In “From A Square Deal to a Raw Deal,” Chapter Six of his book, Sen. Webb writes that according to the New York Times, with a one-year exception, total income reported by taxpayers increased annually after World War II right up to 2001, the year of George Bush’s election. What followed was four years of lower income totals for the majority of Americans born after 1945. Almost half of these people filed tax returns showing incomes under $30,000 while two-thirds reported incomes of less than$50,000.
Meanwhile, the stock market rocketed to historic heights. But this kind of growth does nothing for the little guy and his family, living off $30,000 to $50,000 a year. The phenomenal amounts of money generated by the market activity described in the New York Times flowed to people making over $1 million a year. Who are these people? They make up less than one quarter of one percent of all taxpayers. And this tiny group hauled in nearly 47 percent of all income gains in 2005.
Who really benefits from these market surges? The top one percent of our society which also owns more than 50 percent of stocks. So they have real power on Wall Street and the “capital gains” taxes paid on their stock earnings is 15 percent, considerably less than the percentage the average worker pays on income earned through labor.
How big is the divide between the earnings of people at the top of the ladder versus the average income earners on the bottom rungs? Paul Krugman an economic theorist and columnist for the New York Times used John D. Rockefeller, the richest man in American during the late 1800’s, as a reference point. Rockefeller made $1.25 million in 1884, about 7,000 times the average per capita income at the time. But this is chump change compared to money made by hedge fund managers who pull down billions of dollars a year. In 2007 one of them received $1.7 billion, over 38,000 times the average income. The top twenty-five hedge fund managers were paid a combined $14 billion.
As outrageous as these numbers are, following the global sub-prime disaster when the largest banks on Wall Street lost $50 billion, those institutions began paying “retiring” CEO’s anywhere from $40 million to $160 million in retirement benefits.
Dancing along in the top 1 percent or "upper crust" of America is the society of the super rich who regularly replenish the ranks of the highest paid officers and directors of huge corporate employers. If they are allowed defeat the passage of the Employees Free Choice Act, they will "own" the American working class. They will move from the virtual aristocracy they are to an invincible ruling class that will dictate wages, water down benefits even more, put the lid on retirement funds and restrain workers from having a voice in the workplace or developing any means of getting ahead. If the workers have no voice, no way to push back, no means to bargain fairly, whom among us will be there to take up their cause?
WRITE, EMAIL OR WIRE YOUR SENATORS TO VOTE FOR
THE EMPLOYEES FREE CHOICE ACT ON JUNE 30th
