"Corporations are People"

There is a trend on both sides that annoys me - if a candidate on the other side says something that sounds bad out of context, or sounds the least bit stupid, they latch onto it like a hungry snake. One that the left really latched onto is the, "corporations are people, my friend." Out of context, it sounds like a dumb out of touch rich guy (fair description of Romney, perhaps) saying quite literally that corporations as a whole deserve all the same rights as people.

That's not quite what he was saying, though. Let's put in the rest of what he said for context (thanks to Washington Post for the text):

“Of course they are,” Romney said. “Everything corporations earn ultimately goes to people. Where do you think it goes?”

That much is true. I won't argue that point. But, contrary to what Romney said, corporations indeed are not people. They are made of people, but in themselves are not people. What the businessmen built were not people, but businesses. Made of people, from the lowly customer service type people who will likely side with the ones who say they're underpaid (liberals) to the execs and business owners who will side with whoever will let them keep the larger portion of their wealth (conservatives) and everyone in-between.

What Romney was saying here was that giving tax cuts to a corporation is the same as giving tax cuts to people as a whole. I'm guessing that he figures it will trickle down. But, remember what I keep saying: the rich really like to just keep their money. Why trickle it down when they could just keep it instead? It's not like there's any limit on how much money they can have.

Yeah, they'll spend some money, and that will help keep other businesses in business... but in general, they will not hire more workers than they really have to, and they will not pay said workers much more than they have to. Raise the legal wages? Fine, they'll raise prices and lay off workers, then keep even more profits to themselves. That's the way it works. Trickle Down is a rotten lie. But, in general, the rich like it. It moves their responsibilities to a "good faith" footing.

Hey, Republicans - don't look at me like that. I said I was putting the quote in context, not that I was defending Romney.

Living Wage

This is something that's been getting increasingly common, and is supported by liberals and hated by conservatives. For my part, I'm generally seen as fairly liberal, but I don't love it or hate it. The idea behind the living wage is pretty simple - some areas are more expensive to live in than others, so the federal minimum wage simply doesn't cut it. Of course, that is likely the case nationwide - that the federal minimum wage doesn't cut it. But, as I've said before, wage increases simply don't work like we'd like them to. Rather than execs or business owners taking a cut in their pay, they lay off workers and raise prices, thus causing more unemployment and higher cost of living across the board, thus being a self-perpetuating problem. It's ugly, but that's the way it works. A city raising its living wage also will encourage businesses to either open up just outside of town or to move just outside of town to avoid having to pay the living wage.

That is not to say however that current, even living wages, are sufficient to get by on, as many Republicans suggest. For my part, I live in the southwest, so that's the area I'm most familiar with. The federal minimum wage is, if memory serves, $7.50/hour. The Santa Fe living wage is $10.29/hour - the highest in the nation, or so I've heard. Now, Santa Fe has always had a high cost of living - that's no secret. A big part of it is that they have ordinances saying that it shall always remain a small city, no buildings over two or three stories without a special permit, that sort of thing. It's for the tourists.

So, let's do the math here:
$10.29/hour ˣ 40 hours per week = $411.60 per week, or if we go by the average 2 week pay period, $823.20 per pay period. Using two pay periods (4 weeks) to represent a month, as most bills are due monthly, that's $1,646.40 per month.

That's before taxes.

For filing single, the federal income tax looks to be about 15% in this bracket. So, $1,646.40 ˣ 0.15 = $246.96. So, we subtract that from our original figure: $1,646.40 - 246.96 = $1,399.44. But, we're not done yet. Let's look at the state income tax. The state income tax for New Mexico is 4.9%, so subtract 4.9% from the original figure: $1,646.40 ˣ 0.049 = $80.67, so let's go ahead and take that out of the $1,399.44 figure = $1,318.77. Looking around online, it seems that the Social Security withholding is 6.2%, although I think it's probably more. We'll go with the 6.2% though. $1,646.40 ˣ 0.062 = $102.08. So, let's take that out of the 1,318.77 = $1,216.69. There are other deductions, but the big three will work as a jumping-off point. We already know that Santa Fe has a high cost of living, so let's apply there living wage numbers to a nearby larger city with a lower cost of living. Because I have some experience with it, I'll use Albuquerque as an example.

I used to have a low income apartment there, where they got their profits in part from tax credits for providing the low income housing for qualified tenants. I was paying $600/month for a one-bedroom apartment, all utilities included. Not bad... so let's take that out of the $1.216.69 = $616.69. Me, I don't have car payments - my car was bought straight-away from a private individual rather than a dealership, and I get pretty reasonable mileage. But, if you have car payments, that can take anywhere from another $200-$400 out of that $616.69... and someone with this kind of income, well... often, the predatory types are the only ones who will sell a vaguely modern/reliable car to someone with this sort of income. Let's do kind of a conservative estimate and say payments are $250, and take that out of the remaining monthly income = $366.69. Insurance is probably another $70/month, roughly, so that brings us down to $296.69. $200 a month seems about right for groceries, right? Assuming one's not going on an all-Ramen/mac and cheese diet (really unhealthy). How about gas? Right now, it's about $3.70/gallon.

Well, with those figures, you'll be lucky to break even... that's assuming no incidentals, like medical bills, car repairs, etc. With those, hopefully you'll have some savings, but not too likely. Your option then is to get a roommate or to find a cheaper apartment. Like I said, that was already a low income apartment. Maybe find a studio? Maybe a cheaper part of town (like the war zone)? And roommates aren't often all that great, either. I've known best friends to turn into worst enemies for that.

"But minimum wage is just for people flipping burgers!" Not really. People working call centers/customer service make about that Santa Fe living wage. As do many people working in the medical field with "certified" or "assistant" in their titles - medical assistants, certified pharmacy techs, certified nurse's assistants, etc. They often have to take more than one job to make ends meet, and their hours don't always make it easy to plan around to have another job. Also think of your waitresses - they generally make below minimum wage (there are special exceptions for jobs that get tips), and survive off their tips. Bank tellers also make around that Santa Fe living wage.

Yet, with all that financial stress of their own, all these people are nonetheless expected to show up every day dressed nice and with a smile and cheerful attitude to help you out.

While a living wage is not the answer for the reasons I've mentioned in previous posts as well as toward the beginning of this post, I think that we do need to find an answer.

Occupy Wall Street

By now, I think it's safe to assume we've all heard of the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement. We've seen the signs saying "we are the 99%," we've seen the occasional Guy Fawkes mask. Less well known is just what they want. We know they're part of the 99%, we know that a lot of them probably like "V for Vendetta," and we know that they are angry. But about what, exactly?

The problem is that they don't have a centralized structure to get their message out. Maybe that's good with their ideals, but maybe not so good when it comes to the press. Sad to say, I suspect that many of the OWS people aren't even sure why they're out there.

But some messages still do come out loud and clear, thanks in particular to journalists and bloggers who support the movement and do some research into it. One such message in particular caught my attention:

The income gap in the modern day US is wider than that of the Roman Empire

Yes, you read that right. The gap between rich and poor in the US is wider than it was in the Roman empire, and the Roman empire collapsed. I'm not expecting the US as we know it to collapse anytime soon... at least not within our lifetimes. But then, what would a collapse mean? I don't imagine repo agents coming and shooing us out of the US. I imagine more that it would mean a complete loss of faith in the government. Maybe an armed revolt, maybe not. When you think about it, any government rules only at the mercy of its people. If the people as a whole simply began to ignore the government and set up their own, then that would be an effective collapse of America as we know it.

Many who read this may be rattling their sabers and shaking their fists, saying, "yeah, me and my group could make some real changes here!" That's kinda what I'm afraid of. I'm aware of some such groups... and the ones that I'm aware of, both conscience and my desire for survival would dictate that I resist such groups who would want to take things over. Each has their own agenda, and what I have seen, it is NOT to restore America.

Let's look back to this income gap issue though, shall we?

First of all, there is nothing wrong with capitalism in and of itself. It is kind of the ultimate freedom, and as I've said before, with freedom comes responsibility. Don't like an idea? Don't feed money into it. I feel that capitalism and democracy go hand in hand. Ideally, one gets paid for their efforts, and fairly so. That's the ideal. But, the human element gets thrown in, and that's where things get screwed up. As a whole, humans tend to be rather lazy and greedy.

If we go back maybe a hundred years, give or take, people were working their lives away. The five day work week, eight hours a day... if you mentioned that, you would have been laughed out of where ever it is you went. Even children had to work, just so their families could make ends meet. You may also have heard of "company stores." What that was, the companies, instead of paying workers in regular money paid them in credit for the company store, where they could buy the necessities. This way, there was a bare minimum in loss of profits by the company, by basically treating their workers as slaves. The workers had little choice but to accept.

Enter the labor unions. The labor unions organized workers to make a lot of changes in company policies and in law. This is where we get our more recognizable forty hour workweek, child labor laws, and similar things. But, as time passes, even the labor unions are not immune to the same laziness, greed, and corruption that they once fought against. They have the potential to still do good, but too often, they do not. They also attempt to take choice out of the workers' hands by making union membership, or at least paying union dues, a mandatory condition of employment, whether the worker feels they are doing a good job representing them or not.

Going forward, as technology improved, companies began noticing that it was possible to conduct business from afar. They hearkened back to the good ol' days of underpaid workers with low standards. This is when they began outsourcing to other nations. They loved it, the shareholders loved it, profits soared. For a time.

The thing about greed is that it is self-destructive. So many companies did this outsourcing that it noticeably raised unemployment and lowered salaries of workers. The very simple foundation of the economy is that if people are spending money, people are making money. American workers now had substantially less money to spend, because their jobs are being shipped overseas, and they are having to accept substantially less money when they are employed, and enjoying much less job security.

Seeing that income gap widen yet?

Further, like I said, this greed is self-destructive. With the American workers not working or having less money to spend, that greed is coming back around to bite those companies in the ass. Not just the ones that outsourced, though... poverty doesn't discriminate. Although what money people do have is generally used to buy the cheapest things possible to stretch the money as far as possible... which means more underpaid workers with minimal job security. So the problem is feeding off itself.

Whether you take OWS seriously or not, it may be wise to at least hear what messages you can from the movement. There is a reason for it, however garbled it may sometimes seem. As I've said, I'm not a news breaker, I simply think about the news and events more in-depth to clarify them, to look for first causes.