Memories – Unemployment During the Reagan Years

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The sobering fact is that without a progressive tax rate for the wealthiest income earners, incomes go up for them, while the rest make less. The best way to minimize that beyond a progressive tax rate is to support labor unions.

Do you actually want their income to go down, or do you just want the Government to take more of it?

I look at it as a cause and effect - that wealth or capital is not created in a vacuum. The imperfect marriage between the private sector and government may sometimes be an ugly one, but a necessary one. Capital, by default, funnels upward. We want to allow the private sector to create jobs and capital, but without a tax policy that is progressive, wealth becomes concentrated into the top 2 percent. I wish I knew a better way, but I have to see any other way beyond supporting such things as labor unions.

You're going to get this to the point though where in order to spread the wealth as it were, half of people in this country are not going to be paying taxes at all, or so little that it is insignificant to the total tax in take. We are actually already very close to that point now.

Do you not see a danger in creating a situation where essentially 1 group of non-vested citizens have the power by majority to control what policies affect the other part and not themselves? Tax increases would always pass, because the majority wouldn't be affected!

I think it's possible to have upwards of 75 percent of incomes within Middle Class wages. When that happens, everyone benefits. Redistribution of capital or wealth happens whether it's through progressive tax rates or low wage jobs. Both ends of the spectrum - income earners who don't even make enough to pay taxes, and those in the top 2 percent paying higher tax rates - are indications of an economic imbalance, IMO. If you look back, our economic prosperity was most prominent when this country had a strong Middle Class, thanks in part to FDR's New Deal.

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The sobering fact is that without a progressive tax rate for the wealthiest income earners, incomes go up for them, while the rest make less. The best way to minimize that beyond a progressive tax rate is to support labor unions.

Do you actually want their income to go down, or do you just want the Government to take more of it?

I look at it as a cause and effect - that wealth or capital is not created in a vacuum. The imperfect marriage between the private sector and government may sometimes be an ugly one, but a necessary one. Capital, by default, funnels upward. We want to allow the private sector to create jobs and capital, but without a tax policy that is progressive, wealth becomes concentrated into the top 2 percent. I wish I knew a better way, but I have to see any other way beyond supporting such things as labor unions.

You're going to get this to the point though where in order to spread the wealth as it were, half of people in this country are not going to be paying taxes at all, or so little that it is insignificant to the total tax in take. We are actually already very close to that point now.

Do you not see a danger in creating a situation where essentially 1 group of non-vested citizens have the power by majority to control what policies affect the other part and not themselves? Tax increases would always pass, because the majority wouldn't be affected!

I think it's possible to have upwards of 75 percent of incomes within Middle Class wages. When that happens, everyone benefits. Redistribution of capital or wealth happens whether it's through progressive tax rates or low wage jobs. Both ends of the spectrum - income earners who don't even make enough to pay taxes, and those in the top 2 percent paying higher tax rates - are indications of an economic imbalance, IMO. If you look back, our economic prosperity was most prominent when this country had a strong Middle Class, thanks in part to FDR's New Deal.

I think with the labor pool essentially being a global market now those days are over. I do in fact believe that the wealthy are benefiting from lower wages, but its not from lower wages in the U.S alone. Products remain cheap because of a labor pool in some distant country with labor laws that no progressive tax scheme can begin to touch. It really does not matter frankly. The WTO has insured that the U.S cannot contain its wealth within its boarders so there is nothing compelling wages to increase here.