This Thanksgiving, Billionaires Gorge as Many Starve

[Fantastic Anarchist]

Source: The Contributer

If Beverly is approved for food stamps, she'll get about $1.50 per meal. David and Charles Koch made enough in one second to pay her food bill for an entire year.

---snip---

3. Perspectives

As Joe walked with her to the restaurant, Beverly told him she felt lucky to be in Chicago, with several nearby Resource Centers where she could apply for food stamps. He remembered pausing for a moment before they went inside, as Beverly, balancing nimbly on her crutches, deposited her empty paper cup in a trash bin.

Chicago is now the second major city - after Detroit - to become a depository for Koch Industries petroleum coke, the byproduct of refining heavy tar sands oil. It's being dumped along the river on the city's low-income southeast side. A Koch Industries spokesperson shrugged it off as business as usual. Charles Koch had recently proclaimed, "I want my legacy to be...a better way of life for...all Americans."

---snip---

In October, 2011 Senate Republicans killed a proposed $447 billion jobs bill that would have added about two million jobs to the economy. Members of Congress filibustered Nancy Pelosi's "Prevention of Outsourcing Act," even as two million jobs were being outsourced, and they temporarily blocked the "Small Business Jobs Act." Most recently, only one member of Congress bothered to show up for a hearing on unemployment.



Read more: http://thecontributor.com/economy/thanksgiving-billionaires-gorge-many-starve

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The USA, land of the broke, home of the greedy.

[TBF]

1. To the greatest page - THIS

is the kind of thing we should be talking about.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

5. Yes, this needs to be yelled about from the rooftops.

People still don't get it.

It's all about "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps" which is all well and good if there were enough bootstraps to go around. It seems, the uber-rich have horded them all.

[sakabatou]

2. The income disparity in this country makes me sick

[Fantastic Anarchist]

4. Me too. nt

[ErikJ]

3. David Koch is a bad tipper.

From the article;---Charles and David Koch are both members of the .00001 percent. That's a group of twenty individuals who have a total net worth of over a half-trillion dollars, about $26 billion each. One of David's residences is at 740 Park Avenue, in the most exclusive area of Manhattan. The doorman at the 740 building had this to say about David Koch: "We would load up his trucks - two vans, usually - every weekend, for the Hamptons... multiple guys, in and out, in and out, heavy bags. We would never get a tip from Mr. Koch. We would never get a smile from Mr. Koch. Fifty-dollar check for Christmas." - See more at: http://thecontributor.com/economy/thanksgiving-billionaires-gorge-many-starve#sthash.yLo053RY.dpuf

[xxqqqzme]

8. Fifty dollar check

once a year - WOW!

Hey, big spender

[onehandle]

6. The Kochs deprive the poor and middle class of food as they pass laws to arm them to the teeth.

That's all I got.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

7. We'll take it.

[Amimnoch]

9. We need to get off the minimum wage idea, and implement the workers tax.

Focusing on income disparity is focusing on a small piece in a large puzzle, much like the focus on the minimum wage as a means of increasing income for the lowest paid of our wage earners.

For example how much is $1,000.00? Is it a lot? Is it a little? $1,000.00 (or any amount) is really not important at all. It's what you can buy for that $1,000.00 that really matters!

Take the minimum wage as an example. Since the beginning of the minimum wage corporate America has gotten very good at "adjusting" for minimum wage hikes.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0774473.html

Please refer to the link, throughout the history of the minimum wage, the actual buying power of those stuck at the minimum wage level has never really increased. Dollar amount isn't as important as dollar value. Move it up to $10/hour, corporate America will adjust. Raise it to $22/hour, corporate America will adjust it again to ensure that those on the minimum wage never really gain any real, lasting increase in buying power.

The income gap is the same. The gap itself isn't what matters as much as what can the people on the low end of the gap afford to buy with what they make.

What we really need is a workers tax. A tax where the proceeds go directly to the workers. A tax that ties corporate profits to employee income. Starting at 15% Corporations need to compensate all employees, equally, 15% of their net. For example, Walmart netted $469 billion last year. Take 15% of that amount, or $70.35 Billion, and equally distribute it to all estimated $1.4 million employees. That's an additional, lump sum profit bonus to all employees of $50,250/ year. Then, if Walmart (and the rest of corporations) attempt to "adjust" they will have to do so by adjusting their own profit margins... something they won't do.

The benefit of this method, vs the minimum wage has an additional advantage. Because profit margins are the basis of the pay out, it will actually benefit corporations to increase their employee base rather than cutting them to protect their precious profit margins.

Heck, we might even be able to sell this to the cons, since this also vests the employee's interest in working harder to ensure the companies are successful (after all, they all have a real, and vested interest in the success of the company!)... THEN, for the gap to widen any further between the haves and the have nots, it would mean the have nots would also be getting a real, and proportional increase as well! One of those few cases where it could really be a win/win for all of us.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

10. I've never heard of this.

From your post, I definitely like the idea. I'll have to read more on it.

[Amimnoch]

15. As far as I know, it's not an established idea out there yet.

This was an idea I'd sent to my Senators and Rep back in 2009 when the last round of ineffectual minimum wage increase was being discussed in congress.

Increasing "money" is pointless if the purchasing power of the increase is summarily reduced by Corporate America.

With this kind of plan, the need to ever really increase the minimum wage again will be reduced. If a business is successful, because of the labor of its employees, the employees should have a legal right to share in the wealth of the business model imo.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

17. I totally agree with that.

[JEFF9K]

12. Calling it a "workers tax" will help sell it to conservatives, but we might need a different ...

... name to sell it to NORMAL people.

[Amimnoch]

16. Workers tax is just what i've referred to it as.

I'll let smarter people than I come up with a name that meets the sensibilities of the public. I only really care about the end result, which is legislation that allows workers to have a legal entitlement to a reasonable portion of the wealth that their labor generates for corporations.

[calimary]

13. Intriguing idea, I must say!

Thanks for bringing it up, Amimnoch!

[grilled onions]

14. The Value Added Tax For Those Who Truly Have The Wages!!

I like it. They tax pennies from the peons while the mega wealthy get to keep theirs. They can find more loopholes then there is fog on London.

[JEFF9K]

11. AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM: exceptionally bad!!

[rickford66]

18. I wonder if the Kochs and other 1% ers would enjoy their food if ...

they knew the cooks and waiters spit in it.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

19. Evil.

I like you.

[rickford66]

20. Thanks

I'm just saying, you know? If it was me, I'd be personally buying and cooking my own food. You know. Just in case.