Ah. I wasn’t clear. I was referring both to people who support helping the poor, AND people who support tax breaks for the rich. They are separate groups, for the most part, and are have separate reasons. But all the reasons come down to self-interest at their base.
The ones who want to give money to the poor, don’t actually do it as much as they want to think they do, “just to be nice.” That’s why the more recent admonitions from the left, to give more because “we really really should,” have fallen on deaf ears. They give money to the poor, because they think it will make THEIR OWN LIVES directly better. Things like keeping the poor from rising up and robbing them, or even just keeping them from having to deal with street beggars. Notice that a lot of the complaints from the people who want to STOP helping the poor, include some mention that no matter how much they do so, there are still people asking for cash accosting them in the street, and still people breaking into other peoples cars and houses to steal? Self-interest.
The reason why it’s become so popular to want to give THE RICHEST people extra money, is because a lot of people have been LIED TO, and told that “rich people are the investors who drive the economy, and if you don’t give them lots and lots of money, they will stop doing that, and you’ll lose your job.” Again, pure self-interest is at the base of it.
That's a flat out lie, though. Rich people don't invest in a business because they have extra money lying around. They invest, again, for pure self interest.
The ONLY reason to expand or start a business, is if you think you will have a lot of CUSTOMERS buying what you offer. That’s it. When the CUSTOMERS are the ones who are broke, rich people put their money ELSEWHERE. Or hoard it in cash or bullion.
The worst of the modern “tax the rich less to fix the economy” BS, is that the people pushing this now, want to get the money to give to the rich, by INCREASING the taxes and expenses on the CUSTOMER CLASSES. They are so insistently stupid (because they are otherwise angry at those groups due to racism, sexism and general testy political resentment), that they refuse to look at historical fact.
If they did, they would realize quickly that ALL of the times when ANY nations’ economies have expanded significantly and sustainably, it has ALWAYS been because the largest part of the society had extra money to spend.
We all have a good time when THE CUSTOMER CLASSES are well off, and are spending their money.
Historically, whenever the RICH people have had lots and lots, and the customer classes have had their incomes held low (to keep costs down!), the economies have ALWAYS stagnated, or even declined.
The story of the Middle Ages was exactly that. In the Feudal systems that had the worst situations, it was because the lords made sure that all but the barest minimum needed to keep the peasants alive, was given to them.
