-- iceage.wikia.com
It's like watching the 'Grand Canyon' of earning basic Human Dignity getting wider and wider -- only that it's not really so "grand" when you drill into some of the latest data ...
Divide between rich and poor a widening chasm in US
by Joseph Stiglitz, smh.com.au -- October 14, 2014
[...]
In the US, upward mobility is more myth than reality, whereas downward mobility and vulnerability is a widely shared experience. This is partly because of America's health-care system, which still leaves poor Americans in a precarious position, despite President Barack Obama's reforms.
[...]
But, partly owing to a Supreme Court decision and the obduracy of Republican governors and legislators, who in two dozen US states have refused to expand Medicaid (insurance for the poor) -- even though the federal government pays almost the entire tab -- 41 million Americans remain uninsured.
When economic inequality translates into political inequality -- as it has in large parts of the US -- governments pay little attention to the needs of those at the bottom.
[...]
Interactive:
A State-by-State Look at How the Uninsured Fare Under the ACA
Kaiser Family Foundation, kff.org -- Dec 2014
Here are some more glimpses of our ongoing "wealth erosion" from the recent Report that Stiglitz cites:
Income and Poverty in the United States: 2013
Current Population Reports
Issued September 2014 -- P60-249
by Carmen DeNavas-Walt and Bernadette D. Proctor
Widening disparities, flat-lining growth rates, spreading the impoverished 'pain' -- these are NOT good things -- for those of us without 'a winning ticket' in their Economic Game.
Just in case you didn't know ...
5 Must-Know Facts About the Shocking Divide Between Rich and Poor in America
by Hayley Fox, takepart.com -- November 13, 2014
[...]
2. Most Americans Are Not Wealthier Than They Were in 1986
“Contrary to a widespread view, we find that despite the rise in pensions and home ownership rates, the middle class does not own a significantly greater share of total wealth today than 70 years ago,” the report states.
[...] The middle and lower classes have yet to recover, and the average wealth of the bottom 90 percent of Americans was no higher in 2012 than it was in 1986.
[...]
4. Very Few People Can Save Anymore [...]
5. Is There a Way to Better Share the Wealth?
Maybe, but it would require new policies that would allow middle class families to make more money and keep that money -- for example, instituting a more progressive income tax policy, which would require the rich to pay a larger percentage of their income and allow the poor and middle class to pay less, the researchers say.
[...]
“Ten or twenty years from now, all the gains in wealth democratization achieved during the New Deal and the post-war decades could be lost,” the researchers write. “While the rich would be extremely rich, ordinary families would own next to nothing, with debts almost as high as their assets.”
Here's another numerical glimpse of our widening "wealth canyons" from the recent Report that Hayley Fox cites:
Wealth Inequality in the United States Since 1913: Evidence from Capitalized Income Tax Data
Emmanuel Saez of the University of California, Berkeley, and Gabriel Zucman of the London School of Economics.
National Bureau of Economic Research
October 2014
A real wealth growth of 0.1% for 90% of us, over the last 2 decades --
really sucks!
We work our butts off, to what end? So that the Top 10% can pocket the profits?
We used to believe in this country, that every worker deserved a decent wage:
"We stand for a living wage.
Wages are subnormal if they fail to provide a living for those who devote their time and energy to industrial occupations.
The monetary equivalent of a living wage varies according to local conditions, but must include:
enough to secure the elements of a normal standard of living--
a standard high enough to make morality possible,
to provide for education and recreation,
to care for immature members of the family,
to maintain the family during periods of sickness,
and to permit of reasonable saving for old age."
--
Theodore Roosevelt Nomination Acceptance Speech, 1912 --
Social and Industrial Justice to the Wage-Workers
And there were these -- epic demands -- on behalf of us, the Working Majority:
As our nation has grown in size and stature, however -- as our industrial economy expanded -- these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.
We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.”[3] People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.
In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all -- regardless of station, race, or creed.
Among these are:
The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
The right of every family to a decent home;
The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
The right to a good education.
All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.
America's own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for all our citizens.
For unless there is security here at home there cannot be lasting peace in the world.
-- “
The Economic Bill of Rights” -- from President Roosevelt's January 11, 1944 message to the Congress of the United States on the State of the Union.
May Americans not let these worthy goals and dreams, be taken away from us, lightly.
May new champions of the Working Majority, step forward and demand what is Right. What is Fair. Before the New Deal, and all our America Dreams along with it, are totally eroded away.
... like only so much sand in the once-grand river of opportunities and very worthy ideals.
-- www.healingtaousa.com