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The total impoverishment of 27 million American families

Lafayette

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The Dems need to concentrate on taking back the HofR. It's the only way to assuring the passage of legislation that renews the country. Presently, the latest HofR voting share was 43% vs 57%, in favor of the Replicants. That has to be reversed.

Of the HofR total Democrats, only 28 Representatives are members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (of which Bernie was the only Senate member).

I suggest it is time for the US to formulate, within the Democrat Party, a subset of Social Democrats consisting of CPC members. And the Dems should strive at the local level to promote Social Democrats, where they can, towards electing them as members of the HofR.

That's how we can move America forward and repair the neglect and damages of the past 30-years since Reckless Ronnie was PotUS.

We must start first with the aberrant system of taxation and its upper-income flat-rate; which functions as the money-pump of Income into Wealth.

Here is how that Money-Pump works, from figures compiled by the Census Bureau:

Median Household Net  Worth by Quintile.jpg

Note the breakdown by quintile (5, each 20% of American households):
*Poorest quintile with a negative Net Worth*.
*The 3rd-quintile is 9.4 time that of the 2nd-quintile.
*The 4th-quintile is 3 times that of the 3rd quintile, and
*The 5th-quintile is 3.1 times that of the 4th quintile.

With a more fair taxation of Net After-tax Income that becomes Wealth, and then (less Debt) becomes Net Worth would see those disparities lessen.

Yes, Fair Income Taxation is "Robin Hood". We take from the rich and give to the poor. Because the present tax system unfairly allows too much of Net After-tax Income to become the Wealth of a select group of families. And it has been like this since Reckless Ronnie changed drastically the taxation of upper-incomes in the 1980s. (See here.)

*Negative Net Worth means that a household's liabilities exceed their assets. It is therefore Total Impoverishment of 20% of American households, or 27 million families, or 69.7 million fellow Americans.
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Taking money from some people, and giving it to other people "to not better themselves" has been going on for 50 years.
 
What is the difference between a self-made rich person and a poor person?

I'm not talking about people who have inherited wealth, I am talking about people who created their own wealth.

There must be some difference because in just about every society and every form of government this dichotomy exists.

The self-made rich person is one who discovers, develops, and then exploits something other people desire. This something can be tangible, like an invention, food, art-form; or intangible like a political idea, belief system, social ideology. It doesn't even have to be their own idea, merely something they have the ability to recognize as marketable and successfully exploit.

These individuals usually work diligently and intensely, often experiencing setbacks, failures, and false trails...but they persist until they reach success.

Your ideology ignores this dynamic, and is the root cause of the failure of socialist and communist ideologies.

It is like the story of the little red hen. The one where the hen discovers some seeds, plants them, nurtures them, harvests them, grinds them into flour, bakes this into bread, then eats the bread. At each stage she asks other farm animals who will help in this labor and every one has an excuse for not helping the process...yet ALL want to share in the final product.

Wealth redistribution, as shown throughout history, ends up in a lot of people doing very little and sharing less. Or, more likely than not, a system reflected in Orwell's "Animal Farm" where some equals are more equal than all the others.
 
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The Dems need to concentrate on taking back the HofR. It's the only way to assuring the passage of legislation that renews the country. Presently, the latest HofR voting share was 43% vs 57%, in favor of the Replicants. That has to be reversed.

Of the HofR total Democrats, only 28 Representatives are members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (of which Bernie was the only Senate member).

I suggest it is time for the US to formulate, within the Democrat Party, a subset of Social Democrats consisting of CPC members. And the Dems should strive at the local level to promote Social Democrats, where they can, towards electing them as members of the HofR.

That's how we can move America forward and repair the neglect and damages of the past 30-years since Reckless Ronnie was PotUS.

We must start first with the aberrant system of taxation and its upper-income flat-rate; which functions as the money-pump of Income into Wealth.

Here is how that Money-Pump works, from figures compiled by the Census Bureau:

View attachment 67202934

Note the breakdown by quintile (5, each 20% of American households):
*Poorest quintile with a negative Net Worth*.
*The 3rd-quintile is 9.4 time that of the 2nd-quintile.
*The 4th-quintile is 3 times that of the 3rd quintile, and
*The 5th-quintile is 3.1 times that of the 4th quintile.

With a more fair taxation of Net After-tax Income that becomes Wealth, and then (less Debt) becomes Net Worth would see those disparities lessen.

Yes, Fair Income Taxation is "Robin Hood". We take from the rich and give to the poor. Because the present tax system unfairly allows too much of Net After-tax Income to become the Wealth of a select group of families. And it has been like this since Reckless Ronnie changed drastically the taxation of upper-incomes in the 1980s. (See here.)

*Negative Net Worth means that a household's liabilities exceed their assets. It is therefore Total Impoverishment of 20% of American households, or 27 million families, or 69.7 million fellow Americans.
__________________________

That is the populist story. But as we saw, you could not show your yarn was correct for public health care costs, where you were just repeating superficial numbers that you had never analysed even briefly.
 
Taking money from some people, and giving it to other people "to not better themselves" has been going on for 50 years.

Social Democracy is not working in Europe and bringing it to the US would be crazy. That does not mean that we should not make changes to our order. But the old populist war cries are not the way to go about it.
 
That is the populist story. But as we saw, you could not show your yarn was correct for public health care costs, where you were just repeating superficial numbers that you had never analysed even briefly.

Borrrrrrrrrrrrinnngggg!

Public Health Care Costs, Comparative, OECD:

Average HC costs versus Life Span.jpg

Twice as expensive in the US than most of Europe for a life-span three-years less ...

If you had pertinent information regarding the matter you'd show it, instead of always the same blah, blah, blah.

C'mon, put up or shut up ... !
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Always the same blah, blah, blah.

M... R... A...

That is exactly, what I told you in somewhat more polite language and a point at how you might improve your tale.
 
That is exactly, what I told you in somewhat more polite language and a point at how you might improve your tale.

Respond to the matter at hand.

Explain how America's privatized health-service is "better" than Europe's nationalized heath-service. Explain also how American university students graduating with an average $30K debt is better than no-debt students in the EU.

You haven't a clue, because on the Replicant side none exists. The American electorate is supposed to believe your claptrap that "what's good for plutocrats is great for America".

Which seems to work, since the Replicants control both chambers of Congress, and plenty of voters still want to see the Dunderhead as PotUS.

Stoopid is as stoopid does ... (Forrest Gump)
____________________________
 
The Dems need to concentrate on taking back the HofR. It's the only way to assuring the passage of legislation that renews the country. Presently, the latest HofR voting share was 43% vs 57%, in favor of the Replicants. That has to be reversed.

Of the HofR total Democrats, only 28 Representatives are members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (of which Bernie was the only Senate member).

I suggest it is time for the US to formulate, within the Democrat Party, a subset of Social Democrats consisting of CPC members. And the Dems should strive at the local level to promote Social Democrats, where they can, towards electing them as members of the HofR.

That's how we can move America forward and repair the neglect and damages of the past 30-years since Reckless Ronnie was PotUS.

We must start first with the aberrant system of taxation and its upper-income flat-rate; which functions as the money-pump of Income into Wealth.

Here is how that Money-Pump works, from figures compiled by the Census Bureau:

View attachment 67202934

Note the breakdown by quintile (5, each 20% of American households):
*Poorest quintile with a negative Net Worth*.
*The 3rd-quintile is 9.4 time that of the 2nd-quintile.
*The 4th-quintile is 3 times that of the 3rd quintile, and
*The 5th-quintile is 3.1 times that of the 4th quintile.

With a more fair taxation of Net After-tax Income that becomes Wealth, and then (less Debt) becomes Net Worth would see those disparities lessen.

Yes, Fair Income Taxation is "Robin Hood". We take from the rich and give to the poor. Because the present tax system unfairly allows too much of Net After-tax Income to become the Wealth of a select group of families. And it has been like this since Reckless Ronnie changed drastically the taxation of upper-incomes in the 1980s. (See here.)

*Negative Net Worth means that a household's liabilities exceed their assets. It is therefore Total Impoverishment of 20% of American households, or 27 million families, or 69.7 million fellow Americans.
__________________________

You start by complaining about the overall economy and then shift to wealth distribution. The former has little to do with the latter. If you want a good economy then leave the money with the people who know how to invest it properly and create wealth. If you just envy the wealthy and want to get the government to take it from them and give it to you then knock yourself out, but don't delude yourself into thinking that this will improve the economy. Quite the opposite in fact. Take a look at Venezuela, for example.
 
Respond to the matter at hand.

Explain how America's privatized health-service is "better" than Europe's nationalized heath-service. Explain also how American university students graduating with an average $30K debt is better than no-debt students in the EU.

You haven't a clue, because on the Replicant side none exists. The American electorate is supposed to believe your claptrap that "what's good for plutocrats is great for America".

Which seems to work, since the Replicants control both chambers of Congress, and plenty of voters still want to see the Dunderhead as PotUS.

Stoopid is as stoopid does ... (Forrest Gump)
____________________________

We've been there and you just continue to rage wildly without focus. Just take the public health care system. At this point, I had not claimed the American one was "better" I don't believe. One could show certain important aspects that are indeed "better" by some standards. But I thought we were talking spending per beneficiary. That is another matter. You understand?

PS: in regards the health care systems it is actually difficult to refer to a "European" one. They are quite different, you see, and in quite different states of repair.
 
But I thought we were talking spending per beneficiary. That is another matter. You understand?

That has no meaning, except perhaps in-country. For purposes of international comparison, any statistic is typically shown "per capita"; particularly as regards HealthCare, which is a service to the population as a whole.

... in regards the health care systems it is actually difficult to refer to a "European" one. They are quite different, you see, and in quite different states of repair.

Knit-picking (again).

Medical care is about the same, with only slight differences country to country (if comparable economically) within the EU, in both market-economies. The only real difference is "who pays what to whom". In the US, HC is treated as a highly profitable business by Private Insurance companies.

In Europe, it is a public-service ...
_______________________________
 
The Dems need to concentrate on taking back the HofR. It's the only way to assuring the passage of legislation that renews the country. Presently, the latest HofR voting share was 43% vs 57%, in favor of the Replicants. That has to be reversed.

Of the HofR total Democrats, only 28 Representatives are members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (of which Bernie was the only Senate member).

I suggest it is time for the US to formulate, within the Democrat Party, a subset of Social Democrats consisting of CPC members. And the Dems should strive at the local level to promote Social Democrats, where they can, towards electing them as members of the HofR.

That's how we can move America forward and repair the neglect and damages of the past 30-years since Reckless Ronnie was PotUS.

We must start first with the aberrant system of taxation and its upper-income flat-rate; which functions as the money-pump of Income into Wealth.

Here is how that Money-Pump works, from figures compiled by the Census Bureau:

View attachment 67202934

Note the breakdown by quintile (5, each 20% of American households):
*Poorest quintile with a negative Net Worth*.
*The 3rd-quintile is 9.4 time that of the 2nd-quintile.
*The 4th-quintile is 3 times that of the 3rd quintile, and
*The 5th-quintile is 3.1 times that of the 4th quintile.

With a more fair taxation of Net After-tax Income that becomes Wealth, and then (less Debt) becomes Net Worth would see those disparities lessen.

Yes, Fair Income Taxation is "Robin Hood". We take from the rich and give to the poor. Because the present tax system unfairly allows too much of Net After-tax Income to become the Wealth of a select group of families. And it has been like this since Reckless Ronnie changed drastically the taxation of upper-incomes in the 1980s. (See here.)

*Negative Net Worth means that a household's liabilities exceed their assets. It is therefore Total Impoverishment of 20% of American households, or 27 million families, or 69.7 million fellow Americans.
__________________________

It's the democrats that allowed all the middle class jobs to be shipped to third World Countries with their trade agreements ! Work on getting jobs back not taking more from those that work and try to be successful ! Who came up with NAFTA and TPP , DEMOCRATS !
 
1)That has no meaning, except perhaps in-country. For purposes of international comparison, any statistic is typically shown "per capita"; particularly as regards HealthCare, which is a service to the population as a whole.



2) Knit-picking (again).

Medical care is about the same, with only slight differences country to country (if comparable economically) within the EU, in both market-economies. The only real difference is "who pays what to whom". In the US, HC is treated as a highly profitable business by Private Insurance companies.

In Europe, it is a public-service ...
_______________________________

1) That is an interesting approach. You do realize that there is a difference between $ 5.000 per capita calculated on the total population being spent on the everyone or instead on half of the people?

2) Again that is a baffling admission to ignored reality. "Medical care is about the same,"? How can anyone with an inkling say something like that about the EU?
The most obvious false assumption is the equivalence "with only slight differences country to country" is visible, when you look at Germany's or the Swedish systems and compare them with Greece, where the system effectively broke down and you had people dying of cancer without medical assistance, when the social systems went down. Or have you recently been to Romania or Bulgaria to be treated in their public sector programs?
But these poor countries aside, even if they are in the same EU with unitedly chartered human rights with France or Germany, you will find large differences among the rich countries' systems. You have been following, what is happening in the German system, where people paid for decades and are now finding that they cannot get the quality medical care they had been promised, because the systems are becoming too expansive to maintain?
 
Social Democracy is not working in Europe and bringing it to the US would be crazy. That does not mean that we should not make changes to our order. But the old populist war cries are not the way to go about it.

Social democracy is already here and has been for most of our lives in the form of our social safety net and our public schools. We do not have that safety net to the same degree as most of the other first-world nations...

...but the social safety net that we and the other first-world nations - including not just western Europe but also Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea - is one of the big reasons that we ARE first-world nations.

To put it in a different light, if "social democracy" were such a terrible idea, then don't you think it would have already ruined the economic might of the West in the 80 years that we've had Social Security and the 55 years since we adopted LBJ's "Great Society"? But has it ruined us? No. Instead, we've only grown and prospered. And when it comes to Europe, look at Germany - their social safety net is significantly more comprehensive than our own...yet they've got a more peaceful society AND their economy is in better shape than our own!

Despite all the naysaying of the Right about how social democracy would ruin the free world, in reality, we're all still on top - the only economy that's larger than America's is the EU. It's time the Right stopped paying restricting themselves to pseudo-Randian rhetoric and actually began looking at the hard-and-fast results of social democracy - it WORKS.
 
Social democracy is already here and has been for most of our lives in the form of our social safety net and our public schools. We do not have that safety net to the same degree as most of the other first-world nations...

...but the social safety net that we and the other first-world nations - including not just western Europe but also Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea - is one of the big reasons that we ARE first-world nations.

To put it in a different light, if "social democracy" were such a terrible idea, then don't you think it would have already ruined the economic might of the West in the 80 years that we've had Social Security and the 55 years since we adopted LBJ's "Great Society"? But has it ruined us? No. Instead, we've only grown and prospered. And when it comes to Europe, look at Germany - their social safety net is significantly more comprehensive than our own...yet they've got a more peaceful society AND their economy is in better shape than our own!

Despite all the naysaying of the Right about how social democracy would ruin the free world, in reality, we're all still on top - the only economy that's larger than America's is the EU. It's time the Right stopped paying restricting themselves to pseudo-Randian rhetoric and actually began looking at the hard-and-fast results of social democracy - it WORKS.

You are right that the US has introduced more social programs than many think.

What is important to do is look more closely at what we call "social program" unthinkingly. These programs are not homogenous in the economic sense and the components should be evaluated separately.
They combine consumption and production aspects and have public and private goods characteristics that can be separated. This sloppy construction is historical, habitual and also due to populism.
Therfore it is true that the efficiency of our countries has been higher than without the valuable pieces of the programs. On the other hand, the economies are less productive, where historical solutions are no longer the optimal production method and where non-productive additions were attached and the programs overshot. This has happened in the US and especially badly in Western Europe.
 
You are right that the US has introduced more social programs than many think.

What is important to do is look more closely at what we call "social program" unthinkingly. These programs are not homogenous in the economic sense and the components should be evaluated separately.
They combine consumption and production aspects and have public and private goods characteristics that can be separated. This sloppy construction is historical, habitual and also due to populism.
Therfore it is true that the efficiency of our countries has been higher than without the valuable pieces of the programs. On the other hand, the economies are less productive, where historical solutions are no longer the optimal production method and where non-productive additions were attached and the programs overshot. This has happened in the US and especially badly in Western Europe.

Of course, of course! Which is why ever since the social safety nets were adopted by ALL the first-world democracies, almost all beginning at least fifty years ago (the exception being the ACA), the economies of the first-world democracies have just tanked, huh? All the economies of the first-world democracies have diminished and dwindled and gone right down the tubes, huh? Now America and all of western Europe are third-world countries, huh?

Whereas the democracies that have little or no social safety nets have really boomed, huh? They used to be third-world democracies, but because they had no taxpayer-funded social safety nets, they were able to become first-world nations, right? Right?

I do hope you see the sarcasm above. Your entire post is arguing against REAL WORLD RESULTS. The first-world democracies - all of which are socialized democracies with very significant social safety nets - remain on top even a half century after having adopted those social safety nets...whereas those democracies with little or no social safety net were and remain third-world nations.

Instead of ignoring the real-world results of socialized democracy in first-world nations, you should be asking yourself why it is that if socialized democracy is so bad, why is it that the first-world democracies are still the freest, most advanced nations on the planet even after a half century of what you think should have destroyed their economies. WHY didn't it work out the way that conservative dogma demands?
 
Of course, of course! Which is why ever since the social safety nets were adopted by ALL the first-world democracies, almost all beginning at least fifty years ago (the exception being the ACA), the economies of the first-world democracies have just tanked, huh? All the economies of the first-world democracies have diminished and dwindled and gone right down the tubes, huh? Now America and all of western Europe are third-world countries, huh?

Whereas the democracies that have little or no social safety nets have really boomed, huh? They used to be third-world democracies, but because they had no taxpayer-funded social safety nets, they were able to become first-world nations, right? Right?

I do hope you see the sarcasm above. Your entire post is arguing against REAL WORLD RESULTS. The first-world democracies - all of which are socialized democracies with very significant social safety nets - remain on top even a half century after having adopted those social safety nets...whereas those democracies with little or no social safety net were and remain third-world nations.

Instead of ignoring the real-world results of socialized democracy in first-world nations, you should be asking yourself why it is that if socialized democracy is so bad, why is it that the first-world democracies are still the freest, most advanced nations on the planet even after a half century of what you think should have destroyed their economies. WHY didn't it work out the way that conservative dogma demands?

I guess, if one is not interested in the details one might see it that way. But you see, you did not address any of the implicit questions. But they are essential to understanding the implications of programs as we have installed them.

Btw, the history of social programs go much further back, than you seem to realize.
 
I guess, if one is not interested in the details one might see it that way. But you see, you did not address any of the implicit questions. But they are essential to understanding the implications of programs as we have installed them.

Btw, the history of social programs go much further back, than you seem to realize.

You can claim what you like, but the simple fact is, you're arguing against the real-world results. If democratic socialism - as has been in place in ALL first-world democracies (including America) for at least a half century - were as bad and terrible for the economy and for personal freedom, then we would have seen our collective economic demise already.

But what's actually happened? Instead of a general demise due to socialist programs, the first-world democracies have maintained their best-in-the-world-and-in-human-history standards of living, and our economies (even given the Great Recession (which had NOTHING to do with such socialist programs)) have remained strong in relation to the rest of the world.

Again, you are arguing against real-world long-term results. You can't make a convincing argument that such programs are terrible if across all first-world democracies and across several generations, those programs have not had the deleterious effects you claim that they would.
 
You can claim what you like, but the simple fact is, you're arguing against the real-world results. If democratic socialism - as has been in place in ALL first-world democracies (including America) for at least a half century - were as bad and terrible for the economy and for personal freedom, then we would have seen our collective economic demise already.

But what's actually happened? Instead of a general demise due to socialist programs, the first-world democracies have maintained their best-in-the-world-and-in-human-history standards of living, and our economies (even given the Great Recession (which had NOTHING to do with such socialist programs)) have remained strong in relation to the rest of the world.

Again, you are arguing against real-world long-term results. You can't make a convincing argument that such programs are terrible if across all first-world democracies and across several generations, those programs have not had the deleterious effects you claim that they would.

Against the real world results? In what way? Don't be silly now.
 
Against the real world results? In what way? Don't be silly now.

"In what way"? What nations generally provide the highest standards of living AND of freedom for their citizens? The first-world democracies...even though they've ALL essentially been socialized democracies for over half a century. Those are the real-world results you're arguing against.
 
"In what way"? What nations generally provide the highest standards of living AND of freedom for their citizens? The first-world democracies...even though they've ALL essentially been socialized democracies for over half a century. Those are the real-world results you're arguing against.

There is no question that Western industrial and post industrial societies offer higher standards in most respects than emerging economies with autocrats in command. But the broad brush you use will never get the detail one requires to answer the question you pretend to be answering.
 
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