Publisher's note: Brant Clifton reviews the liberal Drive-by Media in his "bare knuckles" Conservative online publication known as The Daily Haymaker.
US wealth gap putting squeeze on
state revenue.
Yep. That's the headline McClatchy slapped on a screed penned by someone at the AP with the title of "economics writer":
Income inequality is taking a toll on state governments.
The widening gap between the wealthiest Americans and everyone else has been matched by a slowdown in state tax revenue, according to a report being released Monday by Standard & Poor's.
Even as income for the affluent has accelerated, it's barely kept pace with inflation for most other people. That trend can mean a double-whammy for states: The wealthy often manage to shield much of their income from taxes. And they tend to spend a lower percentage of it than others do, thereby limiting sales tax revenue.
As the growth of tax revenue has slowed, states have faced tensions over whether to raise taxes or cut spending to balance their budgets as required by law.[...]
First, this whole "income inequality" crap being spouted by Barry Obama and his fellow travelers has its roots in the
writings of Karl Marx — the father of godless communism. (Our leftist pals bend over backward to publicly distance themselves from the failed Marxist ideology. They label Democrat-voting states as "blue" instead of "red" — a color which can have communist connotations. But one of their main talking points comes straight out of the writings of the founder of a political ideology that has ruined economies and oppressed and murdered millions of people over the course of a century. )
One of the precepts of Marxism / Communism is that everyone is the same and everyone's stuff is to be shared with everyone. There is no such thing as private property. If you and I are treated just alike — regardless of what we do — what's the point of working hard? If everything I accrue as a result of my hard work HAS to be shared with my neighbors — why bother working hard?
What kills Marx's theory is the natural human instinct to want to achieve. Some people have more talent and / or intelligence than others. Some will rise to the top, while others will be natural followers. Marxism takes away the incentive to achieve because your rewards are the same whether you give 100 percent or 5 percent to a task.
People are paid more based on the value they bring to an organization. It's pretty easy to find and replace ditch-diggers. Can you say the same about a talented sales person or financial controller?
The whole thesis being pushed by the AP drive-by and the Wall Street clown is that wealth needs to be spread around forcibly — so that bloated government bureaucracies can continue to rumble along. Perhaps government, and not society or capitalism or drive_by_media1"greed", is the problem.
It can be credibly argued that government meddling in the banks and in health care has led to our current economic distress. Loans were dumped on people who could not possibly afford to pay them back. Therefore, we had an increase in bankruptcies and foreclosures. ObamaCare jacked up health care costs — forcing employers to choose between eating the new costs, cutting back on expansion plans, or going Galt. Taxes and regulations were jacked up, thereby increasing the cost of doing business dramatically. Hiring ground to a halt and tossed a record number of people into unemployment lines.
The statist ruling class is obsessed with the idea of stripping every penny they can from society's achievers to feed the social welfare beast. They ignore the clear fact that the tax cuts of the 1980s and the early 2000s actually increased tax revenue. When you forcibly try to gouge someone of their hard-earned money, they are going to do everything possible to keep as much as they can. (Hide it. Get a bank account in Switzerland or The Carribean.) People with the big bucks can afford to hire all kinds of lawyers and accountants to help them navigate and beat the labyrinth of tax regulations. Those of us who don't have millions to burn are forced to comply with the shake-down.
liberal-media-biasIn a punitive, class warfare environment, the wealthy hide their money and hold on tight to it — instead of investing it in new businesses or expanding existing ones. The very people demonized by Kay Hagan and Barry Obama are the people we need out there investing their money, growing businesses, and creating more workers and taxpayers.
Scaring the hell out of the investor class with a confiscatory tax policy is not the way to grow the economy and help us escape this mess. History is full of examples where taxes have been cut, government has been rolled back, and prosperity has resulted. History is also full of examples where successful, brilliant Americans will step out there and take risks — innovating and creating jobs — when there is little fear of the government swooping in to confiscate their hard-earned assets.
Marx's ideas have failed time and time again. They've produced a lot of misery and little to no prosperity. Back government off and watch that Invisible Hand work some real magic.
