The Rich Get Richer - Not

Politicians lie. The media misinforms. Not exactly a surprise, but when a particular theme is repeated over and over, some people eventually take it as gospel.

“The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly - it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.”

 Joseph Goebbels

A good example of this is the 'evil 1%' message currently being parroted by liberals and the media: "They get richer while everyone else gets poorer;" "They don't pay their fare share."

The only problem is none of that is true.

Myth #1 - They get richer while everyone else gets poorer.

Fact - The rich have gotten poorer much faster than anyone else.

The total income of the top 1% - or those earning more than $343,000 - fell by more than 30% from 2007, according to the most recent Internal Revenue Service data. By contrast, the average income of the bottom 90% fell less than 3% during the same period.

Subsumed in Myth #1 is the notion of an inequality gap - the gap between the rich and the poor - that not only is large, but growing. Again, however, the facts do not bear this out.

... the most recent data from the IRS and Federal Reserve show that income inequality was lower in 2009 (the latest period available) than it was in 1995. The top 1% of earners held 16.93% of the nation’s income in 2009. In 1998, their share was 18.47%.

An interesting side note to the inequality gap is that most Americans don't see it as a problem, despite what the politicians and pundits would have us believe.

According to a recent Gallup poll, 52% of Americans say the rich-poor gap is “an acceptable part of our economic system.” A slightly lower 45% said the gap “needs to be fixed.”

The survey found that Americans prefer growth over a reduction in inequality. Some 82% said growth was either “extremely” or “very” important; only 46% said “reducing the income and wealth gap between rich and poor” was “extremely” or “very” important.

The poll goes on to note that "Americans are less concerned about inequality now than they were in 1998."

Myth #2 - They don't pay their fair share.

Fact - the rich pay more taxes proportional to income than any other group.

... the infamous top 1% – those earning over $380,354 – paid 38.02 percent of federal income taxes... Meanwhile, the bottom 50 percent of income earners – the group that, according to the liberal world view, is subsidizing tax handouts to the wealthy – shouldered just 2.7 percent of the federal income tax burden.

The top 1 percent ... earned 20 percent of the nation's adjusted gross income – yet their share of the tax burden was nearly twice that (over 38%). Meanwhile, the bottom 50 percent earned 12.75 percent of the nation's income, while their share of the tax burden was about one-fifth of that. You can see this demonstrated in the chart below.

Furthermore, the tax burden shouldered by the rich has remained essentially level over the past decade, even as tax rates went down as a result of the Bush tax cuts. So much for tax cuts that favor the rich.

... the distribution of the tax burden across income levels was roughly similar in 2000 – the last year of the Clinton tax rates – than it was in 2008, after the Bush rates had been effect for years. In fact, the rich paid a slightly higher share in 2008.

So the facts show that the income of the wealthiest 1% has dropped more than any other group, the inequality gap has shrunk, and the wealthiest 1% pay proportionally more in taxes than any other group. Yet obama and his drones, aided and abetted by the blathering sycophants in the media,  continue their class warfare campaign in a shameless attempt to impose their socialist agenda on the rest of us.

 

In the interest of full disclosure, I am not part of the 1%. Not even close. But I hope to be some day. And I don't believe in punishing people for being successful.

I guess that means I can't be a liberal...