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"increasing income inequality harms equal opportunity for two reasons. First, it gives rich parents more money to skew the playing field in favor of their kids. Second, it gives those rich parents a much bigger reason to do exactly that. Ultimately, a society of high inequality generates a system that crowds smart poor kids out of important positions while crowding mediocre rich kids into them. Such a system poses a real problem for the achievement of fairness and institutional competence."
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Cornel West and Tavis Smiley Rightfully Scare Us
The heart of Smiley and West’s message is simple and profound: the United States is far more economically divided than most people want to acknowledge,and this chasm will destroy our nation. They make their case in their book by using vast amounts of very robust data from credible sources, like the Pew Research Center. (Indeed, this is the same data that drives the work we do at EARN to help low income workers save and invest to foster prosperity.)
There are some of you who will quickly dismiss Smiley, West, and their message. You may dismiss them because you don’t like their politics, or don’t like them as people. You make this dismissal at your own peril, and the peril of our nation. Irrespective of how you view Tavis Smiley or Cornel West, their passionate call to the American public to face the hard facts, is rooted in data that transcends politics or ideology.
In fact, the Smiley-West cautionary message is backed by groundbreaking research from economists Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson, in their new book Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty. Acemoglu and Robinson conducted expansive research to understand why some nations fail while others prosper. While much of the conventional wisdom among economists on the issue involves natural resources or cultural traits, Acemoglu and Robinson found that it is open political institutions that allow for shared power, and collective decision making about economic opportunity that drive prosperity.
This thesis cuts straight to the heart of what Smiley and West warn us is coming. Tens of millions of Americans toil endlessly, but never find their efforts rewarded with economic security. Increasingly, these hard working people will be disenfranchised and disengaged from the political process, and have less say in how economic opportunity is fostered and distributed. This is precisely the dynamic that Acemoglu and Robinson found at the heart of poverty, corruption, and human beings at their worst. We’re moving down a dangerous path as a nation. Listening carefully to what West and Smiley have to say, however, is a good step back in the right direction.
(Source: azspot, via mohandasgandhi)
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High ResolutionWe cannot stop now. Occupy or support the occupation. This is from Occupy Salt Lake. He fears that we’ll shape policy? Good.
We must send the message that we are not just in New York City, Chicago, Washington D.C., etc.
We are everywhere.
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"
I have no trouble understanding what they’re complaining about. They’re complaining about the fact that Wall Street wrecked the economy three years ago and nobody’s held responsible for that. Not a single person has been indicted or convicted for destroying 20% of our national net worth accumulated over the course of two centuries. They’re upset about the fact that Wall Street has iron control over the economic policies of this country and that one party is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street and the other party caters to them as well. That’s the real truth of the matter.
If I am the spokesman for all of the people who think that we should not have 24 million people in this country who can’t find a full-time job, that we should not have 50 million people in this country who can’t see a doctor when they’re sick, that we shouldn’t have 47 million people in this country who need government help in order to feed themselves, and we shouldn’t have 15 million families that owe more on their mortgage than the value of their home — okay, I’ll be that spokesman.
"- Former U.S. Representative to Florida Alan Grayson, on Real Time with Bill Maher. (via chcameron)(via diadoumenos)
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A Message to the 53 Percent
Congratulations on successfully mastering a condescending tone. I have some news for you, though: you are part of the 99 percent. I am part of the 99 percent. My neighbor in his brand new Prius is part of the 99 percent. Our grievances are wide-reaching. Our stories and backgrounds are vastly different.
Don’t believe me? Here’s some anecdotal evidence for your taking: according to my income, I am the 60 percent. I am young like many of the Occupy Wall Street protesters. I have a full-time job and will soon be a salaried employee. I make enough money to live in DC with roommates, pay my bills, pay my student loans and still have a little money left over each month. I have worked damn hard but I am also incredibly lucky. Hard work is not universally successful. Just because my hard work and your hard work eventually paid off doesn’t mean hard work pays off for everyone.
So I guess you and I are the same, no? I’m just outside your “53 percent” range, but I also have a job and also “actually pay taxes“… as though someone working a minimum wage job barely surviving on their paycheck doesn’t pay taxes.
The purpose of “I am the 53 percent” seems to exist solely to say, “I didn’t have an easy life either, but I worked hard and now my life isn’t so bad, so stop complaining.” Despite the inherently condescending nature of your grievances, your stories are important, too. Yes, even you, Erick Erickson (pictured above). We don’t all agree. Erickson might try to throw salt on me and brandish a cross any time my progressive being crosses his path, but I don’t wish for the complete destruction of capitalism. Being part of the 99 percent means our ideas for solutions to our nation’s problems will not be the same. And you’re rolling your eyes because we’re outraged at Wall Street? Actually, no, I’m not sure you’re rolling your eyes; you’re merely keeping your eyes shut:
- How Goldman Sachs Created the Food Crisis
- The People vs. Goldman Sachs
- Hedge Fund Gamblers Earn the Same In One Hour As a Middle-Class Household Makes In Over 47 Years
- The More Americans That Go On Food Stamps The More Money JP Morgan Makes
- The new “Let Them Eat Cake!”
- Is the SEC Covering Up Wall Street Crimes?
- Obama Seeks to Win Back Wall St. Cash
- Revolving Regulators: SEC Faces Ethic Challenges with Revolving Door
- “The richest 5 percent of households obtained roughly 82 percent of all the nation’s gains in wealth between 1983 and 2009. The bottom 60 percent of households actually had less wealth in 2009 than in 1983, meaning they did not participate at all in the growth of wealth over this period.”
- Q: “Are you comfortable with the fact that several of your member companies have engaged in large-scale criminal activity?”; A: “You’ll have to be specific.”
Need proof that Occupy Wall Street is a left-wing grassroots movement that scares the piss out of right-wingers? Now you have it. Or you can turn to Faux News and watch the extreme right-wing millionaire demagogues it employs smearing the movement non-stop. — Ryking
(Source: pantslessprogressive, via diadoumenos)
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High ResolutionThis, and 10 more charts that help explain what’s wrong with America.
If anyone is still wondering what #OccupyWallStreet is about, let them look at these graphs.
(via workonprogress)
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"
Warren Buffett has a message for Rupert Murdoch and the Wall Street Journal: Sure, I’ll release my tax returns, if you do too.
Last week, the Wall Street Journal published an editorial that asked Buffett to disclose his tax returns. The piece, “Mr. Buffett’s Tax Secrets,” took issue with Buffett’s plan to hike taxes on some of the super-rich.
The Journal’s conservative editorial board doesn’t think that’s a great idea, saying that Buffett should instead “educate the public” by letting “everyone else in on his secrets of tax avoidance by releasing his tax returns.”
Asked about the editorial on Tuesday at Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Summit, Buffett said he was willing to release his tax returns, on one condition:
“I think it might be a terrific idea if they would just ask their boss, Rupert Murdoch, and he and I will meet at Fortune, and we’ll both give you our tax returns and you can publish them,” Buffett said.
“I’m ready tomorrow morning,” he added.
Representatives from News Corp., the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
" -
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"I don’t know, but I expect the wealthy to write a check ’cause it’s as bad as it’s ever been. It would be unpatriotic not to try to save the country. I’m sure people will bitch about it, but if it meant we get to operate in this country and live here another day, then so be it.
One way or another, before it’s over they’re gonna have to come and take big money from the earners and big corporations to save the country. I’m sure that everybody that has a patriotic cell in their system will say, ‘If it’s gotta be done, it’s gotta be done.’ I’d rather live here and not have as much money than live anywhere else and have twice as much."-Toby Keith, on taxing the rich and corporations.
(Source: addictinginfo.org, via cognitivedissonance)
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(Source: think-progress, via diadoumenos)
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High ResolutionFrom Real Coastal Warriors:
Over 700 hundred Continental and United pilots, joined by additional pilots from other Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) carriers, demonstrate in front of Wall Street on Tuesday
Solidarity forever, my friends! The Occupy Wall Street movement is growing and it’s a beautiful thing. Love the signs - how much is a pilot worth? A hell of a lot more than a Goldman Sachs executive if you ask me. So far, no one has asked me, much less them.
Maybe they should.
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A Massive Union Just Voted To Side With The Wall Street Protesters
The New York Transit Workers Union (TWU) voted to support the Wall Street Protestors at their meeting last night.
A member of TWU Local 100 told a reporter that they would join the protest Friday at 4PM.
Here’s more about them from their website:
The TWU has four main divisions: Railroad; Gaming; Airline; Transit; and Utility, University and Service. The Union has 114 autonomous locals representing over 200,000 members and retirees in 22 states around the country.
Occupy Wall Street has been picking up some decent support from unions in the past few days. Yesterday we reported that the Teamsters Union declared their support for protestors, and we also found out that the United Pilots Union had members at the protest demonstrating in uniform.
Keep it rolling, folks! I wish I could make it to New York, hoping to make Occupy Denver soon! I’m thrilled to see the union support. Workers everywhere, arise!
(via tinfoilandtea)
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"A person of good intelligence and of sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality ― and it’s not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing ― it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavored dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street."
- George Carlin (via starsinhereyes)(via sixtyforty)
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"How the hell did we get into a world where workers making $60,000 are overpaid but CEOs making millions are overtaxed?"
- Returning to the scene of the class war — Feministe (via linzyxxxxx)(Source: sociolab, via domesticterrorism)
-
![tinfoilandtea:
cognitivedissonance:
Uh-oh. Looks like Florida’s mandatory drug testing for taxpayers is costing the taxpayers more than they’re actually saving.
Governor Rick Scott had praised the program when he signed it June 1st of this year, proclaiming, “It’s the right thing for citizens of this state that need public assistance. We don’t want to waste tax dollars.”
However, the numbers are not adding up. From WFTV:
Just six weeks after Florida began drug testing welfare applicants, WFTV uncovered numbers which show that the program is already costing Central Florida taxpayers more than it saves. 9 Investigates’ reporter George Spencer found very few applicants are testing positive for drugs. The Department of Central Florida’s (DCF) region tested 40 applicants and only two tested positive for drugs, officials said. One of the tests is being appealed.
Governor Rick Scott said the program would save money. Critics said it already looks like a boondoggle. “We have a diminishing amount of returns for our tax dollars. Do we want out governor throwing our precious tax dollars into a program that has already been proven not to work?” Derek Brett of the ACLU said.
DCF said it has been referring applicants to clinics where drug screenings cost between $30 and $35. The applicant pays for the test and the state reimburses [the applicant] if they test negative. Therefore, the 38 applicants in the Central Florida area, who tested negative, were reimbursed at least $30 each and cost taxpayers $1,140. Meanwhile, the state is saving less than $240 a month by refusing benefits to those two applicants who tested positive.
I’m not at all shocked by this, and the ACLU is planning to file suit. Oh, and they’re also saying to Rick Scott: “We told you so.” Literally.
The sad part? These measures scare people off from applying for benefits. If people test positive for drugs, it means two things: Either they ingested that substance at least once, and maybe only once, within the testing window - or it’s a false positive. Here’s a short list of things that can cause a false positive:
Poppy seeds: (Opioids)
Cold medications: (amphetamines)
Wellbutrin: (amphetamines)
Tricyclic antidepressants: (amphetamines)
Zoloft: (benzodiazepine)
Daypro: (benzodiazepine)
Quinolone antibiotic drugs: (Opioids)
Sustiva (prescribed for HIV): (cannabinoids)
Ibuprofen: (cannabinoids, barbiturates, phencyclidine [PCP])
Foods made with hemp and hemp oil: (cannabinoids)
Effexor: (phencyclidine)
Vicks Inhalers: (methamphetamines)
Zantac: (amphetamines)
Ultram: (phencyclidine)
Over-the-counter cough medicine containing dextromethorphan: (Opioids)
Huh. So drug tests aren’t infallible and they’re not saving Florida any money? As the ACLU points out, Florida should have learned this 10 years ago, when they tried this program and had to dump it for cost reasons.
I’ll indulge the governor for a moment, though. Let’s say there’s parents who have used some kind of drugs in the period before the test. Why deprive children of quite possibly the only support they’ll receive because their parent(s) may or may not have used drugs voluntarily or involuntarily in the testing period? I’m not comfortable with that thought, and any other person with an iota of compassion should not be thrilled with that proposition either.
Things that happen when you stereotype people in poverty…](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqf3l9mAkO1qcfoo3o1_1280.jpg)
High ResolutionUh-oh. Looks like Florida’s mandatory drug testing for taxpayers is costing the taxpayers more than they’re actually saving.
Governor Rick Scott had praised the program when he signed it June 1st of this year, proclaiming, “It’s the right thing for citizens of this state that need public assistance. We don’t want to waste tax dollars.”
However, the numbers are not adding up. From WFTV:
Just six weeks after Florida began drug testing welfare applicants, WFTV uncovered numbers which show that the program is already costing Central Florida taxpayers more than it saves. 9 Investigates’ reporter George Spencer found very few applicants are testing positive for drugs. The Department of Central Florida’s (DCF) region tested 40 applicants and only two tested positive for drugs, officials said. One of the tests is being appealed.
Governor Rick Scott said the program would save money. Critics said it already looks like a boondoggle. “We have a diminishing amount of returns for our tax dollars. Do we want out governor throwing our precious tax dollars into a program that has already been proven not to work?” Derek Brett of the ACLU said.
DCF said it has been referring applicants to clinics where drug screenings cost between $30 and $35. The applicant pays for the test and the state reimburses [the applicant] if they test negative. Therefore, the 38 applicants in the Central Florida area, who tested negative, were reimbursed at least $30 each and cost taxpayers $1,140. Meanwhile, the state is saving less than $240 a month by refusing benefits to those two applicants who tested positive.
I’m not at all shocked by this, and the ACLU is planning to file suit. Oh, and they’re also saying to Rick Scott: “We told you so.” Literally.
The sad part? These measures scare people off from applying for benefits. If people test positive for drugs, it means two things: Either they ingested that substance at least once, and maybe only once, within the testing window - or it’s a false positive. Here’s a short list of things that can cause a false positive:
- Poppy seeds: (Opioids)
- Cold medications: (amphetamines)
- Wellbutrin: (amphetamines)
- Tricyclic antidepressants: (amphetamines)
- Zoloft: (benzodiazepine)
- Daypro: (benzodiazepine)
- Quinolone antibiotic drugs: (Opioids)
- Sustiva (prescribed for HIV): (cannabinoids)
- Ibuprofen: (cannabinoids, barbiturates, phencyclidine [PCP])
- Foods made with hemp and hemp oil: (cannabinoids)
- Effexor: (phencyclidine)
- Vicks Inhalers: (methamphetamines)
- Zantac: (amphetamines)
- Ultram: (phencyclidine)
- Over-the-counter cough medicine containing dextromethorphan: (Opioids)
Huh. So drug tests aren’t infallible and they’re not saving Florida any money? As the ACLU points out, Florida should have learned this 10 years ago, when they tried this program and had to dump it for cost reasons.
I’ll indulge the governor for a moment, though. Let’s say there’s parents who have used some kind of drugs in the period before the test. Why deprive children of quite possibly the only support they’ll receive because their parent(s) may or may not have used drugs voluntarily or involuntarily in the testing period? I’m not comfortable with that thought, and any other person with an iota of compassion should not be thrilled with that proposition either.
Things that happen when you stereotype people in poverty…
Divine Irony
is a rich archive of religious delusions, scientific truths and political implications.
"Tell people there’s an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority believe you. Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure."
-George Carlin
“If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed”.
-Albert Einstein
![tinfoilandtea:
cognitivedissonance:
Uh-oh. Looks like Florida’s mandatory drug testing for taxpayers is costing the taxpayers more than they’re actually saving.
Governor Rick Scott had praised the program when he signed it June 1st of this year, proclaiming, “It’s the right thing for citizens of this state that need public assistance. We don’t want to waste tax dollars.”
However, the numbers are not adding up. From WFTV:
Just six weeks after Florida began drug testing welfare applicants, WFTV uncovered numbers which show that the program is already costing Central Florida taxpayers more than it saves. 9 Investigates’ reporter George Spencer found very few applicants are testing positive for drugs. The Department of Central Florida’s (DCF) region tested 40 applicants and only two tested positive for drugs, officials said. One of the tests is being appealed.
Governor Rick Scott said the program would save money. Critics said it already looks like a boondoggle. “We have a diminishing amount of returns for our tax dollars. Do we want out governor throwing our precious tax dollars into a program that has already been proven not to work?” Derek Brett of the ACLU said.
DCF said it has been referring applicants to clinics where drug screenings cost between $30 and $35. The applicant pays for the test and the state reimburses [the applicant] if they test negative. Therefore, the 38 applicants in the Central Florida area, who tested negative, were reimbursed at least $30 each and cost taxpayers $1,140. Meanwhile, the state is saving less than $240 a month by refusing benefits to those two applicants who tested positive.
I’m not at all shocked by this, and the ACLU is planning to file suit. Oh, and they’re also saying to Rick Scott: “We told you so.” Literally.
The sad part? These measures scare people off from applying for benefits. If people test positive for drugs, it means two things: Either they ingested that substance at least once, and maybe only once, within the testing window - or it’s a false positive. Here’s a short list of things that can cause a false positive:
Poppy seeds: (Opioids)
Cold medications: (amphetamines)
Wellbutrin: (amphetamines)
Tricyclic antidepressants: (amphetamines)
Zoloft: (benzodiazepine)
Daypro: (benzodiazepine)
Quinolone antibiotic drugs: (Opioids)
Sustiva (prescribed for HIV): (cannabinoids)
Ibuprofen: (cannabinoids, barbiturates, phencyclidine [PCP])
Foods made with hemp and hemp oil: (cannabinoids)
Effexor: (phencyclidine)
Vicks Inhalers: (methamphetamines)
Zantac: (amphetamines)
Ultram: (phencyclidine)
Over-the-counter cough medicine containing dextromethorphan: (Opioids)
Huh. So drug tests aren’t infallible and they’re not saving Florida any money? As the ACLU points out, Florida should have learned this 10 years ago, when they tried this program and had to dump it for cost reasons.
I’ll indulge the governor for a moment, though. Let’s say there’s parents who have used some kind of drugs in the period before the test. Why deprive children of quite possibly the only support they’ll receive because their parent(s) may or may not have used drugs voluntarily or involuntarily in the testing period? I’m not comfortable with that thought, and any other person with an iota of compassion should not be thrilled with that proposition either.
Things that happen when you stereotype people in poverty…](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqf3l9mAkO1qcfoo3o1_500.jpg)
