Tuesday, March 13, 2012

The Widening Wealth Divide, and Why We Need a Surtax on the Super Wealthy

Let Santorum and Romney duke it out for who will cut taxes on the wealthy the most and shred the public services everyone else depends on.

The rest of us ought to be having a serious discussion about a wealth tax. Because if you really want to know what’s happening to the American economy you need to look at household wealth — not just incomes.

The Fed just reported that household wealth increased from October through December. That’s the first gain in three quarters.

Good news? Take closer look. The entire gain came from increases in stock prices. Those increases in stock values more than made up for continued losses in home values.

But the vast majority of Americans don’t have their wealth in the stock market. Over 90 percent of the nation’s financial assets – including stocks and pension-fund holdings – are owned by the richest 10 percent of Americans. The top 1 percent owns 38 percent. Read more.....

2 comments:

  1. Oh great, they just become citizens of Switzerland or another country that does not punish them so away goes the taxes that they are paying.This class envy stuff has to stop.

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  2. I agree if we tax the wealthy enough we will drive them away and then we can collapse this mess and start over with that lesson fresh in our mind. More free stuff!! We want MORE FREE STUFF!! Tax the wealthy and give us more free stuff or we will riot and kill people in the streets... again!

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