First, Trump is president; whether he is “accepted” or not is irrelevant. I did not vote for him. He has demonstrated numerous times that he does not have my best interests at heart. By completely ignoring the concerns, desires, and needs of more than half the nation, he has demonstrated that he himself has not accepted all Americans as his constituency.
Consider all the following factors:
- Unemployment at its lowest since late 2000, 4.1%
2. This article is a bit dated (October, 2014), but I haven’t seen any different studies since then. “According to the BLS, the average hourly wage for non-management private-sector workers last month was $20.67, unchanged from August and 2.3% above the average wage a year earlier. That’s not much, especially when compared with the pre-Great Recession years of 2006 and 2007, when the average hourly wage often increased by around 4% year-over-year. (During the high-inflation years of the 1970s and early 1980s, average wages commonly jumped 8%, 9% or even more year-over-year.)
“But after adjusting for inflation, today’s average hourly wage has just about the same purchasing power as it did in 1979, following a long slide in the 1980s and early 1990s and bumpy, inconsistent growth since then. In fact, in real terms the average wage peaked more than 40 years ago: The $4.03-an-hour rate recorded in January 1973 has the same purchasing power as $22.41 would today.” (For most workers, real wages have barely budged for decades)
“Adjusted for inflation, the federal minimum wage is worth less than 50 years ago: Despite periodic increases, the buying power of the federal minimum wage hasn’t kept up with inflation, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data show that in 1968, the federal minimum was equivalent to $10.90 in 2015 dollars, nearly $4 higher than today’s rate.” (Adjusted for inflation, the federal minimum wage is worth less than 50 years ago)
3. The pay gap between company bigwigs and ordinary working stiffs: In 1965, it was 20–1; 1989, 59–1. Today, “CEOs at the largest U.S. firms now make 271 times more than the average worker, according to calculations by the Economic Policy Institute for 2016 salary numbers.” (emphasis mine) (What the CEOs of Google, CBS and others have in common: They make 271 times more than most people)
4. Our corporate tax rate, 35%, is the highest in the world. True. And irrelevant. “According to the Tax Foundation, the average top corporate rate is 22.5%, across 188 countries (including the U.S.). So, on the surface it would seem that our corporations are more heavily taxed, but that 35% is the statutory tax rate; “What the U.S. Government Accountability Office found in a 2016 study is that the effective tax rate — the amount paid in taxes relative to taxable income — is far lower. The study examined the tax years of 2006 through 2012. (Remember that this included the worst of the Great Recession, so total revenues were down, though that shouldn’t necessarily affect tax percentages.) Below is a graph of the results.
“In any one of these years, at least two-thirds (between 67% and 72%) of all active corporations had zero tax liability after credits. The peak came at the end of the recession, but in 2012, it was still 70.1%. Moreover, the low of 67% happened in 2006, beforethe financial meltdown set in.” (Trump’s Corporate Tax Slash Ignores How Little Companies Already Pay)
5. Corporate profit taxes
6. Corporate profits after tax
What have we got?
- The lowest unemployment rate in 7 years.
- Stagnant wages. Americans haven’t seen a real “raise” in 40 years.
- CEOs and executives, however, have increased earnings by “an order of magnitude”. In the same period average Americans got no raise, executive earnings rose 250%.
- Corporate taxes, while “high” on paper, are zero for 70%; it is much less than the statutory 35% for the rest.
- Taxes on corporate earnings (that are ever taxed) have dropped consistentlysince the 1950s, while at the same time…
- Corporate profits have consistently risen to record levels.
ALL of this is before the Republicans’ new tax plan: Record profits for corporations; record incomes for the wealthy; NO MATTER WHAT THE TAX RATE HAS BEEN, the rich have gotten unfathomable richer and corporations have earned unfathomable amounts of money (THREE men, not three percent, but THREE INDIVIDUAL MEN, now own more wealth than the bottom 161,000,000 people in America!).
My question, Republicans, is this: Exactly when are we supposed to see wages go up? Exactly when are we supposed to see the higher paying jobs? Exactly when is all that gelt going to start running over the edges of the cups of the wealthy, and “trickle down” to the lowly, average US who are working our asses off to earn rich people more money?
Donald Trump is THE president. He will be MY president when wages, real buying power for average Americans, rise to the same level as earnings and wealth for the top 1%. When the Burger King girl makes $40 an hour and lives in a decent house with the healthcare she and her family needs, Donald Trump will be my president.
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