Socialism? The Rich Are Winning the US Class War: Facts Show Rich Getting Richer, Everyone Else Poorer

by Bill Quigley

The rich and their paid false prophets are doing a bang up job
deceiving the
poor and middle class. They have convinced many that an evil socialism
is alive
in the land and it is taking their fair share. But the deception cannot
last –
facts say otherwise.

Yes, there is a class war – the war of the rich on the poor and the
middle class
– and the rich are winning. That war has been going on for years. Look
at the
facts – facts the rich and their false paid prophets do not want people
to know.

Let Glen Beck go on about socialists descending on Washington. Allow
Rush
Limbaugh to rail about “class warfare for a leftist agenda that will
destroy our
society.” They are well compensated false prophets for the rich.

The truth is that for the several decades the rich in the US have been
getting
richer and the poor and middle class have been getting poorer. Look at
the
facts then make up your own mind.

Poor Getting Poorer: Facts

The official US poverty numbers show we now have the highest number of
poor
people in 51 years. The official US poverty rate is 14.3 percent or
43.6
million people in poverty. One in five children in the US is poor; one
in ten
senior citizens is poor. Source: US Census Bureau.

One of every six workers, 26.8 million people, is unemployed or
underemployed.
This “real” unemployment rate is over 17%. There are 14.8 million
people
designated as “officially” unemployed by the government, a rate of 9.6
percent.
Unemployment is worse for African American workers of whom 16.1 percent
are
unemployed. Another 9.5 million people who are working only part-time
while
they are seeking full-time work but have had their hours cut back or are
so far
only able to find work part-time are not counted in the official
unemployment
numbers. Also, an additional 2.5 million are reported unemployed but not
counted
because they are classified as discouraged workers in part because they
have
been out of work for more than 12 months. Source: US Department of
Labor
Bureau of Labor Statistics October 2010 report.

The median household income for whites in the US is $51,861; for Asians
it is
$65,469; for African Americans it is $32,584; for Latinos it is $38,039.
Source: US Census Bureau.

Fifty million people in the US lack health insurance. Source: US Census
Bureau.

Women in the US have a greater lifetime risk of dying from
pregnancy-related
conditions than women in 40 other countries. African American US women
are
nearly 4 times more likely to die of pregnancy-related complications
than white
women. Source: Amnesty International Maternal Health Care Crisis in the
USA.

About 3.5 million people, about one-third of which are children, are
homeless at
some point in the year in the US. Source: National Law Center on
Homelessness
and Poverty.

Outside Atlanta, 33,000 people showed up to seek applications for low
cost
subsidized housing in August 2010. When Detroit offered emergency
utility and
housing assistance to help people facing evictions, more than 50,000
people
showed up for the 3,000 vouchers. Source: News reports.

There are 49 million people in the US who live in households which eat
only
because they receive food stamps, visit food pantries or soup kitchens
for
help. Sixteen million are so poor they have skipped meals or foregone
food at
some point in the last year. This is the highest level since statistics
have
been kept. Source: US Department of Agriculture, Economic Research
Service.

Middle Class Going Backward: Facts

One or two generations ago it was possible for a middle class family to
live on
one income. Now it takes two incomes to try to enjoy the same quality
of life.
Wages have not kept up with inflation; adjusted for inflation they have
lost
ground over the past ten years. The cost of housing, education and
health care
have all increased at a much higher rate than wages and salaries. In
1967, the
middle 60 percent of households received over 52% of all income. In
1998, it
was down to 47%. The share going to the poor has also fallen, with the
top 20%
seeing their share rise. Mark Trumball, “Obama’s challenge: reversing a
decade
of middle-class decline,” Christian Science Monitor, January 25, 2010.
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2010/0125/Obama-s-challenge-reversing-a-decade-of-middle-class-decline

A record 2.8 million homes received a foreclosure notice in 2009, higher
than
both 2008 and 2007. In 2010, the rate is expected to be rise to 3
million
homes. Sources: Reuters and RealtyTrac.

Eleven million homeowners (about one in four homeowners) in the US are
“under
water” or owe more on their mortgages than their house is worth.
Source: “Home
truths,” The Economist, October 23, 2010.

For the first time since the 1940s, the real incomes of middle-class
families
are lower at the end of the business cycle of the 2000s than they were
at the
beginning. Despite the fact that the American workforce is working
harder and
smarter than ever, they are sharing less and less in the benefits they
are
creating. This is true for white families but even truer for African
American
families whose gains in the 1990s have mostly been eliminated since
then.
Source: Jared Bernstein and Heidi Shierholz, State of Working America.
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/swa08_00_execsum.pdf

Rich Getting Richer: Facts

The wealth of the richest 400 people in the US grew by 8% in the last
year to
$1.37 trillion. Source: Forbes 400: The super-rich get richer,
September 22,
2010, Money.com

The top Hedge Fund Manager of 2009, David Tepper, “earned” $4 billion
last
year. The rest of the top ten earned: $3.3 billion, $2.5 billion, $2.3
billion,
$1.4 billion, $1.3 billion (tie for 6th and 7th place), $900 million
(tie for
8th and 9th place), and in last place out of the top ten, $825 million.
Source:
Business Insider. “Meet the top 10 earning hedge fund managers of
2009.”
http://www.businessinsider.com/meet-the-top-10-earning-hedge-fund-managers-of-2009-2010-4

Income disparity in the US is now as bad as it was right before the
Great
Depression at the end of the 1920s. From 1979 to 2006, the richest 1%
more than
doubled their share of the total US income, from 10% to 23%. The
richest 1%
have an average annual income of more than $1.3 million. For the last
25 years,
over 90% of the total growth in income in the US went to the top 10%
earners –
leaving 9% of all income to be shared by the bottom 90%. Source: Jared
Bernstein
and Heidi Shierholz, State of Working America.
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/tabfig/2008/01/19.pdf

In 1973, the average US CEO was paid $27 for every dollar paid to a
typical
worker; by 2007 that ratio had grown to $275 to $1. Source: Jared
Bernstein and
Heidi Shierholz, State of Working America.
http://www.stateofworkingamerica.org/tabfig/2008/03/SWA08_Wages_Figure.3AE.pdf

Since 1992, the average tax rate on the richest 400 taxpayers in the US
dropped
from 26.8% to 16.62%. Source: US Internal Revenue Service.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/07intop400.pdf

The US has the greatest inequality between rich and poor among all
Western
industrialized nations and it has been getting worse for 40 years. The
World
Factbook, published by the CIA, includes an international ranking of the
inequality among families inside of each country, called the Gini Index.
The US
ranking of 45 in 2007 is the same as Argentina, Cameroon, and Cote
d’Ivorie.
The highest inequality can be found in countries like Namibia, South
Africa,
Haiti and Guatemala. The US ranking of 45 compares poorly to Japan
(38), India
(36), New Zealand, UK (34), Greece (33), Spain (32), Canada (32), France
(32),
South Korea (31), Netherlands (30), Ireland (30), Australia (30),
Germany (27),
Norway (25), and Sweden (23). Source: CIA The World Factbook:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2172.html

Rich people live an average of about five years longer than poor people
in the
US. Naturally, gross inequality has consequences in terms of health,
exposure
to unhealthy working conditions, nutrition and lifestyle. In 1980, the
most
well off in the US had a life expectancy of 2.8 years over the least
well-off.
As the inequality gap widens, so does the life expectancy gap. In 1990,
the gap
was a little less than 4 years. In 2000, the least well-off could
expect to
live to age of 74.7 while the most well off had a life expectancy of
79.2
years. Source: Elise Gould, “Growing disparities in life expectancy,”
Economic
Policy Institute.
http://www.epi.org/economic_snapshots/entry/webfeatures_snapshots_20080716/

Conclusion

These are extremely troubling facts for anyone concerned about economic
fairness, equality of opportunity, and justice.

Thomas Jefferson once observed that the systematic restructuring of
society to
benefit the rich over the poor and middle class is a natural appetite of
the
rich. “Experience declares that man is the only animal which devours his
own
kind, for I can apply no milder term to…the general prey of the rich on
the
poor.” But Jefferson also knew that justice can only be delayed so long
when he
said, “I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that
his
justice cannot sleep forever.”

The rich talk about the rise of socialism to divert attention from the
fact that
they are devouring the basics of the poor and everyone else. Many of
those
crying socialism the loudest are doing it to enrich or empower
themselves. They
are right about one thing – there is a class war going on in the US.
The rich
are winning their class war, and it is time for everyone else to fight
back for
economic justice.