General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsOne of America's greatest problems summarized in a chart
I'm sure this has been posted before in various ways, but this illustrates what has gone so drastically wrong, and politicians (mostly on the right, IMO) have facilitated it:
Something MUST be done to reverse that. Taxing billionaires more sounds enticing to me, and Joe Biden has been touting exactly that. Go Joe!!
dalton99a
(81,062 posts)enough
(13,235 posts)wryter2000
(46,016 posts)Ronald Reagan
intrepidity
(7,240 posts)wryter2000
(46,016 posts)After that, it only took Newt Gingrich to ruin the congress.
certainot
(9,090 posts)foundation and later, kremlin think tanks
trump would don't have gotten anywhere close to the WH without limbaugh, like bush. gingrich piggybacked limbaugh and reagan owes his remake and rehab to limbaugh, who deified him and bush sr, north, rumsfeld, cheney etc instead of recognizing the treason and election fraud of the october surprise/iran.
the record partisanship, and ALEC's sudden success after years of struggle, coincides directly with the end of the fairness doctrine and the early years of the rw radio monopoly buildup in the late 80s early 90s
Amishman
(5,538 posts)Product quality, customer satisfaction, and employee wellbeing all became distant concerns behind maximizing profit. It became the norm that the former considerations only received attention when the latter was negatively impacted.
My suggested fixes:
Mandatory profit sharing with all employees.
Requiring companies that pay dividends, pay executive bonuses or stock options, or perform stock buybacks spend a matching sum on bonuses to non-exclusive employees. Perhaps double for stock buybacks. My current employer is stiffing employees with 3-4% raises while doing stock buybacks that work out to $25k per employee.
Tax the use of contractors.
Lonestarblue
(9,874 posts)They are a way for executives to manipulate market prices and feather their bonus nests, and the money for them comes at the expense of workers and job geowth.
BettyonRed
(40 posts)OnlinePoker
(5,702 posts)Michigan supreme court ruled: ... that Henry Ford had to operate the Ford Motor Company in the interests of its shareholders, rather than in a charitable manner for the benefit of his employees or customers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.
Basically, if you're a company owned by shareholders, there's not much you can do to benefit the employees over shareholders. This is why unions are so important so you can at least try to get profit sharing included in the contract.
wryter2000
(46,016 posts)Experts say, and I believe them, that keeping your employees in the long term is better for your bottom line than being cheap with them.
I worked for Kaiser Permanente for 22 years, and I was nowhere near the longest-lived employee there. There were people who'd been there 40 years or more. I don't think KP is publicly traded. I know Costco is because I own a few shares of their stock, and it does very well.
TexasBushwhacker
(20,043 posts)He decided absolutely nothing mattered but increasing profits for shareholders. Reagan and his followers said GREAT!
plimsoll
(1,664 posts)So the GOP decided that lawsuits should be curtailed. So, no regulatory agencies, and no legal remedies. They heard the part they wanted, and ignored the other parts.
Wounded Bear
(58,436 posts)Trust_Reality
(1,721 posts)His followers proudly displayed bumper stickers on their big RVs that said:
I'm Spending My Kid's Inheritance!
Reagan was a silver voiced, smooth talking, con man.
OMGWTF
(3,891 posts)czarjak
(11,191 posts)pazzyanne
(6,518 posts)Ronald Reagan was elected President of the United States.
wnylib
(21,146 posts)was more like "trickle on" than "trickle down."
Poiuyt
(18,087 posts)The tax policies in this country are terrible (unless you're a billionaire)
Wounded Bear
(58,436 posts)Novara
(5,752 posts)ShazzieB
(15,952 posts)jimfields33
(15,450 posts)The question is why?
peppertree
(21,526 posts)And as you know, what they say - usually goes.
mjvpi
(1,384 posts)Citizens United decision and dark money in general give the wealthy a unbalanced voice in elections.
FakeNoose
(32,328 posts)Clinton came in in 1992 with a fresh mandate after the Reagan/Bush1 years were finally over. Clinton could have made needed changes in the taxing matrix, but he didn't. The timing would have been right and he could have saved us from a lot of pain. Why didn't he do it?
Response to FakeNoose (Reply #28)
Name removed Message auto-removed
FailureToCommunicate
(13,988 posts)we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both." -- JUSTICE LOUIS BRANDEIS
Raygun was the beginning of the downward slide.
Of course Nixon and Ford we pretty bad as well before Reagan.
True Dough
(17,090 posts)And I hope the Republicans find out its consequences without stealing our democracy!
KS Toronado
(16,900 posts)Should be talked about more headed into the midterms and how it keeps people poor.
True Dough
(17,090 posts)It's extremely difficult to converse with Republicans and find common ground, but if you raise this issue and say, "See, we're all worse off over the past four decades except for the ultra-wealthy. We have to do something about that and put more money back in the hands of the average American."
Of course things are likely to devolve into, "Your side is responsible for getting us here." But if we can avoid arguing over who's to blame and just agree that the rich have been robbing from the lower and middle classes, at least we have that much in common with the other side.
Joinfortmill
(14,229 posts)panader0
(25,816 posts)Lonestarblue
(9,874 posts)They would look at it and say, See, the rich are paying 194% more in taxes than those at the bottom. Thats good.
Economic education in this country is a joke.
G_j
(40,366 posts)numbers.
Martin68
(22,663 posts)ymetca
(1,182 posts)and repealing Glass-Steagall (you can thank Slick Willie for that one), which put the icing on the cake. Now hedge funders are literally carving up the spoils.
They are salivating over Social Security and Medicare now. The want ALL of it, so they can play crypto games on their yachts.
True Dough
(17,090 posts)They're in jeopardy and we have to fight like hell to keep them!
LAS14
(13,749 posts)pansypoo53219
(20,906 posts)zombie reagan except for the clinton blip.