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That's a good point too ... so we have an extremely messed up system. Wealth is too mis-disributed to the extreme (this is not a statement on whether capitalism is "right" or not, by the way), and so is our taxing system.
1) I am not ok with 90 people struggling to get by while 10 people live lavishly.
2) I am not ok with that same 10 people carrying the other 90 on their backs.
How does this get fixed?
By people working and earning a better life instead of being given handouts.
I personally think that people need to step up and take responsibility for themselves and not look to other people to fix things for them. I am 23 and my husband is 25. We make less than $75,000 a year as a household. Yet, we afford to pay our bills on time, we pay our house payment on time, we pay for child care for our son. As of right now we do not have excessive amounts of money to spend and the stimulus check that we go went to paying for new sidewalks on the house we just bought a year ago because the city came by and marked 13 squares that needed to be replaced. We did the work ourselves and saved quite a bit of money on it, but the stimulus check came and went without us spending on luxury items.
I am currently employed in workplace where I am not going to move any further up and I have not gotten a raise in over a year and a half. In fact I only got one raise in the entire time I worked here and I earned quite a few raises, but our workplace is intentionally not doing reviews in order to not have to give raises.
I am a very hard worker and I know that I can make more money at a different company, so I am taking college courses and I found a job that will hire me once I graduate for more than twice what I am making at my current job. Not only will they pay me twice as much, but once I work for them for a year they will send me back to school to get one degree up from the one I get next year. They will pay for my schooling and I will wind up making more than 3 times what I make now within the next 4 years.
I am a very hard worker, but I am not necessarily any smarter than the average person. I work hard to make sure that I maintain a 4.0 average and I stay at the top of my class. My parents were not wealthy in any way shape or form, they purchased their first home when I was 17 years old and the home was $116,000. I was raised to always live within my means and not to take on too much debt. I do not use credit cards and my husband and I bought a home we could afford (ie we make more than 3 times our house payment in a month). We do not buy things we do not need.
All the people I know who have amassed any amount of money have done so by working very hard, by keeping debt low and by not being greedy. My DH and I pay quite a bit in taxes and the more money we make, the more we are taxed, but you know what. We are not complaining, we are not putting our hand out and asking anyone else to foot our bill. I am not happy when I see how much of my paycheck went to taxes (and health insurance by the way, yeah I pay for that myself too), but I can't imagine being someone who managed to make 1 million dollars and seeing how much they took out of my check. I think it would hurt a lot more!!!!
I personally think that people need to step up and take responsibility for themselves and not look to other people to fix things for them. I am 23 and my husband is 25. We make less than $75,000 a year as a household. Yet, we afford to pay our bills on time, we pay our house payment on time, we pay for child care for our son. As of right now we do not have excessive amounts of money to spend and the stimulus check that we go went to paying for new sidewalks on the house we just bought a year ago because the city came by and marked 13 squares that needed to be replaced. We did the work ourselves and saved quite a bit of money on it, but the stimulus check came and went without us spending on luxury items.
I am currently employed in workplace where I am not going to move any further up and I have not gotten a raise in over a year and a half. In fact I only got one raise in the entire time I worked here and I earned quite a few raises, but our workplace is intentionally not doing reviews in order to not have to give raises.
I am a very hard worker and I know that I can make more money at a different company, so I am taking college courses and I found a job that will hire me once I graduate for more than twice what I am making at my current job. Not only will they pay me twice as much, but once I work for them for a year they will send me back to school to get one degree up from the one I get next year. They will pay for my schooling and I will wind up making more than 3 times what I make now within the next 4 years.
I am a very hard worker, but I am not necessarily any smarter than the average person. I work hard to make sure that I maintain a 4.0 average and I stay at the top of my class. My parents were not wealthy in any way shape or form, they purchased their first home when I was 17 years old and the home was $116,000. I was raised to always live within my means and not to take on too much debt. I do not use credit cards and my husband and I bought a home we could afford (ie we make more than 3 times our house payment in a month). We do not buy things we do not need.
All the people I know who have amassed any amount of money have done so by working very hard, by keeping debt low and by not being greedy. My DH and I pay quite a bit in taxes and the more money we make, the more we are taxed, but you know what. We are not complaining, we are not putting our hand out and asking anyone else to foot our bill. I am not happy when I see how much of my paycheck went to taxes (and health insurance by the way, yeah I pay for that myself too), but I can't imagine being someone who managed to make 1 million dollars and seeing how much they took out of my check. I think it would hurt a lot more!!!!
My life story is very much like your own and I see that today's students have less opportunities than did I when I was going through all that.
My complaint is how much our government is representing mulitnationals and not we, the people. Look at the over 700,000 jobs that were lost in our country just this year - and it is not yet over.
Working hard and taking advantage of every opportunity that we can - this just does not do it for some people.
You get by nicely on the money you are making because you live in an area where that is possible. Post that place on the net and you will see people migrating over there to dry up what jobs there are, some who already have the qualifications that you are currently struggling to achieve - some will probably accept less pay than you.
Our current economic downturn, the worst since the depression, and it looks as though we may be heading for one - is going to have the effect of removing even more jobs.
Our current economic problems are due to the dropping of government regulations of our financial markets that were implemented right after the great depression, just to avoid it happening again. Those regulations worked for all those years.
What do they say about those who don't learn the lessons of history being doomed to repeat it?
So, first the neocoms hit the poor, but who cared as long as the rest of us were doing well. Then they hit a great deal of the middle class who could not pay medical bills, but that was in no way the majority of us, so who cared? Now, the rest of us are seeing their deregulation policies ruin our pensions and 401k plans and the wealthy, finally, are also feeling it in their investments.
And, after all of this, there are still some suicidal souls who will vote for McCain.
Now, the old McCain, if he still had campaign finance reform as a living issue, I would vote for that, but he has left that by the wayside and is floudering and saying anything he thinks will 'work'. And, I'm sorry, but I think Palin is an act of desperation. The word 'bimbo' has been tossed around. Well, I guess I can see how most of her supporters are men.
Why should not the people who benefit most from a particular economic system pay to support the government that maintains the economic system to a greater degree and amount than those who benefit less from the system? No economic system that currently exists is a "natural" system in that it flows from nature. All are products of sets of complex governmental structures. As such, it would seem only fair that the wealthy pay more in taxes to support the government. The wealthy benefit disproportionately from almost all government activities, but especially those of the military (if one has more property one has more to lose from military conquest of the nation) and the police and other security institutions (protection of property disproportionately benefits those with more property and protection of life disproportionately benefits those that have a greater quality of life based on material possessions).
What appears to be missed in all the above posts is that the 1% of wealth and income earners controls the laws that allows them to EARN & KEEP the wealth. If I could dictate what the winning lottery numbers were after I bought my ticket I too could be considered smart, wealthy, industrial, job provider, capitalist, etc. Smoke and mirrors. Do a simple search on "wealth distribution" on google. All you need to know.
What appears to be missed in all the above posts is that the 1% of wealth and income earners controls the laws that allows them to EARN & KEEP the wealth. If I could dictate what the winning lottery numbers were after I bought my ticket I too could be considered smart, wealthy, industrial, job provider, capitalist, etc. Smoke and mirrors. Do a simple search on "wealth distribution" on google. All you need to know.
Good post.
It takes money to make money.
6% interest on a million dollars is a lot more than 6% on ten thousand.
In every society, even so called 'egalitarian' ones there are great advantages to wealth. Wealth brings influential contacts. Pathways are smoothed by wealth.
Surly, vast wealth cannot make a person live longer, but it will buy the best doctors and fly you to countries on the cutting edge of medical technology.
It will buy great legal representation, and sometimes judges and congresspeople.
It might put you on boards and give you info on investments.
It will give you friends 'in the know' who will warn you if trouble is brewing so you can avoid it.
You will never have to worry about being laid off with your family destitute.
In the US you will not have to worry about gaining entrance to the best schools. In fact, you will not have to work that hard in school, anyway. You can have great tutors.
You can often notice the matured product of extravagant wealth. When a person gets a certain age, you can notice how well his mind functions which is an indication of his putting a lot of effort into schooling. You can compare these people with those who never really had to struggle in life and decided not to push themselves.
Notice how little George Bush knows. How his actions often end up contradicting his words. How sure he seems that he is right because people always deferred to him in his life due to his family's wealth and stautus. How he does not consider the opinions of others.
Don't many of us have a certain sadness when they see Paris Hilton? She seems to want to do well in life, on her own, but it is hard when your name, looks, fortune, influence everyone with whom you come into contact.
It should not surprise us that some 'old' money in this country keeps to itself, out of the limelight. They do not have the incentives in life that the rest of us do. The fear of a harsh reality is more remote to them. Their push to be the best that they can must come from somewhere other than to provide a good life for their families or to rise up the corporate ladder or to impress the boss.
Contrast that with people like Clinton and Obama, people who do consider the viewpoints and ideas of others. Who realize that they do not have a corner on all the good ideas that the world has to offer. People who research before forming opinions and so, seldom are caught with their feet in their mouths. People who have had to compete in life.
Can the wealthy actually be productive? Sure, but many had nasty old dads, like the Kennedy's. People who tested them and drove them to excel on their merit.
Extreme poverty AND extreme wealth both present problems that cause the individual to sub-optimize his potential. The poor person often gives up before he starts, seeing little to hope for. The wealthy often are not challenged by their environment to excel.
It is a vast and mobile middle class that produces the wealth and ideas of a nation. There is also a huge economic boundary that defines the middle class. I believe it is healthiest for a nation to aim its legislation to cut back the extremes on either side of what is defined as 'middle class', especially when there is dramatic growth in those two areas, as is the case today.
It's funny how the top 10 people can get away with butt-raping the bottom 90 people with no revolt ... whether all 100 believe in the goodness of capitalism or not.
It's due to the top 10% keeping us divided and conquered with fear driven anger over meaningless topics like gay marriage, definition of marriage, abortion, gun control and other boogeymen that they say are out to get us or ruin our nation. Sure. They keep us distracted with this crap, and actually get us to send our money to them to keep these noisy distraction scams running, and while those people who are willing to 'act' on matters are out protesting abortion and gays, the top ten are busy raping the U.S. Treasury. Next time you get a funding request from Focus on the Family or other agent intolerance, or the NRA, your choice is to bend over and take out your wallet or throw it in the trash.
I hope you're going to pay back that unemployment back - or thank the Democrats that you received it.
We pay more in taxes every year than most people make in a year.
Thank the dem's because my husband worked hard all his life and was eligible for unemployment when he needed it? I thought the repubs were to blame for the last 8 years...hmmmm...
Miss Martha,
Quote:
I personally think that people need to step up and take responsibility for themselves and not look to other people to fix things for them. I am 23 and my husband is 25. We make less than $75,000 a year as a household. Yet, we afford to pay our bills on time, we pay our house payment on time, we pay for child care for our son. As of right now we do not have excessive amounts of money to spend and the stimulus check that we go went to paying for new sidewalks on the house we just bought a year ago because the city came by and marked 13 squares that needed to be replaced. We did the work ourselves and saved quite a bit of money on it, but the stimulus check came and went without us spending on luxury items.
I am currently employed in workplace where I am not going to move any further up and I have not gotten a raise in over a year and a half. In fact I only got one raise in the entire time I worked here and I earned quite a few raises, but our workplace is intentionally not doing reviews in order to not have to give raises.
I am a very hard worker and I know that I can make more money at a different company, so I am taking college courses and I found a job that will hire me once I graduate for more than twice what I am making at my current job. Not only will they pay me twice as much, but once I work for them for a year they will send me back to school to get one degree up from the one I get next year. They will pay for my schooling and I will wind up making more than 3 times what I make now within the next 4 years.
I am a very hard worker, but I am not necessarily any smarter than the average person. I work hard to make sure that I maintain a 4.0 average and I stay at the top of my class. My parents were not wealthy in any way shape or form, they purchased their first home when I was 17 years old and the home was $116,000. I was raised to always live within my means and not to take on too much debt. I do not use credit cards and my husband and I bought a home we could afford (ie we make more than 3 times our house payment in a month). We do not buy things we do not need.
All the people I know who have amassed any amount of money have done so by working very hard, by keeping debt low and by not being greedy. My DH and I pay quite a bit in taxes and the more money we make, the more we are taxed, but you know what. We are not complaining, we are not putting our hand out and asking anyone else to foot our bill. I am not happy when I see how much of my paycheck went to taxes (and health insurance by the way, yeah I pay for that myself too), but I can't imagine being someone who managed to make 1 million dollars and seeing how much they took out of my check. I think it would hurt a lot more!!!!
Good for you! You sound a lot like my daughter and her husband, same age, same out look on life. They got married, he worked, she worked part time and went to school part time. Her work paid for her schooling and he supported them and bought a house. When she graduated from college she did so debt free, no loans. I tell ya, it really is what "you" make it.
People don't owe no one nothing!
Everyone has the same opportunities in this country. It's nice to hear testimonies like yours, Miss Martha! Keep up the good work!
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Fairness
