-skill sector, is second-worst in terms of pay, with average annual earnings of $27,700. - Mike Cassidy, Where Are the Jobs? 2015 (1)

By most media accounts, the US economy at the beginning of 2015 is recovering nicely from the Great Recession. GDP is growing at a historically healthy rate, above 2 percent per year. Unemployment is about the historic average, at 5.7 percent. The stock market is near record highs. And more jobs are being created than at any time in more than 10 years. But this is all a great deception. The expansion is benefiting a tiny minority of the population only - the very rich. No one else has any money, and without significant changes in government policies, no one except the wealthy is likely to have any in the future.

This is the fact that eluded the Democrats in the 2014 election. When Democrats boast of how well President Obama has done with the economy despite Republican opposition to everything he does, they are missing the point. This economic resurgence has not reached most Americans.

Ronald Reagan brought supply-side economics to the federal government, the belief that suppliers of goods drive the economy, not the consumers. The supply-siders believe that lower taxes stimulate production and improve the economy. They also favor deregulation of industry. The theory, which acquired the nickname "trickle-down economics," was that economic growth would benefit everyone. That has not happened. The entire supply-side economic theory has proven to be totally wrong as the data in this article shows.



http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/29447-what-trickle-down-economics-has-done-to-the-us-the-rich-get-all-the-money

[Turbineguy]

1. It took the Russians 70 years

to figure out that communism doesn't work. This could have a while yet to run.

[tk2kewl]

2. 36 yrs... half way there...

i hope that's long enough. i'd rather not have to reach collapse

[tblue37]

3. The problem with their "communism" was that it was strongman cronyism, whereas

democratic socialism, as found in the more enlightened European nations, does work.

[Turbineguy]

4. Trump

will be strongman capitalism.

[tblue37]

5. For sure. nt

[davidn3600]

7. No one knows if it can work on a large scale, however.

European nations are rather small and tightly-knit culturally. People of each country share a lot of common interests and goals.

The United States, by comparison, is very large with a large scattered population. Culturally, we are all over the place. We also still have racial problems and many other forms of inequality. And each region of the country has their own set of problems where a solution for one region may negatively effect another region. Centralizing power would likely lead to favoritism for certain regions or certain people which would lead to further tension. We would ultimately end up with a lot of the same problems the Soviet Union had. The Soviet Union was very large and had a very culturally-diverse population.

No one has really ever been able to come up with an idea to make communism work for a large, culturally diverse country.

[Octafish]

6. Tax the rich and their corporations...

Tax Offshore Wealth Sitting In First World Banks

James S. Henry
Forbes Magazine, July 1, 2010

Let's tax offshore private wealth.

How can we get the world's wealthiest scoundrels--arms dealers, dictators, drug barons, tax evaders--to help us pay for the soaring costs of deficits, disaster relief, climate change and development? Simple: Levy a modest withholding tax on untaxed private offshore loot.

Many aboveground economies around the world are struggling, but the economic underground is booming. By my estimate, there is $15 trillion to $20 trillion in private wealth sitting offshore in bank accounts, brokerage accounts and hedge fund portfolios, completely untaxed.

SNIP...

This wealth is concentrated. Nearly half of it is owned by 91,000 people--0.001% of the world's population. Ninety-five percent is owned by the planet's wealthiest 10 million people.

SNIP...

Is it feasible? Yes. The majority of offshore wealth is managed by 50 banks. As of September 2009 these banks accounted for $10.8 trillion of offshore assets--72% of the industry's total. The busiest 10 of them manage 40%.

CONTINUED....

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2010/0719/opinions-taxation-tax-havens-banking-on-my-mind.html

[WhaTHellsgoingonhere]

8. The problem in the US is that Trickle-Down is

...only deemed a problem when Republicans are in office. We are willfully blind to it when Democrats are in charge. We're just relieved to be in charge, so in the case of Trickle-Down, we don't hold Democratic Presidents to the same standard.

We finally have a choice in the upcoming election: more Trickle-Down or a paradigm shift. Until Democrats are capable of acknowledging their culpability and role in Trickle-Down, we don't appear ready for a paradigm shift. We'll know in a few months.

I will credit Democrats for coming around on Bill Clinton. More Democrats are critical of his economic policies, today. Maybe in a few years, more Democrats will feel the same about Obama.