Eight Key Charts About the Growing Income Inequality in the United States

Number one is real simple. I predicted it in my book, The Rigged Game: Corporate America and a People Betrayed, that income inequality is growing in the United States. President Obama, Wall Street Senator Ron Wyden, the Democratic party leadership, Mitt Romney and the Republican party leadership, know this. They all have the same plan regardless of who wins the upcoming presidential election. They plan to make sure income inequality continues to grow by redistributing income and wealth from the 99 to the 1 percent.

Currently, the 1 percent receive about 30 percent of all income in the US, up from about 7-8 percent in 1980. That means the 99 percent have less money to purchase stuff with, which is why the economy is mired in this Great Recession, jobs are scarce, and the economy is tilting on the edge of an economic abyss that will make our current situation look like the good old days.

There is one key difference between the two; Republicans want to redistribute income to the 1 percent faster than the Democrats. Big Deal. The end result is the same; the economic disenfranchisement of the 99 percent. It will soon be banana republic time in the United States. Political disenfranchisement has already occurred.

The rich have created a much larger income gap because they have stolen the money from the 99 percent via US legislation, such as free trade treaties, deregulation and privatization scams. All of these redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent.

Liberal Wall Street Senator Ron Wyden, a nasty son-of-a-Wall Street-Bitch, is a driving force behind these scams. Free trade treaties open the door for US businesses to ship (or create) jobs overseas. The difference between the lost higher wage US jobs and the new lower overseas jobs goes into the pockets of the rich via higher corporate profits, surging dividends and rising share prices. The senator of Wall Street knows this but continues to vote for Wall Street and hedge funds over the interests of the 99 percent. Worse yet, the jobs shipped away or created overseas were once the tax base that supported government services, such as schools, roads, bridges, fire fighters and polices.

“The middle class is shrinking. According to Prof. Alan Krueger, Chairman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, ‘the shift in income inequality over the last three decades is the equivalent of moving $1.1 trillion of income from the 99 percent to the top 1 percent every single year.’” There’s a reason for this. That’s because $1.1 trillion of income has been redistributed every year on average from the 99 to the 1 percent via free trade treaties, deregulation and privatization scams.

The middle class is still shrinking under Obama. He knows this and continues to sign legislation to do exactly this. Last autumn he signed free trade treaties with Panama, South Korea and Colombia. The result, according to numerous estimates, will be a net loss of nearly a million jobs. So the difference between the old higher wages and the new lower wages goes into the pockets of the wealthy. Now Obama has his people negotiating the Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TPP), which the Guardian newspaper of the UK calls “Nafta on steroids.” The TPP will accelerate the decline of the middle class by redistributing more income and political power from the 99 to the 1 percent. Obama knows this, but continues the policy anyway.

So what? Profits are up? Where are the jobs? Obviously, trickle down didn’t work. Worldwide, US corporations are sitting on over $5 trillion. But they can’t invest it because demand is so slack due to the massive redistribution of income from the 99 to the 1 percent.

Wall Street Mitt the Twit Romney claims tax cuts for the rich will stimulate the economy, but 30 years of failed trickle down economics is ultimately the primary reason the current economy sucks big time, like total New Great Depression. The Twit’s trickle down economic policies will only make things worse for the 99 percent. That’s because the 1 percent will have more income with the cuts with which to purchase more legislation from Mitt Romney (if elected), Obama (if re-elected), Ron Wyden, John Boehner, Rand Paul, Earl Blumenauer and lots of others in congress and the senate. So does Obama and Wyden. Too bad for the 99 percent. Apparently, Mitt the Twit thinks the US economy should be used to redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent. Make the rich richer at the expense of the rest of us? I don’t think that’s what an economy is for.

Bank profits are enormous because the Federal Reserve continues to help these folks out. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke last week announced a plan to stimulate the economy. It was a lie. The fed has decided to purchase $40 billion of worthless mortgage backed bonds from wealthy investors and institutions such as investment banks like Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. The Fed will purchase the worthless or nearly worthless bonds on a face value basis. If the investors or banks paid $10 million for the bonds, which are now valueless, the Fed will still pay the stupid bank or investor $10 million for the worthless bonds. The Fed has been very helpful with increasing the profits of banks for several years now using such scams.

CEO pay has risen because the government and the Federal Reserve continue to bail out the rich and help to increase corporate profits by enacting income redistribution legislation, like the South Korea free trade treaty. See the chart above.

There is a reason 1 in 5 US workers earn so little. Wall Street Senator Ron Wyden and others continue to redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent via free trade treaties that ship or create jobs overseas. This puts downward pressure on wages in the US, which redistributes income from the 99 to the 1 percent. The same process occurs when too many immigrants come to the US, creating a surplus of labor, which also puts downward pressure on wages. Republicans love this, but so do Wall Street democrats, like Ron Wyden.

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Breakdown of the $26 trillion the Federal Reserve Handed Out to Save Stupid, but Rich, Investors and Banks

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Obama’s Betrayal of the 99 Percent; The Pacific free trade deal that’s anything but free

The Guardian UK reports, In reality, the Trans Pacific Free Trade Treaty… “has almost nothing to do with trade: actual trade barriers between these countries are already very low. The TPP is an effort to use the holy grail of free trade to impose conditions and override domestic laws in a way that would be almost impossible if the proposed measures had to go through the normal legislative process. The expectation is that by lining up powerful corporate interests, the governments will be able to ram this new “free trade” pact through legislatures on a take-it-or-leave-it basis.”

Free trade scams, which are labeled “agreements” to avoid the constitutional requirement that all treaties require a 66 percent yes vote in the senate, are treaties aimed to redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent. It’s also a way to redistribute what little political power the 99 percent has to the 1 percent, as the Guardian noted above. President Obama represents one faction of the 1 percent; Wall Street Mitt the Twit Romney represents the other faction.

When jobs are shipped or created overseas because of these treaties, the difference between the old, higher US wages and compensation and the new, lower foreign wages and other compensation goes into the pockets of the 1 percent via higher corporate profits, higher dividends and surging stock prices.

The rich also receive the difference between the cost of the old higher standard environmental US regulations and the more lax environmental regulations (if any) in the foreign nations.

But now the TPP has new things in store to redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent by bypassing the normal political process, which is why the Obama regime is negotiating the treaty in the first place.

These treaties are the biggest reason the 1 percent now receive nearly 30 percent of the total income in the US compared to around 7 or 8 percent thirty-two years ago.

The Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement is more of the same, only worse. The Guardian UK has called the treaty NAFTA on Steroids. Click on the link below for more of the story.

Obama's Betrayal: The Pacific Free Trade Income Redistribution Deal–Guardian UK

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Where Have All the Good Jobs Gone?

John Schmitt and Janelle Jones of the Center for Economic and Policy Research reached a conclusion from their research. Their conclusions are incorrect, but the information is still impressive. A synopsis is below.

“The U.S. workforce is substantially older and better-educated than it was at the end of the 1970s. The typical worker in 2010 was seven years older than in 1979. In 2010, over one-third of US workers had a four-year college degree or more, up from just one-fifth in 1979. Given that older and better-educated workers generally receive higher pay and better benefits, we would have expected the share of “good jobs” in the economy to have increased in line with improvements in the quality of workforce. Instead, the share of “good jobs” in the U.S. economy has actually fallen. The estimates in this paper, which control for increases in age and education of the population, suggest that relative to 1979 the economy has lost about one-third (28 to 38 percent) of its capacity to generate good jobs. The data show only minor differences between 2007, before the Great Recession began, and 2010, the low point for the labor market. The deterioration in the economy’s ability to generate good jobs reflects long-run changes in the U.S. economy, not short-run factors related to the recession or recent economic policy.”

The reason why so many good jobs are gone is simple; they’ve been redistributed to the rich. Enact a free trade treaty, ship jobs overseas. The difference between the old higher wages in the US and the new lower wages is pocketed by the affluent via higher corporate profits, rising dividends and surging share prices. This income redistribution scam is achieved by manipulating the political markets, i.e. purchasing the rules of the game. That’s precisely how the 1 percent have stolen nearly 30 of the total national income compared to about 8 percent back in 1980.

When the jobs are shipped away and the income from them is redistributed to the 1 percent, opportunities are lost for the rest of us, and more so than just the loss of the jobs. When those jobs are exported via bribed-enforced legislation, we lose our tax base and government jobs go away, like police, firefighters and teachers. There are less opportunities for accountants, mechanics and attorneys in government.

And illegal free trade treaties are just one way the one percent manipulate the legislative process to achieve income redistribution from the 99 percent. There’s a ton of other ways. Deregulation, for example, allows corporations to jack up the prices they charge at will. The difference between what prices would be under real competitive conditions and the manipulated prices go into the pockets of the rich via the same route as free income redistribution treaties.

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Nafta on Steroids; The Trans Pacific Free Trade Income Redistribution Treaty

Where Have All The Good Jobs Gone? Center for Economic and Policy Research

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GDP data shows US economy is losing altitude – along with Obama’s chances

The state of the economy is always a crucial factor in presidential races – even more so than some overseas gaffes, like Mitt the Twitt’s comments about the London Olympics. It’s true Obama inherited a disaster of epic scale, but he ignored the fires of an economic blaze that is fueled by the redistribution of income from working people to the uber wealthy. In fact, with his free trade treaties with South Korea, Colombia and Panama, and his continued negotiations for the Trans Pacific Income Redistribution Free Trade Treaty, Obama clearly shows he is not the man for the job.

Neither is Wall Street Mitt. So we have a choice in the is election between nincompoops. Click the link for more on the faltering economy.

The president’s primary mission seems to be to redistribute income from the 99 to his favorites among the 1 percent; whereas Mitt’s mission to do the same for his favorites, including himself, no doubt, among the 1 percent. Mitt’s favorites and the rivals of Obama’s 1 percent supporters.

GDp Data Shows US Economy is Losing Steam–the Guardian UK

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The 99 Percent Protest Obama’s War Against the Middle Class in Portland Oregon

President Obama came to Portland Oregon on Tuesday, fundraising, of course. There were protesters outside the Convention Center where Obama held his fundraiser. They were protesting the free trade treaties that are redistributing income and democracy from the 99 to the 1 percent. Click the link below to see the news report.

Demostraters Greet Obama in Portland Oregon

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Trans Pacific Free Trade Income Redistribution Treaty: “NAFTA on Steroids”

President Barack Obama continues to wage war against the American people and against democracy for the 99 percent lowest income earners in the USA. He’s doing this by having his people negotiate the Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TPP), which is another income redistribution scam being foisted on the American people by Obama, president of the 1 percent only.

In a recent issue, the Nation magazine called TPP “NAFTA On Steriods.” It’s a “horrifying” mechanism to “formulize” corporate “rule.” TPP will not only redistribute income from the 99 to the 1 percent, but it will undermine democracy and the rights of citizens and give those rights to corporations, which are the primary mechanisms and conduits through which income and democracy are redistributed. Click the link below for more on this story.

The Nation: Trans Pacific Free Trade Treaty: Nafta on Steriods

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American Parasites: The top 0.001 percent (the Uber Rich) Part One of a Draft

They’re destroying the middle class via their primary weapons: tax cuts for the rich, control of the federal government, control over the Democratic and Republican parties, the media and Wall Street. They’re sucking the middle class financially dry, just like any out-of-control parasite sucks its host of all life. That’s because the rich are parasites unto this nation and the world. This is the story of one parasite and how he does it; Rich Romney. It goes something like this.

The Story of a Romney.

Rich Romney purses his lips. A giddy feeling courses through his body as he thinks about the Trans-Pacific Free Trade Treaty and all of the riches his already vast vault of stolen wealth will suck in from distant nations, and from his less fortunate US neighbors. Happiness causes his body to tremble. He guffaws. As his joyful thoughts snap back and forth from one section of his frontal lobe of his brain to another, like jolts of electricity, the ends of its lips rise upward into a sadistic smile. A trickle of froth dribbles from the ends of his lips, rippling over his chin like tiny streams of pure organic honey.

Romney walks past his massive diamond studded desk to the window of his executive suite, twenty floors above the teeming masses of tiny people ambling back and forth below. He has one thought. The Trans-Pacific Free Trade Treaty (TPP) is going to put a lot of those lesser creature out of work, and redistribute their income to my vault. Those things deserve what they get and so do I. I’m going to earn their money.

Romney hears a knock at the door. He ignores it. His eyes race to the window cleaners across the street, dangling thirty floors above the artificially concrete jungle below. Their arms sweep back and forth, turning dirty glass into shining beacons. Romney’s eyes stay focused on the window cleaners as he hears another knock on the door.

Romney thinks about the person at the door, Let the idiot sweat, he’s just my little bitch.

Rich thinks about window cleaning; I’d never do that job. That’s dangerous, just hanging there. They go splat if they fall. That’s a death sentence. But I’m going to put those boys out of work, replace them with somebody cheaper, put the difference between their higher wages and the lower wages of their replacements into my own pockets, where it belongs. I deserve it. They don’t.

A knock at the door is louder than before.

He folds his arms over his chest. As his eyes stick to the window cleaners, Rich says, “Come senator, join me.”

Senator Ron Wyden of Wall Street pushes the door open. He stands in the door frame, a pasty look on his face, a bead of sweat dangling on his forehead.

Rich looks at the reflection of the senator through the window. “You didn’t have to knock at the door. I heard you the first time.”

“I’m sorry sir.”

“I said come senator.”

Part two tommorrow

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The Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement–Redistributing the American Dream From the 99 to the 1 Percent

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The Trans-Pacific Free Trade Agreement (TPP)–Destroying the Free Exchange of Ideas and News

Negotiations are taking place behind closed doors to create the TPP’s Internet trap criminalizing our day-to-day use of the Internet through expensive fines. You and over 80,000 others around the world pushed back by signing the StopTheTrap.net petition. Yet the list of TPP lobbyists is also growing; over 600 from telecom, media, and other conglomerates are privy to these secret negotiations. We need the entire pro-Internet community to push back against the TPP’s Internet trap.

The object of the TPP is to separate us, grind us down and limit our sources of information to the major corporate news (largely bull shit) organizations. That makes it easier to redistribute income and wealth from the 99 to the 1 percent, which is the real reason these negotiations are occurring.

You can take the next crucial step by sharing the petition on Facebook, Twitter, and forwarding the URL http://stopthetrap.net to everyone you know today. Fight back. Don’t be passive. Your rights, information, ideas and freedoms are at stake.

After citizens stood against big telecom and media conglomerates’ attempts to push through national laws that would crush free expression and innovation online, their lobbyists decided to go behind closed doors through the TPP. It’s an undemocratic, extreme attempt to take decisions about the Internet out of your hands. But the pro-Internet community is taking the fight global as well. We’ve assembled a powerful coalition of people and organizations—including experts at Public Knowledge, Public Citizen, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation—who are currently on the ground at meetings in San Diego. They have committed to hand-deliver the StopTheTrap.net petition signatures to leaders, but we need to give them the numbers to have influence.

Please help OpenMedia.ca hit the crucial 100,000 signatures mark by reaching out on Facebook, on Twitter, and by forwarding the URL http:/stopthetrap.net to everyone you know today.

The pro-Internet community is already having an impact across borders. In the U.S., 130 members of Congress just signed a letter calling for secret TPP documents to be made public; in Canada the largest federal opposition party has come out against the TPP; rifts are also developing between other signatory countries.

If we work together we could all be part of a foundational achievement of the global pro-Internet community: dismantling this Internet trap before it gets set. Thanks for sharing through the links above.
For the open Internet,

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One Percent Trying to Redistribute More Income From the 99 percent via the Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement–Update on Protests and Negotiations

Here’s how free trade works; your income is freely given to the rich. It’s that simple. When your government signs a free trade treaty, it is opening up doors for US companies to ship jobs overseas from the USA, or giving them a conduit through which to create jobs over seas rather than here, which would never have occurred without the treaty. The difference between the old wages here and the new lower wages there go into the pockets of the one percent via higher corporate profits, rising dividends and enhanced share prices. The losers of those jobs might get unemployment insurance, if they’re lucky. The American tax base is being systematically destroyed via each treaty as more and more jobs are shipped or created overseas by American companies. Schools are starving for money, so are public libraries and other governmental agencies because the tax money has been stuffed into the already fat wallets of the one percent via trade treaties.

In other words, the Obama administration is knowingly negotiating to redistribute income from your pockets and the pockets of your children to the rich as it negotiates the Trans Pacific Free Trade Agreement. How’s that for a man of the people?

Here’s the latest update from Dallas, Texas.

As trade negotiators from throughout the Pacific Rim gathered outside Dallas for a trade summit aimed at speeding the secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Free Trade Agreement towards conclusion, Texans were out in force to demand a public voice in the negotiating process. With the help of Citizens Trade Campaign and the Texas Fair Trade Coalition, local labor, environmental and community advocates:

Delivered over 42,000 petition signatures urging the U.S. Trade Representative to release the texts. Over 24,000 were presented during a media event with speakers from the Texas AFL-CIO, Lone Star Sierra Club, Communications Workers of America Local 6215, and then delivered to Assistant USTR Carol Guthrie. Later in the week, CTC hand-delivered an additional 18,000+ to lead U.S. negotiator Barbara Weisel during a stakeholder briefing, at which point she publicly stated USTR’s new position that “constantly evolving TPP chapter texts cannot be released to the public” — a rollback in transparency from both the current World Trade Organization negotiating process and the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) of more than a decade ago.

Followed up on the petition with a high-energy “TPP: Out of the Shadows!” rally and march. The demonstration started with a rally trade justice advocates from across Texas and the Pacific Rim. More than 300 people then marched over into the parking lot of the hotel where negotiators were meeting, before they were stopped by police. Texas AFL-CIO President Becky Moeller led the march by asking “What are they trying to hide?,” and CTC Executive Director Arthur Stamoulis led the crowd in a spirited “mic check” directed at negotiators.

Conducted a wide range of educational activities, including a teach-in moderated by the Dallas Peace Center, with fantastic presentations by Lori Wallach (Global Trade Watch), Celeste Drake (AFL-CIO), Ilana Solomon (Sierra Club) and Sanya Reid Smith (Third World Network). CTC staff also participated in a CWA-hosted telephone town hall, as well as meetings and events throughout the week with the Steelworkers, Teamsters, Building Trades, Sierra Club and Occupy Dallas. Occupy even live-streamed the May 12th rally.

Separate from CTC’s efforts, a number of independent activists also carried out a variety of stunts throughout the week, including a Yes Men award presentation; replacing hotel toilet paper with special TPP TP; projecting transparency messages onto the side of the hotel; putting flyers under negotiators’ hotel room doors; and more.

The next round of TPP negotiations will be in the United States from July 2 – 10, 2012, widely rumored to take place in Los Angeles.

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