Earlier today, I published a post titled Americans Have Been Turned Into Peasants – It’s Time to Fight Back. In the hours since, I came across an article in the Washington Post which offers some additional details and graphics on the subject.
Here are a few excerpts from the piece titled, 2015 Was a Terrible Year for the Common Working Man:
By at least one measure, inequality among working men has grown for decades. But, in 2015, it accelerated: The wage gap among men saw its largest single-year increase on record.
Top earners — men who made more than 95 percent of their peers — saw wages last year rise by 9.9 percent, according to an analysis of federal data. Men in the middle — with earnings higher than half their peers — saw a much-smaller 2.6 percent increase.
Now here’s a graphic of the trend:
Meanwhile…
Since 1973, wages among men in the 50th percentile have fallen a total 4.6 percent. Wages for men in the 95th percentile, meanwhile, are up 51.4 percent.
Here’s what that looks like:
This isn’t the outcome of a fairly regulated free market economy. It’s what you get in a rigged economy.
The American public is being used like a cheap suit by the status quo. When will enough be enough?
For related articles, see:
Americans Have Been Turned Into Peasants – It’s Time to Fight Back
Where Does the Real Problem Reside? Two Charts Showing the 0.01% vs. the 1%
New Report from Princeton and Northwestern Proves It: The U.S. is an Oligarchy
Bernie Sanders Passionately Decries the American Oligarchy on the Senate Floor
Portrait of the American Oligarchy – The Very Troubling Income and Wealth Trends Since 1989
When Asked if the U.S. is a Capitalist Democracy or Oligarchy, Janet Yellen Can’t Answer…
In Liberty,
Michael Krieger
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So a group of unassociated/unconnected people got together and said, hey let’s allocate all of the income gains to ourselves and stick it to the people below our income percentile? I have to say as someone in the upper percentile I never got the invite to the meeting where the rigging decision took place. I guess I better go back and read rule book on a how a “fairly regulated free market economy” is suppose to work. Somehow I’m thinking that a “regulated free market” might be an oxymoron. Maybe its time for people like me with an outdated understanding of how a business works, to liquidate our businesses and let equality minded people like yourself put your capital at risk and create the kind of wealth/income sharing engine you think somehow should exist. Just be careful, because the concept of “fair” is a fluid one and you may find yourself eventually on the “unfair” side of things. I do agree the economy is rigged, but not the way you seem to think it is. Its rigged by the government to optimize tax revenue collections by encouraging economic risk taking activity and maintaining stable asset prices. The top income groups essentially pay most of the operational bills at every level of government. The best case for government revenue is for these people to not only make the same as last year but to increase their earnings to meet the growth in government spending. Stable asset prices drive risk taking and allow for these increases to keep happening by making those with capital less apprehensive about investing it. But there is also another side to stable asset prices that has to do with protecting [government] pensions. This is why I know that the Fed will not allow asset prices to fall too much since that will crush government pension funds and destroy the budgets of cities and states that fund them. When the market sinks and stays down, you’ll know the rigging has been undone, but don’t expect the common man to immediately benefit from this. Quite the opposite. Welcome to the progressive model of government. Its a great thing once you understand how it works. lol
I’m sure you didn’t get the invite. I’ve defined oligarch in the past, and it doesn’t = people that have money. It’s far more complicated:
If you’ve read any of my articles over the past several years, you will be well aware of my disdain toward a small group of individuals I refer to as oligarchs, and their destructive influence on America and the world at large. When people hear “oligarch” they probably automatically assume I simply mean billionaires and other extraordinarily wealthy people, but as with most things in life, it’s not that simple.
In a nutshell, while many oligarchs are extremely wealthy (or have access to extreme wealth), not all people with extreme wealth are oligarchs. The term oligarch is reserved for those with extreme wealth who also want to control the political process, policy levers and most other aspects of the lives of the citizenry in a top-down tyrannical and undemocratic manner. They think they know best about pretty much everything, and believe unelected technocrats who share their worldview should be empowered so that they can unilaterally make all of society’s important decisions. The unwashed masses (plebs) in their minds are unnecessary distractions who must to be told what to do. Useless eaters who need to be brainwashed into worshipping the oligarch mindset, or turned into apathetic automatons incapable or unwilling to engage in critical thought. Either outcome is equally acceptable and equally encouraged.
These oligarchs and the centralized institutions they control pose the greatest threat to humanity at this time. I’m not exaggerating in the slightest when I say that the entire balance of the planet depends on their defeat. A world created in their image will be at best a technocratic, fascist dictatorship, and at worst end in a nuclear holocaust.
From the post: Inside the Mind of an Oligarch – Sheldon Adelson Proclaims “I Don’t Like Journalism”
https://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2014/11/10/inside-the-mind-of-an-oligarch-sheldon-adelson-proclaims-i-dont-like-journalism/