"America now has more wealth and income inequality than any major developed country on earth, and the gap between the very rich and everyone else is wider than at any time since the 1920's"
This is a quote directly from Bernie Sanders' web site. It may be true but I do not have the time to research his statistics. Let's assume it is true...but what are the reasons and what are the results of this country producing more millionaires and billionaires per capita than any country in the world? And why shouldn't we take away more of their money and redistribute it, after all these "wealthy' people don't need all that money do they?
There are not very many billionaires in this country that have inherited their wealth. Here are some of the billionaires in Forbes top 15 - Bill Gates - Microsoft, Warren buffet - Berkshire Hathaway, Larry Olson - Oracle founder, The Koch Brothers - Koch Industries, the Walton family - Walmart, Jeff Bezos - Amazon, Mark Zuckerberg - Facebook, Phil Knight - Nike ...and I could go on (including Beyonce and JayZ). These entrepreneurs produced a product that people wanted and they probably had no thoughts when they started about becoming a millionaire or a billionaire, they had a great idea, worked their ass off, and their business was successful. Bernie sanders says "the system is rigged" if that's true how did so many people in our lifetime (many who started from scratch), become millionaires and billionaires?
I recently read an article which analyzed the Forbes list of 400 wealthiest Americans. These 400 created 10 million jobs in the country. The top 100 founded companies that employed on average 40,000 workers.
This class warfare which is a staple in the Democrats play book is getting old. As of 2015 The top 20% of wage earners pay 84% of all taxes, the lower 50 % pay on average 2.9% and the bottom 20% actually get paid by the government. Hey Bernie why is that not fair?
I am not a billionaire, nor am I jealous of them, but I did start a successful tech business from scratch; so did many of my entrepreneurial friends. And if you count real estate especially here in California you could call us millionaires. But we also remember the long hours, great risk putting all our assets on the line, and periods when the business almost "went south" and no one will ever convince us that the free enterprise system attacked by Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton, is "rigged".
Bernie has proposed a top income tax rate of 54%, with a capital gains rate to match (up from the current 25%). With state and local taxes the top earners could pay 75% in California and New York. Who is going to work for three quarters of the year and give that income to the government - no one. Under a Bernie Sanders society the high wage earners will just go offshore and our economy will tank. "Socialism" has a proven record of failure, but 'progressives' like Bernie and Hilary continue to want to repeat it and try again.
Bernie says the wealthy should pay their "fair share". To me, giving even 50% of your income to the government borders on being 'fair', no matter how much you make. To pay more than 50% is simply "confiscation".
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I guess the alternative at this point is to turn the country over to organized crime. Given yesterday's announcement, my guess is the Republican ticket may be Trump-Christie. Both men are undoubtedly well connected to New York and New Jersey Mobsters. You don't build hotels in New York, Miami, and Vegas; and work with the trades unions without "owing" the guys in the back fedoras, nor do you get elected in New Jersey without the same connections.
But let's stop making wealth distribution the issue and focus on the loss of the middle class and the large body of poor, disenfranchised and unemployed in the wealthiest country in the world. If the Republican Party will stop slandering their own members, putting unqualified, egocentric buffoons up for election and start solving problems, then they will have a chance. The Republican Party has become the Party of Self Interests in our era. They consider their own interests above those of the country or their fellow citizens. It's nonsense to keep pointing out that billionaires create jobs because much of that wealth was gained through speculation, which is non-productive. Using yourself is not a good example of the average successful person. Yours was a small business built with grit and determination. It's a dying breed I our current world. A large amount of the nations wealth is essentially sequestered in speculative activity and it does not produce jobs. In addition, to say that billionaires will take their money out of the country and produce jobs elsewhere is also off the mark. Companies have been doing that for years. A lot of Capital is already sequestered offshore.....have you looked at Apples financials lately. Where would the money and jobs go that it hasn't already migrated too.
The major global markets are in the USA. Our markets built China and Japan. What needs to happen is for the structure of business incentives to change to bring those jobs and Capital back.
I'll also remind you that under Eisenhower the tax rates were even higher than proposed by Bernie Sanders. As I recall, he was a Republican, he warned against the dominance of the military industrial complex, he believed in investing in infrastructure, and the economy was doing very well during his administration.
John you're too hard on the Republican party, and calling us the party of "self interest" is ridiculous. You don't think the Democratic party has self interest? Give me a break.
I'm not real happy with the blowhard ahead in our primary but we have a ways to go, we'll see what happens Tuesday.
None of the billionaires I have listed have earned their money through "speculation" unless you consider taking a risk and then building a company speculation.
If Trump gets elected we'll have to deal with it. Certainly better than the Clinton crime family.
I reposted my prior comment with a word change. It might have been interpreted as insulting and that was not my intent.
Did you notice the news today that the Government just awarded an $80 BILLION development contract to develop a new strategic bomber. There is an additional commitment to 100 aircraft, likely to cost a billion each. aircraft that can be shot down using a $100K missile The Russians are ramping up their weapons programs again and it has the look of a second Cold War that will cost the country TRILLIONS of dollars over time. All wasted resources. It's quite frankly disgusting to even contemplate......and people are focused on the difference in 30% and 38% taxes. How self centered is that.....I ask you?
It's not the difference in tax percentage, which is where we disagree. This economy has been stagnant for years. If you want those middle class and poor folks lifted up we need to get back to 4-6% growth rate in the economy. I believe that would happen if taxes were lowered and more capital went to the free market. I agree with your position on the military complex and spending. But it's more complicated than to just quit spending on the military when the bad guys around the world continue to get more aggressive. But I will be the first to also agree that the military needs some serious management. When $400,000 is spent to build a gas station in Afghanistan something is seriously wrong.
The Billionaires you mention, with the exception of Zuckerberg and Jay-Z made their mark years ago. You also fail to mention the Wall Street hedge fund billionaires, who create nothing; the inherited billionaires, who live off of the wealth their ancestors created, and the banking billionaires, that created the financial debacle that put us in our never ending recession.
The Waltons are a perfect example of the egregious abuse of the system of free enterprise. Old Sam built a company from nothing and proudly promoted the fact that all of his goods were American Made. He left the company to his children and they moved the sources of supply offshore, held wages at substandard levels with no benefits, used predatory tactics to literally destroy family owned small businesses all over the country. Now they live a lavish lifestyle, while the people that produce their wealth work two jobs just to make ends meet. They represent all that is wrong with American business today.
I'm not anti-wealth, nor do I fully agree with Sanders; what I do believe is that he is the only honest person running for President, and he will change the conversation in Government.
I wasn't making a comparison Chuck. Each Party stands or falls on its own merits. To make comparisons, in my option, is an attempt to diffuse the issue and deflect attention from the issue. The Republican Party is clearly the Party of Self Interest in my opinion. The Democrat Party is blantently dishonest in the way it is holding its Primary in an attempt to elect Hillary. Electing Hillary is just like electing Bill for a third term. Politics is blantently corrupt and Sanders is the only honest person in the race. That gets him a lot of points with me.
What people don't seem to realize is that every dime we spend goes into somebody's income. Iron ore has no value. Men are paid to dig it out of the ground. Others are paid to haul it to the steel mills. Others are paid to turn the ore into steel. Then others are paid to haul the steel to a plant where still more workers are paid to convert the steel into useful products. The products are then transported by workers to the point of use. All of those workers paid taxes on what they had earned. In the end, 100% of the product has a value equal to the sum total of all of the people involved in the process. So, when we say we are going to spend $100 million on a new piece of military equipment, we are saying that $100 million will be distributed among all of workers involved in the production. Obviously, some of the money goes into profits, which will generate more taxable income to someone.
As an example, the space program has cost a lot of money, but not one cent of that money went into space. It all went into the taxable pockets of the people who were employed to produce the raw materials, build the equipment, provide the fuel (produced by workers), and design and operate the program.
The challenge we face is keeping people employed. When the taxes exceed a reasonable level, motivation will go away and a lot of those workers will find that their jobs are no longer available for them. When the taxes reach a certain level, so that the corporate after tax level is the same as the hamburger flipper's after tax level, motivation will be gone and the CEOs will decide it isn't worth the effort, and they will look for the job at McDonald's and the guys that have been flipping burgers will be out of their jobs.
The concept of seeking to level income among all people doesn't create more money for the people at the bottom of the pile. It just lowers the standard of living for everyone.
Can't agree with you Nighthawk..but on politics we rarely agree. But let's leave it at that. I don't even agree on Bernie, he may be honest, but it's an easy political platform to offer people the moon without any possibility of getting it through Congress or paying for it if he did. Think your backing a losing horse in that race.
Jim Packer has it right, socialism's net effect is to "lower all boats".
Thanks Jim for the primer on basic elements of economics in a balanced system. Unfortunately, you left out a key element of the system in the real world....greed. That is why we are where we are. I'll ise my Walmart example to represent what happens in a balanced system when people in power decide to exploit those less fortunate. It creates an imbalance into which a Bernie Sanders or a Karl Marx can in turn exploit the situation in the name of an ideology that will also ultimately fail. All of us have to be cognoscente of the fact that all men are not created equal in terms of ability or opportunity. When people in power exploit the masses we end up with what we have now in America. I don't know where it will go, but Republicans don't have the numbers to keep the White House. Until the Republican Party returns to the ideals of its founders the Party will always be second in the nation. Money and wealth are not the goal. They are the byproduct of an honest effort. Unfortunately, that reslity does not exist in our society these days.
Just so you know Chuck, Nighthawk was the name of my squadron in the Marines. VMA(AW)533, the Nighthawks. One of the most decorated aviation units in the Marine Corps. We got both the Presidential Unit Citation and the Navy Unit Commendation when I served with that unit. That's why I use it as my moniker
Nighthawk should start your own Blog...90% of the comments on mine are from you :-) And maybe your own Blog would help your man Bernie, he got his butt kicked in SC today.
John I feel sad you that you have such a low opinion of American business...based on greed. Your Walmart example is a classic example; Walmart has probably helped ten times as many poor people as they have hurt, with access and low prices throughout rural America. In a recent Walmart opening here they hired 200 employees and 600 had applied. The classic liberal fallback is to attack Walmart, sorry but I can't buy your greed argument. You may recall my small business controlled 75% of the underwater photo camera market and I wanted it to be 100%...I guess you call that "greed".
P.S. You may recall Photosea's low light level intensified camera was called the "Nighthawk", and I came up with that name not even knowing your Marine history. Unfortunately my "Nighthawk" was ahead of it's time and never got off the ground :-)
Chuck, you have a short memory. There was a time, pre-Walmart, when small towns had a square with a hardware store, a bank, a plumbing supply, etc. Those businesses employed just as many people as Walmart does today, but it was small business, and it was the backbone of this country. Wealth was spread across thousands of hard working people and reinvested daily in their businesses. I ride my motorcycle through small towns all across the country and see boarded up businesses, unpainted homes and people holding signs asking for a handout. That is the Walmart legacy. Junk goods made in China, sold cheap with profits going outside the community. Capital sequestered for the benefit of a few people, who are exploiting the people that they employ and serve. Walmart is a staging area for the local landfill, in my opinion. It is a perfect example of greed in America.
SC was a gimmie for Clinton. Let's wait until California, Florida, New York and Texas have their primaries.
Heard at the dinner table from the youngest of two 4.X GPA kids: "If Bernie's elected will I have to give some of my GPA to kids who won't work as hard as I do?"
Take me to school, Nighthawk.
You'll need to type loudly, please. I lost a good bit of my hearing working as a flight deck troubleshooter in the vicinity of the USMC's A6. Without question, that was the loudest noise I've ever felt.
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