You think the quality of life for 40% of Americans is hanging by a thread? That’s absurd hyperbole. I want to see some cites to support that.
I’m not sure what lawyers have to do with it, but I very strongly object to the implication that somehow all we need is the folksy homespun wisdom of the little guy. What’s going to give you more bang-for-your-buck when using limited funds to try to improve quality of life in a struggling neighborhood, tax incentives to lure in new businesses, investments in infrastructure, or investments in programs to improve civic responsibility and career possibilities among the youth? Beats me. But whatever the answer it is, it demands actual knowledge and study and expertise, in fields like urban development and political science and economics and sociology, not just common sense.
Granted, taking that position too far leads to an attitude of “oh, we know much better than you do what’s good for you”, and certainly some people who are theoretically experts have come up with some bizarrely boneheaded ideas. But if fixing the lot of poor Americans was so simple that it just required some good old common sense, it would have happened already.
No, you’re right, people who commit identity theft should be nowhere near customer info, for example. But we should set a standard that if you’ve kept your nose clean for X amount of years that it should no longer come up on background checks.
Everyone pays sales and payroll taxes and excise taxes. Income taxes do not have to apply to everyone, and already don’t apply to 47% of taxpayers. But many of those non-taxpayers are pretty well of, while some minimum wage workers have to come up with as much as $50-100/month to meet their tax bill. Taking that off their shoulders would increase their quality of life a great deal.
I’m all in favor of free trade and i recognize that we can’t do much about outsourcing. But importation of cheap labor is something we can do something about as a sovereign nation that ostensibly controls its own borders.
This is one area where Barack Obama has been literally the best President we’ve ever had: he’s attacking the causes of poverty more directly than any other President in history, because his years as a community activist gave him knowledge about what actually keeps poor people poor. So he’s adjusting overtime rules, making it easier for poor people to access health care, and he’s working on getting minor offenders out of prison and getting them access to the job market(which admittedly is the thorniest issue out there). HE’s even vocally criticized parents for lack of accountability, telling them to turn off the TV and get their kids to do their homework. He’s even addressed the racial aspect(black kids who study being accused of “acting white”).
Now of course Obama is a lawyer and didn’t grow up poor, but he did deeply immerse himself in these issues at the ground level. We need more of those, rather than John Edwards types who talk a lot about poverty but don’t really know much about poverty beyond what they’ve read from their briefing books. And I still would like to see more poor and lower middle class workers actually elected to Congress. Lack of a degree should not be an effective political attack on someone running for office if they seem to know what they are talking about.
Just out of curiosity, what makes people so sure that doubling the minimum wage overnight is such a great idea? I’m in total agreement that there is a great wage disparity that needs to be addressed. I’m not completely sure how we do that. I’m not an economist but I’ve leaned more toward taxing the upper end of the economy, either on income or wealth, and redistributing to the lower end. The minimum wage is a tool in the toolbox but I don’t get the fixation over $15 per hour. It seems reasonable to incrementally increase wages to see what the effects of an increase would be. That’s my take anyway.
I disagree that it’s winning for winning’s sake. The reality is the United States is an extremely politically diverse nation, divided along the lines of race, religion, geography, educational attainment, and class. We’re not all going to agree, and I sometimes have to remind myself of this, so I’m not saying I’m any better. But compromise is how you make progress. Even if you enact legislation along purely partisan lines like Obamacare, you still have dissenters within one’s own party for those reasons mentioned above. There’s still some crossover and compromise. It’s utterly impossible to achieve everything progressives want in the time and in the manner that they want. No legislation happens that way. Not Obamacare. Not New Deal. Not the Civil Rights Acts. Nothing.
Solid analysis on your part. I appreciate the balance post even if we sometimes disagree.
For a guy with whom I seldom agree, and one who has taken great pains to disparage Obama at every opportunity, this is one post I solidly agree with. It’s heartening to see a staunch Republican admit that Obama has a good side. If I ever find good in Trump, I’ll be sure to let everyone know.
He’s decisive. That’s about all I can think of right now.
As a lower middle class citizen, the ACA and mandatory purchase of skyrocketing health insurance has the greatest impact on my fiscal well-being. First it was $120 a month, then $180, then $225, now they want $280. I opted out and will dodge the tax refund penalty.
If you are going to bring up history…
Many of the problems with ACA were caused by a unforeseen circumstance-the untimely death of Senator Kennedy and the loss of his seat to a Republican.
Prior to that, the Democrats made many unfortunate compromises in the ACA with the Republicans to win some measure of bi-partisan support. They thought, reasonably enough, that if the Republicans didn’t deliver, the Democrats would take out the compromises and pass a better bill. With Republican support, they figured any really bad ideas would get fixed in the future like any other Government program. When Sen. Kennedy died the Democrats lost their ability to unilaterally make changes to ACA. The Republicans refused to make ANY changes and the Democrats were forced to enact the bill as passed by the House-warts and all.
The Democrats didn’t choose the ACA as it is currently written, including the penalty for not having insurance. It was either that or nothing-due to unforeseen circumstances.
Incidentally, I think the penalty for not having insurance is a very good idea, except that it is too small. The idea behind ACA is to cover the increased costs through more efficient medicine and a greatly enlarged ratepayer base. I agree with that strategy and I think most Americans do. No one likes being forced to do the right thing, but that is why we have speed limits and medical insurance penalties.
Speed limits and fines for speed limits are constitutional. Health insurance penalties are not. You can have a health insurance TAX, but at some point it becomes draconian enough that it would not be considered a mere tax and would get struck down by the courts. The Roberts decision pretty firmly established that the government cannot actually force people to buy health insurance, it can only incentivize it.
Also helping the government’s case is that the tax cannot be collected by the normal means, making nonpayment a viable proposition that involves no criminal sanctions and no seizure of income other than tax refunds. If the government attempted harsher means, the victim of those means would just sue and SCOTUS would declare it unconstitutional.
And all of that will be fixed in the Republican alternative bill, right?
Exactly. It’s been almost two weeks. Where is TriPolar’s cite?
What constitutes a “living wage” depends very much on where you live. Where I, personally, live it would constitute a living wage for my household. In Chicago, a mere 50 miles away, it would not.
Well… when you’re poor you’re perceived as not having power. Several years ago I had an employer, a small business, who “specialized” in hiring people who were down and out. And then she stopped paying us. Then she paid us with rubber checks. When I tried to talk to her she hung up the phone, wouldn’t respond to e-mail, etc. Basically, she assumed that I was powerless and she could whatever she wanted without consequences.
At which point I hired a layer to “stand up” for me, even if I was able-bodied and able-minded. He agreed to a contingency fee, which is the only way I was able to afford his services, and we both profited.
People of able mind and body need help, too, sometimes, because no one can do absolutely everything all of the time.
You and your wife are young… you do not yet realize that there are age restrictions on many things. When I was laid off in 2007 I found most worker retraining programs offered were not available to me solely because I was over 40. That’s the only reason. There are a number of professions I was interested in that I could not enter solely because I was over 40 (Air traffic controller, for instance - the cut off to start training is 30. I missed it by 15 years). A LOT of people in the 40-65 age group laid off during the Great Recession fell into that giant crack in the safety net.
I did, with persistence and several years of searching eventually find an honest employer who genuinely did not give a damn about my age, only that I was capable of doing the work, and no rubber paychecks. Yay.
Of course, it helps a great deal I only had one dependent, I could work any schedule because I didn’t have to worry about kids at home, I am basically healthy, and physically fit. There are people half my age who are physical wrecks, weighed down by dependents both young and old, and otherwise disadvantaged compared to myself. That doesn’t make it impossible for them to get ahead but it does make is significantly harder, and it will take them longer.
Age discrimination, like other forms of discrimination, is also a very real thing. It makes it much harder for people over 35 or 40 to start over after a lay off or some sort of catastrophe.
YOU try hiring out as a manual laborer as a small woman over the age of 45 and come back and tell me how easy it is - because it isn’t. People who employ folks for manual labor don’t take women as seriously as men, and don’t want “old folks”
While I often disagree with adaher on these topics he does make a good point. We need to truly look for what is actually needed. Sometimes, that’s going to be annoying regardless of political outlook or personal belief.
I think we need to stop treating the poor as a monolithic entity (I’m happy to say my state has made some strides in that direction). What a high school drop out 22 years old with three kids truly needs is very different than what someone who is 40 years old, single, and who is laid off and has obsolete skills needs. Someone with a criminal record who is having trouble finding a job needs something different than someone paralyzed in a car crash or an amputee war veteran needs.
I call it “paper credentialism”. I’m old enough to remember when job positions asked for “X or equivalent experience”, now it’s either you have the slip of paper or nothing - and sometimes you have to have the paper from a particular school, even a competent, accredited school isn’t enough you have to have it from a subset of educational institutions. This just makes it harder for anyone to either bootstrap themselves OR to start a new career when an old one become obsolete.
^ This. Just about every other nation does this better than we do.
Um… maybe we should look at categories of crime, but yes, after a certain period of time most offenses should be ignored if there have been no further offenses.
If we have progressive tax on individuals why not on businesses? (We have a bit of this already, with employers under a certain size exempt from certain regulations, but I’m talking a more robust version of this). Reduce the burdens most on small businesses to encourage their growth and success. Huge corporations, however, pay more just as the wealthiest individuals (in theory) pay more. I’m also OK with employer local contributions counting towards their tax bill - if a factory installs anti-pollution devices, for example, I’d be OK with that counting towards their share of paying for society because cleaner air is a definite benefit to the local community
Of course, as always, the devil would be in the details.
Kill the poor, problem solved. 
Kill the conservatives. Problem solved.
This article is a good read.