Comments on: The Triumph Of "Trickle Up" Economics

CBS' Dick Meyer Stands On The Income Gap Precipice And Ponders The View

[bm6005]

BTW I can inject IQ into this. I expect the president of our country to be smarter than I. All he''s had going for him are Daddy''s connections. He''s failed every frickin'' business venture he was involved with except the ball team and that was a present from Daddy''s friends!!

[bm6005]

Sorry but Bush is a major league idiot no matter how you hide his frickin'' cheese!! Outsourcing is also taking away many high pay engineering jobs. I lost a high pay job to outsourcing (mex & asia). Once they found out these people couldn''t do my job they hired me back as a contractor. I don''t worry so much for me as I''m 62, but how about my kids generation? Both of my sons are engineers also and it took one a year and a half to land a job after graduation because all the high tech jobs went offshore. I say hang the present administration from their overly stuffed wallets.

[donbl1]

Does anyone notice that the last time the top 1% made this much was during the last year of the CLINTON presidency just before the Tech Bust?

This is not a Bush problem it is a market problem. The smarter or better educated with the most risk taking ability (and luckiest) who work hard make more money in a growing economy. They also get hit in a slowdown as the data show.

The bigger question is this how we are going to evolve in America? Is this how a democracy with a free market economy works? Some make ever more?

You can not inject IQ...... or luck for that matter. However, we do need to find a way to take care of the less fortunate if this is what we face.

The outsourcing is also taking away jobs from those in the bottom 20%. How do we replace those jobs and what is the role of government?

[bm6005]

p.s. Not unemployment during mr bush''''s presidency has been consistently at an all time low. I hear no point made of this
Posted by alanrobisch2

Yup, lot''s of McDonalds jobs open Genius. Know anyone hiring any AMERICAN software engineers? Bush is an IQ 91 MORON!!

[alanrobisch]

p.s. Not unemployment during mr bush''s presidency has been consistently at an all time low. I hear no point made of this

[alanrobisch]

SURPRISE AMERICA!!!,....You''''ve just been boned by the Bush/Cheney Crime Cartel,....and to all those who helped elect these Scumbags???,....Thanks a lot, dumba$$e$!!!


Posted by veteran71 at 07:13 PM : Oct 18, 2007

You haven''t got a clue. Lose the attitude and maybe think about things rather than posting mindless insults
+

[alanrobisch]

I think Mr Meyers is your basic socialist. I live better than I ever have and much better than my parents and I have 5 siblings 4 of which have better incomes than I do and live better. We came from a low income family where my father often could not find work as a carpenter.

I did not have health insurance as a child. I rarely saw a doctor. I almost never went to the dentist. We didn''t go on vacations. We never ate out and my mother earned some money from taking in laundry she stayed home. We had one car not two.

We got toys at christmas time. to have an ice cream sundae was an exceptional treat. stocking stuffers were oranges and chocolates and nuts not expensive small items

[tnt1954]

why communism came about? to make the rich, richer.
from slave labor, an entire slave country.
where everyone volunteered to have a cot, three
hots and a real job to go everyday, all day, and
sometimes all night, so they could be worked
to death, literally, so that the gravy could
go to the financiers on wall street and london, england who formulated the Plan. beats stealing
from each other. how cheap can you get it? wholesale
is too expensive. stealing is more cost effective.
read about the history of the pirates, and then
how the pirates got pirated by the government leaders.
most enlightening. mother russia fed so many
americans during the dust bowl and the Great Depression, while the high rollers, continued
to control the dice at the table, always was that
way, always will be that way. the wobblies? sure.
fat chance.

[archangelric]

looked at historically; middle class is the amount of income required to buy the average house in one year up to the amount required to buy an expensive house in one year in the average (i.e. NOT California or New York) market. $50 K is nowhere near middle class.

The issue I have with *** Meyer''s argument is that regardless of what he might think, ALL wealth depends on government actions. Take Inheritance: it takes laws allowing wealth to pass on to descendants rather than be 100% taxed (whether you believe either is correct - it takes laws to provide that action)

The same for income; the argument that wages are kept in place by competition falls apart when you get to upper management who set their own wages. In a 1989 study, japan and european executives wages were 17 times their lowest workers while american executives were making 2014 times their lowest workers AND the lowest workers were making roughly the same in wages and benefits (generally the japanese and europeans had far more benefits, more vacation days, etc.); IN OTHER WORDS while american workers were getting a competitive wage american executives were getting 125 TIMES the competitive wage. Invisible hand of the market be damned!

I think the average tax payer finds it galling that through special tax breaks for "capital gains", etc. he is basically subsidizing the super rich. For Fairness and for the markets to work we need a deductionless, exemptionless, exceptionless graduated income tax.

[geoffgw]

Of course $365k is not middle class, the data show its top 1%. It''s as quartermass says, the pursuit of happiness has us trapped going after all this stuff!

[drivelphobe]

quartermass2...

What does payoff a car refer to? Also, I don''t know anyone who mows their own grass. Everyone has a gardener and most people get new cars more frequently, like every 2 years. Where are you from, the skids?

[quatermass2]

"I define the middle class as having sufficient income to pay for all goods and services required to live. That is gardeners, house painters, termiters, maintenance for anything you own, and new cars every 3-4 years."

Sounds more like a Pharoah to me. Slaves and new chariots, eh? What, you don''t have the time or energy to mow your lousy grass, and you get a new car before the old one is paid off? And that''s "middle" class?

The definition of middle class **has** changed from the "Leave It To Beaver" days. Average home sizes have doubled, everyone "has" to have cable, cell phones, high-speed Internet connections, and try to find a car with manual window controls, no air conditioning and a carburetor. The average Joe Sixpack takes vacations in Cancun, Hawaii, and Europe. I don''t think the whole gestalt is being given air here.

[drivelphobe]

geoffgw....I''m old and retired. I just look back with more clarity than I did when I was working. I used to be in the insurance business, a far cry from Wall Street. Have a nice day.

[geoffgw]

Some of this is law of #''s stuff, all the tinkering in the world won''t change it. What is sad is that Wall St "whiz" kids trading with 0.05% commissions on massive deals, make $1M bonuses while the rest of us do real work to produce their play money. By the way, $365K is middle class?? Sounds you work on Wall St!!

[drivelphobe]

jjarden...

I live in the greater Los Angeles area. A $200,000 income, while it sounds good, provides just enough to purchase a home, have a couple of cars and maybe some private health insurance. Costs of a couple of kids, a vacation and emergencies, and you''re out of money. Don''t forget the huge tax bite at this income level. Homes are not under $500,000, and will be considerably more for a livable, middle class neighborhood.

I define the middle class as having sufficient income to pay for all goods and services required to live. That is gardeners, house painters, termiters, maintenance for anything you own, and new cars every 3-4 years. This class should be able to fully fund their retirement, pay for health care coverage and entertain the purchase of a vacation home. They should not be worrying about money at all for necessities.

The middle class should have 3-4 year''s income in liquid savings and a stock portfolio. That is the middle class. What the government wants to promote as middle class, is the largest group of lower income that will believe it. $50,000 per year is insufficient to meet the needs of even a single individual and forces the use of credit. I''ll agree that maybe $200,000 might be the lower end of middle class, but only for those who are prudent, frugal and on pace to improve their lot financially. The $50,000 to $200,000 you cite is just politicians making people feel better.

[creeper00]

"There are three types of lies - lies, *** lies, and statistics." - Variously attributed to Benjamin Disraeli, Alfred Marshall and Mark Twain

I don''t need to look at statistics to know that we are losing ground. I just have to look at my checkbook.

Are YOU better off now than you were six years ago?

[random_radar]

I don''t care how much the rich earn. I just wish the government would let me keep what little I earn. Taxation is theft from the working man!

[usbrit-2009]

"You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.....

Written in 1916 by the Rev. William J. H. Boetcker, a Presbyterian clergyman and pamphlet writer.

[jjarden]

drivelphobe..."an income of $365,000...is probably the "beginning" of middle-class."?

REALLY? Please exaplain. In America, a Middle Class income is between $50,000 - $200,000.

[samthetvcat]

pt 2 (oops I didn''t finish my thought - lol)

Oh so anyway, the conclusion of the paragraph below is that the top 1% are getting richer and paying more taxes because their making more money, but that the trickle down effect seems to be trickling down to China, India, and the drain of Iraq.

* * * * *

pt 3 Also what''s alarming is how much wealth is being made off hedge funds. Hedge funds aren''t like investments in equity or debt necessarily, they''re more like gambles on the market. People put money down based on their gamble that the value for products and services will either go up or down, and when they''re right they make money. They''re getting rich of the inefficiencies of the market, but aren''t directly adding anything in particular of value to society like a good or service, which is kind of troublesome. It''s kind of like how Halliburton can charge a mint and just not build stuff in the sense that people are getting paid big bucks and their work doesn''t really benefit others (except investors). I''m not sure why they should be getting tax breaks.