Wealth Distribution and Poverty in America

This year, more than any other, there has been significant agreement that our tax system is not fair, that the rich take advantage over the poor, and that the poor in America are more needy than ever. Despite the apparent unanimity of thought in these areas, the facts seem to be quite different.

For example, the bottom 1/5 of all households has had a surprising upward mobility, while those with the largest wealth trended downward and this information has been provided from what one would believe is an objective source: the Treasury Department and the IRS.

The IRS reported that nearly 58 percent of the households that were in the lowest 20 percent (lowest quintile) in 1996 moved to a higher income quintile by 2005. Similarly, nearly 50 percent of the households in the second lowest quintile in 1996 moved to a higher income quintile by 2005. The Treasury study also documented that more than 57 percent of the richest 1 percent of households in 1996 fell out of that category by 2005. Similarly, more than 45 percent of the households having the top 5 percent of income in 1996 fell out of that category by 2005. The main point is that, over time, a significant number of poorer households move to higher positions along the income distribution and a significant number of high income household move to lower positions along the income distribution.

Also, the question of “fairness in taxation” is one where there seems to be agreement that there is little fairness. However, in the US the top 1% of all payers, who earn about 20% of total income, pay about 40% of our taxes while the botton 2/3 pay 8%. So, on average (if you divide 40% by 8% and multiply the result by 66), the wealthiest pay on average more than 300 times the taxes of the average person in the lowest two thirds of the population. Doesn’t this seem fairer enough? Or should the top 1% pay on average 1000 times the taxes of the bottom 2/3.

In addition, the US has the most generous people on earth and more than ½ of the world’s charitable contributions are donated by US citizens which give $300 billion yearly for charity. Also, our welfare system for our governments spend over $400 billion yearly for welfare. How much more do you think is needed by the poor to accomplish our goals? Perhaps a government that was more efficient and responsible could utilize our tax monies with better success?

Meanwhile, over 40% of all poor households own their own houses (that average 3 bedrooms, one and half baths, a garage and a porch or patio); 75% have air conditioning; less than 10% of poor households are overcrowed (the typical poor American has more living space than the average person in Paris or London); 75% own a car (and 30% own more than one car); almost everyone owns a color television (and over half own 2 or more televisions); over 75% have a VCR or DVD and more than half have cable or satillite TV reception. In other words the poor are not sleeping in tent cities or similar circumstances in the US.

This information is meant to be factual and not political. It appears that we already have a significant movement toward fairness in taxation and, by most standards, the poorest in the US, while not thriving, already receive a great deal of support.

You said — I am the author to this article and I did not contribute any money to the Obama campaign.

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Well, it would have made things a lot clearer, then..., if you had simply said you were the author. The way it’s indicated at the top of the post (and also with the same name at the end of the post), it says that “Stephen Einhorn” is the author.

Now, when looking that up (and since it was not indicated that you were the author) — that name, on the web, shows a contribution to Obama and to the Democrats, in the amount of $5,300.

That’s documented on the web.

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And then you said — I am suspicious of you because of the inaccuracies of your Post and suspect that you are a plant from the FAR LEFT or the Obama Administration -—but I would hope that my suspicion is incorrect.

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I don’t see any inaccuracies in my posts to you. I said there was no link, and indeed there is none (as you never indicated that you were the author).

I said the material did not exist anywhere else on the web, and indeed, it does not.

I said that Stephen Einhorn contributed $5,300 to Obama and the Democrats, and indeed, he did.

There are no inaccuracies in those posts....

Following up, again, on the other parts of your statement...

You said — The primary sources for information on this article on Poverty were the Heritage Foundation (see No.1713 of January 5, 2005) article called Understanding Poverty in America by Robert Rector and Kirk Johnson and “household income in the USA” in Wikipedia which identifies all of the primary sources for their work.

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You know, in case you haven’t been posting here very much, the way people do things on Free Republic, is that they give the links for the material that they are citing.

For example, you mention that source material. All that is necessary to do is simply “source it”... like...

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Welfare/bg1713.cfm

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I guess you’re just not familiar with posting very much on Free Republic...

It would have been easy to have simply labeled this as a “vanity”, saying that you’re the author and you took the information from “such and such” source material, provide the link and that’s it.

Then it would have all been very clear and it would have avoided the “20 questions”... LOL...

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However, I would still like to know what Stephen Einhorn has to do with this and why he gave $5,300 to the Democrats....??

Comments to you:

1. You are absolutely correct that somewhere there is a Stephen Einhorn who contributed to the Obama campaign. However, it was not this Stephen Einhorn. So, either stop writing the fiction that I contributed to the Obama campaign or verify that it is ME that contributed the money.

2. If there is any specific information or facts that I presented which are inaccurate, then please point them out.
It is a fact that I did write this article and that it was based on information from the IRS, the Treasury and the Heritage Foundation. So you can just stop the innuendo and concentrate on the facts.

Can you point out any fact that I presented in my article that was incorrect? I doubt it....

Steve

PS What if some Steve Einhorn somewhere donated money to Obama. Whatdoes that have to do with the accuracy of my posting? My posting basically says that any further redistribution of wealth —by Obama (who wants to achieve this) or anyone else — is not necessary..

You said — So, either stop writing the fiction that I contributed to the Obama campaign or verify that it is ME that contributed the money.

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Well.., it seems that you’re not reading/comprehending very well — or — posting very well... LOL... You don’t have dyslexia do you?

You won’t find a comment by me that says you contributed to the Obama campaign. What you will find me posting is that Stephen Einhorn posted to the Obama campaign....

And since you don’t seem to know how to construct your posts, you might make it clear (that is..., only *if* you want to; but most *do not*) that *you* are Stephen Einhorn (if that is indeed the fact and *if* you wish to say so, but you don’t have to). All that matters here is that you post under the pseudonym of “astudent”. And when I’ve posted to *you* — I’ve posted to “astudent”.

When I’ve said something about “Stephen Einhorn” (whomever that is, as I actually have no idea who that guy is... other than his campaign contributions to Obama...) — I’ve also documented the stuff about Stephen Einhorn...

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And then you said — . If there is any specific information or facts that I presented which are inaccurate, then please point them out.

It is a fact that I did write this article and that it was based on information from the IRS, the Treasury and the Heritage Foundation. So you can just stop the innuendo and concentrate on the facts.

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Well, you do seem to have a bit of trouble comprehending things. You’ll notice that my first comment was *Where is the link?*.... LOL... You post an “article” and provide no link to verify the article was on the web *somewhere* and so..., failed to reference it with that link. You’ll notice that there is a “link” space provided in the posting form on Free Republic.

Since you *failed* to post this as a *VANITY* — then the only other assumption is that this is an article posted somewhere on the net that you’ve *failed* to provide the link for. And in addition to that, you provided some supposed “author” of the article, in both the form that you filled out when posting it (instead of indicating it was from “astudent”... LOL...) plus indicating the supposed author at the bottom of the article itself...

If you had posted as a *VANITY* and had placed the “name” of the author as “astudent” — then no one would have been questioning anything about the source of the article, because *then* it would be apparent that you, as the poster, were “spouting off” out of your own mouth....

So, the *facts* are — seemingly — you have no idea how to post stuff here... :-)

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And then you said — Can you point out any fact that I presented in my article that was incorrect? I doubt it....

Ummmm..., where did I state that something was incorrect in your article. I hadn’t even gotten as far as that part of it, yet. I was trying to find out where the article was posted on the Internet, and who the author was, since you failed to mention you were posting a *VANITY* ... LOL...

All I’ve been doing is trying to document where this supposed “article” came from, since it *finally* becomes apparent *now* that you posted as — “astudent” — but indicated that the author was some guy named “Stephen Einhorn” (whoever that is... other than an Obama contributor...).

I hope you’ve finally learned how to post a *VANITY* now... :-) — so we all know when *you* are “spouting off” versus us reading a legitimate article from some other source on the Internet...

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