Top .1% of wealth about to exceed bottom 90% :

[grahamhgreen]

http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2014/11/daily-chart-2?fsrc=scn/fb/te/bl/ed/somearemoreequalthanothers

[Rex]

1. Woooooooooooooooow.

Never thought I would see the day. Always kind of knew Reaganomics was going to lead to a plutocracy, just kinda hoped people weren't that greedy.

[KingCharlemagne]

10. This probly would never have happened, had Dems and Repubs not colluded in the 40s

and 50s to smash Socialists and Communists. As ye sow, so also shall ye reap. The seeds of Reaganomics (busting PATCO, breaking inflation on the backs of the working class, cutting taxes massively on the rich) were sowed in the 40s and 50s.

[Rex]

18. You are so right, we reap what we sow.

It's just mind boggling that so few people could have so much money and power.

[hifiguy]

20. Greed has never been and never will be self-limiting.

Which by itself proves the free-market boneheads completely wrong.

[Rex]

24. True the scope of greed in the past pails in comparison to what can be owned now.

Free trade will always mean slave labor. One reason you don't put profit above party and principles imo. You end up with shitty politicians.

[Live and Learn]

2. k&R nt

[cantbeserious]

3. The Oligarchs, Corporations And Banks Own And Control The Politicians That Own And Control Us

eom

[AZ Progressive]

4. Progressive Taxes were meant to be harsh on the Rich to make wealth distribution more equal

The top tax rate in 1917 was 67% on those making more than the equivalent of $35 million dollars in todays money. In 1919 it was 73% on those making the 2013 equivalent of $13.2 million dollars. Taxes were lowered during the 20's, obviously leading to the Great Depression. When FDR came into office, the top tax rate was put high again, at 63% for those making the 2013 equivalent of $16.7 million, raised to 79% in 1936, and in the early 40's it crept as high as 94% before coming down to 91% from 1946 to 1963. Ultimately this high top tax rate was in place until Reagan, which lowered the top tax rate to 50%, 38.5% in 1987, and then eliminated the progressive tax altogether with a 28% tax rate in 1988. Clinton reinstated it at not even as high as the Reagan years before 1987.

Why does progressive tax legislation work? It puts disincentives for the rich to hoard money, instead they pour it back into the business which includes hiring people and paying them better wages.

Progressive tax legislation, as the graph shows, worked in keeping the rich under control.

[grahamhgreen]

9. It's meant to make money hoarders pay their fair share. If you look at it like

a village with excess food, it does little good for one man in the village to hoard it all.

It's not really being harsh to ask someone with a hundred billion to live on ten billion

[Sirveri]

25. It actually disincentivizes them from hoarding initially.

Because the system is progressive, you pay taxes that vary at each tier. So the zero percentile tier is like 8500, the first 8500 your keep every penny, then it jumps to 15k and you give up lets say 10 cents on the dollar until you cross the threshold of the next tier. By having a top tier of 91% people are encouraged not to actually cross into that tier, because they will only see 9 cents on the dollar. The point isn't to take that money in taxes, it's to stop them from earning that much in the first place.

[grahamhgreen]

31. Well said:)

[jtuck004]

5. I agree, but this is history. Too many people have never been exposed to it, and the oligarchs

would hire their employees to kill whomever tried to reinstate such a thing. And they would, happily. Just tell them they have a job again when the bastards are dead.

Even if you disagree, what is the solution if that happens to be the case? Even though the people here today refuse to quit living on debt, which would end a large part of it.

I think one thing would be to gather people in little coops and try to avoid the others as much as possible. It could go on for a long, long time, as I think that describes India.

[grahamhgreen]

8. The solution is to tax them, make them pay their fair share,

Of course, if they've murdered someone, then they would need to be prosecuted for that!

[jtuck004]

11. Sounds a little like the workers on the plantation are just waiting for the Master to make it better

I suspect it will never happen, not in our lifetime or the next one.

Over 10 million people have moved into poverty in this administration alone. They took taxpayer money and enriched the banksters. So even when we had the taxes they took care of the banks and let kids go hungry. Still are, too.

We have birthed 2 or 3 generations now under the corporate plantation model, and they will have no concept of what you are talking about. Tens of millions will resist it, because they have been told it was wrong for 20 or 30 years. And nothing you or anyone else can do will change them.

Besides, we need $20-30 Trillion to make up just part of the ongoing losses to the lives that have been destroyed, and the jobs that have been replaced with those which offer a lifetime of servitude ending in death.

I agree, it needs to happen, but I doubt it will, without a huge national change in consciousness which isn't on the horizon. And even if it did it would be symbolic - which is important - but we would need 40 years of high taxes to being to recover the worthless crap we have shoveled under the rug at the fed, the jobs, the lost homes, the broken lives - and that doesn't even start us on the road to providing opportunity to people instead of asking them to prostrate themselves in front of banksters.

I think people better figure out how they can get together and make it better for themselves and their neighbors. 'Cause there ain't no help comin' that's got any substance.

[grahamhgreen]

15. Would you like to see us raise taxes on wealth, again? I assure you,

most Americans do!

2/3's, in fact: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/polls-show-longtime-support-for-tax-hikes-on-rich/

[jtuck004]

19. I would, absolutely. High time and all that. Don't think anything but a token gesture is ever gonna

happen now, because I think we are gonna either hit a wall or continue to devolve into a Western culture that resembles life in the poorest parts of India. People say that can't go on. It is in India.

Anyway, let me know when people who make $500,000 a minute give a flying rat's ass about anything anybody else thinks. When you get their attention - and that hasn't happened in 40 years, at least, then perhaps something will change.

But finding other things to keep us and whatever group we manage to come up with really isn't that expensive or hard, and imagine what they could do to our effort with an hour's - $500,000 x 60.

Think they could throw away an hour to make sure whole families or neighborhoods have lots and lots of trouble? Maybe a little sickness? Kill off a few kids, have a "terrorist" attack or three...

Or, they could get mean. And there are a lot of people on their side. Maybe one near us right now. Or not

"The time to make money is when blood is running in the streets".

Might be nice to have a plan to walk away from them too. Just in case continuing to play this game doesn't work out like one thinks it might. And the best way to do that is with your neighbors, eh?

I can't help but remembering that all the truly wealthy have is what we gave them. We don't have to tax them, just quit giving it to them in all the myriad ways we sell our freedom.

They will fall over of their own weight. de la Boetie wrote that in about 1550 or so, I still think it is the best strategy I have seen. Now how to implement it?

[lancer78]

27. The Great Recession almost did,

remember Boner bawling on the house floor begging people to support TARP? The only way things will change is if Capitalism is threatened.

[blkmusclmachine]

6. Savvy!

[woo me with science]

7. K&R

[progressoid]

12. Hooray!

[lonestarnot]

13. Harder. Longer. Faster. Go slave labor! sis boom bah.

[Initech]

14. The billionaires' extreme greed is about to sink us into a global great depression.

[grahamhgreen]

16. .....but not for them:(

[Zorra]

17. Two weeks of a mass general strike/boycott would help balance that out real fast. nt

[hfojvt]

21. one trouble with that statistic

is that the bottom 90% includes the 18.1% (in 2011) who have zero or negative net worth. Kinda drags the total down.

[grahamhgreen]

22. Should be better when we get to 90% with zero!

[hfojvt]

23. that's kind of what I mean though

90% does not even come close to having zero

Here's the distribution by household from the 2011 census of wealth

9.05% - less than ($8,610)
9.05% - $8,610 to zero
4.55% - zero to $1,679
4.55% - $1,679 to $4,999
2.4% - $5,000 to $7,113
2.4% - $7,113 to $9,999
3.3% - $10,000 to $16,039
3.3% - $16,039 to $24,999
3.45% - $25,000 to $35,624
3.45% - $35,624 to $49,999
5.2% - $50,000 to $71,982
5.2% - $71,982 to $99,999
8.95% - $100,000 to $159,226
8.95% - $159,226 to $249,999
6.3% - $250,000 to $341,848
6.3% - $341,848 to $499,999
6.75% - $500,000 to $836,033
6.75% - $836,033 and over


As you can see, 35% of households have over $159,226 in wealth. 71% of them are in the bottom 90%. 19.8% of households have over $341,848 in wealth. Half of them are in the bottom 90% as well.

Those people are a long way from being dirt poor.

[lancer78]

28. And until they start to suffer,

things will never change.

[drray23]

26. striking graphic

The curve start to bend right when Reagan gets elected and start the reaganomics. Of course, this could all be a coincidence...

[grahamhgreen]

30. Their selfishness will be legend.

[liberal_at_heart]

29. K&R

[lonestarnot]

32. kick

[lonestarnot]

33. Why doesn't this kick?

[grahamhgreen]

34. Lord i don't know!

[lonestarnot]

35. Hmmm.