For too long we have been subjected to accusations from the right of pursuing “class warfare” and advocating “redistribution of wealth.” Has anyone bothered to point out that we have been engaged in class warfare since at least the Great Depression? Has it not occurred to anyone that there has been an ongoing redistribution of wealth since at least the late 1950s? The only problem is that these accusations have been made in the opposite direction of that in which they are actually being pursued.
Of course the class warfare has been continually waged from above against the middle class by the moneyed elite, who have eventually become known as the one percent—those who now own a staggering forty percent of the wealth of this nation. These are now the plutocratic upper class whose wealth is currently engaged in buying control of the United States to further enrich them and increase their wealth and power even more. Yes, there is indeed a redistribution of wealth taking place. It is a transfer from the hard-working home-owning (and mortgaged) middle class to rapacious bankers and financial institutions that have gamed the system, thoroughly corrupted our financial institutions and caused a massive transfer of wealth via rampant foreclosures from innocent mortgagees. And this is real wealth—land, homes and real estate—whose values have been manipulated and distorted through incredible accounting tricks.
The growing result is that not only real property but also liquid assets are in the hands of what only can be called criminals. In addition, these wealthy elites and huge corporations are sitting on mountains of cash that they are not investing in useful enterprises that could result in well-paying jobs that in turn could make revenues available to consumers who could then again, with their purchases, spur further job growth and prosperity for the vast majority of this country. But the one percent is not in any way interested in that. They are only interested in sitting on vast wealth and acquiring political power to further enrich themselves to no purpose that is useful to the greater society. Like the dragon Fafnir in Wagner’s Rheingold lying on its horde of gold, they simply say, “I sleep and possess.”
To save this democratic republic at this critical point in our history, extraordinary measures are required. There must be some way to actually reverse the direction of the “redistribution of wealth” that is already taking place toward the top. And there must be a way to take up the struggle of the middle class against a class that would ultimately subjugate and destroy it and create a world of modern serfdom, poverty and ecological ruin. There must be a way to achieve a society where the vast majority can live doing meaningful work in exchange for a life of relative comfort and security. The alternative is a dreary and somber existence for the vast majority of a country that has created wealth and prosperity only to have it usurped by a rapacious clique of criminals who would sneer at us from their gated fortresses of luxury while we all continue to toil for their gain.
Therefore we must promote and pass the PRA—the Plutocrat Reappropriation Act. The PRA would initially involve a temporary military occupation of the Cayman Islands along with the immediate freezing of the liquid assets of all persons with a net worth of over 200 million dollars. Once that was done there would be a detailed accounting of these holdings and an appropriate one-time progressive tax levied against them. And remember, “Corporations are people too my friends.”
With a detailed accounting of the funds squirreled away in the Caymans and whatever other liquid assets can be secured offshore, and an accurate assessment achieved of all other liquid assetts and the appropriate taxed levied, the funds would be transferred to the United States Treasury for use in Projects of Economic Renewal. These would include but not be necessarily limited to: infrastructure repair and upgrade—repair and enhancement of roads, bridges, high-speed rail, rapid deployment of a smart energy grid, funding of research into clean energies and similar large, society-enhancing projects.
The interesting aspect of this is that it would in many cases involve contracting with many of the same corporations that had been subjected to the PRA tax in the first place. The advantage would be that this tax would fund projects that would produce jobs that would in turn accrue to the profits of many of the various corporations that had been assessed the tax in the first place. The movement of the money through the system would also enable those employed in the projects to support families and purchase homes and automobiles. That would, of course, put commerce into other sectors of the economy such as real estate, automobile manufacturing and a vast array of consumer products resulting in even more jobs and more profits for business.
It would also make once again possible the equitable bargaining between those who own the means of production and those who operate those means. This is the very balance that spared this country from the upheavals of communist uprising that rocked so many other societies in the course of the twentieth century. A strong partnership between ownership and labor and between producer and consumer is the best way to achieve a prosperous and just society. Unfortunately, that balance must often be enforced rather than simply recognized and followed.
We cannot have prosperity if rich plutocrats are sleeping on stagnant pools of cash. We can only all prosper if we move it through society. Fresh running water is so much more healthy than still, stinking swamp water.
The purpose of a PRA would be to break loose the pools of stagnant cash and send them flowing once more through a revitalized economy. Money is like blood. As it flows, it nourishes the living tissue, the jobs, products, hands and families that make, provide and buy the products and services that constitute the economic life of a society. When its continuous flow is blocked the fabric of economic life dies. The economic life of the United States is presently in a state of monetary gangrene.
Seemingly drastic measures like those I am suggesting for a Plutocrat Reappropriation Act have been made necessary by the greed and power-hungry policies of what has become the one percent. We could, of course, avoid such drastic steps if our body politic could recognize that this income inequality is not only bad for the economic life of our republic but also deadly for the democratic freedoms upon which it was founded. Alas, that does not seem to be the case. There is a class of people for whom these rights and freedoms have become an impediment. This is the class waging class warfare against those who have put their bodies hearts and fortunes into building this nation and these are the ones who hope to reap unholy profit from it. They must be stopped.