Inequality and the budget

Ricky M

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Los Angeles Times
By Rich Benjamin
Feb. 21, 2020
3 AM
Jeff Bezos dropped $165 million last week for the most expensive residential property in the history of Los Angeles. That’s about an eighth of 1% of his $131.9 billion net worth. Bezos’ purchase is like a regular person forking over just $121 for a house, given that the Federal Reserve says the median net worth of an American is $97,300. Bezos’ home, nestled on nine acres in Beverly Hills, includes two guesthouses, a nursery, three hothouses, tennis court, swimming pool and a nine-hole golf course.

Put Bezos’ ground-breaking purchase against another record: The United States just hit the highest number of homeless school kids in modern history: 1.5 million.

As the media revel in the lifestyles and trophies of the ultra rich, reporting on the policy choices that are worsening inequality and homelessness gets buried. Consider President Trump’s fiscal 2021 budget proposal, which also came to light last week.

“Who the hell cares about the budget?” Trump asked the donors at a pricey political fundraiser in January at Mar-a-Lago (reportedly worth $160 million). No one in that room might have cared, but taxpayers should.

Trump’s proposed budget would extend his cockeyed 2017 tax cuts to 2027. Those cuts primarily benefit wealthy individuals and corporations like Bezos’ Amazon. (Amazon — guess what? — paid $0 in taxes in 2018; in 2019, its effective tax rate was 1.2%.) The 10 years of the tax giveaway would cost all of us $1.9 trillion.

In addition to a tax policy that explodes inequality, the president’s budget demands deep cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, programs that offer a lifeline to unemployed individuals, low-income families and senior citizens — in other words, those whose homes are least secure. The budget also demands sharp cuts to Social Security programs that help support those unable to work because of disability. This despite the president’s repeated promises not to cut these programs.

Trump’s budget also makes massive cuts to just the type of programs that offer services and limited assistance to working-class and poor people. The cuts to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program and to food stamps (also known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) would amount to more than $20 billion a year on average over the next decade. Some social service programs would be eliminated.

The most galling parts of the president/real-estate baron’s budget eviscerate housing spending while pretending to increase it.


The president is proposing a cut of $5 billion in voucher rental assistance for the next year alone. New rules would deprive some families of subsidized housing if the workers in the household cannot obtain and document sufficient hours of work. This despite the arbitrary, at-will scheduling of many jobs in our service economy.

Trump’s budget would also eliminate the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, the national Housing Trust Fund, Community Development Block Grants and the Choice Neighborhoods program, wiping out another $5 billion a year for investment in affordable housing and community development.

The Fair Housing Initiatives Program would be cut by 12%. More than 60% of reported housing discrimination complaints are investigated by groups that are funded by FHIP grants. These cuts are perhaps predictable, coming from a president whose family has a long, documented history of racial bias in the management of their housing properties.

As we gawk at the palaces of rich men such as Bezos, and as so many struggle to find affordable housing, we should focus our attention on the federal policies that fuel this discrepancy. The most draconian cuts in the 2021 budget are not likely to be OK’d by Congress, nonetheless, they are not just numbers on a spreadsheet. The attack on the safety net represents an ideology in the White House that would widen America’s pernicious levels of inequality, deepen poverty, and worsen suffering for poor families. As the price tags for the houses of the rich set dizzying records, so do the numbers of families and children living in substandard housing and on the street.

Rich Benjamin, a fellow at the Puffin Foundation and the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, is a contributing writer to Opinion. @IamRichBenjamin
 

SkyWriting

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Jeff Bezos dropped $165 million last week for the most expensive residential property in the history of Los Angeles.

5 Successful Companies That Didn't Make a Dollar for 5 Years

Why Amazon Has No Profits — Benedict ...
www.ben-evans.com › benedictevans › why-amazon-has-no-profits-a...
Sep 5, 2014



Ask poor people to work like that for one day.
My experience....they won't work not one hour without pay.
Here is the place (subsidized housing) people will not work one hour without being paid first.
As apartment manager, I could not pay people to pick up the trash in the yard:
Google Maps
 
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SkyWriting

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Inequality

People don't want to work. Jeff Bezos does.


Amazon, Bezos says, is focused on its customers, not its competition or Wall Street or short-term profitability — a tricky proposition in a letter to investors who are, typically, worried about precisely those things.
Surprise! Jeff Bezos explains to Amazon investors why no profits are a good thing



and later:
Jeff Bezos Forms $10 Billion Fund to Fight Climate Change

Jeff Bezos donated $100 million to fighting homelessness

Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos top list of biggest philanthropists
Jeff Bezos Scorned For $690,000 Donation To Australia Fire

Australia Fires: Jeff Bezos Dragged For Donating Less Than...

 
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OldWiseGuy

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Los Angeles Times
By Rich Benjamin
Feb. 21, 2020
3 AM
Jeff Bezos dropped $165 million last week for the most expensive residential property in the history of Los Angeles. That’s about an eighth of 1% of his $131.9 billion net worth. Bezos’ purchase is like a regular person forking over just $121 for a house, given that the Federal Reserve says the median net worth of an American is $97,300. Bezos’ home, nestled on nine acres in Beverly Hills, includes two guesthouses, a nursery, three hothouses, tennis court, swimming pool and a nine-hole golf course.

Put Bezos’ ground-breaking purchase against another record: The United States just hit the highest number of homeless school kids in modern history: 1.5 million.

As the media revel in the lifestyles and trophies of the ultra rich, reporting on the policy choices that are worsening inequality and homelessness gets buried. Consider President Trump’s fiscal 2021 budget proposal, which also came to light last week.

“Who the hell cares about the budget?” Trump asked the donors at a pricey political fundraiser in January at Mar-a-Lago (reportedly worth $160 million). No one in that room might have cared, but taxpayers should.

Trump’s proposed budget would extend his cockeyed 2017 tax cuts to 2027. Those cuts primarily benefit wealthy individuals and corporations like Bezos’ Amazon. (Amazon — guess what? — paid $0 in taxes in 2018; in 2019, its effective tax rate was 1.2%.) The 10 years of the tax giveaway would cost all of us $1.9 trillion.

In addition to a tax policy that explodes inequality, the president’s budget demands deep cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, programs that offer a lifeline to unemployed individuals, low-income families and senior citizens — in other words, those whose homes are least secure. The budget also demands sharp cuts to Social Security programs that help support those unable to work because of disability. This despite the president’s repeated promises not to cut these programs.

Trump’s budget also makes massive cuts to just the type of programs that offer services and limited assistance to working-class and poor people. The cuts to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program and to food stamps (also known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) would amount to more than $20 billion a year on average over the next decade. Some social service programs would be eliminated.

The most galling parts of the president/real-estate baron’s budget eviscerate housing spending while pretending to increase it.


The president is proposing a cut of $5 billion in voucher rental assistance for the next year alone. New rules would deprive some families of subsidized housing if the workers in the household cannot obtain and document sufficient hours of work. This despite the arbitrary, at-will scheduling of many jobs in our service economy.

Trump’s budget would also eliminate the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, the national Housing Trust Fund, Community Development Block Grants and the Choice Neighborhoods program, wiping out another $5 billion a year for investment in affordable housing and community development.

The Fair Housing Initiatives Program would be cut by 12%. More than 60% of reported housing discrimination complaints are investigated by groups that are funded by FHIP grants. These cuts are perhaps predictable, coming from a president whose family has a long, documented history of racial bias in the management of their housing properties.

As we gawk at the palaces of rich men such as Bezos, and as so many struggle to find affordable housing, we should focus our attention on the federal policies that fuel this discrepancy. The most draconian cuts in the 2021 budget are not likely to be OK’d by Congress, nonetheless, they are not just numbers on a spreadsheet. The attack on the safety net represents an ideology in the White House that would widen America’s pernicious levels of inequality, deepen poverty, and worsen suffering for poor families. As the price tags for the houses of the rich set dizzying records, so do the numbers of families and children living in substandard housing and on the street.

Rich Benjamin, a fellow at the Puffin Foundation and the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, is a contributing writer to Opinion. @IamRichBenjamin

Soo, Bezos should open his new home to the poor? Sell it and use the money to build housing for the poor? What will happen to all those who earn a living by maintaining such properties, and who benefit from the property taxes paid on it?
And will the next owner be attacked as well, even if they don't have the fortune that Bezos has?

Also, who got the $165 million. Shouldn't we go after that money? Bezos is out $165 million and now owns a huge 'money pit'.
 
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timewerx

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Fun fact:

This Is Why Global Income Inequality Is a Real National-Security Threat

Of particular interest is that huge income gaps provides the ideal environment for organize crime (like drug cartels) to flourish and work at maximum profits.

Another fun fact:

How big is income inequality as a determinant of crime rates?


A less fun fact is that many Christians seem tolerant or even promoting reforms that leads to even higher income gap between the rich and poor. Our of their love of money, they become blind to its perils.

A large income gap is really the symptom of a nation serving the rich while the poor are largely neglected. A nation that neglects God too as what you do the least, you do to Him.

It's rather ironic that the "Godless Scientists" are the ones waking up to these issues. The same issues that the Bible warned us about!

I guess too much blind faith will make you blind!

.
 
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OldWiseGuy

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Fun fact:

This Is Why Global Income Inequality Is a Real National-Security Threat

Of particular interest is that huge income gaps provides the ideal environment for organize crime (like drug cartels) to flourish and work at maximum profits.

Another fun fact:

How big is income inequality as a determinant of crime rates?


A less fun fact is that many Christians seem tolerant or even promoting reforms that leads to even higher income gap between the rich and poor. Our of their love of money, they become blind to its perils.

A large income gap is really the symptom of a nation serving the rich while the poor are largely neglected. A nation that neglects God too as what you do the least, you do to Him.

It's rather ironic that the "Godless Scientists" are the ones waking up to these issues. The same issues that the Bible warned us about!

I guess too much blind faith will make you blind!

.

I am undereducated, from a working class family, possessing ordinary skills, have no particular ambitions, have been poor most of my life, have never taken a handout, and yet I'm a $millionaire today with a six-figure income. Can you explain that?
 
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Ricky M

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I am undereducated, from a working class family, possessing ordinary skills, have no particular ambitions, have been poor most of my life, have never taken a handout, and yet I'm a $millionaire today with a six-figure income. Can you explain that?
Obviously you possess greater than ordinary skills, and ambition.

Without them you would have never risen above your birthplace.
 
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OldWiseGuy

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Obviously you possess greater than ordinary skills, and ambition.

Without them you would have never risen above your birthplace.

I credit my success with simply not making the usual mistakes that keep you poor (although I have made just about all of them in the past :(). I'm able to save and invest lots of money because there's nothing that I'm particularly interested in buying. But when I do it will be an asset that appreciates in value, or provides lasting value to me.
 
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Ricky M

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I credit my success with simply not making the usual mistakes than keep you poor (although I have made just about all of them in the past :().
Ambition is the key. If you're not willing to use them, all the skills in the world are useless to you.
 
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Ambition is the key. If you're not willing to use them, all the skills in the world are useless to you.

This is true. I use my limited skills very effectively. There's an old saying, "Beware of the man who only owns one gun. He is probably very good with it."

If I were truly ambitious I would be fully invested in rental property in my city. As it was I only owned one property and that was acquired to supplement my retirement. As it is I have enough. No need to be greedy.
 
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SkyWriting

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Of particular interest is that huge income gaps provides the ideal environment for organize crime (like drug cartels) to flourish and work at maximum profits.
.

I'm thinking the drug cartels do not believe in or practice equal income guidelines for all employees. Perhaps even working people more hours at under minimum federal wage guidelines!
 
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SkyWriting

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I credit my success with simply not making the usual mistakes that keep you poor (although I have made just about all of them in the past :(). I'm able to save and invest lots of money because there's nothing that I'm particularly interested in buying. But when I do it will be an asset that appreciates in value, or provides lasting value to me.

Consider
#572: Jay Greenberg: Litigation Finance Cashflow
 
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SkyWriting

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A less fun fact is that many Christians seem tolerant or even promoting reforms that leads to even higher income gap between the rich and poor.

Christian churches don't build the factories that made middle-class income possible.
Try and build a factory in your local town. The reason you don't is not political.
 
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timewerx

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I am undereducated, from a working class family, possessing ordinary skills, have no particular ambitions, have been poor most of my life, have never taken a handout, and yet I'm a $millionaire today with a six-figure income. Can you explain that?

I'd also be a six figure income if I'm working the same job / business in USA

Back home, the income inequality is far worse than in USA due to a dysfunctional government. It's horrible. don't let your country go down the same path.

I'm absolutely NOT a big fan of policies or general government attitude favoring the rich. What it did to my country, ruined it.
 
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timewerx

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I'm thinking the drug cartels do not believe in or practice equal income guidelines for all employees. Perhaps even working people more hours at under minimum federal wage guidelines!

It wasn't the article was about.

But huge income inequalty provides drug cartels with plenty of financially desperate people willing to take risks working for them and plenty of ridiculously rich clients to buy their produce.

Create the same imbalance in your body organs and it starts breaking down too.
 
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OldWiseGuy

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I'd also be a six figure income if I'm working the same job / business in USA

Back home, the income inequality is far worse than in USA due to a dysfunctional government. It's horrible. don't let your country go down the same path.

I'm absolutely NOT a big fan of policies or general government attitude favoring the rich. What it did to my country, ruined it.

Sorry to hear that. What is your country?
 
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Cimorene

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Henry Ford understood the concept. He figured he had to pay his workers enough that they could afford to buy his cars - or he wouldn't sell any.

He didn't pay workers very well at 1st. Bc of that, there was constantly huge staff turnover. It was stressful, strenuous labour with a high rate of injury so ppl said stuff it, it's not worth that low pay. That meant that $$$ had to be spent training new workers all the time. So Ford doubled the worker's pay. He changed things so that the safety standards were better. Totally turned around employee retainment. Plus then his workers became like marketing for his cars bc they were driving them.
 
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timewerx

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He didn't pay workers very well at 1st. Bc of that, there was constantly huge staff turnover. It was stressful, strenuous labour with a high rate of injury so ppl said stuff it, it's not worth that low pay. That meant that $$$ had to be spent training new workers all the time. So Ford doubled the worker's pay. He changed things so that the safety standards were better. Totally turned around employee retainment. Plus then his workers became like marketing for his cars bc they were driving them.

I used to work for a company like that and they had insane staff turnover as well. Worse, they were also getting lots of workers from overseas so they had to pay for travel / VISA expenses too.

Not just the cost of training, they also had to waste a lot of money on recruitment (which includes the huge cost of moving foreign workers in.

They also had to train new workers for at least a month and within that time, they are unable to contribute to the work.

And finally, you constantly deal with new, inexperienced workers, and your good ones leave en masse so work quality and efficiency suffers tremendously.

It became so bad, they tried to further reduce costs like cut back on food, acquired cheaper offices. This is the 21st century mind you, they still have no idea what to do!

People just never learn, short-sighted greed doesn't pay. And that's only the shallowest level. Then we have long term sustainability, not just with people's salaries but with the environment as well. The design of the product can factor in. Most people desire looks over efficiency or having minimal impact to the environment and many business strives to fill that desire for looks, at the cost of heavier impact to the environment.

At the end of the day, it's still about money. If Ford's original low-wage policy ends up making more money instead he would have maintained that policy.
 
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