I hope the Bush administration didn't expect us to say thank you. That measly amount won't begin to make a dent in most household budgets according to an article in today's Washington Post (all emphasis added):
The debt of the typical American family earning about $45,000 a year rose 33.1 percent from 2001 to 2004, after adjusting for inflation, according to a study based on data compiled from the Federal Reserve Board's most recent Survey of Consumer Finances. [...]What do the experts suggest people do to help their situation?
Real wages, after adjusting for inflation, have been flat since 2001, according to the study, while the cost of big-ticket items for which families pay the most rose. In the past five years, the costs of medical care, housing, food, cars and household operations rose 11.2 percent, the study said. [...]
Housing debt has climbed notably because home prices have risen and people have borrowed against the equity in their homes. From 1989 to 2004, for example, the median mortgage debt more than doubled, from $46,900 to $96,000.
Education debt, meanwhile, rose 127 percent between 1992 and 2004, from $3,427 to $7,800. Health-care costs rose, too, because insurance has become more costly and employers are shifting more of the expense to workers.
[...]families that can no longer realistically afford their single-family houses should move to condominiums, consider limiting their families to a single automobile, get second jobs to pay off debt, or move to less expensive school districts that may not have the highest test scores but where children perform acceptably well.Those are all sound suggestions to help people handle their debt, but why should the lower and middle-classes get second jobs and trade down their homes while the rich get thousands of dollars in tax breaks?
As the article pointed out, "The average American family is walking a high wire and hoping there won't be a high wind." Apparently our legislators don't care. Our Republican Congress is to the American Dream what Katrina was to New Orleans, and we know how that turned out.
10 comments:
why should the lower and middle-classes get second jobs and trade down their homes while the rich get thousands of dollars in tax breaks?
Because that's the American Way?
But the million-dollar question is, how did this guy get elected twice - he's doing exactly what he said he would do taxwise. How do you fool millions of people into voting against their own self-interests?
Hot damn I get NINE dollars- hmm, that is 2.5 gallons...gee I am so excited...I want to get a French Fry Car ( you know what I mean ? )...They are really really screwing our country daily...even the repugs are in the same lousy leaky sinking boat at this rate....
Keep up your great blogging...
That's a great question, Abi. I think the moral issues really swayed voters. I hope they've learned their lessons...just because a person says they have morals it doesn't necessarily make it true.
Thanks for the compliment, enigma4ever! I'd like to get one of those cars that run on used French fry oil too because it accomplishes two things at once - it recycles the old oil and it reduces our dependency on crude oil. Win-win.
Get a second job? If you're lucky enough to find one that won't interfere with your full time job. It's obvious that most of these people don't live in the real world.
Apparently, no one here or at the Washington Post knows how taxes work.
Apparently, no one here understands how tax breaks, especially for capital gains (which benefit all of us) are driving record revenue to the US treasury.
Before you jump on my case about it, yes, I agree conservatives have failed HORRIBLY at controlling spending. Which is why, even with record revenues, our deficit continues to grow.
I also don't understand how telling people to live within their means is a bad thing. People either have more debt than they can afford or they do not. What advice are you going to give your children? Spend to their credit card's limit and indulge all their wants and desires? Or to save money, pay cash, and live within their means so they don't get caught in a debt trap?
Do you want them to save for their retirement and education or become regulars at the lay-a-way counter?
Hi, Thomas. You might want to check out this and this regarding taxes. Experts are starting to speak out about the failure of tax cuts to produce the results the government claims:
William Niskanen, chairman of the fervently anti-government Cato Institute, did a calculation showing that, since 1981, every $1 in tax cuts tends to produce 15 cents of extra spending. Likewise, every $1 of tax hikes tends to reduce spending by 15 cents. The notion that tax cuts cause spending to dry up, or that tax hikes encourage more spending, is not just wrong, it’s completely backward.
Also, I never said telling people to live within their means is a bad thing. I'm the "queen of cheap" as my husband likes to say and I believe in saving and living below my means and I encourage the same in my children. However, I think there is a problem in our country when the poor and middle class are asked to do all the sacrificing while the income gap grows wider. The rich won't worry about buying prescriptions, heating their homes or having enough to eat if they don't get a tax cut, but that isn't true for many of us struggling in the lower income levels. That was the point I was making.
I had read several of those articles citing how contrary statistics. But they're looking at the wrong statistics. A tax cut, especially to capital gains, isn't about getting "the rich" to spend more money. It's designed specifically to get them to re-invest their money. "The rich" aren't just people with a lot of money. When capital gains are concerned it has to do with what they sell, primarily stocks and other investments. Your mutual funds, pensions, retirement, and educational savings accounts are all affected by capital gains. Investors (whether private or hired fund managers) are sensitive to the tax affects of selling some stocks they may be over-allocated to purchase those where they're less concentrated when they incur 30% tax liabilities. For every dollar they earned they have to pay $0.30 to the feds. That tends to make their sales more infrequent. When capital gains taxes are lower they tend to sell, then buy, more stocks. I'd rather sell three shares and pay $0.45 on a $3 gain than sell a single share and pay $0.30 on $1 gain. The net effect is the treasury gets $0.15 more than it would when taxes are higher.
Once I've realized the gain I can invest more money in stocks, which can be good for the economy.
When tax conditions are favorable, "the rich" invest more of their money because they can make money doing it. When taxes are higher they invest less, or sit on their investments, and in their bordom buy a new toy. Think tanks shouldn't compare "the haves" to the "have nots" too closely because they behave differently. That's one of the reasons "the haves" have and "the have nots" have not.
I'm curious why people despise the rich so much. First, everyone would like to be rich, but most people don't often want to become something they despise. Rather, when people envy or covet what someone else has they simultaneously despise them for having what they want but would like to be them so they could posess what they covet.
A very interesting pschological condition--hating that which you wish to become.
A good topic for a blog article...
Lastly, don't forget everyone got where they are starting where they were. We envy "the rich" for where they are, but few people consider what it took for them to get there. In that way I think "the rich" are despised because they remind us the American Dream is alive and well for those that do the work, take the risks, stay in the game, and never give up.
The grasshopper, if he didn't need the ant's food so desperately, probably would have despised him, too.
Why do we hate the rich? Maybe we see what we could have become if we went that extra mile.I think we hate what money can do to some people.I would love to be rich. I tried poor growing up and it sucks
Thomas, I don't think people hate all rich people, only the ones who get greedy. Also, not all rich people get where they are through blood, sweat and tears. A fair number of them just lucky and got born into wealth.
a) I think it would have been grand to be born into a wealthy family.
b) No matter where you are on the ladder there are people above and below us. Those looking up believe we are wealthy and want what we have. Those looking down encourage us to keep climbing so we might do amazing things.
c) It is sinful to want what your neighbor has. A good friend of mine put it this way, "It is one thing to want your neighbors house and workd hard to afford your own. It is quite another to burn his house down because it is better than yours."
People who strongly feel "the rich" aren't paying enough are eerily ready to start burning houses. Anyone inciting such passions should draw our suspicions and we might reconsider our thoughts and actions.
You never know who might think you're rich and want what you have. Will you give it to them if they covet your house, spouse, or children?
Post a Comment