Unfettered corporate greed is liquidating Americas wealth. That's why we're shipping all our jobs to countrys unbothered by annoyances like labor, environmental and consumer safety laws. It's also, coincidentally, why we had to recall Chinese toothpaste sweetened with antifreeze and poisoned dog food (that could as easily have been bread; same grade of grain) from our grocery stores. Corporate income taxes have been reduced to such a pittance that, no, that's not the bulk of income taxes; the bulk of income tax comes from grunts doing the actual work of making the product, the ones that, as noted in Stacks suicide note, don't get the cozy loopholes and tax shelters allowed for their companies and the board members running them. My mother likes to point out that in 1992 George H. Bush paid a lower percentage income tax than she did, despite making about ten times as much and living in a house she paid to maintain. And a lot of "average Joes" don't have 401ks or mutual funds; she never did, in nearly a half century of work.

That's before we get to the Arthur Andersens, Enrons, Worldcoms etc. who let greed drive them past mere avarice into the realm of criminality, usually with no consequences to anyone save "average Joes" they formerly employed. How much is a 401k invested in Enron in 1995 worth now? Or Worldcom? Less than Arthur Andersen said it was right till the end, I promise you.

I dispute that, strongly. Unfortunately, for many Americans whether to get a job right out of HS or go to college isn't a choice, it's a given, and intellect or education is frequently irrelevant. The rest may ultimately do quite well, but not many will find themselves in a multi-million dollar McMansion behind a gate. A few may have, but for SOME reason those who worked their way up from the bottom seem to have no more taste for living with people who've never worked a day in their lives than the latter have for them. More often than not, from what I've seen, the "right decision" to get into the gated community was "Harvard instead of Yale. " The valedictorian of the HS class after mine got a $25,000 scholarship to Harvard; she still had to work full time because that only covered half a years tuition. Short of robbing a bank, what "right decision" would you suggest for the salutatorian to attend Harvard at $50,000/year? In 1992. No, I believe the truth is that gate and those security guards are there for a reason that has less to do with the criminal element than with basic elitism. Poll the country club next time you stop by and see how many people worked their way through college, ate a ton of student loans or (most likely if they did earn their way) both. And, no, getting a job because daddy wouldn't foot the bill doesn't count.

Sure, it's a straw man; the people who donate the most to charity don't do so primarily for tax reasons, and don't donate the most because the rest of us have so little to spare for charitable donation. A senior lawyer NEVER responded to the statement, "you have to think of those who are less well off" by saying, "no, I don't. " Warren Buffet surely never said, "If there's a class war in this country, my class is winning. " He's the exception though; in my experience, those who speak of class war do so only to deny it. "Methinks the lady doth protest too much. "

Seventy plus years, eh? Those who survived the 25% unemployment of 1932 wouldn't call that decade prosperous, and the war it spawned brought rationing. My great-grandfather gratefully lay in a ditch digging ten hours a day while water froze around him, knowing if he didn't show there were ten guys waiting for his spot; so abundant was our prosperity. As I recall, it was more like Americas economy collapsed due to overspeculation, we were no longer able to loan the Central Powers (mainly Germany) money, they were no longer able to make reparations payments with interest to the Allies, and they were no longer able to pay interest on loans we made THEM during the Great War. I believe it ended in something called "World War II" with something called "the Holocaust" along the way. I not only know what happened, but have already addressed it. Would you like to address the '70s stagflation, or the hardships of Reaganomics, when the Dow posted it's worst loss since the Crash of '29 and our national deficit went from $1 trillion to $4 trillion? Supply side economics didn't work in the 21st Century, the '80s or the '20s, it simply got people to dump their earnings into unsustainable credit nightmares so those who made the loans got to take the money AND the property; the only difference now is (as stated in Stacks note) this time the taxpayers ate the banks debt. It hasn't been a seven decade boom, but a gradual consolidation of wealth nearing its logical conclusion. Nearly all the nations concrete wealth has been systematically liquidated and concentrated; all that remains is to transfer it to a numbered Swiss account and depart the empty husk. But for where...?

Did you notice the quotes around the statement about money? The statement was from another poster on this site, and I was rebutting it as I did when he made it. Money is indeed NOT the end all be all of life, particularly fiat money. You're preaching to the choir on that one, but do you see where the sermon leads...?

Good night then. I would not say riots and strikes equal disenfranchisement; indeed, I think the government declaring a strike illegal and firing workers much more so (not that I support the coal strike of '46; that was LABOR greed. ) It cuts the heart out of any strike to say, "If you start making an impact the government will disallow your strike. " While the situation as you describe it sounds extreme, I don't think guaranteed employment once you find employment is disenfranchising either. I've done everything required and requested of me, am one of if not the best workers in my area, and may not have a job at the end of next week, but I can't even get the person who made that decision (who doesn't work for my company) to discuss it. Speak to me of disenfranchisement.

But before you do, you should understand: If you reduce America to a Third World country, you will discover it is as I said: Bribery is possible only in places where the rule of law prevents government officials taking money by force; that is why power, not money, is the ultimate expression of power. Perhaps one might instead move to another country that lacks Americas heinous tax laws (which are still far more generous than anywhere with a comparable living standard) but there again rather than taxing part of wealth legally, most rulers will simply put a bullet in peoples heads and take it; that's how they got to be rulers. I understand the Caribbean has many, and that wealthy Americans all live in gated communities; it keeps their corpses from being dragged through the streets. I think, or at least hope, that is not what we desire for this country. Rest as well as you can; I pray the awakening will not be rude.