Obama's Deal From a poor Person's Perspective

[ProSense]

Obama's Deal From a poor Person's Perspective

by ban nock

As usual Obama looked out for us fairly well. All you folks in the financial industry who are weeping and wailing can just pound sand, cash in some stock options, sell your Lincoln, cry me a river.

The biggest thing is earned income tax credit and medicaid, neither of which were touched. Looks like we lost 2% on Social Security contributions but that is more than made up by the earned income credit (EIC)

I should do more to define poor. By poor I mean lower than median income down to, well, to really really poor. Median is around 40K.

The earned income credit is the thing that pulls the greatest number of people out of poverty in the USA. It's an alternative to raising minimum wages.

You take your adjusted gross income and if you're a family with a coupla kids making between $13K and $22K Uncle Sam is going to either reduce your taxes by around $5K or reduce them as much as possible and send you a fat check for the remainder. How cool is that? Chart to figure what you get here. http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-dft/i1040tt--dft.pdf What is Adjusted Gross Income? That's how much money you make, but it could come down for things like IRA contributions.

What else? Unenjoyment. Which I can't get anyway, and lots of people can't get, and it's not much, but, and it's a real big but.

For many demographics unemployment isn't 8%, it's like double that, or higher. Of course if you count everyone without a job who would like one the numbers are staggering. Some demographics it's more than half. And I don't mean people who are too proud to work in Walmart or Burger King, those jobs are the ones everyone is fighting over.

So ya, unenjoyment isn't great but it's much better than nothing.

Without reading I know that there are all the usual posts like every time there is progress made. "Obama sold us out" "caving to the Repubs" blah blah blah. Heard it all before, broken record.

I expect to hear 4 more years of the same.

End of the day, the guy gets up every day and goes to work and does the job I re elected him to do. Best president I'll probably see, and I was alive for Kennedy. Was it the best deal he could have gotten? Who knows, I'm just some schmuck on a keyboard, he's the President of the United States.

It's a happy New Year for me.

<...>

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/01/1175341/-Obama-s-Deal-From-a-poor-Person-s-Perspective

Note:

Kos Media, LLC Site content may be used for any purpose without explicit permission unless otherwise specified

[s-cubed]

1. Thank you for some much needed perspective. We have to look at the whole deal, not 1 number. nt

[JDPriestly]

16. We don't know what the whole deal will be.

The negotiations to lift the debt ceiling will be used to wedge as much as possible out of programs that haven't been raided yet. Just wait and see.

The Obama administration and the Republicans have now separated the issue of middle class tax cuts from cuts to Social Security and other programs.

The current generation has been excused from paying the higher tax rates that we who are now retired paid all of our lives. Now that those tax cuts for the middle class have been preserved, when those of us who are now retired or disabled are asked to make a "shared sacrifice," we will be told that our reminders that we paid these higher tax rates are irrelevant since the tax issues were negotiated way back January.

Dividing the cuts from the tax issues is just a nasty strategy to make it easier to harm the truly poor. Just another blow to the very elderly about 10-15 years from now who will be living in pigsties instead of decent nursing homes because of the cuts to Social Security.

Social Security and the other programs of its type that help those who cannot work are still very much in jeopardy.

It is too early to rejoice.

Many DUers do not think strategically. But rest assured the advisers to the politicians do.

This is a political strategy to divide Democrats. It is very clever, and I expect it will work.

[BainsBane]

22. that decision was made over 10 years ago

Where were you then? Your generation paid less in taxes than the preceding ones, but you see no problem in that. What is it about baby boomers that makes you more important than anyone else on the planet?
Not a single cut has been made to social security, which is obviously all you care about. But there is still hope. There is a good chance the GOP House will shoot down the bill and the poorest Americans will see their next paychecks decline by 17%. That will make it all the more difficult for them to afford food or heat their homes, so you just may get your pound of flesh from those who can afford it the least. Who cares about poor kids anyway. They don't vote. They can't afford well funded lobbyists.

[sulphurdunn]

28. Oh yes,

the young vs the old. Classic divide and conquer. The proposition that the common people are each others worst enemies, and that a widow raising orphans on SS, who would probably feed you if you were hungry, is an economic threat while the Wall Street banker who'd tell you to get a job if you were starving and wouldn't piss on you if your on fire is irrelevant.

[fasttense]

51. Well, I'm a poor person and this is what I see.....

"Sec. 328 extends “tax exempt financing for York Liberty Zone,” which was a program to provide post-9/11 recovery funds. Rather than going to small businesses affected, however, this was, according to Bloomberg, “little more than a subsidy for fancy Manhattan apartments and office towers for Goldman Sachs and Bank of America Corp.” Michael Bloomberg himself actually thought the program was excessive, so that’s saying something. According to David Cay Johnston’s The Fine Print, Goldman got $1.6 billion in tax free financing for its new massive headquarters through Liberty Bonds.

$9B Off-shore financing loophole for banks – Sec. 322 is an “Extension of the Active Financing Exception to Subpart F.” Very few tax loopholes have a trade association, but this one does. This strangely worded provision basically allows American corporations such as banks and manufactures to engage in certain lending practices and not pay taxes on income earned from it. According to this Washington Post piece, supporters of the bill include GE, Caterpillar, and JP Morgan. Steve Elmendorf, super-lobbyist, has been paid $80,000 in 2012 alone to lobby on the “Active Financing Working Group.”

Tax credits for foreign subsidiaries – Sec. 323 is an extension of the “Look-through treatment of payments between related CFCs under foreign personal holding company income rules.” This gibberish sounding provision cost $1.5 billion from 2010 and 2011, and the US Chamber loves it. It’s a provision that allows US multinationals to not pay taxes on income earned by companies they own abroad.

Bonus Depreciation, R&D Tax Credit – These are well-known corporate boondoggles. The research tax credit was projected to cost $8B for 2010 and 2011, and the depreciation provisions were projected to cost about $110B for those two years, with some of that made up in later years. "

And I get a 2% increase in taxes while these corporate pigs go oink, oink, oink. All the while the stupidest Senators in Congress are asking for a Trillion dollar raid on Social Security.

I may be poor but I'm NOT stupid.

[mountain grammy]

53. That's what I'm talking about...

The corporations get the meat, but they threw a few bones to the poor. Don't eat cake, make soup! Oh yeah, and don't forget to pray.

[Ian62]

68. TY for posting this information

Do you mind if I use it elsewhere?

[SidDithers]

2. DU rec...nt

Sid

[alcibiades_mystery]

3. There's a reason that many progressive constituencies voted for Obama at higher levels than 2008

While the people who claimed to speak on their behalf predicted and threatened that they wouldn't. Progressives with skin in the game get what's going on. their self-appointed spokespeople on message boards very often do not.

[freshwest]

6. +1,000

[Buzz Clik]

11. +1

[SaveAmerica]

42. This should be posted as often as possible here.

Thanks for writing it!

[Walk away]

43. Amen! nt

[DevonRex]

4. And Social Security is strengthened

By that 2% boost which helps the same poor person in the retirement years. Because that's probably most of what he or she will have to live off of then.

It was good during the worst of the recession to give folks a break. But SS is too important to risk for long.

[JDPriestly]

17. The cuts have yet to be negotiated. Until the debt ceiling has been raised, Social Security is stil

very much in jeopardy. Sorry to bust your balloon, but delaying the cuts to social programs so that issue will be separate from the tax issues is the horrible strategy being deployed here.

It is unfair to seniors, the disabled, children, the poor.

[whathehell]

18. +1 n/t

[DevonRex]

23. So you just ignore the 2% increase in payroll SS tax? LOL!

And it looks like we are gonna go off the cliff anyway since Cantor is being a baby. Are you ready for the economy to automatically shrink by $800bn? Have lots and lots of fun with the deep recession that will follow. Oh, and if the debt ceiling isn't raised? Depression. Actual, worldwide depression. That's Ezra Klein's opinion.

But here you are complaining about something that COULD have avoided all of that. Good fucking lord.

[cstanleytech]

58. Were the Bush tax cuts ending an increase to?

No, they were not. They along with the payroll tax cuts were never meant to be permanent because if they were then they would not have had an expiration date.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

5. Thanks.

The earned income credit is the thing that pulls the greatest number of people out of poverty in the USA. It's an alternative to raising minimum wages.


Of course, that is the real problem...tax breaks instead of wages...while the EITC tax breaks help the poorest among us, the lack of a living wage hurts everyone and is the main reason the rich keep getting richer, while the rest of us struggle along.

[mountain grammy]

54. The EIC should not be a substitute for raising the minimum wage

which is ridiculously low and a slap in the face to all Americans who are working for companies making record profits and trickling nothing down to their employees (or "associates" as Walmart calls them.)

[Sekhmets Daughter]

55. Agreed...it shouldn't be

but it is. Tax cuts are the same thing, a sop to the middle class, so they won't notice that their paychecks have been stagnant or that the rich benefit the most from those tax cuts.

[mountain grammy]

56. Republicans have never accepted the fact that there are "working poor"

in America. As a single mom in the Reagan years, I worked two jobs to keep a roof over our heads. I still qualified for the EIC, yipee for me! Taxpayers can give me a tax credit but the profitable companies I worked for couldn't give me a raise, which would be far more beneficial to the country.Greed was just getting on a roll in the eighties, but at least then I could find two jobs!

[Sekhmets Daughter]

61. Exactly...

However, as a nation we seem not to value labor and certainly not the labor of other people. It's amazing to me.

I know a young couple, 2 professionals, whose combined income in just over $250K annually. Everyone wants them to pay higher taxes...but they pay $36,000. a year for childcare for their 1-year-old twins and of course, they don't get any tax break for that because of their income. Meanwhile, during the debt ceiling fiasco of 2011 I read this very sympathetic article on HP (written by one of the HP staff) about a mother in Wisconsin (I think it was Wisconsin) who was worried she would lose the $3,600. a month that she gets for childcare for her 6 youngest children. Now, I don't mind that she receives $600.per child per month...but I do mind that she had 8 children ranging in ages from (at that time) 21 to 1.5 years. The oldest were 21 and 18, the youngest 3 and 1.5... It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why she had the last two. I have no idea how common this abuse is.... But I do know of lawyers who gamed the system for years and years getting "Black Lung" SSI for people who never worked in the mines. I had 2 uncles who received the benefit; one was never a coal miner and one worked in the mines for 3 days. So both sides are wrong in this debate because not even the most liberal of Americans want to pay the taxes necessary to make that kind of spending sustainable. Tax the other guy, he makes more. Greed and selfishness is not peculiar to either the rich or republicans....

[freshwest]

7. Ban Noc speaks for most of the people I know. Thanks, ProSense.

[leftstreet]

8. How fucked is your economy when people rely on EITC?

Oh well, when there are no jobs and the ones we have pay shit wages....


Folksy OP rhetoric is folksy

[Skink]

62. Single 18000=no EIC

[Melinda]

65. And then there are those disqualified from EITC, retirees on SS, those making above cut-off...

threshold, SSD and SSI recipients, etc. That 2% is going to make a painful dent from many of us.

[stultusporcos]

9. It is good to read the perspective of someone who will be hurt the most by any deal

Yes we should go over the cliff and fight for more for those who are hurting the most, but I am not hurt by going over either.

I still think it is a crap deal but if those impacted the most can accept it, so be it.

[Tutonic]

10. nailed it.

[mzmolly]

12. Thanks ProSense.

[Buzz Clik]

13. I was particularly struck by two passages:

"Without reading I know that there are all the usual posts like every time there is progress made. "Obama sold us out" "caving to the Repubs" blah blah blah. Heard it all before, broken record. "

I gather that things are as horrid at Kos as they are here.

End of the day, the guy gets up every day and goes to work and does the job I re elected him to do. Best president I'll probably see, and I was alive for Kennedy. Was it the best deal he could have gotten? Who knows, I'm just some schmuck on a keyboard, he's the President of the United States.

It's a happy New Year for me.

Says it all for me.

[Cha]

37. they can lump Bernie

Sanders in there, too.

[sheshe2]

14. Thanks ProSense

[graywarrior]

15. Thankie!

[JDPriestly]

19. ProSense, the spending cuts have yet to be negotiated.

Do you think that Social Security will face a fight then?

I do.

And now Obama and the Republicans have separated continuing the middle class tax cuts from the spending cuts. Very clever. And shameful.

What do you think will happen on Social Security, military and other government pensions, Head Start, etc. when it comes time to squabble about lifting the debt ceiling?

[ProSense]

26. Only as

"ProSense, the spending cuts have yet to be negotiated."

...they relate to this deal. Conversely, those who advocate going over the cliff are basically saying they're willing to live with the consequences of the already signed into law spending cuts.

They're focused on the expiration of all the tax cuts as the most important thing, putting the spending cuts, extension of unemployment and other aid secondary to that goal. I know because I accepted that to let the tax cuts expire meant postponing any extension or even losing some of these programs and accepting the spending cuts.

Howard Dean: "I think the smart thing to do here is to go over the cliff..."
http://upload.democraticunderground.com/10022097157

Robert Reich:

More importantly, the fiscal cliff is on the President’s side as well. If we go over it, he and the Democrats in the next Congress that starts later this week can quickly offer legislation that grants a middle-class tax cut and restores most military spending. Even rabid Republicans would be hard-pressed not to sign on.

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/10022110382

Krugman acknowledges that some things will be lost.

As background, it’s important to understand what Obama clearly could have gotten just by going over the cliff. Basically, he could have gotten the whole of the Bush high-end tax cuts reversed, which would mean close to $800 billion in revenue over the next decade. What he couldn’t get, or at least couldn’t count on getting, were various spending items. This included the extension of unemployment benefits and various “refundables” on things like the Earned Income Tax Credit, that is, pieces of tax legislation that end up having the government cut checks to families instead of the other way around.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/conceder-in-chief-2/

The deal also states that every $1 in spending cuts negotiated in the next round, must be accompanied by $1 in tax increases.

Tax increases! Additional revenue is built into the deal.

From the perspective of someone like the OP, getting aid (current deal) is not worse than facing cuts to social programs (going over the cliff).

[JDPriestly]

31. We shall see what happens in the House, but this deal does not foreclose pension cuts.

And the low interest rates and nervous stock market have already hurt middle class retirees who will not gain anything from this deal.

Cuts to Social Security that convert it into program that relies on the largesse of Congress to keep its poorest recipients safe are unacceptable. Cruel. And when I speak of Social Security, I am using the term as shorthand for a number of programs including SSI, government pensions especially military pensions, etc. Those programs should not be tampered with.

I hope I am wrong but the fact that President Obama appointed Tim Geithner, virtually a Pete Peterson protege to be Secretary of Treasury causes me to distrust Obama when it comes to Social Security in particular but these other programs for the disabled and retirees in general.

Listening to, agreeing with and praising Pete Peterson's anti-Social Security theories has become a ticket for advancement on Wall Street and in D.C.

It is shameful and immoral for these extremely wealthy but also extremely greedy folks like Pete Peterson to want to increase the insecurity and possibly the poverty of the poor, the needy and the elderly in order to satisfy their own insatiable greed.

These are issues of values, of morality.

As for unemployment, we need to employ people building new infrastructure for the 21st century. And we need to impose taxes on imports and less on incomes.

[woo me with science]

45. Thank you for this excellent post.

These are moral issues. It cannot be said often enough.

[mother earth]

50. Well said, JD.

[Chathamization]

57. Well said.

Even a fraction of these $3.6 trillion in tax cuts could have been used for a massive stimulus package to repair infrastructure and put people back to work. Not politically feasible at the moment, true, but we shouldn't loose sight of what we should be doing. We also shouldn't ignore the consequences of these massive tax cuts. Just this morning I'm hearing talk that cutting the deficit is next. This $3.6 trillion tax cut is going to be paid for somehow, and there's a very strong chance they're going to do so by cutting programs that help the poor.

It's like a chess game where you get excited that you took on of your opponents pawns, and then realize that it was just bait as they swiftly move in an take your rook.

[George II]

20. Excellent - and I see the posts of gloom and doom as you predicted are showing up...

....unfortunately for some, there is no such thing as the glass being half full or half empty. They're just not satisfied unless the glass it overflowing.

[loyalkydem]

21. but will the anti Obama people see it that way? Chances are no

[JDPriestly]

39. Opposing this deal does not mean you are anti-Obama.

It is wrong to dismiss people who criticize this deal in that ad hominem manner.

It's best to say why you like the deal and see if you can convince those of us who are wary of it why we are wrong.

Argue the ideas, not the people.

I don't think there are very many "anti-Obama" people on DU.

Just about everybody likes him very much. We don't always agree with his policies. But then maybe he doesn't agree with all of them either.

When I criticize this deal, I am not criticizing Obama. When I say he doesn't care much about seniors, I am talking about an observation of his behavior and policies, not my opinion of him.

[bama_blue_dot]

24. Does anyone know if the child tax credit

is still in effect? That has been the most helpful for me..

[Pirate Smile]

46. It extends the child tax credit and the college

tuition credit for five years, individual and business tax extenders for two years, and the Medicare "doc fix" for one year. The Alternative Minimum Tax will be permanently fixed. The agreement also extends the farm bill for one year.

[former_con]

25. Yes but this is only the begining....

Have you forgotten that we have a debt ceiling approaching and then there will be another spending crisis after that or a budget showdown or something....

The way I see it and I just came from the right so I know how they are going to look at this, Obama claims victory because he got a tax increase the republicans caved.... Really?

So how many times is Obama going to try and go back to that make the rich pay more well before he starts to look like he is incapable of addressing the spending side of the equation that even some Democrats have claimed exists...


This side needs to do more to put out alternative ideas to spending cuts and alternatives to taxing the rich...

I suggest that Democrats start rallying around a VAT or a transaction tax.... There is no stomache for cutting DOD they can't even allow this minor sequestration cuts its such a political hot potatoe....

IMHO the rich got away again, because the left set the bar way to low in the tax debate..... You don't see the pubbies setting the bar low on the spending side do you?

[tabasco]

27. The wrath of the comfortable utopians will descend upon you!!

The comfortable utopians demand Overlord Obama decree utopia and free LSD starting tomorrow.

They don't give a shit about the poor, but believe they "channel" the poor.

[Indykatie]

29. Thanks for Posting This Perspective

Some here believe PBO didn't have to make any concessions to get a deal despite the opposition he faces. I sometimes think that no matter what the deal was it would never be good enough for some who proclaim to be his supporters with an understanding of the barriers. Just as the right didn't want to give on anything we have those on our side who feel the same. When the country says they want compromise they mean it for both sides. I'm glad to see he was able to maintain the unemployment benefits for the millions that rely on it. This certainly required him to give something to the republicans who would have no problem ending the funding.

[radhika]

30. Thank you, we need to remember what COULD have been...and how that didn't happen

We Progressives often keep score by goals and agendas that were NOT met. When I take stock calmly, I realize how much really bad stuff was averted. And some considerable Progress was made in the last year. Our work is not in vain.

Romney is not President
Ryan is not Vice-President
The Senate is still Democratic, with a few more Dem seats
Some Democratic seats were gained in the House
Some really vile anti-woman politicos got ousted from the Right
ACA was upheld by the SCOTUS
The US did not start or get drawn into a NEW war - you know the big kind as with Iran, Pakistan etc
Unemployment, SS and Medicare have not been cut
The Grover Norquist no-tax, no-way domination has begun to crumble
Saner voices are emerging on matters of gun safety
The Tea Party is less of a force
The corporatist voices of Rove, Armey and the Billionaire's Bagger Club have some wound licking to do (but they'll be back)
American voters bravely pushed back against voter restriction policies, saving the day IMHO
ALEC is losing members and revenue
Fox News is losing viewers - considerably
Voters are giving the thumbs up to Marriage Equality
Marijuana sanity is emerging as a winning state issue

We have 365 more days to work on what's wrong.

But for today, Thank you all! Proud to be a part of this site.

[Arcanetrance]

32. My biggest objection to this deal is the situation that bore it. This whole problem was caused by a

Previous deal Obama made for the debt ceiling. This fiscal cliff was created than and alot of my friends championed it saying it was the best Obama would get. Meanwhile in that deal were things that would hurt the poor and the lower middle class. The thought was well eventually we will get a lasting solution to avoid this meanwhile the crazies in the house and Senate have obstructed fixing the problems. So here we stand even if the deals passed in two months there's another negotiation and the Republicans will extort cuts from the president at that time. It seems to me either way the poor are about to hurt me being one of those poor.

[louis c]

33. I couldn't agree with you more

God bless you and thank you for being so intelligent.

You are in my tax bracket and everyone that I represent in my small union.

I wish all my members understood this as well as you do.

[ProudProgressiveNow]

34. K&R nt

[Scurrilous]

35. K & R

[Cha]

36. It seems Bernie Sanders was Lookin' out for the Poor, too..

Thanks ProSense

[ProSense]

44. And the entire Progressive Caucus. n/t

[Pirate Smile]

47. This happens every time. Republicans despise these tax credits where the Feds end up sending a check

to people which literally lifts them up from below the poverty level. Obama, from what I've seen, is always trying to protect these but this isn't the flashy part that gets focused on in the media. It is extremely important and a constant battle with Republicans. These are the folks Republicans want to increase taxes on.

[JohnnyRingo]

38. "Unenjoyment"?

I wonder that that's a typo, as I'm called it that forever. While many think an unemployment check is a great windfall when someone is out of work, all they'd have to do is try to live on one.

Contrary to what the class of people who believes UC is milked by those unwilling to work, it pays only a small fraction of one's pay before losing a job, and requires quite an adjustment in life style. I do admit, it's usually better than working along side high school kids at the McDonald's drive thru or shining shoes at the curb, but that's about it.

That's what upsets wealthier people about social safety nets. They feel unfairly compensated unless they can look down at a large mass of people so dirt poor they have to degrade themselves through desperate tasks. They're like high school bullies grown up.

[4_TN_TITANS]

40. Poor people have a perspective?

[OnionPatch]

41. I hear ya

Cause I've been there.

I reserve the right to complain when Obama doesn't do things the progressive way but I also recognize the political reality of governing in such a divided country. Overall I'm happy (and proud) of the president. The line in the sand for me may be social security tho ....... there best not be any cuts or raising the age. It's just wrong to balance the budget on retired and disabled people.

[AnnieK401]

48. Thanks for putting it so well nt

[hfojvt]

49. a poor person who is apparently not very good at math

"as usual"

more like "as if"

the top 20% got $108 billion a year in tax cuts from the deal

the bottom 60% got $35 billion, the bottom 20% got $5 billion.

Yep, as usual that's Obama, looking out for those at the bottom.

Oh, and my own perspective? http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002625762

[D23MIURG23]

52. K+R

[Doctor_J]

59. I am very happy for this person, and those who will survive, but...

I am really tired of having to choose between having the poor starve and reining in the oligarchs. Seriously, this is a terrible deal over the long haul, but we were forced into it by the ruling class just to keep people like the author alive. This is an absolutely awful way to run a country.

Let me put this very succinctly:

This was not a matter of the (R)'s and (D)'s battling each other before we hit the "cliff". It was a matter of the governing class pushing us working stiffs to the cliff. I expect such treachery from the Repukes; it is their nature. However, I expect the Dems, especially the leader of the party, to fight against the (R)'s, tooth and nail. They don't any more. They offer us a non-fatal alternative, but do nothing to get us out of the death spiral.

I am happy that those who are on the brink got some relief, but this deal is a bad one for the nation as a whole. Period.

DU Rec for "saving" the desperate, at least temporarily.

[oldhippie]

60. Half of the population is "the poor" ?

I should do more to define poor. By poor I mean lower than median income down to, well, to really really poor. Median is around 40K.

So anyone making less than the median income (which is by definition, half of the population or households, whichever is being sampled) is "the poor?" I don't think I have ever heard it put that bad before. I guess the other half is "the rich?" What happened to the middle?

[Nikia]

64. Depending on how you look at it, pretty much

If you are raising family on median income, you are pretty much making enough to get by. If you don't save, you can enjoy a few middle class luxuries from time to time, but then you don't have a retirement and any little three figure emergency will wipe you out and put you in danger of not paying your bills.
A single person making $40,000 per year might do alright in certain areas of the country, but probably can't save much and try to live a middle class lifestyle.

[derby378]

63. Once again, the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer...

For me, it looks like the tax hike will result in another $8 being taken out of my paycheck every week. Doesn't sound like much for one week, but it adds up a lot - $8 roughly equals an hour of my after-taxes take-home pay.

The only consolation that I have is that finally, while the rich get richer, the very rich will actually start to pay a little more. But I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

[Ian62]

66. The fiscal cliff deal is primarily directed at protecting Corporate profits

and Corporate interests.

The bill ensures that marginal and middle class tax payers are worse off, whilst protecting the income of the top 0.1% whose income is primarily derived from Corporate profits.

Corporate profits are at record levels.
The massively bloated military budget and massive Corporate Welfare weren't touched. Indeed they added some new goodies for Corporations.
There are easy savings of over $1 trillion a year from these. But nobody wanted to put these on the table - they were never up for discussion.

Social Security cuts via chained cpi were only mentioned so that they could later be dropped and the gullible would breathe a sigh of relief. They are not tenable for public opinion at the moment.
They have now been put into the public consciousness for injecting into the agenda for future discussions though.

Increasing taxes on those earning between $400,000 and $1million is neither here nor there - it involves a trivial amount of money - around $50bn a year. Another red herring for the gullible.

The payroll tax hike nets over $100bn a year.
AMT and the closure of middle class tax breaks net over $200bn a year.
(It is reported that AMT is going to be "resolved". No details are available as to what that "resolution" might be.)

It ensures that America will see a recession in 2013.
The coming tax hikes on marginal and middle class tax payers are going to make the coming US recession far worse.
The politicians "solution" to the "Fiscal Cliff" is no solution at all.

In fact what the politicians have just done is to push American workers and America straight off the economic cliff into mass economic deprivation.
Expect unemployment to be significantly higher than it is now by the end of 2013.

What the politicians should have done is to cut the massive military spending and Corporate Welfare and prevent tax hikes on the lower paid - e.g. by REDUCING income taxes on those earning less than $50,000 a year or by raising tax thresholds on lower incomes.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022116278

[Ian62]

67. If this was France :-

There would now be a million strong protest outside of Capitol Hill.

There would be further million strong protests on the streets of NY, LA and Chicago.

The highways would be being blocked by truck drivers.

The politicians would be subject to mass abuse.
They would be pelted with eggs.

But Americans have turned into pussies.
Or sheep - lining up to be fleeced.

[Ian62]

69. The 99% lost on this deal

The 0.1% won
The politicians also won - if you were deceived.

It's about time people stopped cheer leading for a particular party or politician, or treating the political machinations in Washington DC like some kind of sporting event.

It's about time people started cheer leading for America and Americans again, because there is far too little of that.