Out of all of the cases I filed, the saddest was a guy who lived in the same house that he grew up in and eventually bought from his parents. He had done (hard) menial labor his whole life, and had medical trouble that his crappy insurance wouldn't cover. He was forced to file bankruptcy and was likely to lose the house. It broke my heart. Poor guy fell on hard times and was basically helpless. That, to me, is what the government is for, and it failed him. Conservatives contend that the government does too much. But what about that guy? Should we just leave him to suffer?
If minimum wage was higher, he might have been able to make it. If health care was universal, he wouldn't have had to file bankruptcy or lose his house. For all of the people who take advantage of "entitlement" programs, there are people like this guy who are the reason for it, and yet it still fails. And on the flip side, when "the market" regulates things, LOTS of people game the system (think mortgages), so that argument should be a wash. We should focus more on the good that these programs do and how to make them better.
I'd prefer an increase in funding to add administration which could reduce the number of freeloaders and train the well-intended, hard-working folks for different opportunities.
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Warren Buffet posted an op-ed in the NY Times this past week suggesting that the government ask more of the super-rich. I have no way of verifying anything he says, but the numbers are the most eye-opening thing to me. Less than 250K households bringing in more than $1 million/year in the US is a surprise. I would have expected many more than that. Out of the entire US, that's basically the population of Aurora, IL.
I think Buffett simplified the situation, because folks in his range of wealth have odd, nebulous "jobs" - mostly investing, or letting their money make money. Income from labor and income from investments are taxed differently. Unless greater taxation on investments is stipulated to start at a certain dollar level, then suddenly my 401K gets hit harder, too.
The overall suggestion leads to a question I've asked a few times but still haven't heard a reasonable answer for: why not implement a flat tax? According to Buffett:
I have worked with investors for 60 years and I have yet to see anyone — not even when capital gains rates were 39.9 percent in 1976-77 — shy away from a sensible investment because of the tax rate on the potential gain.
The taxation system as it stands benefits the rich and hurts the poor. A lower, flat tax would even out that ratio. It would provide more revenue from the rich and ease the burden on the poor. I simply don't understand the argument against.
