There is a word for the feeling you get when a mean bully goes to kick an innocent, little puppy, and instead, the bully falls down and breaks his own leg. It’s a relative of, “Hah, serves him right.” The word is “schadenfreude.”
It’s a feeling I try to fight when I see post-World War photos of Berliners sorting through the shattered remnants of their city – the same people who cheered the removal of people to death camps.
Schadenfreude is mean and low, like a drug that provides a short-lived high, to be followed by a long period of self-recrimination.
Today our government, rather than sending innocent Germans to death camps, plans to destroy lives a different way — by deporting young, innocent “Dreamers” to countries they don’t know. This is how the current administration plans to “Make America Great, Again.”
But there’s more to the story than just immorality and intentional cruelty. The deportation of 800,000 young, productive people will result in a recession, if not a full-blown depression, and the people who always are hurt most during economic crises are the lower-and-middle-income classes.
Those people, now delighting in the misfortune of good, young people, suddenly will realize it’s not so funny, when they themselves begin losing their jobs, as their companies start laying off workers.
The Dreamers are not stoop-labor picking your veggies in the South. They actually are among our best and our brightest.
Being “illegal” they have had to be far more careful to comport themselves better than is typical for American teens and young adults. They are less likely to commit crimes, more likely to attend college, and are the people we would rely on to be our leaders, helping to grow our U.S. economy.
Losing good people will force many American companies to lose profits, fire employees, and/or go out of business altogether. And guess which group of American citizens will be hurt most. Right. The lower-and middle-income class Trump backers.
Initially, the mean-spirited will cheer at the sight of unfortunate youngsters being rounded up and trucked to countries they never have known. Right-wingers will enjoy watching “law and order,” Trump/Sessions style.
Then as the pink slips are given out, and the jobs disappear, and homes are lost, the realization will sink in: When you get rid of good people, business suffers, and when business suffers, the working class suffers most.
And then — I really am embarrassed about this — I will try not to shout, I TOLD YOU SO,” and though I’ll fight it, I’ll feel schadenfreude. It’s a feeling like a drug, with a short-term high, and a long period of self-recrimination, after.
You, of the middle classes, can deny the storm is coming, but your denials won’t change the reality. The storm is coming.
I’m starting to feel schadenfreude already, just knowing what lies ahead. Darn it!
But, that’s not all.
The people who happily wish to deport “Dreamers” also deny global warming, and by a strange irony, they also will be the ones hurt more by the change in our climate.
The lower-and-middle-income-classes tend to live in more flood-prone areas, are less likely to have insurance, are less able to afford higher food and energy prices, will suffer more from insect-borne and warm-weather diseases, and will be far less able to maintain their lives, than will the upper-income groups.
The nation that immigrants grew, now wishes to deport immigrants — and for no good reason. These immigrants, by virtue of their consumption and their ambition, stimulate America’s economy. They add to available jobs. They act as good citizens without being citizens.
When they are gone, we will miss them and their contributions, and the ones who will miss them most are the ones who wished them away.
Trump’s followers will suffer the day. For the rest, it will be schadenfreude.
•All we have are partial solutions; the best we can do is try.
•Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.
•Any monetarily NON-sovereign government — be it city, county, state or nation — that runs an ongoing trade deficit, eventually will run out of money no matter how much it taxes its citizens.
•No nation can tax itself into prosperity, nor grow without money growth.
•Cutting federal deficits to grow the economy is like applying leeches to cure anemia.
•A growing economy requires a growing supply of money (GDP = Federal Spending + Non-federal Spending + Net Exports)
•Deficit spending grows the supply of money
•The limit to federal deficit spending is an inflation that cannot be cured with interest rate control. The limit to non-federal deficit spending is the ability to borrow.
•Progressives think the purpose of government is to protect the poor and powerless from the rich and powerful. Conservatives think the purpose of government is to protect the rich and powerful from the poor and powerless.
President Trump is right about one thing: We Americans have allowed our former greatness to slip through our fingers, and yes, we have the opportunity to “make America great, again.”
But, that does not mean making America meaner, more frightened, or more selfish.
The way to make America great again is to make America compassionate again.
It takes far more strength of character and moral courage to be compassionate than to be cruel. It’s oh, so much easier to curse at the downtrodden than to help lift them.
The power of compassion
It’s oh, so much easier to put forth negative examples as excuses for being mean-spirited, than to look past the ragged clothes and different mores and to see the treasure within.
Do not despise the poor, the hungry, the homeless. They are not the enemy. The enemy is poverty. It is the real root of all evil, and we can help reduce poverty. We have that power. We need only use it.
A brave leader strengthens the moral fiber of his nation with a kind and helping hand. A fearful leader needs a harsh steel fist to maintain control.
Weak nations lead a frightened existence. A great nation is not a fearful people. A great nation does not defend itself with petty malice against the powerless. The measure of a nation is how it treats its last in line.
We Americans were great when we fought evil during World War II. Then, we fought for our existence.
But, we even were greater following the war, when we reconstructed Europe with the wise compassion and generosity of the MarshallPlan.
For you who are too young to remember the Marshall Plan (that may be nearly all of you), here are a few highlights:
The plan had bipartisan support in Washington, where the Republicans controlled Congress and the Democrats controlled the White House with President Harry S. Truman..
The purpose of the Marshall Plan was to aid in the economic recovery of European nations after the war.
The Marshall Plan offered the same aid to the Soviet Union and its allies, but they refused to accept it. In fact, the Soviet Union prevented its satellite states (i.e., East Germany, Poland, etc.) from accepting.
Immediately, you see the vast differences between our formerly great selves and today’s anxious America.
A Republican Congress and a Democratic President worked together, instead of trying to sow hatred and defeat each other.
Rather than punishing our enemies, as we did after World War I (which led to WWII), we helped to rebuild them.
The Soviet Union took the opposite course, building walls and enslaving their formerly enemy populations.
The results of our “clever compassion” vs. the Soviet’s “Iron Curtain,” are widely acknowledged. Compassion proved to be smarter and more productive than grim vengeance.
The result should have been predictable to anyone who understands human nature.
President Truman signed the Marshall Plan on April 3, 1948, granting aid to 16 European nations. During the four years the plan was in effect, the United States donated $17 billion in economic and technical assistance to help the recovery of the European countries.
The $17 billion was in the context of a US Gross Domestic Product of $258 billion in 1948, and on top of $17 billion in American aid to Europe between the end of the war and the start of the Plan.
In just the seven years after the end of the War, we Americans gave Europe $34 billion, about 13% of our GDP.
Today, that same 13% of our $19 trillion GDP would amount to $2.5 trillion.
(Try to imagine today’s weak politicians providing an additional $2.5 trillion to help our own poor, much less the poor of other nations.)
History shows that the Marshall Plan not only was compassionate. It was smart.
The Marshall Plan was replaced by the Mutual Security Plan at the end of 1951; that new plan gave away about $7 billion annually until 1961 when it was replaced by another program.
By 1952, as the funding ended, the economy of every participant state had surpassed pre-war levels.
Over the next two decades, Western Europe enjoyed unprecedented growth and prosperity. Marshall aid had provided the critical margin on which other investment needed for European recovery depended.
The Marshall Plan stimulated the total political reconstruction of western Europe.
By contrast, the eastern European nations, trapped behind the walls of the Iron Curtain, struggled in misery. The Soviets saw no benefits from their Iron Curtain. They continuously had to expend resources guarding their borders, imprisoning violators and defending against sabotage.
The cost was great; the reward, non-existent.
Our compassion was not naïveté. We knew full well that some of the people and some of the nations receiving our dollars had collaborated with Hitler. Consider that Germans were among the largest recipients of our aid.
But rather than take the low road by and using the bad as examples and excuses for punishment, we demonstrated American greatness with compassion.
President Ronald Reagan’s finest line was, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” That line will be remembered, forever.
Walls protect rooms. Walls protect houses, and jails. Walls protect the weak, but walls do not protect great nations. Great nations have neither need nor desire for walls.
By now we should have learned that our southern walls have not protected us from drugs and crime. More walls will do not better.
The drug dealers and the criminals know how to circumvent walls. A wall only deters the powerless and the innocent, the very sort of people who have built America.
Our Marshall Plan magnanimity actually grew our economy, created American jobs, increased business profits, and benefitted us all — at no cost to anyone. We cast our bread upon the waters and it was returned to us many times over.
We need a “Marshall Plan for America.
Rather than punishing the poor for being poor, and rather than deporting the homeless and tempest-tossed, we must help them, lift them and make them an effective addition to America’s population.
That is how to make America great, again.
How a President is remembered. “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”
People who have had the strength, courage, and desire to gather up their children and to make a perilous trip from their homes to a strange land — those people remind us of our immigrant ancestors.
What we are proud to call “America” comes from such people, who began with nothing and who created our great nation.
Today, we must remember our heritage. Today, we must remember who we are, what we are, and why we are here.
That is why I say, “Mr. Trump, tear down that wall.” We have the power to feed the hungry and to shelter the homeless, and helping the needy will make us stronger. There is no cost for such kindness. It will benefit us all.
All nations wish to be admired. All Presidents wish to be remembered kindly by history. How will we and our President be remembered?
There is one, and only one, to make America great, again. We must make it compassionate again.
The single most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:
Ten Steps To Prosperity: 1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA ) Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons: *FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and *The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare. 2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All ) This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:
Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap. 8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.
The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.
People’s actions are based on motive. Sometimes the motive seems clear and rational. Sometimes the motive is hard to spot, and may even appear to be counter-productive.
Avoid. No eye contact.
But consciously or subconsciously, logical or illogical, productive or not, there always is a motive.
Further, motives are interrelated. The motives in America affect the motives elsewhere, and your motives affect my motives, and everything connects.
Here is a story about how and why some motives connect to seemingly unrelated issues, for instance how “Gap Psychology” connects to the debt ceiling, directly and also in a round-about way.
Briefly, Gap Psychology describes the near universal desire to distance oneself from those below us on the income/wealth/power totem pole, and to come closer to those above us.
Imagine you are elected CEO of a company. You wish to fill several positions, among which are: Chief Financial Officer, Sales Manager, and Production Manager.
In your interviews of candidates, which qualifications do you consider most important? For example, Chief Financial Officer: Will you look for someone with a strong accounting background, or will you hire a close pal, who thinks accounting is a waste of time?
For Sales Manager, will you prefer a seasoned salesperson, or will you hire your brother’s wife, who thinks selling is an immoral intrusion on people’s prerogatives?
For Factory Manager, would you prefer someone who has a strong record of installing labor-saving, money-saving production systems, or will you employ your neighbor who hates machines because he thinks they take jobs from working people, so he prefers to eliminate all machinery from your factories?
The answers to these questions all are based on an implied motive, that your most important goal is to make the company succeed.
But what if that is not your real motive? What if your motive is something completely different? What if your primary motive is to be loved, admired, even envied and considered a “big shot” by your family and friends?
In that case, you might hire your family and friends, even when seemingly more qualified people are available. It happens often in business. And when it happens, the results usually are not optimal, because unqualified employees adversely affect the company’s results and the morale of its employees.
And in that case, not only have you failed in your leadership, but in short order, you no longer will receive the love and admiration you coveted.
I ask the questions because of an article I just read on the NPR website:
President Trump’s nomination of his former Iowa campaign manager, Sam Clovis, for the post is raising concern in the scientific community and beyond about the politicization of science policy in the Trump administration.
Among the concerns: Clovis isn’t a scientist. He holds a doctorate, but it’s in public administration and not a scientific discipline.
“Frankly, I’m appalled,” says Brenda Brink, a member of the Iowa Farmers Union, “because he’s not made any bones about being a scientist and yet he’s been appointed to this position where he’s elevated to the level of a scientist.”
That is not all that is controversial about Clovis. As reported by CNN, he used to run a blog on which he wrote racially charged posts, once related being gay with pedophilia and questioned whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States.
What does the Office of the Chief Scientist (OCS) do? Here is what its website says:
The Office of the Chief Scientist (OCS) was established in accordance with the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 to provide strategic coordination of the science that informs the Department’s and the Federal government’s decisions, policies and regulations that impact all aspects of U.S. food and agriculture and related landscapes and communities.
OCS advises USDA’s Chief Scientist and the Secretary of Agriculture in the following areas of science:
Agricultural Systems and Technology
Animal Health and Production, and Animal Products
Plant Health and Production, and Plant Products
Renewable Energy, Natural Resources, and Environment
Food Safety, Nutrition, and Health
Agricultural Economics and Rural Communities
If you were hiring someone to be the Chief Scientist, some of the things you might expect to find on a résumé are knowledge and experience in: Science, systems, technology, health, production, energy, environment, food safety, and/or economics.
Employing your former campaign manager, a racial bigot and non-scientist, may not be the best choice to head the USDA’s Office of Chief Scientist if your goal is to “make America great, again,”
But it might be perfect if your motive is to satisfy your ego by undoing everything your predecessor has done, i.e. by widening the Gap between you and the former President.
Or, consider Scott Pruitt, Trump’s administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. One would think the mission of the EPA is to . . . well, to protect the environment. It is what the agency says on its own website:
The mission of EPA is to protect human health and the environment.
EPA’s purpose is to ensure that:
all Americans are protected from significant risks to human health and the environment where they live, learn and work;
national efforts to reduce environmental risk are based on the best available scientific information;
federal laws protecting human health and the environment are enforced fairly and effectively;
environmental protection is an integral consideration in U.S. policies concerning natural resources, human health, economic growth, energy, transportation, agriculture, industry, and international trade, and these factors are similarly considered in establishing environmental policy;
all parts of society — communities, individuals, businesses, and state, local and tribal governments — have access to accurate information sufficient to effectively participate in managing human health and environmental risks;
environmental protection contributes to making our communities and ecosystems diverse, sustainable and economically productive; and
the United States plays a leadership role in working with other nations to protect the global environment.
Based on the above, you might believe the mission of the agency is to: “Protect human health and the environment, access to accurate information, and play a leadership role in protecting the global environment.”
But President Trump appointed a former Oklahoma attorney general who built his career suing the E.P.A., and whose LinkedIn profile still describes him as “a leading advocate against the EPA’s activist agenda,”
Mr. Pruitt has made it clear that he sees his mission to be dismantling the agency’s policies— and even portions of the institution itself.
But as he works to roll back regulations, close offices and eliminate staff at the agency charged with protecting the nation’s environment and public health, Mr. Pruitt is taking extraordinary measures to conceal his actions, according to interviews with more than 20 current and former agency employees.
Mr. Pruitt has taken aim at an agency whose policies have been developed and enforced by thousands of the E.P.A.’s career scientists and policy experts, many of whom work in the same building.
“There’s a feeling of paranoia in the agency — employees feel like there’s been a hostile takeover and the guy in charge is treating them like enemies,” said Christopher Sellers, an expert in environmental history at Stony Brook University.
His aides recently asked career employees to make major changes in a rule regulating water quality in the United States — without any records of the changes they were being ordered to make.
And the E.P.A. under Mr. Pruitt has moved to curb certain public information, shutting down data collection of emissions from oil and gas companies, and taking down more than 1,900 agency webpages on topics like climate change.
William D. Ruckelshaus, who served as E.P.A. director under two Republican presidents and once wrote a memo directing agency employees to operate “in a fishbowl,” said such secrecy is antithetical to the mission of the agency.
“Reforming the regulatory system would be a good thing if there were an honest, open process,” he said. “But it appears that what is happening now is taking a meat ax to the protections of public health and environment and then hiding it.”
Something will happen like (the water poisoning in) Flint Michigan, and the public can’t get any information about what happened or why,” he said.
Mr. Pruitt’s efforts to undo a major water protection rule are one example of his moves to quickly and stealthily dismantle regulations.
The rule, known as Waters of the United States, and enacted by the Obama administration, was designed to take existing federal protections on large water bodies such as the Chesapeake Bay and Mississippi River and expand them to include the wetlands and small tributaries that flow into those larger waters.
The original estimate concluded that the water protections would indeed come at an economic cost to those groups — between $236 million and $465 million annually.
But it also concluded, in an 87-page analysis, that the economic benefits of preventing water pollution would be greater: between $555 million and $572 million.
As Mr. Pruitt prepared a proposal to reverse the rule, E.P.A. employees were told by his deputies to produce a new analysis of the rule — one that stripped away the half-billion-dollar economic benefits associated with protecting wetlands.
“On June 13, my economists were verbally told to produce a new study that changed the wetlands benefit,” said Elizabeth Southerland, who retired last month from a 30-year career at the E.P.A., most recently as a senior official in the agency’s water office.
Ms. Southerland and other experts in federal rule-making said such a sudden shift was highly unusual — particularly since studies that estimate the economic impact of regulations can take months or even years to produce, and are often accompanied by reams of paperwork documenting the process.
In short, when President Trump examined résumés, he chose the man who wished to destroy the protective agency he was supposed to lead.
Or, consider Tom Price, the Secretary of Health and Human Services, who has voted to repeal ACA (Obamacare) and has opted for massive cuts to Medicaid, while pretending otherwise.
Or consider Ben Carson, Trump’s Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). That agency’s stated mission is to:
“Create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all. HUD is working to strengthen the housing market to bolster the economy and protect consumers; meet the need for quality affordable rental homes; utilize housing as a platform for improving quality of life; build inclusive and sustainable communities free from discrimination, and transform the way HUD does business.”
Yes, improve the quality of life, but apparently not too much. Got to keep them folks down.
When Mr. Carson assumed the helm of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, he had no government experience, no political experience beyond a failed bid for the Republican presidential nomination and no burning desire to run a major federal bureaucracy.
But his views on poverty alleviation were tough-minded and well-known. As he toured facilities for the poor in Ohio last week, Mr. Carson nodded, plainly happy, as officials explained how they had stacked dozens of bunk beds inside a homeless shelter and purposefully did not provide televisions.
And then there is Rick Perry, the U.S. Secretary of Energy, who has no knowledge of the agency’s mission. (“The mission of the Energy Department is to ensure America’s security and prosperity by addressing its energy, environmental and nuclear challenges through transformative science and technology solutions).
He famously forgot he wanted to abolish the Department, and now has apologized for that.
Recently, in perfect obedience to an anti-science administration, Perry defended the administration’s desire to eliminate the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, which supports research into new energy. technologies.
The list goes on and on. A Secretary of State having no political or foreign policy experience, a Secretary of Education who wishes to take funds from public education, a Secretary of the Interior who: “Wishes to rescind safety regulations on fracking, loosen safety rules on underwater drilling, allow coal mining on public lands, and opposes controlling emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, from oil and gas wells.”
Why does President Trump appoint so many peoplewhose personal motivations are opposed to the publicprotection missions of the agencies they were appointed to lead.
Why does he not want to protect the populace who need government protection?
This is where motive meets reality.
Donald Trump is a rich man. His friends are rich. He empathizes with the rich. They all are glad to be rich, and those who didn’t simply inherit their riches worked hard to become rich.
“Rich” is not an absolute, it is a comparative. If everyone had the same, no one would be rich. For you to be rich, someone else must be poorer. That means, there must be a “Gap,” or really, Gaps between various levels of income/wealth/power.
The people who worked to become rich actually worked to widen the Gap between them and those “below” them, and to narrow the Gaps above them. The wider the Gaps below, the richer they are.
Thus, for the 1% to become richer, as nearly all wish to do, it is necessary to widen the Gap below, and that is accomplished either by making more or by forcing the 99% to have less.
Gap Psychology is a powerful motivator. It is why some wear diamonds rather than moissanite (which is almost as hard as diamonds is more brilliant, and sparkles in more colors). It is why some buy mansions rather than mere houses or apartments.
It is why some give enough to charity so that their names will appear on hospital and school buildings, and it is why some charities publish lists of donors and the amount they gave.
It is why some go to high-end restaurants when their taste buds crave a Big Mac and why some attend the President’s ball at the White House, though they hate dances.
And it is why President Trump appoints people, who by their actions, will reduce the income/wealth/power of the 99%.
He already has favored plans to cut the healthcare of the less fortunate. He already has announced programs that negatively will affect poor immigrants, but have no effect on rich immigrants.
Soon he will present tax “reform” plans that will widen the Gap between the rich and the rest. When he excuses the Nazis, KKK, and white supremacists, he knows that bigotry causes more hardships among the poor than among the rich. Bigotry widens the Gap.
Trump wishes to deport the 800 thousand children known familiarly as “dreamers.” This will devastate many families. My guess: None of these families are rich.
The “debt ceiling” is an attempt to justify reductions in social benefits to the 99%, while also justifying increases in FICA as “necessary to ‘save’ Social Security.”
Virtually everything the right-wing, and to a lesser extent, the left does contains the ulterior motive of widening the Gap. If Trump merely ruins America for the 99%, he has made himself and his rich family and friends richer. That is his primary motive.
Whenever you are informed of any proposed government program, ask yourself one simple question: “Will this widen the Gap between the rich and the rest?”
There is no faster or better way to evaluate your government representation.
The single most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:
Ten Steps To Prosperity: 1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA ) Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons: *FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and *The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare. 2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All ) This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:
Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap. 8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.
The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.
I lean toward the left, but we all are Americans. Fundamentally, we have similar needs and wants, and that is why I call you “friends.”
I have a sincere question: Why do you so strenuously support Donald Trump?
Yes, I understand. You dislike Hillary. Frankly, I don’t like her myself. I feel she is arrogant and phony. I just wish she would shut up and go far away.
And yes, I get it. You can’t stand Obama. I don’t like him much, either. I feel he is a weakling and not a real Democrat — much too cozy with the banksters and surely not the strong leader I had hoped for.
And I even understand that you don’t like progressives. You may feel they are a bunch of lazy “takers,” who don’t even have the decency to work for their bread. I disagree, but I understand your feelings and sometimes even empathize.
In our basics, we aren’t so far apart, which is why I wonder why you support Trump.
You know he is a coward and a blowhard. He bans transgenders from the military. They are brave people who want to defend our nation, while Trump dodged the draft by faking a heel spur. He bans them?
It’s not “fake news.” It’s the real Trump.
He told you he had plans to “make America great, again,” but he actually had no plans at all. He just had words of bravado.
He is a compulsive cheat, a liar who cheated poor students at his Trump “University,” cheated on his wives, cheated his creditors, cheated his employees out of their wages, cheated you by promising you he would “drain the swamp,” then hired his friends, the billionaire banker swamp creatures who caused the Great Recession.
These are the facts Trump calls “fake news.”
If the image of a brave, honest John Wayne-type character is the quintessential idea of an American hero, Trump is the anti-Wayne. Trump is a mean, immoral bully, who delights in making life difficult for powerless people like gays, Mexicans, and Muslim immigrants, even the little children of immigrants.
Trump is not a conservative. He is not even a Republican. He is the ultimate RINO.True conservatives have no respect for Trump. They would be embarrassed to defend him
He is a finger pointer, who takes credit for things he hasn’t done, and blames others for his own mistakes. He cares only for himself, not for you, not for America.
There is no kindness or compassion in his soul. He is a hate monger, a divider, a sociopath. He is not a President who makes us proud. Instead, he sows fear.
In the past, we bravely saved the people of the world from dictators. Now we fearfully crouch behind walls, and wish to build ever-bigger walls. But no wall will be big enough to ease our nightmares. With Trump as our leader, there always will need to be a bigger wall.
We no longer are admired in foreign lands. We have been turned into the world’s pariahs.
Trump is a dictator wannabe, and by defending him, we encourage not just him but future dictators. Bad people, who see his electoral success and the backing of Americans, will emulate him, hoping to become our leaders, and one day we will learn we have encouraged a mean dictatorship.
Trump is a little man, who while hiding beneath his covers in the dark of night, sends little tweets with misspelled attacks at anyone, right, left, or center, who has the temerity to be truthful about his many faults.
I understand why you may feel the country has been on the wrong course. I truly do. I agree in many ways. And perhaps you have felt that any change is better than no change at all. Desperate people take desperate measures.
But I urge you to take a step back and look at our America with clear eyes. Much needs to be changed, but we will not benefit; we will not improve; we will not become “great again” by supporting a clearly inferior, dishonest, incompetent, egocentric fraud.
Think now of the people whom you feel have made America great. Think of their characteristics and what made Americans admired around the world. Think of the kind of leader who would make you proud to travel to foreign lands and announce, “I am an American.”
Then demand that from our leaders. There are better Americans, better conservatives, better Republicans, even better Democrats.
We Americans should not be represented by an embarrassment. We shouldn’t follow the worst, most inept, mean-spirited windbag among us.
We are not a 3rd-rate, banana dictatorship. We are America.
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 