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Those statistics are misleading because the CPS of the U.S. Census Bureau explicitly excludes about $1 trillion in annual transfer payments to lower-income households and do not account for the effects of taxes. When those transfer payments and tax effects are included, income inequality .
Copy and paste from the Cato Institute, an extremely partisan and usually dead wrong so called "think tank".
People who wish to live in an urban environment with an extensive network of trains, subways, streetcars, buses etc can do so in cities who have such things. NYC has a population north of 8.5 million. I presume most of them wish to live in such an environment. Other major cities have public transportation infrastructure to a greater or lesser extent as well - Chicago, Philadelphia, DC, San Francisco come to mind.
For the 275+ Million of us who decide we do not want to live in those urban environments, it would be a misallocation of scarce resources to spend money on a vast array of trains, subways, streetcars, buses etc.
Not everyone has the resources to just pick up and move to one of those cities. It would benefit many people to have for options for transportation in general...
If you can't see a difference, it's because you've never been outside the US.
I've spent 30 days or more in Norway, Denmark, Britain, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Germany, including East Germany (under communism), Romania (both before and after communism), Czechoslovakia (when it was communist), Slovakia, Italy, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Egypt, Burkina Faso, Kuwait, Iraq, Honduras, Panama and Thailand.
In Burkina Faso, I was on a mountain-top with several villages that were isolated, because the bridge that was their life-line with other villages on neighboring mountains had washed out, so they were unable to trade for food or clothing.
That's right, they didn't have money.
They didn't have electricity or running water, either, so they used out-houses, and it was a 45-50 minute walk to the river (depending on how slippery the trail was) to get water, several times a day.
They didn't have a school, either. They used a lean-to, and the "teacher" had only one year of university training, not in teaching, and no teaching degree or any degree at all, but she was very intelligent. She was trapped there when the bridge washed out, so she came round 2 days a week or 3 days a week, for about half a day.
All the children could read and write their language, plus the language of another tribe (Mossi), plus French and English, which makes them a helluva lot smarter than the vast majority of American children, who can barely read and write English. When the teacher wasn't there, I taught them more English, and we did science experiments with water, so they could understand the forces that washed out the bridge.
The point being, it doesn't take a lot of money to educate kids, but it does require parents who instill the value of education in their children. In America, families in "poverty" (snicker) don't give a damn if their kids go to school or not, and don't encourage them to study.
That's part of the socio-cultural thing.
I took a 2nd shift supervisor position at a meat-packing plant, while I was going to college full-time. 7 of the 8 line leaders were from Senegal or Ghana (and the 8th was a White guy). The Black Americans wouldn't have anything to do with them. They ostracized them, refusing to sit at their tables in the break-room, and they would say nasty thing about them, while constantly complaining that they should be the line-leaders. Well, you need to be able to read and write English, and do math to fill out the production reports, which the Senegalese and the Ghanaians could do, but the Black Americans couldn't. And the packaging machines were made in Germany, so if you restarted the machine, the default computer screen was in German, which the Senegalese and Ghanaians could read, but the Black Americans couldn't, and worse than that, couldn't figure out how to use the touch screens to switch the commands to the English language.
Instead of constantly debasing and denigrating the guys from Senegal and Ghana, and constantly whining about poor treatment, because they can't run the big machines, the Black Americans should have made them role models and attempted to emulate them.
And in any other culture, they would, but not in America, because it's a different socio-culture.
This government is. I don't see the governments of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Belgium, Netherlands, Canada, or even Germany in that way.
There is a backlash coming I think. The Millenials are quite fond of socialism, a very large percentage harbor a venomous hatred for capitalism. They will be voting for awhile. They almost elected one of the more unelectable candidates we have ran in some time. Actually Sanders would likely be our president if the DNC didn't corrupt the process.
Sanders would have probably gotten further as a Democrat if he had been a Democrat instead of an Independent who caucused with the Democrats in Congress.
The fact remains, the income of 80% of non-supervisory workers went down last year, thanks to wages not keeping up with inflation. The nut cases can't blame that on welfare.
What other country provides corporate welfare to the very rich like the US? What country just lowered the corporate tax to 20%, gave plenty of tax cuts to already rich, expanded tax loopholes while increasing the budget deficit to projected 800 billion: https://www.cbo.gov/topics/budget
And that is when the economy is doing well. What happens if there is a recession?
In effect, the government stole from the future generations to pay off the rich. Yes, I don't think there are too many developed , non third world nations that would do this...
You just sound clueless, you obviously need to do more research. The US had among the highest corporate tax rates in the WORLD! There is frankly no reason for corporate taxes at all. Income is taxed at the individual level, nobody has demonstrated or shown by a corporation should pay taxes. It isn't a person. If a company makes $100 million and is owned by 5 people, each one would get $20 million of income as their "share" of the company profits. They would then be taxed on that $20M. Why does the company need to be taxed on top of their personal income taxes? That's a tax on a tax. So reducing the corporate tax rate is what I call "a good first step." There's no reason for high corporate income taxes, or any corporate income taxes, when you already have high enough personal income taxes that you can't avoid paying.
There is no "corporate welfare," so I have no clue what you mean by that. Corporations in this country have always paid nearly the highest taxes in the world and the only way to repatriate a lot of that money held overseas is to lower the taxes and bring that money back to America. Otherwise, they'll leave it offshore where it belongs, no reason to ever bring it back if you're going to tax it higher than everywhere else. It wouldn't make any sense.
Also, why should we waste massive sums of money on public transit that nobody uses?! If you're on the East Coast, don't bother responding, because you live in a bubble. Nobody on the West Coast cares about public transit. In Portland, the percentage of people using public transit has actually gone DOWN despite investment in it going up massively. The more light rails (total waste of money) and bus lines and street cars they build, the less anyone cares. It's all subsidized by taxpayers rather than paid for by revenues generated, which it should be. Like anything else, it should be run like a business because business is efficient while government is inefficient. Business HAS to be efficient because otherwise a more efficient, leaner business comes along and outcompetes the existing business. That is what makes capitalism the greatest and really only system of economics that ever has worked whatsoever. You cannot have $2 bus tickets if it costs $5 per person to run the bus. You can't offer cheap light rail if it's a $5 billion project bill to taxpayers and nobody cares or uses it.
What possible reason is there behind favoring public transit, anyway?! It's an outdated concept that's going to die a miserable death. It was once seen as the future and anyone paying any amount of attention can clearly see it's the past. Once you have autonomous self-driving vehicles (newsflash: we already have these!) driving everywhere and the grid controlling traffic to a substantial extent, you don't have any reason for ANY transportation stuck on a track that takes forever to go from one fixed point to another. It makes WAY more sense to have a bunch of individual rides that self-drive from ANY point to ANY point, all on electric vehicles. Who the heck is saying we are dependent on gas-driven vehicles?! Holy cow 1997 called, they want their technology back! We have an increasing number of hybrid and fully electric vehicles at price points that keep becoming more competitive. As solar power grows in efficiency, a modern home like what I'll be moving into will have solar on the roof and an EV charging station in the garage, completely free power for an all electric renewable energy vehicle. Why would I ever take a bus unless I was just poor? So yes, Captain Obvious, public transit IS seen as for those too poor to afford a car. It will always be that way. If you want to live in a city that relies on public transit, go for it, I want to hop in my car and drive directly to where I'm going the fastest way possible.
Thankfully very few. It is much more efficient to take my SUV to Costco and load it up. I'm imagining a dozen trips over the course of several days to effectively go to and return from Costco using "...just a bus/train/light rail/subway."
In fact, I'm thinking of that Costco run where I load up 400 pounds of water softener salt... now imagine me taking it on that bus/train/light rail/subway...
Yeah, doesn't compute.
One of the things today that I don't understand, is that public transportation is now hip and cool, and qualifies for the overused CD forum word "amminity". To me, relying on public transportation just means someone is a bum.
Every since your "USA has been experiencing hyperinflation" dealie your facts are best backed by more than a post.
Nah, you are going to have to actually read a news magazine. It was in the June 29 issue of The Week. Visit your local library, if you don't subscribe.
You just sound clueless, you obviously need to do more research. The US had among the highest corporate tax rates in the WORLD! There is frankly no reason for corporate taxes at all.
You probably missed the news that the SCOTUS ruled corporations are people, with all the rights and responsibilities of any person. If I have to pay income tax on my political contributions, why shouldn't they?
I have to admit I'm still waiting for one of them to get the death penalty, though.
Copy and paste from the Cato Institute, an extremely partisan and usually dead wrong so called "think tank".
You failed to dispute a single fact.
There are transfer payments to low income families. They receive SNAP benefits, housing subsidies, healthcare subsidies, tax credits and other benefits.
If we add that up, that's $6,240 in Food Stamps, $7,200 to $21,600 in rent subsidies, $6,000 to $9,000 in healthcare benefits, and $6,444 in cash, which comes to $25,884 to $43,284 in cash and non-cash benefits.
When you add that to their earned income, you'll find that many "impoverished" families actually have an higher income than the median income of the State in which they live.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Larry Caldwell
The fact remains, the income of 80% of non-supervisory workers went down last year, thanks to wages not keeping up with inflation. The nut cases can't blame that on welfare.
Why would wages keep up with Inflation?
Show us the law, theory or corollary in Economics that says wages must keep pace with "Inflation."
When the government reports CPI-U or CPI-W, it makes no distinction between the types of Inflation.
If the "Inflation" rate is 7.8%, the government doesn't say that's 2.1% Monetary Inflation, 2.4% Cost-push Inflation and 3.3% Demand-pull Inflation, it simply says "Inflation."
Demand-pull Inflation is caused by Demand exceeding Supply, and the purpose of Demand-pull Inflation is to prevent the depletion, overuse or over-consumption of goods and services, so increasing wages to match Demand-pull Inflation only serves to accelerate the depletion, overuse or over-consumption of goods and services, which is detrimental overall.
Higher prices are one mechanism designed to coerce lower Demand and restore equilibrium in the system.
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