should make people hit the streets and DEMAND change, but for some reason, not yet.

Lets avoid that ugly scene and elect Bernie and then DEMAND others follow suit and do what he says as to making things reasonable

Their idol has therm convinced he'll reveal his magic wand just as soon as they elect him. This country has an industrial strength case of the Stupid!

those deals will NOT benefit the majority of Americans IMO. Given that, I think he's more sane that the rest of the R presidential herd. Some of them are way off the scale on wacky!

Prosperity was widespread, the middle class was growing, and poverty was shrinking. Inequality of income was the lowest it has ever been in the history of this country.

That was all under our current horrible, broken, dreadful, awful PROGRESSIVE and progressing "capitalist" system. Before those who intended to destroy progressive government gained power -- because we didn't stop them. We need to clean up our act, not destroy it.

We should all be ashamed of what our generations allowed to be done with the country those who came before us built. We were supposed to build on what we were given. The blame is ours, pretending it is actually the fault of a horrible system we inherited is inexcusable, and the job of repair and continuing the work of nation building they started is also still ours.

and even more foolish to blame the barn itself for our problems. THAT is actually exactly what enemies of democracy want all Americans to do. Help them destroy what we have built so they can rebuild the way they want.

We the People need to fire the bad managers in November, clean it up, restore what worked well and will, and add what people of today need added. No angry, frustrated incendarism. We had a really excellent revolution in the 18th century. We need to live up to the principles we established then and in the subsequent centuries in our living Constitution we chose to live by.

THAT is actually exactly what enemies of democracy want all Americans to do. Help them destroy what we have built so they can rebuild the way they want.

who is behind most of the bizarrely destructive behavior of the GOP, tea-partiers and other hostile conservatives, and anti-democrat media both mainstream and propaganda. It's up to us to save the Constitution from being twisted into an anti-government, anti -regulation guarantee for extremely wealthy businesses and families.

Once companies were forced to open up the jobs to blacks and women the pay rate started dropping.

My Dad was taking pay cuts in the 70's to keep his job. He took a 2nd job AND he had a small farm to keep going. My mother also worked in a grocery store. My brother and I were also working and adding to the pool.

In 1977 milk was close to $3 a gallon but we had the cows. We had the coal stove for heat but energy was expensive enough parents I knew were putting a lock on the thermostat and having the kids sleep together to keep warm at night.

apply for 3 jobs for every one their white counterparts did, but there were good, appropriate jobs, and not only well paid compared to today but they usually included good benefits. Remember guaranteed paid days off and vacation time? Re!ember paid vacation? This was an eara lifting all boats, something both Bernie and Hillary intend to restore.

You and I were not living the same '70's. Where I live (upstate NY) we began the long decline into rust-beltism in the '70's - a decline that has never really reversed here. I remember something called "stagflation" and high unemployment. We finally got some jobs back, but they are almost all low-wage jobs. I recall it as a time of shrinking rather than growing prosperity. (Not to mention that all paens to some better period in our past have to ignore the lives of PoC, Native Peoples, etc., as well as a fairly large chunk of rural white poor.)

There was an article the other day on parmesan cheese adulterated with high amounts of wood pulp (evidently SOME wood pulp is "allowed" - no doubt due to the influence of manufacturers, since I doubt any of us really like the notion). The question was raised "why do manufacturers DO this" - oh, LOL - because it is CHEAPER and so they make more PROFIT.

That's your capitalism in a nutshell.

All of which is an aside, since no one on the national scene is saying get rid of capitalism.

a progressive era of an expanding middle class. conservative economistS believed that stagflation couldn't occur. when it did, the GOP claimed that progressivism caused stagflation and set the stage for dismantling progressive programs beginning in the 1980s with the election of Republican Ronald Reagan.

Which party gets the presidency matters tremendously. Who wins the Democratic primary not very much at all, except for the issue of electability. Ideologically the only and Bernie are actually pretty similar, differing in their beliefs about what can be accomplished now. in practical terms, Hillary's goals are based on not having control of both houses of Congress. Bernie's goals presume a national mandate for giant change. political scientists tend to believe The results would be limited and pretty similar, although ability in dealing with Congress/obstruction could make a difference.

Not discussing the election.

Because memory is unreliable, I went looking - here's Krugman:
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/slandering-the-70s/?_r=0

because of the progressive government, as those on the right constantly insisted. It was in the 1970s that many wealthy families went to work, establishing charitable organizations and thinks tanks as fronts, to covertly convince Americans that government itself was causing their problems and that the solution was dismantling the regulation of business and the progressive programs that were encouraging poverty, shiftlessness and crime. Major efforts were funded to subvert teachings in universities, especially the Ivy League.

The timing is no coincidence. After the many changes, civil rights especially, and the turbulence of the '60s and '70s, many people were in a mood to believe it, decided it was time for change, and started opposing government efforts to solve often very solvable problems. And voters replaced the Democrats with a Republican landslide. You know, we have to get off the backs of business And get rid of big government.

Ever since, the ultra-right npow extremely well established work to subvert thinking has continued. I read their teachings here on DU every day, promoted as gospel by people who once again, amazingly after the era of conservative destruction, believe it is the Democrats who are ruining our country.

It is very important to realize that what they've accomplished so far is only the beginning of what these ultraconservative plutocrats have planned for America. BTW, Krugman has reported on this many times. I can't copy, or I would grab you a couple of pieces.

However, I do not know what you mean by:

I read their teachings here on DU every day, promoted as gospel by people who once again, amazingly after the era of conservative destruction, believe it is the Democrats who are ruining our country.

The takeover of power in America by a few wealthy families and mega businesses is a conservative scheme that has been facilitated to a small degree by corrupted Democrats. Also, during the 1990s some Democrats did try to maximize their power in a conservative environment by moving more conservative, not corruption but definitely a move right that was occasionally over the line of what is acceptable to most Democrats. Senator Biden actually posted of passing three strikes in the extreme, punitive form acceptable to the GOP after he had failed to get it knocked down to a much milder form.

Those days are over definitively for the Democratic Party, and have been for some years. We have already returned left. The serious damage our president has inflicted on the very wealthy already and reforms he has been able to enact against the ferocious opposition of the GOP and ultra-right plutocracy should be proof of that to everyone.

Right-wing manipulators, though, have always relied heavily on the trick of blaming everything they do that people don't like on the Democrats. At best, many looking for someone to blame believe it implicitely, at worst people in many voter groups will be confused and not know who is responsible, often withdrawing from involvement, which usually benefits the Republicans.

And of course, as we see so well here, many come to believe that the Democrats are as bad and as corrupt as the Republicans, certainly not much better and both a plague on the land.

THIS plays right into the hands of the ultraconservative plutocrats who have spent the last three decades destroying our trust in and support for our government so that they can reform it to their liking.

A thought l'd like to leave people with is that we really are the good guys these days. The GOP has been taken over by the bad guys. A second, very important thought is that we are much more powerful then some people who have become disillusioned and dispirited realize.

Look - I understand - you are well-informed, and so am I. I've been following this stuff since Reagan. We evidently disagree about the degree to which Democrats have complicit and/or pusillanimous. If the "we" in your last paragraph is "the Democrats" it does not include me. I'm not a Democrat, I don't consider the "Democrats" the "good guys," and I don't think that simply voting Democratic will get us anywhere but further down the road that leads to the Company Store.

So we will have to agree to disagree. I don't think our disagreement arises from any lack of information on your part, so I have no interest in convincing you. Do me the same courtesy.

Peace to you.

I really do love your irrational bowl of sub-literate word salad. No doubt, that's what happens when one receives an education from hate radio.

A new record.

can start it. All the others will bring on the SOS and worse.

It will get worse under TPP and all these other crap deals as well.

We are screwed. The damage is done. It is too late to cure.

And quite sensible too- too bad the people in charge have worked so hard to make it otherwise...it means they will kill to keep it "the new normal."

It would take a flush and reboot of our entire Congress, Supreme Court, and President. It would also take years. I fear it will never happen.

entrenched support for the current ripoff system. And the majority of Americans are not the problem, it's the ones elected to power, and so many Americans are so damn clueless when they vote. To me, if begun, it will take several generations for change. And the fight will not be easy, those with big bucks will do everything to preserve the current corrupt system. That said, change needs to begin, but like you, I fear it will never happen for decades, if ever. And the suppression is great, for example, what was done to OWS who dared to challenge the corrupt financial system.

...just take the first step."---- MLK

corporations mailing addresses/HQ's out of the US for tax evasion, etc., etc. And offshore funds hidden. It's an absolute recipe for disaster for the majority of Americans. And at the same time prices for everything in America keep rising. The majority of US citizens are screwed, and I think most still don't get it. They feel the pinch in income, but I really think many still don't get it. And then they vote in those willing to screw over them even more.

yeah right. THE ISSUE campaign.

This has always been one of my major criticisms of Pres. Obama.

He treated the Great Recession as just a more severe than usual typical downturn in the business cycle, in this case caused by the housing bubble. His remedies, therefore, were the usual, i.e., government stimulus -- but no major reforms or restructuring.

So, we have seen a very anemic recovery and we've seen the income inequality gap get worse and worse.

I think, therefore, that we are once again heading toward an economic precipice ... and I think you are already seeing signals of a deflationary spiral, because there is simply not enough wealth amongst the working and middle class to sustain a consumer economy.

And, this is a reason I support Sanders, too. We are going to have to have big, bold changes in the way we run our economy; Bernie understands this -- Clinton and the Repuglicans do not.

one, and it will probably be worse than 2007/ 2008. Bernie really is our only hope.

Was pretty drastic in comparison.

on the Great Recession it should have been handled differently. And, as you say, we are positioned for the same series of events again. Nothing was fundamentally fixed. It will happen again. That's why I support Bernie. The system needs a swift kick in the ass. Bernie IMO is a start. I fear it will take eons to fix the system, but at minimal, Bernie is an excellent start.

at $17,000 a year I make more than 32.2% of workers, and I only work part time.

That still puts me in the bottom 20% for households, because many of those other people making less than $15,000 a year have spouses who make more.

I am not broke either.

even with the ACA I pay over 8k a year out of pocket for medical costs, and I still have 12k of dental work that I need to have done that I can't afford. All it takes is one car accident with an uninsured driver and a tick bite and you're screwed.

between health insurance (at $4,000) and surgery and dental work.

I had insurance though so my $10,000 of dental work only cost me about $1,800.

costs!


And where do you live that the cost of living is so low?

Delta Dental, fortunately it is pretty darned good, although I think they should have co-pays..

For $18.52 a month (and my employer pays another $18.52) I generally get hundreds of dollars in benefits. Mostly because I have lots of cavities.

I live in Kansas, but many smallish towns have low cost of living. I paid my house off back in 2005 (when I was working full time).

Now with Obamacare my insurance is only $73 a month (and I may get more subsidy depending on my final income, I only used $300 of the projected $333) instead of the $320 a month I was paying (and which was gonna go up by about $30 a month). Near as I can tell it seems to be better insurance too.

enrolled in Delta Dental. You post reminded/convinced me we needed to get a plan. The dentist group here looks excellent and the prices through Delta Dental are great. Thanks for your post !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Delta dental what's that floss you have on?
could it be a faded rose from days gone by?
and did I hear you say
you were preventing tooth decay
to take us to that mansion in the sky

for those old enough to remember

And it doesn't include basic dental I'm going to be pissed.
Just sayin.

You can get an abscessed tooth and die from septicemia from it. Some poor black kid in Chicago didn't have $80 to get an infected tooth pulled, but when he was in a coma in ICU on life support, the county paid a couple of hundred thousand for his care before he died.

And as far as vision goes, I literally cannot navigate or drive without my glasses. They are an absolute necessity for everything I do once I get out of bed. And no, I can't get LASIK. I can wear contacts but can't get LASIK. A lot of nearsighted people don't have enough cornea to slice.

Isn't the poverty line woefully outdated? In my neighborhood the average two bedroom rental goes for $1,400 a month. You can rent a garage for $700 a month. And the price of groceries??? Hello?? A family of five would be paying 16-20k for housing and basic utilities ALONE in most cities. There would be *nothing* left to invest in retirement and college. This simply can't go on!

$ilicon Valley.

8-10k a month is not at all unusual. It's not due to supply and demand either, as many homes are vacant. The real culprit is Chinese investors.

Don't be a family of five. I'm serious. Adults and children would be much better off if parents didn't have children they can't afford. Let's not act like poor family planning doesn't lead to most of this poverty.

I mean, it's not like families of five have moms and dads (even those that make decent money) that lose their jobs, end up sick or disabled, dead, or broke for any number of reasons. Also, shame on people for being poor and having children anyway - how dare they? Don't they know that they're increasing the surplus population and making life harder for all the responsible people? I have heard this argument, Kang Colby, from people who once supported (and some who still support) the eugenics movement. It is as cheaply degrading and smug now as it was the first time I heard it.

Some families of five survive on 27K a year - up in my neck of the woods, I imagine there's a few that do just that, some of whom probably earn even less. They ought to be applauded for their courage, their strength, their persistence, in the face of overwhelming poverty. Money doesn't make the world go round, and I'm pretty sure I've never met anyone who lived a perfectly responsible life, financially or otherwise.

We are all vulnerable to financial situations as they occur. We are all just as vulnerable to disaster, to poverty, to sudden hardship, as any of our neighbors.

Instead of telling people not to have children they can't afford... maybe we should be striving towards an economy in which these same people will be able to afford for themselves - and for their children to survive and even thrive. Then this argument will become as irrelevant as it is ugly - a smug little bit of contempt directed at the poor for... well, being poor, and having kids.

I think we should offer basic financial literacy courses in high school. That's basically my point. If you have a child or children you need to understand how things like term life insurance and disability insurance work. Can't afford it? Then don't have children. Life can be extremely cruel, it isn't some birthday party where everyone leaves with a bag of freebies and a smile on their face. It's harsh, but I'm not sure why someone would want to bring a child into the equation unless they were properly prepared to support the kid.

Education and personal responsibility.

even in cases of rape and incest. So how would that be a case of lack of education and personal responsibility on the woman's part?

family planning methods should be available. Women should be offered paid leave for abortion procedures. Anything that incentives abortion or birth control makes sense to me.

it certainly isn't here in the South.

But I think that is something that can change over time.

I can imagine a fleet of 10,000 federal mobile abortion vans serving the needs of women all over the country for little or no cost. These mobile clinics could offer education, free birth control, and could conduct a multitude of free health screening services. We could even use TSA "Abortion Marshals" to help protect the vans from right wing nut jobs.

Yes, we do need - desperately need - better financial education. These kinds of arguments always strike a nerve for me - I was one of those young parents, aged 18, without a clue in the world, thinking he knew everything. I struggled for years, living in poverty with my fiance, our infant son - and her young daughter. This was... almost fourteen years ago now. Minimum wage up here was 5.65? 5.75? An hour, and I washed dishes, spent time as a telemarketer - spent time in between jobs during lay offs, business closings, or even once or twice, I lost jobs due to getting sick - or not having a car decent enough to make it to work in poor weather.

Oh I could have done things so much better, I could have been so much smarter, wiser, more responsible - but I wasn't. Knowing now what I didn't know then doesn't make up for my poor decisions, doesn't alter the fact that I made them. I don't consider my son as a mistake - not in the least, but I do wish I had been better prepared, wiser, older... ready, for what I was trying to do, which was, raise a child when I was barely more than a child myself.

Yeah, I've faced those cruel lessons of life, a lot of them - and a lot of it was my own damn fault, I won't deny that. I will say though, that a lot of young people, regardless of their backgrounds, make poor decisions... some times it's the result of poor education (I had a GED, which is no substitute for a damned clue about the world), general ignorance (sheltered, middle class upbringing) or simply the powerful passions (and hormones) of youth.

There is no way - at least no reliable way, to prevent young people, or poor people, from having children altogether. I do not think it is possible, or even reasonable to attempt to do so. I believe we should focus, instead, on improving our economy, our social safety net, our education, our infrastructure, our healthcare, and other things, in order to give everyone a good shot at survival if not decent living.

We are the richest Nation on earth. I get so tired of saying that - but we are. We can afford to do all of these things that before now we have largely only had the courage to dream of. Everyone should have a chance to go to college, to get a higher education, to have a reasonable wage, healthcare, a home. No one should need to be homeless here, or so deeply in poverty that it comes to a decision between buying groceries, or paying for heat. Or between paying the rent, or paying for medication.

The problem is poverty... not the people in poverty. We can educate, we can rebuild, we can do so much damned better than we've been doing for decades now. That's what this new political revolution is all about...

Sorry, guess I got carried away. Anyhow, perhaps I did read too deeply into your post, but I think about these sorts of things (and talk about them) quite a bit. Often on my mind.

Yeah, my favorite show when I was little, they don't make them like that anymore. I've never seen Regulate, I'll have to check it out some time.

Nate Dogg is Swift and Warren G. is David the Gnome.

and you have a good job that suddenly gets offshored, or otherwise made redundant, or have an accident that makes you lose your job, or get divorced and you were a stay-at-home mom who now has to look for a job and can only find work as a waitress or store clerk, or you develop a serious illness or medical condition that prevents you from continuing with a formerly good-paying job, or...

(Art may be from Ark., but is presently in Japan. )

economies come and go within a generation or two.
There will be more friction and misery when the economy is at odds with the behavior of a species. The economy has to serve the species as it exists, the species will not conform to the economy as you wish it would be.
If you were building a habitat in a zoo, you wouldn't put the monkeys in a fish tank. Our economy is grossly out of sync with our needs as a species.

Or maybe such undesirables could be tattooed so that no one mistakes them for actual people and accidentally affords them basic dignity or respect.

While we're at it, let's just round them up and stuff them in a camp somewhere. It'll be better for them in the long run, and better for us all.


[font size=10]USA! [/font][font size=10]USA! [/font][font size=10]USA![/font]

We should require women to bring proof of income above 27k/year to the pediatrician or they'll have to end the pregnancy. That will do it! What if you're making 120k/year, have your 5th child and then are replaced by a H1B visa worker and lose your job? How many of the children should be taken away and in what order?

"Let's not act like poor family planning doesn't lead to most of this poverty..."

You of course will supply us with objective evidence to support your allegation, yes?

Lack of 'good' jobs (i.e., full time jobs with room for wage advancement, with current and long term benefits. etc.) is the principal cause of poverty. Inadequate educational supports is another. Being born or raised in a low income household is another -- and a broader social safety net would mitigate much that disadvantage.

There are many families of three or fewer who are still mired in poverty. Hell, there are many childless adults who are too.

if you don't count my 17 YO dog. I do count him, of course.

I made less than $7000 last year. I had to create a GoFundMe page when sciatica laid me low for almost five weeks. My back is still compromised (I SHOULD be having surgery, however, the ACA is not going to pay for the care I need), but I am working now. I am a non-medical caregiver for the elderly. It's sad how many elderly people need care -- the costs for them are outrageous, but I only get a pittance--and I have to work less than 40 hours a week. I'm lucky if I get 25 hours a week. The companies that provide such care are making money hand over fist, but we caregivers get paid crap, and no bennies.

I didn't get enough from my GoFundMe page to pay my doctor and my vet, so I expect to be sent to collections next month. I'm trying to sell some of my art supplies. That should get me by.

I am the poorest I've ever been in my life.

Hope my 15 YO car holds up...

I have to sell what I can and freelance on the side. I have no time left over to actually have a life (even though they pay us part time, Professors need to work full time to do a decent job of educating their students). It's been this way for decades now and I'm making less than ever. About 1/8th of what I made 20 years ago! The private owners of the University that I work for are making money hand over fist and spending most of it on real estate investments in one of the world's most expensive cities. Meanwhile my students are saddled with debt for the rest of their lives, and the jobs just aren't out there. It's a shitty system!

It's a scam that began life as an art school for the ad industry (!), somehow got itself accredited, and is now charging Ivy-like tuition (minus the aid packages) and using the proceeds to buy up big chunks of downtown SF, while paying its professors, like yourself and the woman for whose cats I sat last year, a relative pittance.

If it is AoA, I assume that your neighborhood where $1400 rentals are available, like my friend's, is in Oakland. And they may not be available much longer.

I had a very difficult time asking for help with GoFundMe. I have been self-sufficient for most of my life (left home at 17, put myself through college and grad school, etc.), and it is hard to ask for help.

However, you are right. I should put up a new OP. Maybe -- hopefully -- I will get enough additional help to avoid collections.

Thank you for your kind words, and your gentle nudge.

But when I got the emails, I couldn't remember your offsite name, and I couldn't remember who that even was

Only seeing this comment made me realize that was you.

with severe sciatica. I never want to have that pain again!

I keep telling my friends that I'm the poorest I've ever been, but I'm the happiest. I want you to know that I'm living where I am the most joyous: the beautiful and bucolic Ozarks. I have a youngling friend -- a fellow woodcarver -- and he is bartering with me to put a more secure fence around my garden, essentially labor for labor -- and he gets to use my forge. I'll be starting my garden with potatoes on St. Paddy's Day.

Things are looking up. I have steady work, even though it's insufficient hours and salary to do much more than meet my monthly obligations. I do qualify for EBT and Medicaid, and I'm no longer embarrassed to make use of those resources.

Thanks again, Erich. Your thoughtfulness means so much.

Do you sell anything? Etsy shop maybe?

I did a tiny bit of blacksmithing, bronze casting and metal work in the past, and I still have an old anvil rusting away on my patio, heh, but I always wanted to get into woodcarving as well and never did, to my regret.

I've also got spare seeds if you need other things for your garden. Some are a few years old, and you might have some germination rate issues, but I've got blauschokker peas, moon and stars watermelon, japonica corn, and some dragon's tongue beans hanging around, maybe some calypso beans if I can find them.

I've been collecting heirloom seeds! I have a bunch that I'm sharing with a friend who lives about an hour from me. She has agreed to let me help her with her garden, since she has RA. I will PM you anon, and maybe we can share seeds.

I've also got some organic mustard seed, but that's such a fiddly thing to harvest that after the first year I didn't bother.

Probably a few other types of things as well, but I'd have to go through my shelves upstairs.

To make most lives a living Hell for poor people. If the very wealthy and the huge corporations don't pay their fair share of our infrastructure costs then cities turn to fines and fees through heavy policing.

I haven't seen this image before ... it is great!

He was half owner of a very profitable business
My father talked about how he would point out all of the things 'his' tax dollars helped fund
They poured most of their money back into the company

You win the thread

If we raise taxes to 90%, companies will layoff the rest of their American workers and move to Bermuda.

Corporations need to pay their fair share of taxes instead of exporting whole factories and hiding their money in the Cayman Islands.

How many state governments are trying to attract business by promising to raise taxes?

Please see the Republican two-term president illustrated in Post #11.

Top tax rate was 92% when he was President and the United States had a thriving manufacturing sector, and a robust middle class and lots of good paying union jobs, where one wage-earner could buy a house and raise a family, and even save for college.

I live in a state that brags about being low tax to attract business. It really is not a low tax state because we don't have a state income tax. They sock it to everybody in high property taxes, sales taxes, car tag renewal fees, professional license and CE fees, etc.

There are so many different variables that you can't compare the times. Women are in the workforce. Black people have civil rights. China is open. India has a billion people. Fewer people in general are needed to do the job because of technology. I'm sure there are more and even more detailed examples of differences.

The top tax rate was 92%, when there was no other, or at least far fewer, options for business. The same way union membership in the US was at its highest in the 1950's, because place mattered more in the 1950's. Today a given job can probably be done anywhere by anyone. Unless you're very talented, very good looking, very specialized, or just the old in the right place at the right time, you don't have much value in today's world.

…talking as progressively as she is if Bernie wasn't doing so well.

I read more and more about her financial ties and loyalties to the 1% every day.

The article about her nickname at Goldman Sachs——Goldman Handcuffs is actually tragic for Democracy.

because she erroneously thought, that no matter what she did, that she would be the next President.

Naming Robert Kagan, the founder of the neocon movement, as her trusted foreign-policy adviser, cozying up with these powerful Wall Street corrupters, calling the TPP "the gold standard" and never fighting against it.

She had such hubris during the Obama administration, thinking that she could do whatever she wanted--and what did it matter--she'd be the next President, because she's at the epicenter of the rigged game. Who was going to call her out?

Bernie Sanders and the American people, that's who.

She's nauseating.

……nail on the head.

I really am increasingly repelled by her.

I am just as traumatized by her presence as I was by Palin's, when she ran against McCain.

It's one thing to watch the Republican party dole out this nonsense; it's entirely another to watch it happen in your own party.

I'm beyond my tipping point with her.

I just hope it ends sooner, rather than later, so we can all move on and focus on getting Bernie elected President.

PAC Hillary Traumatic Syndrome.

If HRC somehow becomes our nom, I'll vote for her out of party loyalty and nothing else. her increasingly "centrist" politics and status quo thinking has made me really dislike her.

her 'centrist' policies sound more and more 'rightist' every day.

I make more than 50 but less than a 100
I guess I am lucky
Sad part is, my father was making more than 50k in 1990 and retired making more than 100k in 2001
So many people are under 35k now. It's depressing

asked his audience to guess what the total wealth was of the bottom forty% of the American public.

Think about that question, and try to answer it by yourself.





Thought about it?

Want the answer?


Okay. The answer is below zero. The statistical average is in debt.

You effing bet people are pissed off and the righteous anger will only grow.

Go Bernie!!

We'll look like this all over in a few short years.
?i10c=img.resize(height:160)

to dispute this?! They're huddled in their forum waiting until the next Bernie smear idea pops into someone's head. Got a love it.

But we are all in this together.

Go Bernie!!#

on their superdelegates.

Just look at what we spend on the military.

and the wealthy organizations (not individuals) that pay no or little taxes.

There's plenty of money to do what we need to do.

And you're right. Spend that cash on the middle class and we won't have to worry about poverty.

Indeed. But also the undeserved perks religions get.

MO didn't expand medicaid and the current eligibility is 18% of the federal poverty rate and nondisabled people without children are not eligible at all.
I don't understand how do people not understand why people are angry at the 1% and politicians.

Sure, you might have lost a few hundred thousand dollars in lifetime earnings because the good jobs have left the country. But you saved $50/year buying junk at Wal-Mart, and that makes up for it, right?

That's why I'm really hoping for a Sanders victory this year. Otherwise, we're all screwed.

Also says nothing about assets versus income.

Sounds like you got yours, though.

Having to get used to living watching every penny. All my friends, all single older women, are in the same boat.

Have to say that I don't feel poor. I have a little house and a decent car. Food on the table.

I'm still grateful that I live in this country and not someplace else.

and I thought there was a chance we might be able to claim our youngest son as a dependent this year--he's in grad school--
because of the financial support we provide him for his living expenses. Nope. He made just enough over the threshold of
$6,000. from his work/study grant that we can't claim him. How is somebody supposed to live on $6,000? Fortunately for him
we are able to help with his living expenses--and we convinced him to let us do it--so he won't have any loans when he
finishes grad school (also thanks to a very nice financial aid package that covers most of his tuition).

Still, how is somebody supposed to live on $6,000/year and be anything but dependent on someone else for help?

by many in America that well, it's OK, I just have to work harder. It's the most incredible brainwashing of eons. And many think it's their shortcoming if they are not doing well. Many realize it intellectually, but really, IMO, on an emotional level they think their pot of god is around the corner! Many just can't comprehend the system is totally rigged against them, they've been so brainwashed in the US. And so many vote in their own worst interest.
It's an endless WTF!!!

I used to make over $120,000 a year as a freelance designer with Fortune Fifty clients. I socked plenty of it away for a rainy day. Then Bush happened, and I lost half of it. Then I spent a shitload of it to get my kid a bachelors degree. Then web sites popped up offering to sell you a logo design for $5. I used to be able to command $75-100 an hour for professional design services. Now you can get some dude in India to cobble together some clip art for the cost of a can of tuna. Meanwhile, I've pissed through most of my savings just to fill the oil tank and pay the rent. Fortunately, my wife is a professional and makes a good salary and provides our worthless health insurance which we can't afford to use because I need brain cancer or have half my torso cut off in order to meet the deductible.

Now our kid is doing GREAT, even has a tv show in development. Sad, but I think he's going to be our "retirement" fund...not that I ever see myself being able to retire.

They economy is great, but the average working class person still lives paycheck to paycheck.

What is really amazing is that you hit the top 1% with an income of $250,000, putting you in the same percentile as Zuckerberg, Gates, Buffett, Adelson, et al. Here in Silicon Valley where I live, $250,000 will get you into the slightly upper middle class, but you are not at all wealthy. I imagine it is the same for places like NYC - once you factor in housing and other living costs, you are certainly not skiing in Gstaad with the upper crust. The difference between a suburban family in my town earning 250k and the Wall Street or Silicon Valley titans earning hundreds of millions, even billions per year is staggering. It is like the old joke that when you put a poor person together with Bill Gates, the average net worth of the people in that room is 40 billion. It is reflective of how bad the situation is for the bottom 99% of Americans to have a scale that skewed.

This isn't doing much to stimulate the economy. Duh.