To restore equitable US income share, 10% of overall income needs to be snatched away from top 1% earners and restored to the lower 99% (1% takes 20% today): $13 trillion over a decade.
The other half of the lost 10% could be recovered by repairing atrophied labor union density (6.5% in private employment and dropping!) — thereby empowering employees to once again divvy up a decent share of the profit pie with ownership. Illegal (in case we’ve forgotten) union busting has become so deeply embedded in our (not European) labor market DNA that we seem compelled to skip — to forget about — old fashioned organizing. The road left: side-step to Congressionally mandated, regularly scheduled union certification elections? https://onlabor.org/why-not-hold-union-representation-elections-on-a-regular-schedule
At first I thought all TSA agents on their day off could spend an hour riding around airport passenger rings for an hour or however long on their time off — if they could afford the gas. Next I thought ATCs could join them.
Then, I thought the president of the federal workers union should invite all his members to take time to ride the airports passenger circle roads. Then, I thought everybody in the whole country who doesn’t like the shutdown should go out to their local airports and ride the circle roads.
No need to worry about jamming up emergency equipment — fire and cops. Airports are loaded with their own fire and these day certainly plenty of cops.
I am reminded about how, around the time I took my first job in Manhattan back in early 60s, Martin Luther King jammed up the road to the World’s Fair a couple of times and “forced” New York companies to start hiring African Americans in downtown jobs. Downtown Manhattan was Lilly white then. I felt (at age 18 — don’t know how I “knew”) that New York’s companies didn’t really want to discriminate, but nobody wanted to go first. So, I felt, it didn’t take too much pressure to budge.
Ditto for shutting down the Trump shutdown. Could be as easy as that.
To restore equitable US income share, 10% of overall income needs to be snatched away from top 1% earners and restored to the lower 99% (1% takes 20% today): $13 trillion over a decade.
Jeff Stein’s Washington Post column suggests a road to half way there:
“1. $720 billion/decade: Ocasio-Cortez’s suggestion for nearly doubling taxes on people earning more than $10 million;”
“2. $3 trillion/decade: A wealth tax on the top 1 percent similar to those in Europe;”
“3. $3 trillion/decade: Doubling income taxes on the top 1 percent.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/01/05/ocasio-cortez-wants-higher-taxes-very-rich-americans-heres-how-much-money-could-that-raise/
The other half of the lost 10% could be recovered by repairing atrophied labor union density (6.5% in private employment and dropping!) — thereby empowering employees to once again divvy up a decent share of the profit pie with ownership. Illegal (in case we’ve forgotten) union busting has become so deeply embedded in our (not European) labor market DNA that we seem compelled to skip — to forget about — old fashioned organizing. The road left: side-step to Congressionally mandated, regularly scheduled union certification elections?
https://onlabor.org/why-not-hold-union-representation-elections-on-a-regular-schedule
HOW TO SHUTDOWN THE SHUTDOWN — FAST
At first I thought all TSA agents on their day off could spend an hour riding around airport passenger rings for an hour or however long on their time off — if they could afford the gas. Next I thought ATCs could join them.
Then, I thought the president of the federal workers union should invite all his members to take time to ride the airports passenger circle roads. Then, I thought everybody in the whole country who doesn’t like the shutdown should go out to their local airports and ride the circle roads.
No need to worry about jamming up emergency equipment — fire and cops. Airports are loaded with their own fire and these day certainly plenty of cops.
I am reminded about how, around the time I took my first job in Manhattan back in early 60s, Martin Luther King jammed up the road to the World’s Fair a couple of times and “forced” New York companies to start hiring African Americans in downtown jobs. Downtown Manhattan was Lilly white then. I felt (at age 18 — don’t know how I “knew”) that New York’s companies didn’t really want to discriminate, but nobody wanted to go first. So, I felt, it didn’t take too much pressure to budge.
Ditto for shutting down the Trump shutdown. Could be as easy as that.