Income redistribution under Obama: It's happening!

[_krose]

This is what has been happening in America since 2009. Is this Obama's "Socialism" in action?

The income gap between the richest 1 percent and the rest of America last year reached the widest point since the Roaring Twenties, an academic study shows.

The top 1 percent of U.S. earners collected 19.3 percent of household income in 2012, their largest share since 1928. Last year, the incomes of the top 1 percent rose nearly 20 percent, compared with a 1 percent increase for the remaining 99 percent.

The share held by the top 10 percent of earners last year reached a record 48.2 percent.

[...]

[Berkeley researcher] Saez said that during those years, average real income per family grew a modest 6 percent. "However, the gains were very uneven," he wrote. "Top 1 percent incomes grew by 31.4 percent while bottom 99 percent incomes grew only by 0.4 percent from 2009 to 2012.

"Hence, the top 1 percent captured 95 percent of the income gains in the first three years of the recovery."

The top 10 percent haven't done badly, either. Last year, they captured 48.2 percent of income, up from the previous record, 46.6 percent, in 2011.

- Source: CBS News


So the rich have been getting richer, while the rest of the country, especially the working poor, continue to struggle.

I know what we should do. Let's cut $40 billion out of the Food Stamp program! Let's reverse the law that would help people buy health insurance! These great ideas brought to you by those awesome "compassionate conservative" Christians, today's GOP. American Exceptionalism at its best.

[_ajax18]

Even the socialists on this board view Obama as a crony capitalist. Of course the rich will get richer when you give special favors to rich people who donate to your campaign.

The problem we're talking about is the shrinking middle class, the people who can't afford tax attorneys to get special tax breaks. The fact that the only thing that brings up minimum wage is a government mandate rather than the market is a serious failure.

I guess if you count Obama's Latin American constituents, you could say the poor are getting richer compared to where they came from.

[_subgenius]

that's because they are actually "earners"
the decline you speak of is a hallmark of the liberal/democratic policies - families lose money when they are in office
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... income.png

increasing food stamp and health insurance subsidies merely contributes to the problem...it does not solve it...that is the fallacy of the OP.

Besides Obama would rather reform Health Insurance (not healthcare) and Food Stamps rather than address the real problem



Hillary Clinton helped these guys along (only woman on wal mart board of directors in 1990)
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-1 ... taxes.html

Gates and Buffet are doing well...but they also do not need the government to redistribute their earnings either...they recognize their own capability...which is the point.

[_subgenius]

[_subgenius]

[_subgenius]

[_cinepro]

If we accept the claims made in the OP (the top 1% are getting a greater proportion of income and the "income gap" is widening), and that this is undesirable, then what do we presume is the best way to address the problem?

One thing that I would like to see is the abolition (or severe reduction) of the corporate income tax, with a commensurate or greater increase in individual income taxes at the higher levels. Don't tax corporations for making money, tax people when that money is taken out of the corporation.

[_Bond James Bond]

If we accept the claims made in the OP (the top 1% are getting a greater proportion of income and the "income gap" is widening), and that this is undesirable, then what do we presume is the best way to address the problem?

One thing that I would like to see is the abolition (or severe reduction) of the corporate income tax, with a commensurate or greater increase in individual income taxes at the higher levels. Don't tax corporations for maketing money, tax people when that money is taken out of the corporation.

Or we could just raise the minimum wage up to about 9.50 and put $4000 extra dollars into the pockets of the lowest paid workers.

[_Analytics]

If we accept the claims made in the OP (the top 1% are getting a greater proportion of income and the "income gap" is widening), and that this is undesirable, then what do we presume is the best way to address the problem?

One thing that I would like to see is the abolition (or severe reduction) of the corporate income tax, with a commensurate or greater increase in individual income taxes at the higher levels. Don't tax corporations for making money, tax people when that money is taken out of the corporation.

To make that work, would you tax capital gains at the same rate as normal income?