Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Dan DeWalt, who writes for ThisCan’tBeHappening.net.
The ugly reality of the American elite’s new economic attitude is beginning to show itself. As recently reported in the Reformer, over two dozen children in Windham County alone will now be denied access to the Head Start program. Nationwide it will be thousands so deprived. In Texas, the governor is turning away federal money that would provide Medicaid for thousands, denying them any access to health care rather than to risk any possible rise in future tax rates. Even the progressive governor of Vermont has fallen in line and repeats the mantra that we just can’t tax the wealthy any more than we already do. Never mind that during our greatest days of prosperity following the second world war, our tax rates were about three times as high as they are now. He would rather see reduced earned income payments to Vermont’s working poor than a tax rise for the rich.
Our wealthy seem to have become an insecure lot. In the ’60s and ’70s the titans of industry were content with taking home 20 or 30 times as much money as the average wage that they paid. Today the average CEO will make over 400 times that amount. Yet this fabulously rich elite class cries in their highballs about the terrible tax burden that they bear. Now, the wealthy of 50 or so years ago didn’t deprive themselves of anything. They had the full contingent of elaborate estates, art collections, the latest in planes, yachts and automobiles, and money in the bank. But today’s uber-rich seem to be driven by a compulsion that has no relation to need, want or even crass desire. The amounts of money that they take in are so vast that they cannot even be understood in any terms other than sheer numbers of dollars, divorced from any of the normal value associations that the rest of us have with money. Their money caches seem to be symptomatic of some sort of hoarding disorder.
If they don’t have to pay their fair share of taxes, they should at least pony up the resources to keep their society from tanking. After all, it is their manipulation of the economy and how money is made that is bleeding the rest of us dry.
Our big corporations, enjoying their now confirmed status as people, share this human hoarding trait. Today, American business is sitting on trillions of dollars in cash. The CEOs are not willing to invest in the country or in their workforce. These companies are managed with the purpose of enriching the very few at the top, and those few think that keeping cash reserves is in their own economic interest at the moment. When the big banks were given hundreds of billions of dollars to cover their poorly executed and risky loans, the government asked them to lend the money to Americans to get the economy moving again. Instead, the banks sat on the cash, using it primarily to finance more risky deals and enrich themselves further in the process.
The corrupted politicians who have approved the lopsided and unfair laws that have created this mess often refer to the genius of the free market that will take care of all the ills brought about by poverty. They boast of jobs created and charity rendered freely to the needy. We are seeing how job creation is not part of the current free market platform, but what about charity? If more and more families are sinking into poverty, both here in America and around the world, shouldn’t there be a commensurate rise in the amount of money that is given back to society by the wealthiest? A chorus of voices will quickly cite donors who have given substantial amounts of money to various causes. Bill Gates is lauded for having given some $28 billion away over the years. But if his net worth is $72 billion, what does he plan to do with the excess? Does he need that much laying around to feel assured that he won’t have to go hungry? Would it be possible for him to get by on a mere $1 billion of net worth? If he did, what good could be done with the other $71 billion if spent on, say, poverty alleviation? The very rich already have the power to decide what problems or causes deserve funding. This undue influence can even drive governmental policies to a far greater extent than does the expressed wishes of the popular electorate. If they don’t have to pay their fair share of taxes, they should at least pony up the resources to keep their society from tanking. After all, it is their manipulation of the economy and how money is made that is bleeding the rest of us dry.
They have created an economy that makes money by gambling with debt, creating questionable financial instruments and practices along with reducing workforces and worker compensation. The current state of high unemployment, growing poverty and discontent is a direct result of this new economic paradigm. We need to recognize that it is not the unseen, magical hand of capitalism that has put us in this state. It is rather the grasping and money stained hands of the very rich, pulling strings in statehouses, courthouses and the White House, that have created our unequal and failing society. If we can’t cajole them into readjusting their sense of proportion, them perhaps we can shame them into it. They have been engaged in a highly effective class warfare against the rest of us for decades now. It’s time that we recognize this, stop begging for crumbs and instead start hammering away on their pedestals.
