Why a sudden shift in earned income to the already well-paid?
According to a Wall Street Journal analysis, the percentage of total wages and salaries paid to top executives rose from roughly 28 percent of the national total in 2002 to 33 percent in 2007, just five years later. (The figure excludes non-salary compensation, such as incentive stock options, which would tilt the ground even further.)
Now, that’s a pretty remarkable shift of earning power over a very short time, and as the Journal points out, it has serious implications for Social Security. That wage shift toward the already well-paid puts more of the nation’s paycheck out of reach of the payroll tax, which isn’t collected on salary and wages above the legal ceiling, which this year is $106,800. (In effect, the payroll tax operates as a surtax on the income of the working and middle classes, with much of the income of upper earners exempt.)
Because of that shift toward high earners, an additional $1 trillion in annual salary is now out of reach of the payroll tax, meaning the Social Security Trust Fund is projected to use up its surplus by 2037, four years earlier than expected.
I’d propose three basic ways to explain that sudden shift in earning power:
One, top executives and other well-paid employees became considerably more productive and worked even harder in that time frame, while the rest of the American work force slacked off. Thus, the shift is purely the product of personal merit and anybody who dares to even raise the issue is a socialist. (See comments below, no doubt). This is the merit-based, classic free-market explanation that pretends the market is an exacting judge of each person’s contribution to the overall good, and rewards each person appropriately.
Or two, for reasons ranging from technology to global trade, the overall economy is simply shifting in ways that reward the upper managerial class and penalize those who make their living in other ways. This global megatrend means that earning power is being transferred from one group to another regardless of the personal merit or hard work of those involved, and is totally impersonal in its operation.
Or, option three, those in the managerial and executive class control the compensation process and have tilted it in their own favor, skewing it to reward themselves and their peers at the expense of others. That doesn’t necessarily make them evil or even particularly greedy; given human nature, any group of people, granted such power without a countervailing power to offset it, would do the same thing over time and have no conscious sense of doing so. And in 21st century America, the forces that once discouraged such behavior — social and cultural norms, taxation policies, corporate bylaws, etc. — have weakened to the point of being ineffective.
Of course, no single explanation probably applies, and the real answer is a combination of the above. But we ought to talk about it as a nation, because the phenomenon is real, and the explanation we settle upon will determine what, if anything, should be done about it.
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336 comments Add your comment
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:12 am
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:09 am
Thanks for that.
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
11:14 am
y’know, our RW actually posted some intelligent, if rather insular, criticism of Jay’s case, and laid out his own thesis for income disparities, @ 9.52.
Sigh.
I knew as soon as I saw the words “Social Security” in Jay’s original that we’d have about two dozen posts about “is a Ponzi Scheme / is NOT!”, four dozen about “you lazy LIBRAZL just don’t want to work! / “do SO!”, and the rest about Battlestar Gallacaca, or suchlike.
RW, there’ve been some interesting studies done about how the income groups have done over the decades; I have done some poking around (here’s one such article, analyzing a deeper study, just for grins) and if you are still here you might want to consider the case being made there.
If not, well, I guess I’ll just enjoy the usual food fightin’.
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:14 am
“Actually, with a little tinkering, I could support it. Our current system is just too complicated and costly to comply with”
Not me, I haven’t seen any “tinkering” with it that I could support. I’m against any form of income tax, period. No matter how you slice it, it’s always the retail consumer who ACTUALLY pays all taxes. I’m more in favor of a graduated sales tax, based on how much you SPEND at any given time, not on how much you earn.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:15 am
Wyld Byll Hyltnyr
July 22nd, 2009
11:10 am
If you haven’t left yet, surely you can admit that you were vulgar at times. Bestwishes.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:16 am
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:14 am
I was discussing the Fair Tax.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:17 am
Doggone –
So, if you’re a poor family with 2 kids to feed and you spend $100 on groceries, you’re going to spend a greater %%% of your income in taxes than a rich single person who also spends the same $100 on groceries.
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:18 am
“I was discussing the Fair Tax”
yes, I know that
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:18 am
Wyld Byll,
Did you say something?
getalife
July 22nd, 2009
11:18 am
lil byll cut and ran like sarah the quitter.
Gale
July 22nd, 2009
11:19 am
So, if you’re a poor family with 2 kids to feed and you spend $100 on groceries, you’re going to spend a greater %%% of your income in taxes than a rich single person who also spends the same $100 on groceries.
Is there a problem with that? Are you suggesting someone else should buy the groceries for them?
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:20 am
Fair Tax is such a a crock of the truly smelly stuff.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:20 am
I wonder what Wild Byll’s new name will be.
Hey DB! Paul nor I haven’t mentioned Battlestar Galactice ONCE today! Or food. (I think.)
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:21 am
“So, if you’re a poor family with 2 kids to feed and you spend $100 on groceries, you’re going to spend a greater %%% of your income in taxes than a rich single person who also spends the same $100 on groceries”
Nope. What you have outlined is an INCOME tax. A graduated sales tax would mean that anyone who spends $100 pays the same tax as anyone else who spends $100. And anyone who spends $1,000,000 pays that same, but higher, tax as anyone else who spends $1,000,000.
As your amount of spending goes up, your tax rate goes up. But it’s not based on anything like “total for the year” spending…it’s based on what goes on your credit card, or out of your pocket, or on your check at the moment you spend it.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:21 am
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:18 am
It is a consumption tax.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:21 am
No Gale, it means that the poor pay a higher percentage of their income in taxes.
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:22 am
“It is a consumption tax”
close enough…but if there’s NO OTHER taxes, then everyone has more money to spend, and thus there is greater consumption. Or savings, should that be your choice.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:23 am
Gale,
Addendum to 11:21 – ‘under a fair tax, or flat tax, or whatever else you wanna call it.”
Kamchak
July 22nd, 2009
11:24 am
Off topic:
Bosch—-The Blues beat Seattle over the weekend and their old boss last night. Futbol’s been berry, berry good to me!
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:24 am
From my 11:09, restated for emphasis:
Our government was suddenly so badly awash in red ink that Reagan doubled the tax paid only by people earning less than $40,000/year (FICA)
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:25 am
Gale (and Doggone)
“Is there a problem with that? Are you suggesting someone else should buy the groceries for them?”
not saying that someone else should buy their groceries for them, just making the point that the “fair” tax is a regressive tax that hits the poor harder.
Joey
July 22nd, 2009
11:26 am
Sarah Palin.
Just the name strikes fear into the hearts of Progressives and Liberals, both Democrat and Republican. Just the name drives them to cry out in fear mount any attack that they can think of on Mrs. Palin.
Talk about reading pleasure. I am so happy that I was able to come back to this post this morning. Thank you for brightening my day.
mm
July 22nd, 2009
11:27 am
Whiner,
“OR ELSE?”
I used to laugh at your absurd posts. Now I just think you are brain damaged. I hope the Fed cuts off any and all aid to that state. Then Texas and GA next. Time to call their bluff.
“One Republican senator says if the party can stop Obama on health care, it will break him”
Yeah, Obama laughed at that idiot during a news conference.
Blaming Obama for GM’s woes? I thought the union caused them?
Wow, can’t you wingnuts keep your BS straight?
JF McNamara
July 22nd, 2009
11:27 am
This makes sense. Non high level management personnel have seen pay and benefits cut or frozen over the past year. Many have even been laid off. The executives didn’t cut their own pay or benefits. It’s probably not that salaries for the higher execs rose extraordinarily, but that the cuts for all other areas were large.
When you cut 401K matches, raises, and bonuses for everyone else, your unchanged package gets to be a bigger piece of the pie.
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:27 am
People making less than $40,000 per year.
That my friends, is the intial shift of wealth to the upper class from the middle class. That is legal theft.
That is why the middle class can now only barely make ends meet. My parents were better off than I am and I make twice what my dad made at my age.
Stop drinking the kool-aid, folks. You are being snow-jobbed. If you don’t believe me, can’t you believe Warren Buffett?
Redneck Convert
July 22nd, 2009
11:29 am
Well, I kind of like this Fair Tax after my buddy Jim Earl explained it. Say the rate is 25% and I make $20,000 a year and I spend $18,000 on food and gas and stuff like that. My tax is $4500 and the tax rate on my wages is 22.5%. Now say another guy makes $500,000 a year and he spends $100,000 of that on food and gas and stuff and he pays the same 25% rate. He pays a whopping $25,000 in tax and his tax rate on his salary is 5%. What’s wrong with that?
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
11:29 am
but if there’s NO OTHER taxes
Yeah, that’s gonna happen.
We get into this silly bit of fairy-land talk every so often–people who are convinced that a consumption tax would cure our economic ills make a wonderful case sometimes, but they’ve never answered a simple questino I’ll pose to you: If this was such an open-and-shut brilliant way to finance a nation’s revenue needs, why hasn’t some pissant little outfit on another continent tried it, if only for a decade or so?
Big-picture, with federal taxes, I see it this way. You either accept that the duly elected government will use the tax code to effect changes in behavior, and work with your representatives to try to get the best deal for your own economic group that you can muster, or you go mad. More or less.
Normal
July 22nd, 2009
11:29 am
Now y’all, Wyld Byll is OK with me. Being a Believer, he just, as Josef often said, let his dogma get in the way of his karma.
Byll, you can come back and slap me around anytime…you just have to tie me up and cuss at me first…;>)
Bud Wiser
July 22nd, 2009
11:30 am
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
9:20 am
…….Your stereotypical Welfare Queen doesn’t exist anymore.
The incredible ignorance of that statement defines the left at their very worst.
What planet do you live on?
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:30 am
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:22 am
It’s the savings part I think Congress is leery of, since consmers account for 75% of GDP. There would be a painful transition, but we’re in that now. Maybe it would be a good time to change? My “tinkering” keeps the payroll tax and has a provision that doesn’t tax savings already accumulated that is withdrawn to make a purchase.
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:30 am
That’s right JF. The CEO’s and upper level management never tighten their belts.
They believe their decline in bonus (due to the fact that no one has money to buy the plastic thingy they’re selling) is enough of a sacrifice.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:32 am
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:24 am
Reagan, raised taxes? Surely you jest!
Gandalf, the White! (Shiek Abooty)
July 22nd, 2009
11:33 am
po’ Folk should get free food, and medycal covorege, specially fer da chidlens, as we need mo demoncratic votorz.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:33 am
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:25 am
Under the plan being considered all taxes the poor pay are rebated in a monthly check.
David
July 22nd, 2009
11:33 am
Mr. Byll,
“OH Nooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!”
Gandalf, the White! (Shiek Abooty)
July 22nd, 2009
11:34 am
o, raze dem taxes on de money makers 2!
Gordon
July 22nd, 2009
11:34 am
I’m certainly no expert on the Fair Tax, but my understanding is that you get rebates on the taxes you pay the lower your income. It is not a straight consumption tax with a fixed percentage. I think we should have a consumption tax that has 10 or 12 rates based on the type of good or service being purchased. Food would fall under a category that has a zero or very small percentage. The theory is that lower income people spend a greater percentage on necessities which are taxed at lower rates. No filing, no withholding. You are taxed when it is spent, but you have a lot more to spend.
I Report :-) You Whine :-(
July 22nd, 2009
11:35 am
I hope the Fed cuts off any and all aid to that state.
mmoron- I usually refrain from abusing the weak and lame as my Lord and Savior has instructed, but I must ask, where do you think the federal government gets that “aid” money in the first place?
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:35 am
Joey
July 22nd, 2009
11:26 am
Good grief!
You’re delusional.
mm
July 22nd, 2009
11:36 am
Bosch,
The post by Bud Wiser at 11:30 speaks volumes about the mental state of wingers. Their sterotypical lefty exists no more but they still repeat it loud and often.
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:37 am
“I’ll pose to you: If this was such an open-and-shut brilliant way to finance a nation’s revenue needs, why hasn’t some pissant little outfit on another continent tried it, if only for a decade or so?”
And what we have NOW is “an open-and-shut brilliant way to finance a nation’s revenue needs”?
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
11:37 am
Reagan, raised taxes? Surely you jest!
Yebbut he brought down the Soviet Union without firing a shot. While spinning plates and juggling chainsaws.
And stop calling me Shirley.
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:40 am
“Just the name strikes fear into the hearts of Progressives and Liberals”
I’ll try to remember to be scared, once I stop laughing.
Paul
July 22nd, 2009
11:49 am
DB, Gwinnettian, Bosch
Being the compassionate left wing nutjob neocon that I am, I will share of my abilities to bring joy and happiness to your lives.
Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food Battlestar Galactica food.
Satisfied? I am. I needed a break. Thanks!
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:51 am
Forgive me if this is repeated.
Kamchak,
Cool. Are you going to the game tonight? I read where they expect 50,000! Cool beans!
BudWiser,
I live on Earth, most of the time, and sorry to say that you sir, are just plain wrong.
mm,
Anybody who knows anything about social welfare programs know that the stereotypical Welfare Queen does not exist. BudWiser and his kind like to make assumptions based on their social dysfunctions and knowledge based on anything that exists outside their own front yard.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:51 am
Joey –
“Just the name strikes fear into the hearts of Progressives and Liberals, both Democrat and Republican. Just the name drives them to cry out in fear mount any attack that they can think of on Mrs. Palin.”
I’m afwaid, Joey. hold me.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:51 am
Paul,
Thanks!
Kamchak
July 22nd, 2009
11:52 am
The biggest problem with the fair tax is not in the numbers—it’s in the politics. This is an idea that hasn’t even been out of committee chaired by Republicans and Democrats during several sessions of Congress. Those that believe in this concept don’t realize if this were ever to pass it would not resemble the tax that they have carefully memorized from the two books by Boortz.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:52 am
I Report
You Whine 
July 22nd, 2009
11:35 am
Certainly not from Alaskans.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:53 am
Paul –
“bring joy and happiness to your lives”
if I may … Bosch and I would like to recommend you add a little Being Human into your routine of Battlestar Gallactica and food … (nuttin like rotating between vampires and cyborgs and donuts … oh, my)
Doggone/GA
July 22nd, 2009
11:54 am
“if this were ever to pass it would not resemble the tax that they have carefully memorized ”
No kidding! It would give a whole new focus to the definition of a camel: a horse designed by a committee
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
11:54 am
Paul and USinUK,
Oooooo yes!
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:54 am
whiner –
“where do you think the federal government gets that “aid” money in the first place?”
what part of “net RECIPIENT of federal money” do you not understand … ???
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
11:54 am
Andy, AK residents stopped being net revenue contributors 20 years ago, looks like.
(granted, the info ends at 2005, and maybe this has changed since then…)
Kamchak
July 22nd, 2009
11:55 am
Bosch
Yep I’m going tonight. This will be my first visit to the Dome.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
11:56 am
Bosch –
I just saw the first episode of True Blood last night … the accents are dreadful, the soft-core is worse … and whatever happened to Anna Paquin’s acting??? I love me a good vampire story, but this one has one more episode to grab me, otherwise I’m kickin it to the curb.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
11:57 am
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:27 am
You might want to look at your expenses. I guarantee you your parents didn’t have the “necessities” that you do.
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
11:58 am
At first, the outflow of wealth from the USA was offset by selling its agricultural products and other raw materials as well as its high-technology goods. But by the end of the 1960s, an irreversible economic trend started. The USA was now buying more from the world than the world was buying from the USA. As the followers of Japan came into the economic picture, the US trade deficit accelerated and grew, with 1985 being the year that China came onboard the globalization train and the US trade deficit began its climb to the sky.
By the early 1990s, the trade deficit was so large and out of control that the only way that the USA could afford to buy its imported goods, which now included essential and strategic items like autos, steel and clothes, was to borrow the money. US consumers and, therefore, the government added trillions of dollars of debt to buy the goods from overseas.
Finn McCool
July 22nd, 2009
11:59 am
I make out quite well so this isn’t about jealousy or handouts.
This is about being able to call a spade a spade. And some folks just don’t want to face the music.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:00 pm
USinUK,
Of course the accents are terrible! And the campiness is what I like. Don’t take it so serious. Vampire Bill is retarded, but the rest of the show is funny.
Halibut Maoir
July 22nd, 2009
12:00 pm
Jay wont be happy till all are earrning as meager a salary as he! Me, I strive to better myself daily monetarily & spiritualy. I hear & read the term GREED used when descibing overachievers by some on the left. I also hear & read the term LAZY when describing underachievers by some on the right. Both terms are accurate for some but not the majority for either. Laws on the books seem to favor/encourage success, and I agree. But as we all know the Government also seems content on encouraging and in some cases paying for laziness,that I do not agree with. I teach my kids that to achieve success you must strive for it,not settle for the status quo. And don’t expect anything from anyone other than yourself.
RW-(the original)
July 22nd, 2009
12:01 pm
DB,
I perused your link and came away less than impressed. It is telling that the very same 95%/5% meme was already going strong in 2005 though. You do know that 88.4% of statistics are pulled directly from one’s nether regions don’t you?
What your writer tries to do is stop and start history at convenient times to support his argument. For instance, under ordinary circumstances Obama shouldn’t have to take responsibility for the economy for a couple years, but two things make it his right now. One he was part of Congress that kept kicking the can down the road on passing the second half of this year’s budget until they got it safely away from Bush’s veto pen. Secondly and much more important was his emergency Porkulous bill. That made the economy his baby the second he signed it and I’d hate to see what one of your writer’s charts would look like right now.
Chris
July 22nd, 2009
12:01 pm
I gotta respond to the comment by the Whiner at 8:12 who operates under the fantasy that all wealthy people earned their positions through hard work, when the reality is that many, if not most, achieved their super wealth primarily as a result of being heir to the well-connected while others get there for qualities having nothing to do with hard work (e.g. studies show that tall people over 6′2″ are more likely to promoted than others).
For those super rich who actually achieved their wealth through employer compensation, the processes of hiring and promotions are thoroughly subjective, and it’s ludicrous to suggest that a person always gets to a certain position because he or she (usually he) necessarily worked harder or deserved it more than many others who are frequently equally or more. As proof, all we have to do is look at all the upper level management teams who have taken over healthy companies and run them into the ground while gobbling up millions of stockholder dollars for themselves.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:01 pm
Kamchak,
I’ve never been to the Dome either. I don’t think my boys have either. I think. They are excited, so that’s what counts. I’ll be with you all in spirit.
Crazy Joe
July 22nd, 2009
12:03 pm
Speaking of Jesus……….do any believe that the rich can get into heaven? Jesus said that a camel would walk through the eye of a needle first before that happened……..if so, what should be done about Gov. Sanford? What about Ensign? If their sins are forgiven (because they publicly repented); are they still barred from heaven? Hmmmmmmmmm……..
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:03 pm
“(e.g. studies show that tall people over 6′2″ are more likely to promoted than others)”
Sweet!
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:04 pm
Bosch –
“Don’t take it so serious. Vampire Bill is retarded, but the rest of the show is funny”
gah – Bill was the only one last night that I actually liked … well, him and the grandmother (I busted out laughing when she asked Sukie to ask him if he was in the Civil War and would come speak to her group of Daughters of the Illustrious Fallen)
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
12:05 pm
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
11:58 am
Our trade deficit isn’t the problem. We should be contributing that much in foreign aid. What better way than to get something in return and supply them with jobs? The low taxes and unwillingness to fund our government by pandering politicians are the problem.
Paul
July 22nd, 2009
12:05 pm
USinUK 11:53 Bosch 11:54
[[if I may … Bosch and I would like to recommend you add a little Being Human into your routine of Battlestar Gallactica and food …]]
So let it be written, so let it be done.
Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human Battlestar Galactica food Being Human .
and I’m with you on vampires (Twilight kind) and cyborgs (altho I prefer Cylons of the Six variety) but I gotta draw the line on donuts.
DebbieDoRight
July 22nd, 2009
12:07 pm
USinUK: Read the books by Charlaine Harris — they are WAY better than the series!! I don’t think the series does any justice to the books!
http://www.charlaineharris.com/
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
12:07 pm
As for Americans, is it a good deal to exchange your job for lower prices at Wal-Mart?
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
12:08 pm
And what we have NOW is “an open-and-shut brilliant way to finance a nation’s revenue needs”?
Boy, that’s a great question and I wish I had time to really answer it. Short answer is “no.” I don’t claim to know of a brilliant way to scoop up revenue from the right vats and (shudder!horror!) spread it ’round to where it’s needed. But I do think a combination of a progressive income tax and a national V.A.T. isn’t out of the question.
Frankly, I’d rather focus on making the government more representational than worrying so much about the tax system. Fix that first, and the rest will likely follow.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:08 pm
CYLONS … that’s it … I don’t watch the current version of Battlestar Galactica, so I was trolling through my memory …
no donuts??? sometimes, you got the kinda hurt that only the vision of HDN can fix …
ken
July 22nd, 2009
12:08 pm
I will go for the higher SS tax when we drug test all welfare people.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:09 pm
USinUK,
You didn’t like Lafayette? Just wait until you meet Vampire Erik (as all the women swoon). And the Vampire Pam (she’s my favorite).
When he does go speak to grandma’s group – it’s kind of touching. Sniff. Sniff.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:10 pm
Debbie –
“Read the books by Charlaine Harris”
and, of course, the best thing about a book … you never have to hear a southern accent as thoroughly butchered as they were doing last night.
good gawd.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:11 pm
Paul,
“I don’t watch the current version of Battlestar Galactica”
I stopped breathing for a moment.
Debbie,
Soooo……what’s your take on Vampire Eric (as all the women swoon)?
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
12:13 pm
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
11:58 am
Certainly China doesn’t need our aid at this point. Importers need to start looking elsewhere for cheaper, better goods. And we certainly need to get back to making more things, and do it better than anyone else can.
TnGelding
July 22nd, 2009
12:15 pm
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
12:07 pm
Without going ot the link, Hell No!
I’ll read it now.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:17 pm
Bosch (and Paul)
you know how there’s a point where, if you haven’t watched a show, it’s kinda too late to jump in??? BG was one of those shows – I heard great things about it, but never had the time to watch, then next thing I knew, it was the middle of season 2 and, as Austin Powers once said, “that train had sailed”
as for True Blood – it sounds like things pick up, so I’ll give it a go. (which one is LaFayette??)
Paul
July 22nd, 2009
12:17 pm
USinUK 12:08
Yeah, sometimes I do succumb. Buttermilk cake. Plain. Great for coffee dunking.
Bosch 12:11
Yeah, and time did stand still, everything froze, but the awareness, it was so clear, so detailed, just like Bella described it.
We’ll just have to be patient and understanding with USinUK. When she’s ready for the greater light and understanding, she’ll know.
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
12:17 pm
It is telling that the very same 95%/5% meme was already going strong in 2005 though.
Thanks for having a look–I realize that the headline of the piece might’ve been a tad off-putting, but it was just to get this ball a-rolling.
What your writer tries to do is stop and start history at convenient times to support his argument.
whoa. I posted a fairly old article–it was posted during Bush’s second term. Mostly I brought it up because it summarized a much more scholarly study of income disparities, PDF is linked therein. Don’t expect you to read it and give me a report later, just lettin’ you know.
However, I’m with you about Obama owning this economy, good/bad/indifferent. He’s definitely staked out a classically Keynesian path to recovery via legislation he’s advocated, and will ride it. The public will punish him if he’s in fact taken us over a cliff.
(Obviously you fret more than I do that he has/will, but I definitely fret some.)
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:17 pm
USinUK,
“and, of course, the best thing about a book … you never have to hear a southern accent as thoroughly butchered”
So true.
You know – that usually bugs me to the point to where I won’t watch if that’s going on, but it just makes me laugh in this show because to me the show is so funny.
DB, Gwinnettian
July 22nd, 2009
12:19 pm
when we drug test all welfare people.
You going to include Rubin and Paulson, or just the current people?
Halibut Maoir
July 22nd, 2009
12:20 pm
Chris, I’m 5′9 and have been steadily promoted my adult life. Not saying you are incorrect,but I would like to see stats that promote what you state.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:20 pm
Paul @ 12:07 – you crack me up.
“Yeah, and time did stand still, everything froze”
Good. So that wasn’t just here. I was worried. Yes, USinUK does seem like one who understands enlightenment, and yearns for it, so we’ll just be patient.
I Report :-) You Whine :-(
July 22nd, 2009
12:21 pm
I’m still waiting for my answer, all you mmorons out there.
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:21 pm
USinUK,
Lafayette is the black cook at the bar. He’s hilarious.
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:22 pm
upstairs, guys …
Bosch
July 22nd, 2009
12:22 pm
Sorry Andy, what was the question?
USinUK
July 22nd, 2009
12:25 pm
whiner –
“I must ask, where do you think the federal government gets that “aid” money in the first place?”
man, you really do have reading difficulties … AK is a net RECIPIENT of federal money … since you evidently don’t understand that, they RECEIVE more money than they CONTRIBUTE to the system …
so, g’head. secede. that’ll show us.
md
July 22nd, 2009
12:28 pm
“given human nature, any group of people, granted such power without a countervailing power to offset it, would do the same thing over time and have no conscious sense of doing so”
Sounds like the last election, and our current gov’t.
And for many on here, selfishness is a 2 way street. We already pay tons of tax money into a public education system only to have many selfish individuals opt out of said system and then complain that they are not getting their fair share. How absurd.
Real
July 22nd, 2009
12:30 pm
The best health care and budget deficit reform is to stop the continuing generational government dependent numbers, e.g., single parents with 4-6 children, each generally by a different father — perhaps we can fund a sterilization type program???
Quest
July 22nd, 2009
12:33 pm
Obama has scheduled a prime-time news conference Wednesday, expected to focus on health care.
Any bets on how many times this evening we’ll hear “crisis”, “if we don’t do something now”, or “this isn’t about me”??
ken
July 22nd, 2009
12:36 pm
Does anybody on this page work ??
Soothsayer
July 22nd, 2009
12:45 pm
Of course we got ourselves into this quandary by shipping our manufacturing to China and other cheap-labor markets over the last generation. “Dollar hegemony” is backfiring. In fact China is using its American dollars to replace the International Monetary Fund as a lender to developing nations in Africa and elsewhere. As an additional insult, China now may be dictating a new generation of economic decline for the American people who are forced to buy their products at Wal-Mart by maxing out what is left of our available credit card debt.
About a year ago, a former Reagan Treasury official, now a well-known cable TV commentator, said that China had become “America’s bank” and commented approvingly that “it’s cheaper to print money than make cars anymore.” Ha ha.
It’s interesting that this article was written in 2006.
md
July 22nd, 2009
12:46 pm
“Does anybody on this page work ??”
On this page – yes, can’t speak for all the other pages though.
Mrs. Godzilla
July 22nd, 2009
12:48 pm
Have we forgotton Rule # 1 ?
If it comes from the right it must be varified.
“”One solution to the nation’s long-term fiscal problems that has gained support in recent years is the idea of replacing all federal taxes with a 23 percent national retail sales tax called the FairTax. Unfortunately, the administrative problems inherent in this proposal make it impossible to take seriously, says Bruce Bartlett, former deputy assistant secretary for economic policy at the U.S. Treasury Department.”"
More here:
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=15593
Whether you agree with the argument or not….remember this:
If the Fair Tax was really a decent idea – would not it have been
adopted by the Bush Administration when they still had control of Congress?
“”Ignoring Bush tax panel’s findings, Boortz again misled on “Fair Tax”"”
More here:
http://mediamatters.org/research/200605260004
A tax plan by a hyper partisan radio jockey and a 3rd rate congressman….too funny.
Third Rate Congressman
July 22nd, 2009
12:51 pm
Mrs. G @ 12.48, kindly cease and desist this vile character assassination
Structuralist
July 22nd, 2009
12:57 pm
Nardelli got $210 million as a “buyout” from Home Depot after almost running the company into the ground! Ultra sweet money there for failure!!!!!
Mrs. Godzilla
July 22nd, 2009
12:57 pm
Quit being third rate…..then no problem!