[Usagi_yo]

I don’t differentiate the difference between a plumber making $125k a year and a Lawyer making $125k a year. The plumber’s probably ahead of the game because he didn’t spend 6 or 8 years for a post graduate doctorate. Just one has a higher potential than the other. Think buying $5 worth of powerball vs buying $90k worth of powerball lottery tickets. Mainly it’s because those professional fields have been diluted and devalued.

If you approximate an income pyramid, it’s obvious that the top 1% cannot sustain the bottom 20%., but the middle 50% can with +’s and -’s from the remaining 29%. So who does the burden fall the heaviest on? The 50% . That’s just off the cuff pie in the sky examples.

[Zhang Fei]

I don’t differentiate the difference between a plumber making $125k a year and a Lawyer making $125k a year. The plumber’s probably ahead of the game because he didn’t spend 6 or 8 years for a post graduate doctorate. Just one has a higher potential than the other. Think buying $5 worth of powerball vs buying $90k worth of powerball lottery tickets. Mainly it’s because those professional fields have been diluted and devalued. If you approximate an income pyramid, it’s obvious that the top 1% cannot sustain the bottom 20%., but the middle 50% can with +’s and -’s from the remaining 29%. So who does the burden fall the heaviest on? The 50% . That’s just off the cuff pie in the sky examples.

Someone making $125K is not part of the middle 50%, as my earlier link showed. The top 20% of households pays 94% of all federal income taxes.