Billionaire Sam Zell: "The 1% work harder."

[JHB]

78. Is that really where the fight is, politically? Especially nationally?

Or is it the system that reinforces the view that increases expectations of executive compensation and undervalues lower-level work like the janitors?

It's the super-wealthy who are pushing the policies that increase concentration and undercut the ability of everyone else to push back. The entire neoliberal/Reaganomics push has depended on getting the Supies of the country to think they're in the same boat as billionaires on a lot of issues. But the Supies aren't the ones funding and driving the likes of ALEC, pushing laws that make it harder for the janitor to get pay raises.

Remember the arguments over raising taxes on the wealthy? "Is $250,000/year 'rich'?" Why stop on that one number? I like to point out that if you adjust the 1955 tax brackets for inflation two thirds of them kicked in above $250K, and nearly half kicked in above $500K. The top rate affected income above 3.3 million. Even leaving out what the rates were back then, it clearly put extreme wealth in a different category than Supie and his somewhat better off lawyer and doctor friends.

Divide and conquer cuts both ways. If you want to get this country off the Reagy-train, then splitting those 1-5%ers from the billionaires works in our favor. It doesn't hurt to remind them that their savings and investments are the next juicy snack for Wall Street to suck upward.