20 Comments

Yes it’s rigged.

1) Corporations are not people roll that nonsense sauce back now.

2) Get rid of professional corporate lobbyists.

3) Restore campaign finance transparency.

4) implement laws that will remove politicians in any branch, at any level federal, state, or local, caught taking bribes, gifts of more than $200 (yes I’m cheap) in value, engaging in insider trading, or any other kind of financial malfeasance from their offices and bar them from reentering public service ever again.

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Yes, yes it is.

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UBI would be an excellent start. I live in Kansas and would dearly love to have $40,000/year to live on - my Social Security check and a tiny pension gives me just over $2500/month. The only thing that saves me is owning a house - I’d be hurting bigtime if I had to pay rent, especially today’s rents.

And I’m better off than many of my contemporaries, who are scraping by on $1000/month or so. Still, all it would take would be serious illness or health issues - always a concern at my age - to wipe me out completely.

At some point we need to choose between more millionaires/billionaires and a functional society, because it’s looking like that’s going to be our choice.

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Agree completely on a basic income for those making under a certain (rather high) amount. But the qualification process has to be easy, not torturous like food stamps, and should be in addition to other forms of help. Glad to hear you own a home—a lifesaver indeed!

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It has its drawbacks too. My house - purchased in 1998 for $40K - is fast approaching its 100th birthday. It’s old enough they’re not sure exactly when it was built - 1925-1927 is their best guess. Over the last couple of years, the hundred year old sewer line has clogged twice, causing raw sewage to back up in the sink and toilet in my basement. The nearly $20,000 to keep it running properly made a HUGE dent in my savings. (I’ve learned more about plumbing living here than I really wanted to know) $7000 for a new roof a couple of years ago didn’t help either. And there’s still taxes, utilities and insurance that run me $600-800/month. Still, I look at $2000/month rentals here in Kansas City and wonder how people swing it.

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Yes, homes can be a money pit—I learned the hard way that you must have major savings to sink into the home's upkeep! However, my insurance fully covered the installation of a new sewer line and then when I had storm sewer overflow into my basement, they paid me directly to the top level of my policy.

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I used to own a house as well. I researched it in the Registry of Deeds. So far as I can tell, it was built around 1850. So very old. My big ticket item was a septic system. I learned more about septic systems than I ever thought I wanted to know! I had to put it in when I sold the house per Massachusetts law, so that was $40,000 I did not get. My house sat on a creek that was part of the watershed for Hartford, Conn., which is why the system was so costly. After my husband left I had to make all repairs myself or pay someone else to do them. In a house that old something always needed to be repaired. I was totally broke when I finally was able to sell it. But in truth, I miss it. The quiet, the wildlife, the sound of the creek right outside my back door. I do not miss the snow in the winters or the constant dire need for repairs. You need to be somewhat handy to own a house and I was not. I got better, but that’s starting from a baseline of no skills at all. I live in subsidized housing now and I no longer need to fret about doing repairs. It’s an enormous relief.

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Yes yes and yes. When I paid market rate rent two years ago ($1145/month) I got a whopping $249/month in food stamps; then, after a six year wait, I got an affordable unit that isn’t even half the size of the market rate place. I had to get rid of furniture too large for the new place. I tried selling the pieces and had no takers, so ended up giving the largest one to Habitat for Humanity and my grandmother’s treadle sewing machine to one of the friends who helped me move. Now, of course, I have to make up for what I lost in the move because of the downsizing by getting new pieces to replace the built-in linen cabinet, for instance, at a cost to me. My food stamps were cut back to $23/month, which of course buys next to nothing. My life has actually become more precarious. That food stamp benefit allowed me to eat nutritious food. What I currently get lets me eat whimsically, since I find myself often too tired to cook. It’s the stress and anxiety of having to come up with stuff when I feel no inspiration. Luckily I’m a good cook and can basically make something out of very little, but I am not a magician; I can’t make anything out of nothing. My building has a Target in the ground floor. I’ve taken to buying a lot of stuff there. They are fairly cheap, if limited. The only way I “make do” is by juggling the two charge accounts I allow myself to have, one of them being PayPal☹️.

I worked hard all my life and it boggles my mind that I’ve become so impoverished now that I’m really old. I couldn’t find a job if I looked for it, and my ability to work long hours is nil. So yes, I feel ganged up on by “the system.”

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Wow. I'm sorry about your financial situation! Food stamps and additional money from a health insurance advantage plan (Medicare and Medicaid combo) allows me enough food money to eat well.

A question: Were your food stamps reduced because you got a rent-subsidized apartment?

Thanks for your comment!

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Yes. The government gives and the government takes away. No one escapes.

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🥰🥰🥰

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I believe our political leaders on both sides of the aisle are woefully out of touch with what’s happening with everyday Americans on the ground. Honestly, it’s the worst I’ve seen it in my lifetime.

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Yes, I agree. But the research I have done shows that it is by far the Republicans who have no clue what it is like to live with little money and how much federal programs like food stamps and rent subsidies help.

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So true Joan. In fact, you reminded me of this article I wrote last year. Let me know your thoughts.

https://blackbooksblackminds.substack.com/p/chicagos-long-standing-housing-plight?utm_source=publication-search

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I will—thanks for sharing it.

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Yes. Here’s what I would do:

1. Ban involuntary layoffs for federal contractors, and tax stock buybacks at 10%.

2. Use the revenue to fund more antitrust enforcement, and an aid bank within the SBA for employee-owned firms and co-ops. Require that cooperatives get first priority in federal contracting.

3. Raise corporate income tax to 30% (with younger firms exempt), and impose surtaxes on CEO pay if its ratio to entry-level pay is more than 20:1. Use the revenue on demogrants/KIDSAVE/baby bonds, plus item 8.

4. Repeal Taft-Hartley and reform the Wagner Act to allow sectoral bargaining.

5. Streamline occupational licensing rules and ban noncompete agreements and related activities.

6. Get Congress to charter 50 new public research universities in high-poverty rural areas, paid for by revoking certain private university tax exemptions.

7. Impose a 2% land value tax, and use it to fund building 10 million new public housing units and aid to community land trusts.

8. Promote a desegregation agenda that allows for universal child care and health care to reach rich and poor alike. It would likely involve restructuring the welfare state away from predominantly tax credits, to be both administratively simpler and better at tackling the root causes of poverty.

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Sound like good and well-thought out suggestions to me.

One question about No.8: How is the current "welfare state" structured predominately around tax credits/?

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I might have oversimplified here. Some welfare programs are direct benefits (e.g. TANF, SSI, SNAP), albeit underfunded to deal with the root causes of poverty. From my perspective, however, most of the mainstream discourse around wealth redistribution emphasizes increasing the earned income tax credit and child tax credit, as well as health insurance credits under the ACA and employer sponsorship (Vice President Harris’ platform being a prime example of this).

The major weakness is that due to their nature (one has to apply for them once a year at tax season) and to poor promotion from the IRS, their effectiveness is limited compared to their potential. See https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/project/now-is-the-time-for-an-american-child-benefit/

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Thanks—good point.

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Yes.

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