js7a's Journal: Top 1% Get 52% of Bush Tax Cuts in 2010

While playing this funny anti-Bush video game, I ran across a statistic which I first thought was just too absurd to be true:

The portion of the Bush 2001-3 tax cuts benefiting the top 1% of U.S. income earners will rise from 29.8% in 2004 to 51.8% in 2010.

So, I checked it with Citizens for Tax Justice, and sure enough, it's true: See page 4 of this PDF.

Think about that: Six years from now, more than half of the $580 billion in Bush tax cuts (page 2) will go to the top 1% of income earners.

I guess that's why

[tomhudson]

I guess that's why they're the top 1%.

That stat would cause a taxpayer revolt anywhere else in the world. Combine that with several states that have no minimum wage, and others with minimums as low as $2/hour http://www.dol.gov/esa/minwage/america.htm [dol.gov] (I'm providing the link because NOBODY I talked to could believe it - they all thought I was shitting them) and you have the recipe for either a revolution or a quasi-military state to ensure the peace.

Re:I guess that's why

[gmhowell]

Lack of state minimum wage is a moot point in some cases, as there is a federal minimum wage. AFAIR, the $2/hour minimum wage is for various service industry jobs (waiting tables) where it is expected that tipping will form the bulk of the salary.

You are aware, of course, of the effects of a price floor on any commodity, right? Some providers of the commodity (in this case, labor) will attempt to illegally sell that commodity under the market floor. This won't equal the natural number of employees in a fre

minimum wage != increased unemployment

[js7a]

When people are making a higher wage, they are less inclined to quit, which saves training expenses, and they are more likely to work harder, increasing the value of their work. There is strong evidence that the net labor cost does not increase with limited increases in minimum wage, and rock-solid evidence against increased unemployment:

"Total employment in the higher minimum wage states increased by 6.2 percent from January 1998 to January 2004, 50 percent greater than the combined job growth of 4.1 per

Re:minimum wage != increased unemployment

[gmhowell]

Unfortunately, like most economic analysis, it is nearly impossible to have only one dependent and one independent variable.

I would also point out that the quote you snagged only mentions retail employment, which is a piss poor type of employment indeed. No bennies, no rights, no future.

which it does very reliably, but it decreases the unemployment of poor adults to a greater extent.

Perhaps, but I don't see the evidence of that in what you've quoted. Perhaps at the link, but I don't really have the tim

Re:I guess that's why

[Trolling4Dollars]

Oh my god that's SO embarassing to me. I am from Ohio and I've had the luck of living in the northern part of the state (more liberal than the southern portion of the state). However, I already knew that one of the knuckle dragging morons that is one of our state representatives is the genius who came up with "freedom fries". And now this!? Add to that the fact that anyone in this state who graduates from college is leaving, and the one thing that we are "#1" in is tanning salons. I think I've just bee