The River Wanders...

smallrevolutionary:

questionall:

1. Only THREE PERCENT of the very rich are entrepreneurs.

According to both Marketwatch and economist Edward Wolff, over 90 percent of the assets owned by millionaires are held in a combination of low-risk investments (bonds and cash), personal business accounts, the stock market, and real estate. Only 3.6 percent of taxpayers in the top .1% were classified as entrepreneurs based on 2004 tax returns. A 2009 Kauffman Foundation study found that the great majority of entrepreneurs come from middle-class backgrounds, with less than 1 percent of all entrepreneurs coming from very rich or very poor backgrounds.

2. Only FOUR OUT OF 150 countries have more wealth inequality than us.

In a world listing compiled by a reputable research team (which nevertheless prompted double-checking), the U.S. has greater wealth inequality than every measured country in the world except for Namibia, Zimbabwe, Denmark, and Switzerland.

3. An amount equal to ONE-HALF the GDP is held untaxed overseas by rich Americans.

The Tax Justice Network estimated that between $21 and $32 trillion is hidden offshore, untaxed. With Americans making up 40% of the world’s Ultra High Net Worth Individuals, that’s $8 to $12 trillion in U.S. money stashed in far-off hiding places.

Based on a historical stock market return of 6%, up to $750 billion of income is lost to the U.S. every year, resulting in a tax loss of about $260 billion.

4. Corporations stopped paying HALF OF THEIR TAXES after the recession.

After paying an average of 22.5% from 1987 to 2008, corporations have paid an annual rate of 10% since. This represents a sudden $250 billion annual loss in taxes.

U.S. corporations have shown a pattern of tax reluctance for more than 50 years, despite building their businesses with American research and infrastructure. They’ve passed the responsibility on to their workers. For every dollar of workers’ payroll tax paid in the 1950s, corporations paid three dollars. Now it’s 22 cents.

5. Just TEN Americans made a total of FIFTY BILLION DOLLARS in one year.

That’s enough to pay the salaries of over a million nurses or teachers or emergency responders.

That’s enough, according to 2008 estimates by the Food and Agriculture Organization and the UN’s World Food Program, to feed the 870 million people in the world who are lacking sufficient food.

For the free-market advocates who say “they’ve earned it”: Point #1 above makes it clear how the wealthy make their money.

6. Tax deductions for the rich could pay off 100 PERCENT of the deficit.

Another stat that required a double-check. Based on research by the Tax Policy Center, tax deferrals and deductions and other forms of tax expenditures (tax subsidies from special deductions, exemptions, exclusions, credits, capital gains, and loopholes), which largely benefit the rich, are worth about 7.4% of the GDP, or about $1.1 trillion.

Other sources have estimated that about two-thirds of the annual $850 billion in tax expenditures goes to the top quintile of taxpayers.

7. The average single black or Hispanic woman has about $100 IN NET WORTH.

The Insight Center for Community Economic Development reported that median wealth for black and Hispanic women is a little over $100. That’s much less than one percent of the median wealth for single white women ($41,500).

Other studies confirm the racially-charged economic inequality in our country. For every dollar of NON-HOME wealth owned by white families, people of color have only one cent.

8. Elderly and disabled food stamp recipients get $4.30 A DAY FOR FOOD.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) has dropped significantly over the past 15 years, serving only about a quarter of the families in poverty, and paying less than $400 per month for a family of three for housing and other necessities. Ninety percent of the available benefits go to the elderly, the disabled, or working households.

Food stamp recipients get $4.30 a day.

9. Young adults have lost TWO-THIRDS OF THEIR NET WORTH since 1984.

21- to 35-year-olds: Your median net worth has dropped 68% since 1984. It’s now less than $4,000.

That $4,000 has to pay for student loans that average $27,200. Or, if you’re still in school, for $12,700 in credit card debt.

With an unemployment rate for 16- to 24-year-olds of almost 50%, two out of every five recent college graduates are living with their parents. But your favorite company may be hiring. Apple, which makes a profit of $420,000 per employee, can pay you about $12 per hour.

10. The American public paid about FOUR TRILLION DOLLARS to bail out the banks.

That’s about the same amount of money made by America’s richest 10% in one year. But we all paid for the bailout. And because of it, we lost the opportunity for jobs, mortgage relief, and educational funding.

Bonus for the super-rich: A QUADRILLION DOLLARS in securities trading nets ZERO sales tax revenue for the U.S.

The world derivatives market is estimated to be worth over a quadrillion dollars (a thousand trillion). At least $200 trillion of that is in the United States. In 2011 the Chicago Mercantile Exchange reported a trading volume of over $1 quadrillion on 3.4 billion annual contracts.

A quadrillion dollars. A sales tax of ONE-TENTH OF A PENNY on a quadrillion dollars could pay off the deficit. But the total sales tax was ZERO.

It’s not surprising that the very rich would like to fudge the numbers, as they have the nation.

motherfuckers.

(via bohemianarthouse)

sinidentidades:

It’s been four long years for Francisco Reynoso. The California gardener whose son died in a car accident in 2008 was left buried in grief — and in student debt. At last, the bereaved father is getting some resolution.

As ProPublica reported in June, Reynoso was saddled with six figures in student loans that he had cosigned for his son, Freddy Reynoso, to attend college. According to his 2011 tax returns, the elder Reynoso made just $21,000. Debt collectors harassed him. His son’s federal student loan was forgiven upon his death, but because the bulk of the loans were private, Reynoso was left at the mercy of unfamiliar financial firms, Wall Street investors, and even the central bank of a foreign country.

ProPublica traced the complex loan trail of Freddy Reynoso’s student loans, which broke down into two main parts. For the first, Reynoso had borrowed from a bank with a household name — Bank of America. That debt changed hands and was ultimately sold to investors through a company neither he nor his father had ever heard of: First Marblehead, once one of the biggest securitizers of private student loans.

Through the bankruptcy process, that portion of Reynoso’s debt has now been discharged. Court filings show that First Marblehead’s National Collegiate Trust — its name for its student loan securities — decided not to dispute the discharge attempt.

But the other set of loans — the larger portion of Reynoso’s debt — took an even stranger path. Originated by a company later accused of paying schools to steer students toward its loans products, his loans passed through Swiss bank UBS and landed in a portfolio of assets that were acquired by the Swiss central bank to stabilize UBS during the financial crisis.

That fund, known as the StabFund, has reached a settlement agreement with Reynoso’s attorney. It’s not known whether the settlement, which binds all parties to a confidentiality agreement, will still require Reynoso to pay on his debts.

Andrew Bao, an attorney representing the StabFund, declined comment and promptly hung up on a ProPublica reporter. Erik Clark, Reynoso’s attorney, also declined to discuss the case because of the confidentiality agreement.

Speaking generally about the challenges of cases involving opaque private student loans that have been sold and resold, Clark said: “From an attorney’s perspective, when you try to settle or negotiate, the real problem is figuring out who you’re supposed to be talking to. If someone is calling the client and harassing them, you’re not sure that’s who you’re supposed to deal with.” That’s partly because the holder of the loan often contracts with third-party servicers or debt collectors that don’t have authority over the debt. And, Clark says, sometimes such companies won’t divulge who holds the debt.

The current legal standard for discharging a student loan through bankruptcy is “unreasonably high as interpreted,” he said, rendering most student loans generally non-dischargeable.

“What I tell people — almost everyone who comes to me — is this is going to require a political solution,” said Clark. “People in this situation should be getting politically active and talking about this issue to congressmen. Someone has to be ringing the fire bell.”

As for Reynoso — the man who has now suffered for four long years — his financial future remains hazy. He’s aware that one of his debts has been discharged. But even now, he’s not sure about what’s happened with the rest because the final paperwork remains to be signed. Asked whether he knows if he will end up having to pay in the end, Reynoso replied that he didn’t.

(via corporationsarepeople)

sarahlee310:

The billionaire Koch brothers and their aptly-named political strategist Rich Fink spoke publicly about the family’s agenda in The Wichita Eagle this weekend. They insist that they’re the ones under attack in America. Sure, the Kochs have $62 billion and seven homes. And yes, their combined wealth has just about doubled under Obama. And there are now reports of intimidation at Koch Industries for employees who dare speak out against the brothers’ politics.

No matter: the world is lined up against these unfortunate souls. The corruption and machinations detailed in our film Koch Brothers Exposed are, apparently, child’s play compared to the nerve-wracking obstacles these guys face.

What obstacles?

Here’s Charles Koch, lamenting that Obama consultant David Axelrod called out the brothers’ massive investment in policies that promote themselves:

When you have Axelrod, one of [Obama’s] top campaign officials, saying we are contract killers—I mean, I don’t know how somebody in the administration can say that about a private citizen. It’s frightening because you don’t know what they’re going to do. They have tremendous power. They can destroy just about anybody, whether you are totally innocent or not.

And here’s David Koch: “[Obama’s] criticism can stimulate a lot of anger and dislike toward us. So there’s a huge security concern.”

And Fink: “We’re just besieged day and night with attacks and the more visible we are, and the more we’ve done, the more attacks we get.” Not that he expected anything less; he had warned the brothers from the outset that if they became major political players, “You guys will possibly risk the businesses that you have built and your family legacy, and there’s going to be a lot of fallback [sic] from this.”

My tiny violin is broken…

think-progress:

Your fact of the day.

As Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has served more than a decade in Congress, President Barack Obama and his allies will surely be scouring his extensive voting record, if they haven’t done so already. But along with key votes, the Democrats have begun to highlight some of the questionable relationships that Ryan has acquired during his time in Washington. Among them, expect to see a re-examination of Ryan’s ties to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

The pro-Obama super PAC American Bridge has already unveiled an opposition research book about Ryan that documents the Republican’s ties to those symbols of Washington excess. Information pulled from the book and elsewhere shows that Ryan was an ardent defender of DeLay.

moratoriumfornow:

Can’t even believe this one.

A protester belonging to an Occupy Wall Street group in rural Pennsylvania is being charged with felony attempted bank robbery and a terrorism-related charge for holding signs up during a demonstration at a local Wells Fargo branch.

(via reagan-was-a-horrible-president)