Tuesday, April 08, 2014

Let's make a change

1. U.S. Wealth Up $34 Trillion Since Recession. 93% of You Got Almost None of It.
That's an average of $100,000 for every American. But the people who already own most of the stocks took almost all of it. For them, the average gain was well over a million dollars -- tax-free as long as they don't cash it in.

2. Eight Rich Americans (the four Waltons, the two Kochs, Bill Gates, and Warren) Made More Than 3.6 Million Minimum Wage Workers. A recent report stated that no full-time minimum wage worker in the U.S. can afford a one-bedroom or two-bedroom rental at fair market rent.

3. The hype about the "self-made man" is fantasy like the admission of Steve Jobs: "We have always been shameless about stealing great ideas."

4. Three separate studies have shown that corporations pay less than half of their required state taxes, which are the main source of K-12 educational funding and a significant part of pension funding. The percentage of corporate profits paid as state income taxes has dropped from 7 percent in 1980 to about 3 percent today.

5. Citigroup had 42% of its 2011-13 revenue in North America (almost all U.S.) and made $32 billion in profits, but received a U.S. current income tax benefit all three years. Pfizer had 40% of its 2011-13 revenues and nearly half of its physical assets in the U.S., but declared almost $10 billion in U.S. losses to go along with nearly $50 billion in foreign profits. In 2013 Exxon had about 43% of management, 36% of sales, 40% of long-lived assets, and 70-90% of its productive oil and gas wells in the U.S., yet only paid about 2 percent of its total income in U.S. income taxes, and most of that was something called a "theoretical" tax.

6. The minimum wage for tipped workers such as restaurant workers has been approximately $2 an hour since the 1980s. 40 percent of these workers are people of color, and about two-thirds are women.

Why is anyone surprised? This has been going on for centuries. Look, if you have a social system that is based on self interest, social stratification (classes and hierarchy), competition, scarcity and corruption, what are you expecting to happen? And the root of all these negative aspects? CAPITALISM and MONEY. We need to get rid of this profit system. We can provide abundance for everyone, and eliminate the use of money. It can be done you know. Technology today, with an infrastructure updated to said technology, could easily do this. We could easily end the concept of scarcity.

Taken from here

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