The greatest evil about wealth is the way it corrupts people - the "careless rich" as F. Scott Fitzgerald refers to them in "The Great Gatsby". Those in power, being the people with money, sooner or later adopt an attitude of "the devil take the hindmost" as they surge ahead in their luxury cars and their private jets.

For me, the simple life please. I don't want to be significantly richer than my fellow citizens because I don't want to end up turning my back on them when I can no longer rationalize away the guilt of having so much while others struggle to make ends meet.

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What better way is there to help the underclass than importing illegals to work for $3 an hour? No unions, no benefits and no safety laws are required. If they get hurt or talk out of turn, just deport them and have the coyote bring you a fresh batch.

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You might want to remove university professors from that list. There is a growing trend of using part-time adjuncts to teach more subjects than ever before. Adjuncts cobble together a living commuting between campuses to teach various courses (and high per hour rates are often inflated, as they don't always take into account how long preparation and grading take). You can forget about health insurance, too. This is one of the reasons I took my master's degree and headed off to Asia (first Japan, now China) to teach English.

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Interesting you should mention university professors. I've been looking at that job market recently and - this year at least - it's indeed tilted toward Canada. I know more than one American graduate who will be taking a job in Canada as a "guest worker" - though these are mostly not long-term positions. On the other hand, American universities are increasingly farming out their actual teaching appointments to adjuncts, lecturers, etc. - subcontractors all, which are even worse deals.

However, Canada has a different immigration policy than the US and a much higher proportional rate of immigration, (thanks to the different border situation, these are mostly middle-class people with professional qualifications - plus a certain quota for actual refugees), so hopefully my associates won't have too much difficulty getting into more permanent jobs. With the academic job market in the US being as it is, that seems the best hope of decent employment except for the lucky. A small number get absurdly huge grants and long-term positions right away - the rest get onto the treadmill of successive 1-year posts with no benefits and high teaching loads... Anything to shift the work of teaching on the plate of people without tenure, or any prospect of getting it.

It's not yet as bad as the rest of the job market, obviously, but it's heading in that direction.

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One big problem is that few in the bottom 99% know how the system works. At least this article starts scraping the tip of it.

The financial/bank example is a good one: I'm not sure how many of the 99% realize that it's much more expensive to be poor than to be rich, in every aspect of our lives. Many hear the wealthy constantly bitching about the top marginal federal income tax rates, and don't seem to look much further than that.

A whole book could be written about the cost of being poor or middle class, and could cover things like payroll taxes, rent, interest, two-tiered mutual fund/bank accounts, etc. No need to bring up all kinds of abstract Marxist theories. Just go through the average Joe's checkbook to see how he's getting screwed. Maybe Michael Moore could do a movie on it.

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Never mention the fact that Clinton's top campaign adviros/stratagists are major union busters ('Left-wing' union busters)

Never mention that she used to be a highly paid executive at Wal-Mart.

Never mention that her husband gets millions per year to make SPEECHES.

Never mention that the former B. Clinton cabinet and pending H. Clinton cabinet were filled and are going to be filled with investment bankers, stock traders, 'treasury officials,' and the usual cabal of capitalist pigs. They care NOTHING for the poor; they only care about THEMSELVES.

Never mention any of these things.

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Let's see. Now what happened politically after that? Reagan was elected in 1980, and I remember hearing Tip O'Neil talk about the "smell in the House" from the Demos who were voting Reagan's way.

That was soon followed by the next 25 years of a GOP dominated Congress with its anti-labor and pro-taxcut laws. Even Kevin Phillips, a former Nixon aide, wrote a book about how since Reagan there's been a transfer of the nation's wealth to the rich almost as large as during the epitome of the Gilded Age.

Take away the middle class, and what do you have? Feudalism. Lords and serfs. The Republican counter revolution has not needed violence. In a nation where everything is for sale, all you need is money to buy it--the nation, the government, the people.

It can last a few more generations. But the Age of Petroleum is ended. Will the Age of Democracy end with it?

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Blaming income disparity on aliens who enter the US unofficially willing to work for $3/hr rather than the minimum wage a legal resident might "command" is pitting the people at the bottom against one another. Who's hiring these low wage immigrants? Who benefits? The corporations and big money. Who's working in our meat packing industry? Aliens that the companies dump out into the streets when there's a raid. We all like inexpensive food and cheap tube socks and prefer not to ask who suffers to make that possible.

We should direct our anger at our whole political system and the ignorant voters that continue to make it possible. Bush's tax cuts only benefitted the very rich but the majority supported them. People are too easily bamboozled.

Thanks to Barbara Ehrenreich for trying to pull the scales from a few eyes.

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It doesn't matter what your issue, follow the money and you'll find a politician at the end with his hand out. Only when we have full public funding of campaigns will we see the power of the rich leveled, and universal health care, and balanced budgets, and lower taxes, and, hell, I could go on forever. Joe Biden and Dennis Kunicinich (?) are the only two Dems and McCain and Fred Thompson the only two R's, that will support fixing the system.

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The principle of generic class corruption, both economic and political failures, echoes the Olbermann speech of a failed political class, but a principle only applied to Iraq. Unless we understand how this economic slavery, unpaid labor, class processs reproduces itself, and how it corrupts the middle layers, into class elites, as class hierarchies, with their class ideologies, that in turn reproduces Corporate fascsism, and Class Empire, we will never transform ourselves towards the goal of revolutionary democratic movements, to set up middle layers, as the real social mechanism, without class masters, oligarchy that corrupts and begins this class process, and deformation of the inherent moral center, revolutionary democratic impulses of a functioning middle class mechanism, that reproduces internally and externally a social principle of wealth and real democracy abroad.

It is the insertion of a oligarchy, Barabara's "overclass", interacting with its middle layers, that starts the corrupt class process, and is itself the mechanism which reproduces, not just Capitalist corproate fascism and Empire, but all class societies and Empire. If we were to dissolve all class hierarchies, internally, and between nation states, externally, the oligarchy and Class Empire would wither on the vine, without oxygen to grow again, corrupt again. Generic class corruption and failed political classes, "tilted", corrupt middle class elites, did not begin with the failure of Iraq, but with the failure and betrayal of democratic revolutions, by Napoleon and Commercial classes putting property rights over universal rights, and by corrupted national revolutions, including "Stalinism", mislabled Communism, by Stalin, who failed to dismantle the class hierarchies, internationally, with his "socialism in one country", that allowed his own regime degenerate into the same kind of corrupted middle layers within class states.

In fact this generic class corruption, process and mechanism, failed political classes, and other historical class empires, belongs to the history of most of our class rule. When PLato and the ancient Greeks tried to graft democracy, onto class patriarchy, it produced all the same elements of corruption, and that was since the birth of democracy and its ideas were supposed to be revolutionary and new. Real democracy, requires a middle class mechanism, without class masters, in other words a social mechanism, similiar to the ideas of the Enlightenment and Marxists, whose ideas, revolutions were corrupted, by the failure to apply this principle internationally.
We are re-examining this failed principle through many years of failures, and it is time we move on beyond the thousands of years of class rule and generic class corruption, imperial brutality.

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It's true, that getting out of any debt is very hard.....credit card companies make it very difficult for people to wipe out a balance with high interest rates and ridiculous late fees.

You have to be a smart consumer....and many Americans are living way beyond their means. It's not just the poor, it's the middle class, and even the upper middle class.

Fifty dollar sneakers are just as comfortable as a hundred dollar sneakers.

Basic cable with a hundred less channels. You won't miss a thing.

Cell phones are convenient, no doubt, but not a necessity....and your land line....Caller ID and Call Waiting is a waste of money......and if you ask me, putting a friend or family member on hold is just plain rude!

Keep the thermostat below sixty five or lower in the winter and wear extra sweaters.

Use coupons.....for everything.

Buy staple foods that will last.....and avoid fast food restaurants. It's healthier anyway.

Don't buy lottery tickets.

Don't give in to your kids requests. They'll live.

Don't purchase a vehicle.....that costs more than where you live.


Live within your means......you'll be much happier.


Poe

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It may seem counter-intuitive, but the solutions to wealth concentration do not lie in bitching about the rich and looking for government action. The way you improve the lot of the poor and the middle class is by increasing its capitalistic tendencies.

What we are seeing right now is a basic example of 'we played ourselves'. People complain about ever-increasing tuition to go to ivy league schools, but can't see that they are playing the game by the elite's rules, and thus will always fail. The left and NGOs are no better on the topic, prefering to hire go-getters with ivy league degrees and thus propping up the whole game.

No, they way you deal with this is by launching a new wave of businesses that cater to the poor and middle classes. That address their economic needs and dreams. Let me give you an example. Generation X: this much-maligned generation is notorious for having different attitudes to work and saving based on their own experience of the economic debacle of the early 1990s, and then the boom of the dotcom era. They are a rich vein to tap if the right products are marketed to them (and by this I don't mean cynical crap like junk food etc., I mean financial products that make them wealthier, lifestyle products that make their lives better).

What we are seeing across the western world is the greeding gourging of the baby boomer generation. They have established the rules and are playing the system to their advantage. It represents the greatest theft of wealth from the younger generation to the older. But the way to counter-attack is not to ask this same generation to take government action (more taxes, more failed big government programmes, more lame charity). No, the best solution is economic enterprise, entrepreneurialism. A new wave of business and creativity. In short, a capitalist solution is the only solution.

The expansion of the third sector, in time, will be seen as a big mistake. A sometimes misguided (though sometimes cynical self-serving elite agenda) to control the poor and the lower middle class. Our economic salvation does not lie in being told what to do by charities or government social services.

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One of the biggest disparities in the lives of the rich and the working poor is the quality of healthcare they receive. With nearly 50 million uninsured in this country, most of whom are the working folks who can't afford the insurance that is not provided as part of their jobs, we fall way behind all other industrialized countries in adult health, infant mortality, and obesity. The insurance industry in this country has managed to influence the policies of all administrations and all Congressional actions. If we are ever to get a national healthcare agenda, we must accomplish two things. First, we must overcome the corrupting influence of the insurance industry and we must force the healthcare industry to take steps to improve the quality of care. Michael Townes Watson, author of America's Tunnel Vision--How Insurance Companies' Propaganda Is Corrupting Medicine and Law.. www.StopMedicalError.com

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The root of our national problem is "Free Trade". We import the goods that used to be made by American workers at a generally fair wage, from places that have no "minimum wage", health care, retirement plans, environmental demands. American producers can't match their prices UNLESS U.S. imposes tarriffs that nullify the inequities.
Both major political parties have encouraged this export of jobs. Ross Perot had it right when he said he would hear a "giant sucking sound" as result of job losses from NAFTA, et.
The disaster is now happening, and will only get worse.

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dont you just come out and say that you hate capitalism. This is how it works. Instead of blaming rich people etc....how about suggesting ways that people CAN get thier asses out of debt.. Yes I know its hard... But know what? It CAN be done... I am doing it How about educating people about what can be done... Whining solves nothing... Certainly never got me anywhere when I was a kid... So I had to figgure a way to get what I wanted without whining... Now I own a farm, and kick ass.

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Survival instinct had created a nation of alienated and isolated loners so disgusted by a society driven by indifference and greed that many have turned to pets for solace. We see our pets as beloved family members.

Distrust for others is something we sadly learn by experience. Our values as individuals and collectively as a people have been so corrupted by a culture of orchestrated selfishness and greed, that when it comes to money, we don’t trust anyone. For that matter, we have come to distrust one another on all counts.

“Everybody is looking for something” . . . to take a bite , that is.

Some insist it’s just “Human Nature,” but that’s a lie. Most human beings are herd animals because they have learned to go with flow. It’s a matter of survival instinct. Ideology is a powerful weapon wielded by the powerful to impose their views on the masses. Our “values,” or rather their “values,” of indifference and greed have been pounded into our heads since the day we began to understand language. Our parents and society as a whole were taught that socialism is evil, even though socialism in theory is essentially egalitarianism, and what Jesus preached. But rather than attacking egalitarianism, or Christian values, our masters have cunningly taught us that “socialism” is evil.

Few ideologies are inherently evil, the evil arises in the implementation. The powerful in every society seek to impose their ideology and self-interest on the masses everywhere. Are you aware enough to recognize that your “values,” have in many instances been imposed on you by people who don’t give a rat’s ass whether you live or die?

.

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Now that you know the rules of the game, get out there and play. That's the best advice anyone can give you.

The rich don't give a damn about you, the upper middle class don't give a damn about you, the middle class don't give a damn about you, nobody does. All they want to have is a big nest egg on which to retire and acquire the services of young peons to do everything for them until their diseased old body finally ceases to function.

Lie, cheat, steal, do whatever it takes to get yours and survive in this ruthless mercenary country called America. It's kill or be killed, no stranger is your friend, he's an enemy looking to take what you have.

So now that it's all been laid out perfectly clear for you, go make some money. How? Anyway you can!

That Dean of Admissions at MIT worked for 28 years claiming to have 3 college degrees when in reality she had none. How much money did she make during that time (2 or 3 million dollars? I'm sure her salary for the past 10 years was over 6 figures)? How opulent was her life as an academic administrator at such a well funded school? How many banquets did she attend and rub elbows with rich alumni and donors? How much quality wine did she drink and how much gourmet food did she eat?

Do whatever you have to do to get yours, nobody is going to hand it to you, in fact, they'll take a scrap of bread from your starving hands, laugh, and watch you die in the streets.

Welcome to America.

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I've read that in one of the Scandinavian countries, either Denmark or Sweden I believe, it's considered improper/bad form/crude for one to make significantly more than one's neighbours, much less to broadcast the fact. And that applies specifically between the professional and the mechanical trades, rather than being only a code of modesty within one's own business sector. Perhaps, apart from pure social values, this comes from an awareness of living in an economy that is not infinite in size and distance of consequences to others.

Far on the contrary here in the United States, there is no shame in drawing a gargantuan paycheck, even for a job ill-done or deliberately botched and compromised. Where the shame does lie is in the bottom register of society, in the way that the infrastructure of our common welfare system is hidden away like a dirty secret, in the way that people slip through its cracks and out of official statistics, in "created" undertime jobs without any benefits or upward mobility, in the way that employers routinely con job seekers and the homeless are shoved off parkbenches and out of the public eye (even if it means tearing down the local YMCA for a new apartmentless facility). It lies in the suicide rate for those who who fail at the game or can't see any way that they can survive in it. And in the way that it's not the upper class nor the (upper)middle class who have reticence about the money they earn or have at their command, but the rest who are made to feel ashamed that they don't make that much, that they aren't at the top of the heap or even close, because they have its prizes and allurements shoved in their faces at every turn. What use is being Employee of the Month at some retail outlet when that doesn't even begin to approach the astronomical standards of wealth and fame (and public attention) that are established through celebrity culture? What good are anything-but-a-raise employee rewards when people are vying for fame and fortune on TV almost every night of the week? It's a pathological energy-sink of attention -- this 'celebrity culture' is fed by the unfulfilled hungers and displaced ambitions of those who are going nowhere in their own lives, and we have a whole lot of those to drive the hamster-wheel and hold the impossible carrot in front of themselves (with a helpful industry to help them along in their own distraction).

If it weren't for the so-called "American dream", people might rebel more cogently against these excesses being paraded before their eyes. As it is, though, what we have is a gap that sustains many by faith, in the anticipation of striking it rich, making it big, climbing out of the crab bucket and leaving all the rest behind. Poverty and dead-end jobs are thus seen as temporary encumbrances rather than present adversaries; the world online or in videogames (or in more physically addictive things) is more real than the here-and-now that needs to be striven with in order to better it.

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It wasn’t a matter of chance that President Bush’s first legislative goal after taking office in 2000 was to pass a tax reduction bill that favored wealthy citizens over middleclass Americans and the working poor.

Case at point: George W.'s personal tax situation. While he received a refund in 2006 large enough to buy a new SUV, many wager earners in my state, California, got back barely enough money to purchase 10 gallons of gasoline.

I have a single relative in Los Angeles who earned $20,000 last year and paid 23% in taxes. Bush received over $500,000 and his 2006 tax bill equaled just 28% of income. Can any reasonable person argue that kind of tax assessment system is fair, especially when virtually all rich people receive guaranteed medical care and generous retirement benefits while less fortunate Americans don't?

George W.'s second objective after becoming president was regime change in Iraq, which needed the okay of Congress -- a major reason for his tax cut plan. Had he asked for increased taxes to finance the 2003 invasion, Congress probably would not have approved Gulf War 2. Instead, Bush got what he wanted -- bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for overthrowing Saddam Hussein.

Although Congress eventually became dissatisfied with Dub-ya's bungled war of choice, they were quite content to extend his lopsided tax cut package last year at the expense of working Americans. Until attitudes change in Washington, the rich will continue getting richer while the rest of us take it in the shorts.

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Much of America's wealth disparity could be improved simply by emulating the economic policies and programs of several Western European Countries. Particularly, Sweden, the Netherlands, and to a lesser extent, Germany and France. What needs to happen in America:

1. Universal, single-provider, national health care.

2. Fairer taxation. Higher progressive taxation rates, based on income, for the wealthy in the USA. Fewer write-off's for businesses and an increase in the capital gains tax. For example, all Wall-Street gains should be taxed at the minimum level of 40%. Ample evidence exists, based on the economic activity of Western European countries, and also Canada and Australia, that higher progresssive taxation rates will not harm investing and might even encourage it.

3. Subsidized day care. Higher minimum wage. Income transfer, to a certain degree, from the rich to the poor. Again, works in Europe.

Other solutions that should be considered:

1. Elimination of so-called "free trade." No more trading without high import tariffs to countries like China and Indonesia that use documented child, prison and virtual slave labor.

2. No more tax breaks for businesses or corporations moving or shipping jobs overseas. You want the benefits of America, you stay here and you pay for it.

3. No more "blaming the poor," for their economic plight. They don't have a chance. We need to signficantly cap loan and credit card interest rates and gut the industry that feeds on the poor. Again, an increase in the minimum wage will help.

4. Gut the defense/national security state. The money would be much better spent on programs to imrpove the welfare of the people. All a big military budget and infrastructure invites is involvement in fruitless wars anyway, such as Iraq.

So, the solutions, much of them proven, are already out there. We only need to implement them.

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I do blame the poor. Did they ask WWJD when they got pregnant at 16 and not have the abortion? Do they spend money on lottery tickets? Did they finish High School? What are their spending habits? Do they have the latest and greatest Cell phone, Ipod ect? Did they buy it on credit?

In Florida, A HS diploma or a GED gets you in to any Public Community College. A degree from a public community college gets you into a State University. Its too bad only rich white boys like me can afford college. I had an Army ROTC scholarship, a “Bright Future” Scholarship (paid for in part by those lottery tickets), I made about $220 per month in the National Guard, and held a $7.15 per hour job as a life guard at the YMCA. It is not that hard people!

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Barbara E. is one of the few authors to hit the best-seller list talking about 'class' issues. Class divisions are supposed to be a thing of the past in the USA, or at least be so permeable that members of the lower echelons can hope to move in with Paris Hilton someday.

In fact, statistically, the best predictor of a person's class status is his/her FATHER's class status. So much for mobility.

I don't aspire to hang with the Hiltons. I'm doing a job that can't be outsourced at your local supermarket. All I really want is for that work, and the work of my fellow employees, to be valued highly enough to provide a decent life for my family and myself. As in, a Living Wage.

Here's a thought: if ALL full-time jobs in the USA paid a LIVING WAGE with collective bargaining rights, and health and retirement benefits, I'll bet Americans would be doing them, and there'd be no need to import serfs from other countries.

Not a likely outcome in a country run by corporate 'persons'. But can we at least (at VERY least) stop assimilating the GOP talking points into our media discussions of the subject? When you read "low-skill jobs," translate it "low-wage jobs".

Doing any job well requires training, skill and aptitude. We appreciate some forms of training and aptitude (basketball, inheritance) more than others (humility, patience). But imagine the joy of a society where your agricultural workers, grocery baggers, your hotel maids, and your waiters were all really GOOD at it, and DECENTLY paid to do it, and HAPPY doing it.

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Barbara is right on, again.

The top 1% are sucking everything up and it is wrecking our society.

Tell me about it; I just spent the winter in Telluride, where 10,000 sf mansions sit empty 50 weeks a year while the entire workforce drives bumper-to-bumper two hours over a mountain pass twice a day to get to work building more mansions because housing costs are too high anywhere closer to the job.

It's crazy.

One of the weirdest results is how this concentration of wealth affects women. Flocks of wanna-be-wives, super-thin, plucked-eyebrow, hyperfeminine whorey-lookers are attracted to the money like moths to a flame. They rent small apartments, work in galleries, and lurk around, lusting after the high life and putting constant competitive pressure on the anxious uber-wife residents of the big mansions on the hill . . . it's a feminist's nightmare.

Professional women cannot hold a candle, with their own income, to the kind of cash these sex-adventuresses can sometimes get into, if they hit the jackpot.

Most of the time, though, they end up washed-up losers.

Totally retrograde, from a gender-equality point of view.

Jan VanDenBerg

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Let's face it: If even Paris Hilton has confessed that her life -- pre-incarceration -- was one of empty luxury and pleasure, then there is hope for the rest of the wealthy, is there not? A corner has been turned. Now is a time for healing and closure.

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In which world does Lowenstein live? "My kids still have health care, and they go to decent schools", he says blithely. Oh good for him. In real life, a good chunk of American kids have no health care (or insufficient) and go to horrid schools where they barely learn to read (but they do get a dose of those wonderful 'abstinence only' programs that will get girls pregnant at 16 and produce the next generation of low-wage laborers or cannon fodder-or drug addicts).
And this guy is an economic thinker? My my, economics is in a sad state indeed. Thank God for people like Paul Krugman who restore a good name to economics.

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The Heiress had a $1500 fine, no problem for her, BUT for the working class getting the fines paid off is a real challenge especially with a WalMart payday.

On TV you often see the young man or woman trying to evade the PD because there is a warrant out for their arrest for an unpaid fine.

The GOP WASPS who make most of the tough on crime laws, consider non payment of the fine a crime. What is the punishment for this probation violation? I'll guess 6 months in JAIL. Now if you ran from the PD over the unpaid fine , I'd bet it would mean time in Prison.

Can we find a JUST system without those in authority calling reformers SOFT on crime?

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How's the war on poverty going?...... It's over, the poor lost....... What is the one thing the rich are willing to let the poor call theirs and keep?.........Envelope please...........Their distance!!!!!

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It truly can be said that one half doesn't know how the other half lives. Case in point with this insightful article, the rich don't care about the poor and never have, I can recall a statement made by "W" during one of his campaign speeches. " I'm glad to see you all here, the haves and the have mores". What does this say about our society today? It clearly says that the top 1% don't give a rats ass about the downtrodden masses that make up the other 99%. So when it's posted that people should live within there means it makes me sad and angry at the same time. How can we live within minimal means of support for ourselves? Living in Mich at this moment, we have the worst employment rate in the country, one of the highest foreclosure rates anywhere, and are struggling to raise the minimum wage rate. With an extinct automotive industry and no signs of recovery, many residents are moving to places like Florida and seeking better ways to support their families. It's sad that the only time in 7 yrs into his administration the Executive Dumb Ass only wanted to discuss new fuel alternatives with the Big 3 and not how to keep them afloat. People are losing the fight for the American dream which continues to become a nightmare for us "have nots". If we continue on this and other paths of self destruction, everything our forefathers and mothers fought for will be for nothing. The time has come to take back our dignity "By any means neccesary".

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Repuks or Dempuks take your pick there is no difference. The America that they represent has nothing to do with we the people. Personally, I do not think the masters can let a Dempuk be elected in 2008. The chance for a lot of people to realize that, the democracy in the USA is awol is just too great. Let’s hope they make that mistake, so vote for the status quo ho. The problem is not the rich or the poor or the immigrants, the problem is taxation without representation. We have been here before and Babylon always falls. Maybe someday will stop coming back.

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They've poisoned us with lies.

They are our absolute enemy.

Those defending them are either paid to, or are the dumbest people on Earth. The ones these poor saps serve will betray them in the end. It's all they really know how to do.

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Some MP3 lectures on the subject, all worth downloading and listening to when you have the time (I like to burn lectures onto CD, then write LISTEN COPY SHARE on them and pass them out to friends):

Paul Krugman:
Politics, Policy and Inequality

Noam Chomsky:
Free Market Fantasies
Class War
The Mechanisms of Inequality

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prints the money, hands it over to the federal reserve to distribute, and gladly pays interest to the central bankers with our tax dollars, why should anyone in their right mind pay any federal income tax?

Obviously, the federal income tax is not about money. It's about control.

Watch Aaron Russo's movie, "America: Freedom to Fascism."

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that will probably make the last one seem like small potatoes. Inequity in income was most likely the single most important cause of the Great Depression.

All I can say is, learn how to grow cucumbers and make pickles, and drill for your own water source. Nothing else will probably be as important in the coming decades.

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Union busting that brings affordable goods to ordinary people is BAD
Union strangle hold on our failing public schools is GOOD (it is the rich who are screwing up schools)
The current housing bubble was caused by the rich (like all market bublbes in history)
Financial industry profits should be re-directed to soup kitchens
Wealth in politics is GOOD when it comes from the left but BAD when it comes from a different political philosiphy.

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It's not the illegal immigrants, the poor, the baby-boomers, the rich or the war in Iraq. It's us. As long as the powers that control us keep us fragmented and searching for a "fall-guy", we will not unite and force changes. Keep feeding us new episodes of "American Idol" and Anna Nicole/Paris Hilton reruns...we're so stupid we think this crap is REAL. We're as dumb as sheep and all they need to do is keep herding us over the cliff!

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I'm not sure why I'm responding - I'm sure you'll just label me another "pinko bitch" - but I have to point out a glaring fallacy at least about your Wal-Mart argument. Wal-Mart is very successful directly due to their inhibitions in expoliting those who don't have any voice. Their manufacturing plants in China pay a whopping 13 cents an hour on average, workers have no benefits, work ridiculously long hours and the factories have been accused of all sorts of worker abuse. In the US, Wal-Mart exploits its workers by paying them ridiculously low wages and using whatever tactics necessary to prevent union organizing. They offer health benefits, but only for full-time workers and then only allow most workers, even those classified as "full-time", to work thirty hours a week, which doesn't qualify them for benefits. They are also well-known for discriminating against female employees. Sure you can make the argument that people can choose to work elsewhere, but in many rural areas of the country, this is one of the few jobs available. This isn't pinko bullshit, this is the reality for hundreds of thousands of workers all across the country.

All of the Waltons listed on the Top-Ten Richest list make thier money from the Wal-Mart chains, so yes indeed, they are all profiting from exploitation.

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Dear Barbara Ehrenreich . . .

I love you. I love you. I love you! I applaud you for your courage; knowing that many will once again label you a Marxist, you dare to speak of what I believe is necessary and obvious. It seems the idea of inevitable interdependence escapes many, even or especially the super-rich. The top one percent of the population longs for a thriving economy, and simultaneously, denies they bring it down.

More than a year ago, I moved to Florida where the disparity is stark. The cost of living here is extremely high, in my experience higher than it was in Southern California. The wealthy claim, we are paying for sunshine. They think the expense is worth it. Extremely affluent forget some people are just trying to squeak out a living. The more people we, as a nation, have in need, the more we all pay out. Devastation for one will be seen, felt, and experienced by all.

The poor may serve the rich; however, if they are ill and in need of health care, that cost, as well as the expense of a depleted work force will affect the affluent. If the "little" guy or gal is not available to do the work that keeps a company alive, who will. Will corporate moguls stand at check stands for hours everyday? Will ballplayers box their groceries, clean hotels rooms, or do the laundry. Might movie stars or Chief Executive Officers keep the books or teach the children. I think we must assess who actually keeps this country alive, and then honor them.

You mention the rich in regards to national policies. I am astounded by who runs for office. It is not the poor or even the Middle Class [if one still exists.] Yet, we expect lawmakers to understand our plight. Yikes!

If we observe nature, we see there is ample abundance. Any void is immediately filled. Dig a hole in the sand. The water, working in conjunction with the shore will help close the gap. Scarcity is a man-made concept promoted by those that have more than a fair share of the pie. These person convince those at the bottom "there is not enough to go around." However, there is. Our distribution is out of balance.

I invite you to read some of my musings. Please do share your thoughts.
Income Inequity. The Real Reason the Rich Get Richer
Death Tax Keeps The Wealthy Rich. With Increased Wages, Poor Lose
Business Blunders Burden Society
I Can't Get No Satisfaction From Stuff, Or Can I?

Betsy L. Angert
BeThink.org

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...and this is how communism comes about!

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That most people SIMPLY STILL DON'T GET IT? The bad guys are running the show, and we're LETTING THEM get away with murder, treason, and the theft of everything we hold dear. It's even worse than that. We elevate wastrels, con men (and women), and thuggish theives to demigod status merely because they've become wealthy on the backs of the rest of us. We hold them up as models of what we ALL should be, shining examples of virtue, hard work, and rectitude of conduct, when in fact, they're no better than the criminally insane wretches that we incarcerate for life. Until a large majority of us develop the ability to distinguish between friend and foe and isolate greedy sickos from our society, we'll be fair game for their criminal activities.

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Disparity in income is actually an historical cycle. The boom/bust inflation/depression cycle runs about 50 to 70 years. In the last phase, concentration of wealth in the hands of the top 2 percent becomes the norm, just before the crash and the "Kondratiev winter" (economic depression). This cycle has happened repeatedly in American and world history, the last being the 1920s boom/30s bust. In that time we had a similar concentration of wealth, Republican majorities and the rest. The Depression actually took care of this disparity.

Right now the American disparity of wealth has come to resemble those of Latin American countries. We've become another Mexico. The role of the economic depression is to smash down this disparity and level the playing field. All those hedge fund managers living in their Mcmansions or particle board palaces will end up broke.

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As has been stated in previous posts, I think society, and U.S. society in particular, is shot-through with a "me first" attitude on steroids.

As a part-time college teacher, I really see it in the younger generation--especially the sons and daughters of the middle-managers and business owners. "So what if I and my neighbors are poor, some day no matter what it takes, I'm going to get mine and then f**k all the others!"

The great Romanian theologian Richard Wurmbrand once told a story of his idea of what hell was like. He saw a table laid out with sumptuous meals, and the condemned souls were sitting around it, all of them filled with hunger. He asked one of them what their punishment was, and was told that even though each one of them was hungry, none of them were able to bring the food from the plate in front of them to their mouths. He asked one of the souls why they didn't just go ahead and feed each other. To which the soul replied: "what?--feed HIM???? I'd rather go on starving!!"

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I have never worked so hard for so little pay, sadly I see no relief in sight. It's very discouraging when you realize you are just a low wage slave. Amazingly, how is it that 2 people have to work 40+ hrs just to keep what you had 6 yrs ago when 1 worked full -time and the other part-time. Used to be "back in the day" if you wern't making great money at least you wern't breaking your back. I can attest that this is no longer the case. They bleed you dry for that low wage let me tell ya!

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We are being asked to give up incondescent bulbs for compact floureascent ones, which contain mercury, but nobody is asking the rich to give up their Gulfstreams (private jets). And the rich are finding new ways to blow through the earth's resources: Mr. Rutan has develpoed a space plane, Mr. Branson is going to use those planes to develop Virgin galactic Space Line, and Mr. Bigalow (Los Vegas Developer) is developing an orbatil hotel. How much jiuce is it going to take to send an A-list couple into outer space so they can be the first celebraties to fuck in zero gravity? And we will just suck it up. I can just hear some mindless fool saying, "Brad and Angelina consumated their love in outer space, how romantic."

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A lot of complaining and bickering on these threads. If you aren't looking at Ron Paul as the best candidate to get government out of your lives, along with abolishing the IRS then you haven't done any research.

STOP TYPING and griping and go to youtube and see who Ron Paul really is if you want to restore this country.

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is taking the easy way out instead of learning how the US economy actually works and identifying the real culprit, the system that is currently in place.

The poor (and the middle class!) are getting poorer because the dollar is being comprimised by those in power, i.e. the inflation of the money supply by the Federal Reserve that benefits the few at the top. A truly free market with an honest monetary system would put an end to this horrible theft of wealth from the people.

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The USA long ago should have rejected the "free trade" idealogy and we all would have been far better off economically. Why? Because American companies should never have been expected to compete with the low wages of countries like China and their massive subsidies for export industries. Because of America's size, by having a closed market until countries like China developed, we could easily have protected our manufacturing base. Instead, to benefit a small entrepenerial business class, we decimated America's manufacturing and industrial base. So, what is left of American corporations? A bunch of financial holding companies, real estate trusts, a few big pharmaceutical companies, a couple oil companies, and the left over remnants of once great companies that use to make up the S & P 500. Meanwhile, countries like China have accumulated in excess of $1.2 trillion US dollars in reserves. So, they (the Chinese Communist Party) are going ahead and investing in US private equity ventures (like Blackstone) now and no doubt, their cash undergrids a significant portion of Americas economy now. Can you imagine the USA doing this? Not another country in the world would allow it. Our "investment" in foreign countries is what we spend on stupid wars like Iraq. We keep the world's oil flowing, but who is benefiting the most. It isn't America anymore.

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I have read and transcribed all of your statement's into a gigantic hyperultrasupercomputer which has analyzed your comments using solid-state quantum string-theorized socioeconomic phenomenology calculus vectors and it melted the sun processing the ultimate response to these comments.

And the answer is this:

Shut the f*ck up.

Absolutely. I actually traveled back through time to build this superultrahypercomputer that would one day melt the sun and I have succeeded and it has told me in no uncertain terms that you need to shut the f*ck up.

You need to get in your car. Drive to Washington D.C. and randomly eat a politician a day until they behave and fix stuff for real.

If not, problem solved in less than 4 years. You simply eat all of the politicians. It's delicious and it's the only way...

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The income distribution is a lot more lopsided than most people realize. Check out http://www.lcurve.org .

Good article.

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Zebras are good, got any receipies for poached Paris?

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mr.BOVIN a farmersleader in France burnt down a MCDonald. As long as he is in parlement the MCDonald family cannot harm him.
Since very rich people became rich by stealing through;
low salary for their workers
paying low taxes
they are simply thieves
What is stolen is no legal property
so donot destroy lifes like terrorists but destroy materialistic junk.
If you donot destroy it we need war to get rid of the products.

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WILL BE THE OPPORTUNITY FOR THE WEALTHY TO EXPLOIT THE SYSTEM. Ron Paul understands that the greatest way to bring a fairer distribution of the riches of America is to greatly downsize the central government and give control of our government back to the PEOPLE, their communities and the states. STOP shipping jobs offshore and fight for America in world trade rather than lining the pockets of the top 1%.

There wasn't this huge skewing of income to the rich when the central government was small and when the government did speak up for the people through such things as antitrust laws.

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If you were a lawyer that needed to make a living to support your FAMILY, would you defend an accused innocent father of abusing his family that didn't have money to pay or defend a guilty father whose parents could pay you well??? Who said life wasn't fair? What an understatement!!!

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The comments, as usual, concern trivial details and "food
fights". None of the comments concern strategy. The
article itself is the highest level, most abstract comment.
Nobody says anything about what to do or what could be.
Nobody suggested a constitutional convention. Nobody
pointed out that the Internet, if secure and honestly
programmed, could allow every citizen to vote on every
issue. Nobody even pointed out that a smarter lower 99%
could vote the rich out and vote themselves rich.

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This is just a place to blow off steam and for the writers to rub your nose in reality.

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C'mon folks,
Get a clue. It's still possible to move up the ranks through hard work and intelligence. The problem is finding those 2 qualities anymore. None of the kids want to work for anything anymore, thay all want to live like Paris Hilton with none of the consequences. In addition, schools no longer teach many of the skills that get kids through college. Mourn the death of Industrial Technology classes next time you read about underskilled labor.

It dosnt take a genius to see that its possible to move up in life through education or starting a business. Can't afford school, you say? I call bullshit. If you cant scrape together enough to do it yourself, join the military and earn it. I don't care if you dont support the military, you dont always get to be Mr. Moral Highground. Is it easy? Nope. Fun? Hell no. But anyone with enough mental acuity to make a myspace page can do it. It's possible and I meet people every day who are first-generation money. The fact that the gap is widening is more a sign of the lack of will in the current generation. Blame welfare, blame godlessness, blame whatever makes you feel better, but the bottom line is that parents got lazy. Parents can make up for low income, they can make up for poor schools, and they can give their child the drive to move up in life.

The media dosnt help with its image of high-class no brainers: football players, rappers, and major celebritys to start. They play that field because it's what sells to the current crop of delusional get-rich thirty-somethings and stay at home moms who need television drama to feel alive. It's very sad when Paris Hilton's jail time gets more coverage than any other event in the world.

The real problems with todays United States lies in the political system and the way money flows through it. Now that we have second and third generation politicians floating through parties and rubbing elbows we're beginning to see why the crop of politicians needs to be rotated out more frequently. Do you think a room full of average everyday people would vote the way our current crop does? Would they need to check with their lobbyest before voting? Maybe add a few thousand unrelated earmarks to something? Or would they vote the way they feel and not have to follow the money trail?

But how do you even get into politics these days? Without major asskissing and contributions from influential sources, it's impossible. Those in control have rebuilt the system to keep normal, rational people out. THIS is where we need to focus our energies, and watch as the problems begin to fade and the system corrects itself. I only hope it happens before it's too late.

Get ready for change, folks. It's coming. The trade agreements have removed the skills from American manufacturing, and the government handouts have bred a generation of gutless whores. When the next big war comes along, we're going to lose. And maybe thats what it will take to set things right.

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is how communism starts, look at China, Cuba, Vietnam, etc, etc.

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