[PEN-L:33227] Bush Administration On The Poor: Pay More Taxes!

["Ellen Frank" <frank@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Bill --  I haven't participated in pen-l in quite a while, so
maybe, not knowing who I am, you misread my intent.
(maybe this is why I stopped participating in pen-l!).
I am playing devil's advocate here.  My students are not
dumb and I am a very good teacher, BUT.. The ideology
of capitalism runs much deeper in the US public than
the anti-capitalist ideology (I think Marx had something to
say about this).

Certainly I don't believe Ken Lay deserves his $100m or that
the janitor deserves his $6.50/hr. (In fact I wrote a column
for Dollars and Sense a couple of months back defending
the progressive tax and using precisely that example).  And
my students don't believe it either.  But how do you say that
in US political discourse?  Once you say it you imply the
system is unjust, that there are social classes.   Even very
progressive Democrats get tongue-tied when these sorts
of issues come up.

What people deserve is exactly the issue the right wing will
raise -- the rich deserve their luxuries and the poor have no
right to take what others have earned fairly (I guess they'll
want to leave Ken Lay out if it).  How do supporters of
a progressive tax respond unless they are willing to say the
existing distribution of income is fundamentally unjust?

Ellen



pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
>On Thursday, December 19, 2002 at 09:32:34 (-0500) Ellen Frank writes:
>>But shouldn't living standards be determined by
>>what people contribute?  And shouldn't people who
>>contribute more get more?  Rather than being
>>penalized for their hard work and success?
>
>So you are saying Ken Lay deserves what he gets and the janitors that
>clean his office deserve what they get, even if the janitors "work
>hard" and don't "succeed"?  How much of Ken Lay's "success" is due to
>structural factors that favor the dishonest and greedy, that promote
>those born with a silver spoon in their mouth?  What percentage of the
>"successful" actually had to work their way up from the bottom?  Are
>you saying nurses deserve what they get, and doctors, who have the
>political power to lobby to reduce competition and thus enhance their
>"success" by artificial means, also deserve what they get?  Does Bill
>Gates deserve to have more money than a million people (or more) at
>the bottom combined because he happened to roll the dice and get a
>lucky break?  How much of success is due to factors other than "hard
>work"?  I think if you look into it, there are many other things ---
>among them dishonesty, greed, ruthlessness, and privilege --- which
>contribute greatly to "success".
>
>If your students can't argue their way out of a paper bag, you need to
>help them.  Leaving simplistic formulations that equate "hard work"
>with "success" is foolish.  You have to get behind these very extreme
>abstractions and do the hard work of examining actual cases of
>"success" and "failure".  A very different picture emerges out of this
>effort than the one that makes a moral giant of Ken Lay and a runt of
>"his" janitors.
>
>
>Bill
>
>