
Americans Slip into Poverty
Few in Washington talk about the growing chasm between the wealthy and the middle class. The top 1 percent of earners now take home more than 18 percent of national income - an increase from 1973, when the rich's share of income was 7.7 percent.
Globalization and technology have triggered an economy that has proven toxic to the middle-class majority. An unfair tax system, where corporations pay little or no tax compared to private citizens, has helped to worsen the situation.
Jobs which once sustained and grew the middle class are now done more cheaply in India and China or by machines.
The Census Bureau revealed 15.1 percent of the US population are now living below the poverty line - 27.4 percent of Black households are officially poor.
Median household incomes have fallen 7.1 percent since 1999.
Government programs such as food stamps and unemployment benefits, are now the only thing keeping millions of US families from falling into complete despair.
Yet, American continues to spend billions on two wars and rebuilding other countries.
Our collective fear is the American Dream is no longer attainable and for the first time, our children will not be bbetter off than the previous generation.
Americans still believe "the rise and fall" of nations is something which happens to other people.
It's time for us to admit and for Washington politicians to recognize that modern capitalism is no longer working for the rest of us.

Virtually every government administration lies about economic statistics. For example, government stats show average unemployment figures at less than 10% but in reality (due to their faulty accounting methods) it’s probably closer to 20%. Personal bankruptcies are growing and soon, commercial real estate will take a major hit. Private Property rights have been one of the key elements to the success of this country. Are we doomed to becoming serfs or ‘tenant farmers’ on our property?

Bruce’s Instant Stimulus Package
Our income tax system is unfair.
We have too many regulations.
We need more small businesses.
- Revamp the tax system whereby the 1st $25,000 of income of individual taxpayers is exempt from any kind of taxes, state or federal. People need every cent to survive and this would provide an instant ‘raise’ which would help the economy. After $25K, a flat rate of 12% and all non-profits, foreign corporations, domestic corporations would have to pay 12% if they’re doing business in the US.
- The government would begin selling off unused assets, especially land and buildings. A modern version of the homestead act would take place whereby average citizens would have 1st dibs on small plots of land, homes and buildings. Speculators and investors would be next.
- I would initiate an immediate across the board 10% pay cut for all federal politicians and cabinet holders. Government workers would have fewer federal days off and would have to contribute at least 25% of their pay toward health benefits.
- Immediate tort reform – no more stupid lawsuits. If you file a frivolous lawsuit and lose, you pay the legal expenses for all.
- A national health insurance plan, covering at least the basics, would be funded via an additional premium on auto and/or home owners insurance based on a sliding scale. This would create a very large pool of health subscribers and keep costs down.
- Massive cuts in military operations overseas. We don’t need soldiers stationed in 140 countries.
- Like the Manhattan Project of WWII, the government would devote significant resources to putting people back to work in decent jobs by way of making the US energy independent…jobs in creating a national rail service, energy alternatives and rebuilding of our infrastructure (perhaps like the CCC of the Depression era) would be implemented.
- For a 10-year period, I’d suspend Congress. Eliminate their high pay and perks. The governors from each state would be used; appointing non-partisan representatives to help with decision-making.
- I would decriminalize marijuana. We spend too much money incarcerating people for a non-narcotic weed and despite government propaganda, it’s never been proven to lead to hard drug use. Its sale would be regulated and taxed, adding more revenue while decreasing expenses on law enforcement and prisons.
- Finally, my mother would become the National Budget Manager…as a Depression-era woman, she knows how to squeeze a dollar from a dime!
Why We Need Change in this Country-Now!

“Only Unqualified applicants will be considered.”
--Ad for US Forest Service-1994
Stupidity in Government Grows, Economy Declines
There is a distinct correlation between idiocy in government and law and why our country is in decline and why the middle class is shrinking. Not many years ago a young man was denied a position as a police officer. Although he’d passed his training with flying colors, the hiring board decided his IQ of 120 was too high.
Courts upheld this and many other stupid so-called diversity laws which has allowed the government and the legal industry to grow while individual freedoms have eroded. Freedom of association, freedom of contract, freedom of speech have been increasingly abridged.
An odd example…The Boy Scouts of America won their Supreme Court case to ban homosexual scout leaders despite the opposition feeling that “the State has a compelling interest in eradicating invidious private discrimination.” A Gay Rights group file a brief in SUPPORT of the scouts. The group didn’t approve of the ban but wanted to retain their own freedom to keep heterosexuals out of their organization. As the scouts put it…”A Society in which each and every organization must be equally diverse is a society which has destroyed diversity.”
Misguided stupidity by Congress, in its goal to please all, has ruined the United States. According to statistician Aaron Wildavsky, if you examine all of the protected classes, they add up to 374% of the population, rendering it impossible to hire or fire anyone because each must be protected.
We’ve perverted the Constitution and as a nation, we’ve abandoned the notion of personal responsibility…our national motto has become When in doubt…sue! As one sage put it, “any genuine contest between liberty and equality is a contest liberty must lose.”
The Bill of Rights was designed to protect us from the government.
It’s been proven that the more lawyers a country has , the bigger the drain on the economy. Lawyers are like beavers…they get into the main stream and damn everything up. Each lawyer in this country represents a $2.5 million loss to the economy. The enormous slate of laws in this country adds to cost of everything and destroys entrepreneurship, the backbone of America. This is why we’re fallen so far behind the Chinese and other countries.
Congress, made up of too many lawyers, has shackled our economy with its shady backroom deals with corporate America and this ultimately, has destroyed the middle class, our jobs and our country.
America locks up too many people, some for acts that should not even be criminal. No other rich country is nearly as punitive as the Land of the Free.
In 2000 four Americans were charged with importing lobster tails in plastic bags rather than cardboard boxes, in violation of a Honduran regulation that Honduras no longer enforces. They had fallen foul of the Lacey Act, which bars Americans from breaking foreign rules when hunting or fishing. The original intent was to prevent Americans from, say, poaching elephants in Kenya. But it has been interpreted to mean that they must abide by every footling wildlife regulation on Earth. The lobstermen had no idea they were breaking the law. Yet three of them got eight years apiece. Two are still in jail.
America imprisons people for technical violations of immigration laws, environmental standards and arcane business rules. So many federal rules carry criminal penalties that experts struggle to count them. Many are incomprehensible.
Here’s my final example of government stupidity in action. In 1994, the ABC program, 20/20 showed a Department of Defense memo that stated “In the future, special permission will be required for the promotion of all white men without disabilities.”
Volumes can be filled with examples of how government has destroyed this country but it all leads to what the Poor Man has been saying since 1985…We don’t need another election, we need another revolution!
View the classic 1976 TV Movie NETWORK as Howard Beal tells us why we should be Mad as Hell - very pertinent for today!
>>>SPONSORS<<<
Don't Get Caught With Your Pantry Down-New 11th Ed.
http://tinyurl.com/PMBasics
Go Green-save money!
http://www.GreenIrene.com/Poorman
Free Money assistance for women, businesses, more.
http://hop.clickbank.net/hop.cgi?poorman11/mlesko
(C) and (TM) 2008-2011 PoorMan Recession Survival Center