'We Pay More': US Austerity Well Underway

[xchrom]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/26




After I pinned a dollar bill on my jacket lapel with “I PAY MORE” written on it in black marker, I’ve had countless conversations during my travels across the United States that went something like this:

Them: “I pay more? What does that mean?”
Me: “This dollar bill right here is $1 more than General Electric, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citibank, and a bunch of other big corporations paid in federal taxes, since 2008, combined.”
Them: “What? That’s not right. I pay my taxes! Too much, actually.”
Me: “But I bet you don’t hire a bunch of lobbyists to make sure Congress keeps writing in more loopholes like they do, right?”
Them: “Well, no. I don’t have that kind of money.”
Me: “So you pay more. Pass it on.”
Regardless of political persuasion, there isn’t one person I’ve met who isn’t infuriated by the fact that they pay more in federal taxes than a combined majority of most billion-dollar corporations. But what’s even more infuriating is that under the Budget Control Act that was passed after our austerity- crazed Congress forced it into being during the Summer-long debt negotiations of 2011, budgets for numerous essential social programs will be cut to the bone this January, under the false guise that our country is too broke to pay the bills.

Starting on January 3rd, the first $110 billion cut of the mandated $1.5 trillion deemed appropriate by Congress will go into effect. $55 billion will be cut from the Pentagon, while budgets for non-defense programs will be cut across the board by another $55 billion—8 percent for “discretionary” programs and 7.2 percent for “non-discretionary” programs. Under a similar $38 billion budget cut passed in Summer of 2011 to avert a government shutdown, nearly $1 billion was cut from clean drinking water funds, along with almost $1 billion from FEMA assistance for disaster victims, and hundreds of millions of dollars for nuclear waste cleanup and low-income heating assistance for poor families who don’t have enough to keep warm. The latest round of cuts coming in early 2013 will affect Medicare.

[bulloney]

1. Not only do they not pay taxes, they get billions of taxpayer dollars in contracts, bailouts, etc.

There's something inherently wrong with that picture.

And for Jack Welch to gallivant around and bitch about high corporate taxes, someone should tell him to STFU and drink his prune juice.

[fasttense]

2. The US is NOT broke. Our deficit is NOT a problem.

The RepubliCONS do a great advertising or con job convincing Americans that we are the verge of collapse due to debt. That way they can slash budgets and underfund regulatory authority. That way corporations can continue to get subsidies and welfare out of the federal government and not be held accountable for violating laws. How sweet a deal.

[mother earth]

3. Lobbying has taken "we the people" out of gov't. We need to end the oligarchy & return to a

system that isn't bought & paid for right up to SCOTUS. We've allowed a corruption to enter all avenues of gov't.
Profits have trumped life globally.

Is it any wonder the l% own this country?

[CrispyQ]

6. This: "Profits have trumped life globally."

In one of those eco documentaries, the narrator stated, "We are consuming our eco-system for the profit of a few."

The 1% own the planet.

[mother earth]

7. The joys of fucking privatization! I'm so sick of their greed, it's killing ALL of us, & they will

never have enough.

[theKed]

4. its only called austerity

when the rich do it to the poor.

call it what it is, what the rich cry when we try to do it to them: Class Warfare.

[mother earth]

8. Exactly. This is very definitely class warfare & they own the gov'ts, so they have the keys to the

palace.

[theKed]

10. It wouldn't be

the first palace torn down by a populace filled with righteous indignation. Let them have the palaces, we will take the factories and farms. With the factories, we can arm ourselves; with the farms feed ourselves.
We have nothing to lose but our chains.

[caseymoz]

5. The wealthy like government deficits.

Why? Because they prefer to support government with bonds rather than taxes. This works, however, only if the government doesn't default or if it's perceived as not having the cash to pay the bonds. So, they have to keep that deficit from getting out of control.

So, during a downturn, they begin to insist on cuts, and austerity is promoted, Even though it has never brought a nation out of a recession or depression, in fact, it has usually made it worse.

To the rich, it's ideal for them to support government by buying bonds while the middle and lower classes support it through cash. However, bonds are just taxes that have to pay later. The way they are paid eventually are through taxes, which are being paid disproportionately by the lower and middle classes.

Therefore, you can think of a government deficit like this: that negative number is coming out of the pockets of the lower and middle classes and is being transferred overwhelmingly to the wealthy. Austerity is really just the wealthy insisting that they get paid no matter what. It's exactly like getting a call from a debt collector, no more, no less, and bringing the country out of a recession has nothing to do with it.

And that's also the reason why the rich do not like social programs. Because it's less money going to them.

[mother earth]

9. Got that right. What we should have are health care for all, education as a birthright, and a

banking system that is not run by the foxes guarding the henhouse.

Smacks of socialism? Bring it on, these bastards are raping and pillaging here & everywhere.

I guess I long for the gov't I thought was supposed to represent, WE THE PEOPLE.
Above and beyond all else, campaign finance reform must be tackled, or this hijacking never ends.

[blackspade]

11. Excellent summary +1

[marmar]

12. k/r