Chris Collins (Friday, April 22) complains about a progressive income tax proposal, saying, “I know demonizing rich people is an effective political strategy, and I’ve never understood why. When did it suddenly become a bad thing to be successful in this country? The centerpiece of the American Dream used to be if you worked hard, you got to enjoy the fruits of that labor. Now, wealth is something to be redistributed to those who did nothing to earn it.”
But let’s examine a little further Collins’ assertion about getting to enjoy the fruits of your labor.
I can’t believe that anyone, by their own labor alone, produces a million dollars worth of good for society. Most of the extremely wealthy receive income from their property, and from the labor of others, by trading in things others have worked to produce, pieces of paper or electronic ciphers representing those things that others have produced.
People working for minimum wage work at least as hard as those earning million dollar salaries. It’s just that our society values their labor less.
Poverty is expensive. People without money in the bank pay a penalty for all sorts of things, from getting their paychecks cashed to interest rates on loans, from loss of work time when they do not have easy transportation to appointments or cash to put up bail when arrested (even falsely).
The owners of industry have systematically moved factories away from any place where wages were higher than they could pay elsewhere, whether in southern states, Mexico, China or Bangladesh, places where working conditions are grueling and unsafe. No thought was given to the workers who had built those industries or the communities they were a part of.
I do not demonize a person for being rich. There are, and have been, wealthy people who considered it an honor to give back to their communities and country. But I am disturbed when the rich use their wealth to corrupt a political system in which they can buy the fealty of elected officials by legalized bribery and gain more wealth by the influence that they have bought. “J’accuse,” I accuse those who worship their wealth and have no care for their workers, their communities, their fellow humans or their environment.
The American Dream came closest to being fulfilled more than half a century ago when the top income tax rate was more than 90 percent. No millionaire had need to lower their standard of living because of that tax, and those taxes paid for the infrastructure that enabled them to acquire their wealth.
No, Chris, success is not a crime and taxation is not punishment, but a civic responsibility that should be shouldered by those who benefit the most from our system. As John F. Kennedy said, “For of those to whom much is given, much is required.”
Zayt gezunt (be healthy),
Yosl (Joe) Kurland lives in Colrain.