The Best Remedy for Income Inequality: Get Married

The most significant difference between the rich and the poor in America is that the rich mostly come from intact families and the poor come from single parent families. Census Bureau data indicated that in 2012, in families headed by two married parents, just 7.5% lived in poverty. By contrast, when families are headed by a single mother the poverty level jumps to 33.9%.

Unfortunately, the number of children raised in female-headed families is growing in America. A 2012 study by the Heritage Foundation found that 28.6% of children born to a white mother were out of wedlock. For Hispanics, the figure was 52.5%, and for African-Americans 72.3%. In 1964 when the war on poverty began, almost everyone was born in a family with two married parents: only 7% were not. These figures explain why our problems with poverty are so prevalent: Children born in intact families have an easier time becoming educated, wealthy, and successful than children reared by one parent.

The Heritage Foundation has reported that among white married couples, the poverty rate in 2009 was 3.2%; for white non-married families the rate was 22%. Among black married couples, the poverty rate was only 7%, but the rate for non-married black families was 35.6%.

Redistributing money will not solve the problem of poverty in America. If it would, then we would have seen poverty disappear from our country since the war on poverty began in 1964. Welfare/redistribution policies in the United States have spent $20.7 trillion in 2011 dollars since 1964. As can be seen above, the results have been abysmal.

Politicians such as President Obama, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and New York City’s new mayor, Bill de Blasio believe that the income gap can be closed by increasing taxes on wealthy Americans and transferring the money to the poor. America already has an extremely progressive income tax situation (That means that as one’s income increases, the percentage of money going to taxes increases, too.). According to the Congressional Budget Office, the top 40% of wage earners, those who make more than $51,100/year paid 86.4% of all federal taxes in 2010. The bottom 40% of earners paid only 4.2% of taxes. Many people in the bottom 40% of earners even received money back from the government by “refunds” for money they had never paid in the first place. This happens because of the earned income tax credit and other public assistance programs.

What United States citizens need to do in order to remedy the poverty problem in our country is the stay in school and get married—after that, they should have children. Our national problem is the breakdown of the family, not money-grabbing rich people.

(This blog post was redacted from the Wall Street Journal of 1/13/14, page A15.)

The Politics of “Income Inequality.”

We hear a lot, these days, about income inequality. That is the mantra of the liberal who seeks equal outcome for everyone. But…I wonder how sincere this wish really is.

Let’s look at the different types of governments and different models of society throughout history. There can be little doubt that the more leftward a society leans, the more the poor suffer. Is there any doubt that even if you are poor, it is far better to be poor in a free market democracy like the US instead of the old Soviet Union, Cuba, or Vietnam? Isn’t it interesting to see how, in more modern times, places like China experience tremendous economic growth through the embrace of capitalistic policies (the same that made America a superpower)? At the same time, we are seeing liberal Democrats in America embrace some of the same policies that led to hundreds of millions of Chinese, Cubans, and Vietnamese living in huts on less than a dollar a day!

I wonder, would today’s liberals claim that those with special skills should not be paid more than those without those skills. Take for an example, would liberals like President Obama or Al Gore or Bill Clinton give their millions of dollars to the poor or would they refuse to work for a low salary or income level in order to equalize their money resources with a day laborer. This is a nonsense question. Nobody thinks that income equalization at that level would be a good idea. It is necessary for those with special skills and abilities to be paid more than others.

But, a not-so-nonsensical question is this. If these wealthy liberals do not wish to give away their wealth, why should Joe Middleclass be asked to give his income away in a governmental redistribution scheme?

In order to assess the needs of the poor in America, we need to look at their economic situation straight in the eye. Being a “poor” American is not nearly as bad as you might think. More than 80 percent of poor Americans have cell phones, televisions, and refrigerators. Most also own a motor vehicle and have more living space than the average European. On top of all this, immigrants from all over the world still want to come here for a chance at a better life. This would not be happening if “poor” Americans were living in squalor.

One wonders if liberals and their obsessions about income inequality are really only making themselves feel good. Or…are they appealing to low information voters who think that these policies will have some real effects. I suspect that the liberal cry for income equality is an appeal for votes to those on government welfare who may not be particularly interested in bettering themselves.

I think a much better way to address the problem of income inequality is to stimulate business by eliminating today’s onerous regulations and tax burdens. Let business go—it has been an efficient engine for job creation in the past; and it can produce the jobs needed to equalize income better than government redistribution programs.

(This blog post was redacted from downtrend.com 1/5/14.)

Is Marijuana Harmless? Don’t Kid Yourself.

We hear a lot, these days, about Colorado’s “experiment” with recreational marijuana. I think Colorado will be sorry some day that the state ever tried such a foolish “experiment.” According to Mitchell Rosenthal, the founder of the substance-abuse and treatment organization, Phoenix House, marijuana damages the heart and lungs and is a cause of anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, and psychotic episodes. In addition to all that, researchers at Northwestern University’s School of Medicine found that marijuana causes lasting changes in “working memory,” brain structures critical to memory and reasoning. A source of ready recall for basic information, like telephone numbers and solutions to everyday problems, working memory is also a strong predictor of academic achievement.

Recreational marijuana use has important social implications, too. A 2004 study of seriously injured drivers in Maryland found half the teens tested positive for marijuana.

All of us can remember that for decades and even hundreds of years, the use of tobacco for smoking was considered a harmless recreational practice. Finally, it was learned that tobacco use causes multiple kinds of cancer, chronic obstructive lung disease, and—most importantly—a remarkable increase in heart attacks. Who, among thinking people, would ever believe that inhaling noxious marijuana smoke could be harmless. We should use common sense rather than the misguided advice of the potheads among us to help us dispose of this major public health hazard.

Conservatives Need to Reevaluate Thinking about Food Stamp Participation

Conservatives tend to think that the food stamp program is a wasteful government welfare program given to lazy and deliberately nonproductive people. But I think that mindset needs to be modified.

Currently, 47,637,407 people in America are receiving government aid in the form of food stamps. Participation in the food stamp program increased by 955,574 from July 2012 to July 2013, but over the past year, participation has remained fairly stable—monthly numbers of participants has vibrated up and down slightly. About one in seven people in the U.S. receive food stamps. The receipt of food stamps has gradually increased since its low point of 16.9 million in the year 2000 http://frac.org/reports-and-resources/snapfood-stamp-monthly-participation-data/. Admittedly, this high usage of food stamps among our people is alarming; but it must be pointed out that the number of unemployed and underemployed in our society is about the same number as the number of people on food stamps, i.e., one person in seven. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) Clearly, food stamps seem to be going to those among us who really cannot afford to buy adequate food for their families.

Forty-seven percent of food stamp recipients are children, and 26% are adults living with those children. Income for the typical family with children on food stamps stands at 57% of the poverty line—about $10,875 for a 3-person family. Ninety-one percent of food stamp dollars goes to families living below the poverty line.

The reason for the increase in food stamp distribution is that our population has a lot more poor people now. Five years ago, 11.3% of the population was living below the poverty line; now 15% live at that low-income level. According to the Census Bureau, there are 2.9 million more poor individuals today than in 2009. The number of households with income below $25,000 has increased by 3 million since 2009.

One legitimate case conservatives have for their complaint about food stamps is that the number of able-bodied adults without dependents receiving benefits under the food-stamp program has risen to nearly 5.5 million from under 2 million since 2008. Since 2008, work requirements for these individuals have been relaxed. The federal government should reconsider the waivers of current requirements it has extended to many concerning the criteria for receiving food stamps.   

The observed increase in yearly participation numbers demonstrates that food stamps continue to be an important nutritional safety net for people all over the country, especially as unemployment and underemployment rates remain high. The disagreement between liberals and conservatives seems to be about the extent of our collective obligation to the least fortunate Americans and what is the best way to answer their needs.

Although I am an advocate for helping people out of a difficult situation, I do think that the food stamp program has reached an excessive state of liberal distribution. I believe that the free access to food stamps is now contributing to prolonged unemployment. This free government support in food stamps and prolonged payment of unemployment benefits is causing welfare dependency, which eats away at the heart of American bread winners.

It is my recommendation that the food stamp distribution program should be modified. I believe that we all should write our Congressmen and Senators to encourage them to increase the work requirements for those recipients who are able-bodied and without children. Some end to free distribution of food stamps must happen, or else our people will continue to increase in their government/welfare dependency.

(Much of this blog post was redacted from the Wall Street Journal of 11/6/13, page A13.)

Speak Softly and Carry a Small Stick

Today, we are seeing the preeminent power of the United States deteriorate and disappear in wide swaths of the world. We are observing President Obama walk away and shrink from responsibility for effective foreign relations in Eastern Europe, Egypt, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Russia, and Iran. Now, he is refusing to take a public stand in favor of the European Union supporters in Ukraine. He is taking this weak-kneed stand by effectively dismantling our military establishment, as documented by John Lehman in the Wall Street Journal editorial, More Bureaucrats, Fewer Jets and Ships of 12/10/13. During the Reagan years, our navy had 600 ships afloat—today, there are 280. The Air Force has fewer than half the number of fighters and bombers it had 30 years ago. Air Force fighter planes today are, on average, 28 years old. Instead of the 20-division army supported by the United States during President Reagan’s administration, we have only 10 now.

Our President thinks he can control worldwide terrorism and naked aggression against our Middle Eastern allies with diplomacy. He is ignoring the classic aphorism that diplomatic power is the shadow cast by military power.

President Reagan’s legacy for the time he was in office included his facing down the Soviet Union and breaking apart the Berlin wall. He demonstrated that a race for military power need not result in a destructive use of that power. The Soviets backed down because they feared the obvious catastrophe that would consume them if they tried to challenge the United States. Thus, diplomacy backed by the Big Stick mentioned first by President Theodore Roosevelt, was the driving power in saving the world from a conflagration of violence and disorder perpetrated by a rogue nation bent on conquest.

When Jimmy Carter was President, he watched and tried diplomacy to get Libya to quit bombing passenger planes over the Mediterranean. He got no place with that policy. Soon, Ronald Reagan succeeded him in office. One of the first things that Reagan did was to send fighter/bombers over Libya and drop a bomb on a munitions plant in Libya. The trouble with hijacked planes over the Mediterranean quit immediately. Diplomacy without military back-up is a waste of time.

The world has seen timidity like that of President Obama demonstrated before. Prior to World War II, the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, tried to placate and appease the Nazi’s at Munich in 1938. The result was disaster, as Germany marched directly into Czechoslovakia and Poland and subsequently attacked the low countries, Russia, France, and Great Britain, herself. Appeasement does not work with tyrants.

Clement Atlee succeeded Winston Churchill as Britain’s Prime Minister in July 1945 and proceeded to dismantle the strategic and imperial inheritance of world power ceded to him by his successor. Under Atlee’s guidance, the British Empire divested itself of its hegemony over its colonies in India, Burma, and Ceylon; and he reduced the British presence in Egypt, Iran, Turkey Greece, and Southeast Asia. British bases in the Mediterranean and the East Indies were considered obsolete; and they were decommissioned. Atlee’s legacy was a weakened British presence in the world. Britain has never regained her former influence and power in the world.

President Obama seems extremely interested in leaving a good and lasting legacy to America when he is out of power. His legacy seems to be a markedly weakened United States abroad (and a confused health care system at home).  

Foreign Policy, Obama’s Weakest Point

Ever since he was elected, I have considered President Obama’s weakest point of policy making to be his foreign policy. Today, we are seeing that fear becoming manifest.

He has placated the Iranians and given empty promises of attaining peace in the Middle East by appeasement of that regime’s tactic of lying about their faithless peace desires. He has given a pass to Bashar Assad’s tyranny in Syria. He has abdicated the American gains in Iraq and given our Middle Eastern allies cause to distrust us and to know for sure that he will never back up any of his promises, e.g., the “red line” about chemical weapons in Syria. (I’ll bet the Iranians and the Assad regime are still laughing about that one!)

He must admit that Iran has been hostile to U.S. interests in the Middle East. And he must also admit that Iran has done its best to frustrate the war in Iraq and that that country has proclaimed a fierce ideological war against Israel’s place as a state. President Obama’s response to these undisputable facts is to point the blame to his predecessors. 

To make matters worse, during the first summer of his presidency, he remained aloof in the vacuum of his own ideas concerning the uprising in Iran of the brave advocates of government overthrow in Iran in the form of the Green Movement. He gave that very significant uprising no moral support of any kind. Supposedly, he was hoping that his abstention from the movement would induce the Iranian government to quit producing nuclear weapons. Of course, the regime did not do anything of the kind—the centrifuges kept spinning! On top of this, the world can see Iran continuing its support of the Assad regime and Hezbollah in Beirut. (All this without significant American protest.)

President Obama has artfully isolated the chemical weapons being used to kill civilian citizens of Syria from the larger issue that the government is using all other kinds of killing devices to destroy its civil enemies. He has also isolated the nuclear bomb issue in Iran from the obvious pain that sanctions are having on the Iranian people. He absolutely refuses to see the bigger picture of what is going on in the Middle East.

All the feckless dithering President Obama is doing in the Middle East is alarming our allies in the region. Israel is rightly afraid they will have to attack Iran just to prevent being vaporized by nuclear weapons—and all this without American support. Obama’s attitude toward the situation in the Middle East has produced a feeling of abandonment among our allies in the region, i.e., Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

 
President Obama, despite his winsome ways at the podium, is not fooling anyone. Middle Easterners have taken the full measure of this president. They know he will not back up any of his promises; they know that he is desperately trying to get out of the Middle East at any cost. They are alone in the world with the most powerful force on earth sitting on its hands in helpless repose, just hoping for a miracle. WE NEED A LEADER!

What Was the Theory Behind the Affordable Care Act?

We are being saturated with information and propaganda these days about the Affordable Care Act, i.e., ObamaCare. But I, for one was not clear on exactly what was the thinking and the theoretical provisions of this recent piece of legislation that is planned to take over one sixth of our economy. For this reason, I am electing to review its essential features for my readers.

We are aware of the fact that about 47 million Americans are without health insurance. Many of those are young and healthy adults who do not want insurance. They do not seem to realize a need in that area. Nevertheless, this group does need health care from time to time; and the cost of treating them falls on hospitals and on those of us who buy insurance. Additionally, health care costs have been increasing more rapidly than the rate of inflation for many years. Everyone, both conservatives and liberals, understand this problem and seek a remedy.

The Affordable Care Act, (ACA) was designed to bring these 47 million Americans under insurance protection and to distribute health care costs throughout the population. But…how to pay for their protection—that is the question. Democrats devised a system they thought would pay the bill for health care coverage. It ran as follows:

1)      Money would be taken from Medicare and put into the funding for the ACA. $716 billion is to be taken from Medicare spending over the coming 10 years and used to fund the ACA. Concurrently with spending Medicare money on the ACA, spending reductions in Medicare reimbursement schedule for procedures will be legislatively decreased. This will mean that doctors and hospitals will receive less money for their work and for procedures that they do, which were formerly covered by Medicare.

2)      Increased money is to be raised from higher taxes charged to medical devise manufacture and to pharmaceutical and health insurance companies.

3)      Penalty money will be collected from young persons who refuse to buy insurance through ObamaCare exchanges.

4)      Increased income taxes will be levied on the wealthy, i.e., those with annual income >$200,000.

5)      Monthly premium payments from young and healthy persons will more than pay for their own care; and the overage will be used to pay for more expensive, older, and sicker people.

Democrats believe that this increasing money stream will more than pay the cost of insuring the 47 million people.  They even believe that there will be a surplus of money which can be used to decrease federal budget deficits. They believe that our country will be better off financially with ObamaCare in full operation.

Republicans do not believe that there will be nearly enough money in the kitty to pay for this program. I, personally, think that one major defect in the program will be decreasing participation in Medicare by physicians and hospitals caused by the government’s reduction of payment. I have seen doctors for decades declining Medicare payment schedules because of low payment levels. These lower ObamaCare fee schedules will aggravate that tendency.