Center on Capital & Social Equity

Corporate giants need a different brand of capitalism - Karl Polzer

Thanks to the Richmond Times-Dispatch for running this column.  It's based on the longer piece below, which contains references:

Instead of crying about socialist boogiemen, Home Depot, other corporate giants could use a different brand of capitalism to improve service - essay

The Case for Renewing  the Expanded Child Tax Credit - CCSE

Richmond Times-Dispatch op-ed.

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Congress’ failure to re-up expanded child tax credit displays longtime favoritism toward higher income

Click here to read article.

Thanks to the Washington Post for running most of our letter responding to Sen. Hawley's op-ed:

How to make the GOP more appealing to voters - WaPost

The unedited version below has something to say about both political parties:

Sen. Hawley is right on doing more for workers – but the GOP (and Dems) need to deliver concrete economic benefits

Time to get their ducks in a row?

Dec. 15, 2022

Who’s More Likely To Find Gifts from Congress under the X-Mas Tree?  Low-income Families - or Well-off Retirees and Corporate Shareholders? 

"As time ticks down for 117th U.S. Congress to pass a year-end spending package, it will be interesting to see which strata of society our lame-duck lawmakers might gift the most if a deal can be reached.  Will they deliver corporate tax breaks for those at the top? Good chance.  Corporate tax breaks may be the prerequisite for anyone else getting anything.

"What about tax-code adjustments mostly benefiting well-off owners of retirement funds?   Possible.  As described as a case study  below, long-prepared, bipartisan legislation – aka the Secure Act 2 or Earn ACT— is ready for final touches and attachment to a spending bill.

"What about something that could help people at the bottom..."

Click here to read article

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A 25-year fleecing?

Bipartisanship can be golden - but grossly unfair. Congress should slam the brakes on 401(k)/IRA legislation, rethink retirement financing policy

Click here to read article

Aug. 29, 2022

 How Much Pain Will It Take for the ‘Bottom 50%’ To Realize Its Political Power?  What Then?

Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity

Go Dawgs!

Capitalizing on college football

"In U.S. college sports -- as in the nation’s broader blend of capitalism and socialism -- political leverage can be advantageous. Winning football coaches now sit at the top of the public university food chain. They are emblems of both American economic opportunity and inequality..."

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for publishing this op-ed.

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P.S. The draft, titled "Capitalizing on the public-private college football plantation," includes links to the classic Marx Brothers film "Horsefeathers."

American ranch-style house

April 6, 2022

Russia, Nuclear Disaster and What To Do with Our House

Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity

Click here to read article.

Feb. 11, 2022

Congress’ failure to re-up the expanded child tax credit echoes longtime bias against low-income families

Karl Polzer – Center on Capital & Social Equity

Click here to read article

Thanks to the Washington  Post for publishing our letter.

P.S. (March 3, 2022)  As the invasion escalates, it appears that Putin's operational objectives may include: 1) ongoing military and political control of Belarus; 2) depopulation of non-Russian speaking Ukraine to facilitate larger annexation (a la Israel/Palestine); and 3) constricting the mobility and internal political threat of Russian oligarchs (a la Xi and Chinese capitalists).

Western State Hospital home page - December 2020

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Updates:

March 5 - This week, the Senate approved HB 388 with amended text. The House then passed the Senate version.  Both votes were unanimous.  The bill now goes to Virginia's Governor.  Unlike other states, if the Governor does not act on a bill, it becomes law without his signature in 30 days (the majority of bills are not signed). 

Virginia becomes first state to ensure mental hospital patients, families have access to video visitation

April 11 - It's a law!  Gov. Youngkin signed HB 388, which was passed unanimously by both Virginia's House and Senate.  Effective July 1, 2022, the bill requires the director of each of the state's 10  mental health hospitals to have a process in place to facilitate virtual visitation. It will help thousands of patients and their families and friends stay connected and could positively impact patient care and hospital transparency. 

The Center on Capital & Social Equity  worked with staff at Western State Hospital in Staunton to develop a pilot program when in-person visitation was suspended due to Covid 19.  We then advocated to expand access to video visits  to patients at all state hospitals.  Special thanks to the staff at Western State, the Virginia chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and Del. Rod Willett and his staff who were instrumental in making this happen.

To our knowledge, Virginia is the first state to make sure that mental hospital patients and families have access to video visitation.  Today, the world is slightly less unequal!

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COVID Ended In-Person State Hospital Visits So Father Pushed For Virginia Law Allowing Zoom-Like Calls For Patients - Pete Earley

Thanks to Peter Earley for posting on our work to increase connectivity between people living in institutional settings and their families and the larger community.

Extending the Expanded   Child Tax Credit:

"In the bigger picture,
total national work = paid work + unpaid work, which includes raising children."

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Also see last section of the paper below on raising the minimum wage: "Combining a minimum wage hike with the EITC, more aid to raise children" on p.11:

"Considerations on Raising the U.S. Minimum Wage To Help Workers and Families While Minimizing Negative Impacts"

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Nov. 4, 2021

White House’s promised childcare subsidies face a host of ‘devils in the details’

Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity

"The $1.75-trillion Build Back Better (BBB) proposal’s  promise to cap childcare expenses at 7% of income for families earning up to $300,000 faces a series of policy hurdles regarding cost, equity, long-term impacts, and how such a program might be administered.  While subsidized childcare would meet a pressing need for many low- and modest-income working parents, providing benefits to upper-income professionals and inflationary impacts could push the program’s cost as high as $1 trillion over 10 years.  

"Some analysts warn that massive subsidies combined with costly regulatory requirements could end up reducing care choices for many low-income families, particularly those preferring to look after their children at home..."

Click here to read article

Nov. 20, 2021

Why our grandchildren will being moving back from the ocean and heading north

Karl Polzer – Center on Capital & Social Equity

As the fog lifts from what was achieved during last week’s international negotiations over controlling climate change, some outlines of future reality come into focus.  Layers of carbon pollution girding the Earth will continue to drive up temperatures and sea levels.  The world’s 195 countries will not be able to change human behavior enough to stop major climate change.   By later this century, billions of people will face pressure to move away from eroding seashores to higher ground and north to cooler places to live.

There are several reasons to expect this...

Oct. 15, 2021

As Congress Whittles Down the Spending Package, Don’t Bet Low-Income People Will Get Much More - or the Monied, Much Less.

Center on Capital & Social Equity

Oct. 26, 2021

Responses received from Virginia campaigns for governor

Last week, the Center on Capital & Social Equity, which operates from Northern Virginia, sent a short list of questions to policy and press people working on the two Virginia campaigns for governor.  We are pleased that both campaigns sent responses but would have liked to see more specific answers to many of the questions.

Our motivation in asking these questions is to help focus the next governor on the needs of low-income people who make up a large portion of Virginia’s population.  Their everyday challenges are often ignored by their political representatives.  Attention to detail and commitment will be keys to developing and implementing policies that will help improve their lives on issues including adequate wages, paid sick days, access to mental health care, the cost of living,and affordable health care.  We look forward to working with the next administration on these and other matters.

November 20th, 2021 Grocery Store Labor Action - All Workers Deserve Paid Sick Days - Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy

"Grocery store workers are one of the best examples of why Virginia needs a paid sick day standard.  Two-thirds of grocery store workers have no paid sick days. Virginians for Paid Sick Days is partnering with UFCW Local 400 to hold actions outside grocery stores on the Saturday of November 20, 2021 (the Saturday before Thanksgiving) highlighting the need for all grocery store workers to have paid sick days."

Getting Inflation out of Capital Gains Taxation Is Fair - and Might Help Reach a Deal on Taxing the Dead

Karl Polzer - CCSE

Sept.19, 2021

Where Are the Workers??  Show Them the Money - and Benefits!!

Aug. 24, 2021

July 12, 2021

"Congress could do many relatively inexpensive things to improve working people’s lives.  At spending levels near the bottom of what’s being now debated, all workers – including the lowest-paid -- could have additional funds to raise their kids, paid sick days, more job training, and some savings for retirement and emergencies.  Millions more could have higher wages and health care coverage.  And millions more disabled and elderly people could move above the poverty line.  Much of this could be done by modifying existing programs and policies."

Social ‘infrastructure’ improvements for the working class

• Target subsidies for families (child tax credits, daycare, college) to people most in need.
• Raise the minimum wage and index it for inflation.  Give states reasonable flexibility to adjust the minimum.  All workers get paid sick days.
• Repair and improve SSI.
• Establish a universal retirement savings system.
• Incentivize states to expand Medicaid.  Hold Medicare spending increases to general inflation or less.
• Improve Social Security benefits for the bottom 50%. Achieve long-term solvency through higher taxes mostly on the top 20%.
• Improve the unemployment insurance system and job training.

Click here to read essay.

Thanks to the Washington Post for publishing most of our letter:

"Push the pain of taxes into the afterlife"

Really don't think that a particular billionaire (hint: cojones enough to be shot into space) would have objected to being mentioned as in the letter submitted:

"A Smart Way To Tax the Rich: Let Sleeping Billionaires Lie"

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for featuring this.

June 2021

 SSI Is a Disgrace:

Chronic neglect is choking off access to Social Security’s critical backstop.

Click here to read essay.

Biden’s spending spree could destabilize Social Security - Karl Polzer

"President Joe Biden’s plan to inject $4 trillion of social and capital infrastructure spending into a $21 trillion economy could help many people take care of their families. But there are also major economic and political downsides. These risks could be reduced, and the proposal’s value increased, by putting Social Security on the table and targeting new social spending to people most in need..."

Click here to read the op-ed

Where's Social Security?

How much can we tax the wealthy to finance long-run social and physical infrastructure needs?

 Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity

A government, already paying interest on more than its people produce each year (hint: $22 trillion), now proposes to tax its wealthiest citizens in the vicinity of $3 trillion more to finance a growing list of social and physical infrastructure needs.  Like families paying off mortgages, indebted governments should know that each major purchase narrows its ability to raise capital for future needs... 

So, what do we need and how can the wealthy be tapped to pay for it? What's missing?...

Click here to read the paper

American wealth is growing, even during the pandemic. So is wealth inequality. - USA Facts

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for timely publication of this op-ed. 

Yes, raise the minimum wage, but don't stop there

March 1, 2021

"...States could be given flexibility. Congress could set the national minimum at the high end of current proposals, say at $15 or $16, and allow states to adjust it downward by a certain margin, say 20% or 25%, but no lower. A national minimum wage corridor, rather than a line, could help California and New York build up and adjust down from a higher platform. Poorer states could choose lower levels in the corridor, say $12 to $13 an hour.

"Policymakers also should consider how changes to the earned income tax credit and child tax credit can complement wages for working-class families. Members of both parties support higher subsidies to raise children. Such payments should be targeted to help the poorest the most. Yet the current child tax credit provides the most money to higher-income families."

Click here to read the op-ed.

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for running this op-ed and its openness to air a variety of views including our work exploring inequality and advocating for the bottom 50%.  The Examiner's audience includes conservative members of Congress whose votes are needed to pass and sustain  legislation advancing  working class interests.

Biden's stimulus risks sending aid to those who don't need it - Karl Polzer/Washington Examiner op-ed

 January 29, 2021

Who exactly will get the enhanced cash aid, and who won't, in the stimulus package the Biden administration will soon negotiate with Congress? This is the first of many distributional challenges awaiting lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Choices on targeting increasingly scarce public funds will reveal which income groups both parties are committed to represent.

Details of the relief proposal had not been released as of this writing. But it is likely that the administration has been working from the distribution template in legislation Democrats introduced at the end of December. That bill, the Cash Act of 2020, would increase the $600 COVID-19 cash relief authorized last month to a total of $2,000 ($4,000 for couples). It also would send billions of dollars to well-off people that don’t need the money. As with previous COVID-19 cash aid legislation, an argument can be made that the distribution scheme shortchanges millions of people who need money to pay for food and rent.

Click here to read full article

The Center on Capital & Social Equity explores and promotes ways to include all workers and families in the output of capitalist economies. (See chart above.)  All should have the opportunity to own shares of working capital.  One way to mitigate the negative effects of monopolies, which antitrust regulation cannot entirely control, is through widespread profit sharing.  This can be done by setting up a universal retirement savings system.

Missionary being eaten by a jaguar  (Noé León, 1907)

Making Sure We Get to Universal Coverage: a letter to Sen. Bernie Sanders

Feb. 23, 2020 

Dear Sen. Sanders,

Among all candidates for president, we think you are the most committed to making sure that ALL Americans have health insurance and access to comprehensive health care.  We commend you for your leadership on this issue.

Unfortunately, it is hard to see how the Medicare-for-all legislation you propose could gain Congressional approval in the foreseeable political future.  As a longtime member of the U.S. Senate, you must be able to understand the grounds for this concern.

Please answer this question:  If, during your presidency, Congress could agree to pass a universal coverage bill using a different, perhaps more traditional, approach, would you sign it?

Getting ALL Americans affordable coverage as soon as possible is an important part of our policy agenda.  We cannot wait until a political moment in the unforeseeable future in which a Medicare-for-all system can gain approval.  We also recognize that any universal system put in place will need to enjoy long-lasting acceptance spanning the ebbs and flows of partisan politics.

Our question is of deepest sincerity.  Your answer could be key to broadening your base of support and winning the presidency.

Thank you again for your leadership. 

Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity

Interesting evidence on how CARE Act stimulus helped low-income people get through the summer, despite large job losses, and why we need more stimulus now.

Fed report shows a promising turnaround for low-wage workers, but that was before the pandemic

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for publishing this op-ed.

Politics and the pandemic darken the Fed’s findings of a fragile turnaround in American economic inequality

Center on Capital & Social Equity

Policy Goals: Increase economic inclusion at reasonable public cost 

• Raise minimum wage with annual COLA (option: give states some leeway to adjust ↓ to reflect cost of living/labor).
• Five PAID sick days annually for ALL workers.
• 100% of Americans with health coverage by 2025 - with strong cost controls (any number of payers will work).
• Universal retirement savings system with minimum $500 annual government contribution (so, all Americans own working capital, have stake in market economy).
• No surprise medical bill >$500.
• Cut cost of college/expand apprenticeship programs.
• Improve Social Security benefits for bottom 50%. Achieve long-term solvency through higher taxes mostly on top 20%.
• Increase refundable child tax credit.

Life expectancy has not increased for the lowest-paid workers - National Academy of Sciences

A Widening Gap in Life Expectancy Makes Raising Social Security’s Retirement Age a Particularly Bad Deal for Low-Wage Earners - Karl Polzer/Society of Actuaries

Thanks to the Society for publishing this article.

Presentation: Will Growing Inequality Make Social Security & Long Term Care Financing Fixes Harder?

2020 Society of Actuaries Living to 100 Symposium

'Inequality by the Numbers' Virtual Workshop 2020 - Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality

14 short lectures

A Sea Change for Wages v. Capital?

Addicted to Identity Politics, Progressives May Miss a Historic Chance To Connect with America’s Working Class

Karl Polzer – Center on Capital & Social Equity

 New research affirms what has been known for centuries.  In the wake of a pandemic, a smaller, more risk-averse work force is often in position to demand higher wages.  After the Black Death ripped through Europe, for example, peasants, shop workers and craftsmen realized they had gained bargaining power.  Wages rose and the return on capital fell.

Though the impact of the current pandemic probably will be much milder, millions in the American working class suddenly deemed to be “essential” may come to a similar realization.  People working with their hands in nursing homes, grocery stores, meat packing plants, or as home health aides, might ask whether they are getting a fair deal.  Why, they might ask, are we expected show up to work and risk contagion for wages that barely cover the rent, while millions in the professional, management, and bureaucratic classes can shelter at home and still pull down a good salary?  Why don’t we get paid sick days, health insurance, and other basic benefits like they do?  Why can’t we spend more time raising our kids to help them get ahead?

In just two months, the Covid virus has upended the American workforce.  Incomes have crashed.   Unemployment has rocketed.   Whatever new normal emerges will be different and probably more unequal.  A larger portion of the workface – and the electorate -- may well be unemployed or working for low wages.  Jobs that can support a middle-class lifestyle may be harder to find. 

This is the perfect time for elected officials to talk to all American workers about how to improve their lives. Unfortunately, many Democrat leaders are deeply rutted in rituals of race and gender politics.  The Democratic party may be blowing its chance to regain working class support -- once its bread and butter -- in two important ways.   First, its policy agenda largely reflects upper-middle class priorities.  Second, the party’s world view and messaging for many years has presumed that low-wage work is exclusive to blacks and Hispanics.  To many Democratic leaders, pale-skinned poor people seem to have no standing.  It’s almost as if they don’t exist...

July 1, 2020

Letter to U.S. Political Leaders and Media

It’s past time the White House, Congress required - and funded - Covid testing in nursing homes

What wasn’t said at last week’s Congressional hearings on Covid-19 should raise alarm.   Federal officials testified the CDC plans to issue “more targeted” testing "guidelines" for states and nursing homes.  More advice is not enough.  After five months and more  than 120,000 virus deaths, lack of federal and state action -- and adequate funding -- for testing in nursing homes is homicide by negligent policy...

July 14, 2020

CMS to deliver ‘point-of-care’ COVID-19 test kits to all nursing homes

Yes!  Credit to CMS Administrator Verma and the Administration. We've been calling on the feds to deploy rapid, comprehensive testing for nursing home residents and staff for 4 months.  This is a major step toward reducing deaths from the pandemic.  Now, make sure to include long term care providers not directly regulated by CMS, such as assisted living facilities, in the testing program. About 1.5 million live in nursing homes and one million in assisted living.

June 15, 2020

Op-ed:Upgrade Medicaid, don't gut it

Thanks to the Washington Examiner for running this article.

"The current Medicaid regime is a mixture of bad and good. It often renders low quality nursing home care. But Medicaid does provide universal long-term care coverage, a rarity in American social policy. That’s a good thing. Medicaid needs to be upgraded – not gutted. Long-term care insurance and personal savings simply can’t fill the gap cutting Medicaid would leave." ...

"Witness the Trump administration’s delegation of most of the responsibility for the COVID-19 nursing home policy to the states. It recommended, for example, that states make sure COVID-19 testing gets done in nursing homes rather than having CMS require it nationally. Washington’s failure to take the lead on testing can’t bode well for nursing home quality and mortality rates."

The World Inequality Lab Newsletter - July 2020

Thomas Piketty - Why Capitalism Must Be Reformed | The Daily Social Distancing Show

Capital Gains and U.K. Inequality - Arun Advani and Andy Summers

Three policy recommendations include: "Capital gains tax rates need to be aligned more closely with marginal income tax rates, since large gaps lead to repackaging of income, reducing the redistributive effects of tax, creating horizontal inequity, and biasing measures of vertical inequality."

The Missing Profits of Nations: How much each country loses or attracts because of tax competition - Thomas Torslov, Ludvig Wier and Gabriel Zucman

“What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”

- Frederick Douglass

June 2020

Opposing Racism and Human Bondage in the United States

 Center on Capital & Social Equity

"Capital and Ideology": Notes and Figures - Thomas Piketty, 2020

"In this talk, I present some of the figures & tables gathered in my book Capital and Ideology (2020) - an economic, social & political history of inequality regimes, from trifunctional and colonial societies to post-communist, post-colonial hyper-capitalist societies. As compared to Capital in the 21st Century  (2014): Capital and Ideology is less western-centered, more political and focuses on the fragilities and the transformation of inequality ideologies. A much better book (I believe!)"

New Book by Anne Case and Angus Deaton

• How fighting one pandemic can deepen another: Review of “Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism” - Carlos Lozada

• Capitalism Is Killing Us: In their new book, Anne Case and Angus Deaton argue that suicides, overdoses, and income inequality are consequences of capitalism. - The Nation

• "Deaths of despair": The deadly epidemic that predated coronavirus: Vox Interviews Case and Deaton

• Opinion | How Working-Class Life Is Killing Americans, in Charts - NYT

• Case and Deaton talk about their book: "Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism" - Politics and Prose Live

The Saving Glut of the Rich and the Rise in Household Debt - NBER

Comment: Excellent new paper. Remember Macro 101: national savings = national investment?  This takes Keynes one step further. Instead of being invested, savings glut at top generates rents, increases systemic inequality, through increased lending to bottom 90%.  Who pays high credit card interest and transaction fees, and who profits, e.g.?

The spreading virus calls for fast action on paid sick days for health and personal care workers -   at very least

March 3, 2020   -   Letter to the Washington Post 

A wealth tax could be both fair and enforceable

 The Post’s March 3 article “Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren want a wealth tax. Wealthy Swiss say their model could work for America” raises key issues of tax fairness and enforcement.

 Why would it be unfair to tax the super wealthy on total net assets when middle-class homeowners already are taxed on the value of homes largely financed through debt on which they pay interest to banks (whose profits flow disproportionately to the wealthiest)?   Existing American wealth taxes -- state and local property taxes -- now finance most K-12 education.  A national wealth tax could be used to make school funding more equitable and lessen the tax burden on the middle class.  We already tax the middle class on property it partially owns.  So why not tax the wealthiest on the value assets they own lock, stock and barrel?

 Incentives are key to enforcement.  A progressive wealth tax -- rising in increments from point A to point B -- could be enforced by applying the maximum rate to all households with wealth over a given threshold, and leaving it up to filers to document to the IRS that the lowest allowable rate is appropriate.  Finally, a reasonable tax rate could provide an incentive for investment that spurs economic growth.  A high rate could stifle it.

Karl Polzer/Center on Capital & Social Equity

A full time worker paid the federal minimum wage earns 13% of the average national income per worker in the US -- the lowest level since the creation of the minimum wage in 1938.

   Source: Gabriel Zucman.

Wealth in the United States - The Big Picture: Middle Class Now Holds Less Wealth than Top 1% - Barry Ritholtz

"Fastest way to cut carbon emissions is a 'fee' and dividend, top leaders say," Washington Post, 2/14/20

The article above is an example of how the virtue of economic analysis can't be measured by the pound or aggregate number of titles. The insight of a single analyst can contain more wisdom than collective opinion of 100.

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How to make carbon taxes more equitable - letter to the Washington Post

Jan. 28, 2020 at 5:40 p.m. EST

The Jan. 25 news article “At Davos, enthusiasm for trees but not a carbon tax” did not mention an important reason political leaders might balk at levying higher carbon taxes. Carbon taxes, including those on gasoline, are highly regressive, affecting lower-income people much more than higher-income. For example, if gas taxes were doubled in the Washington area, most well-paid professionals would have enough capital (or access to credit) to easily switch to a hybrid vehicle. Over the life of the vehicle, their savings in fuel and taxes would probably cancel out any initial expense. In contrast, for lack of capital, a person driving a used gas guzzler to two low-paying jobs would be stuck driving the gas guzzler along with higher fuel costs.

Hiking fuel taxes would make it even harder for the growing share of the U.S. population working low-paying jobs to make ends meet and raise families. Carbon taxes would be more equitable and politically feasible if governments also made sure that workers struggling to pay their bills could afford the switch to clean-energy technology. 

Karl Polzer, Falls Church

The writer is founder of the Center on Capital & Social Equity.

Response to WaPo  dialogue stemming from our letter on carbon taxes

Dear Washington Post Editors:

Sabrina S. Fu made excellent points in her Feb. 4 letter “Quit saying ‘carbon tax.’ It’s a fee and dividend” addressing concerns I raised in a letter last week.  Her proposal, however, would work best an ideal political world where one can control opponents' and skeptics' language used to frame an issue.   My concern over tax fairness would remain because in the legislative bargaining process -- including a last-minute deal in conference committee -- the redistribution part of the proposal could easily be watered down, or eliminated, while the regressive "tax" or "fee" would become law.

Why don’t we start by applying her proposal to the current gasoline tax?  If it survives the legislative process and works for current energy taxes, then move on to carbon writ large.  Bottom line: advocates for low- and middle-income people trying to survive today need to keep a sharp eye on idealistic proposals coming from the better-situated trying to save the planet in the next century.

 Karl Polzer

Center on Capital & Social Equity

"All I want for Christmas is Affordable Health Care" - Albuquerque Journal, December 25, 2019

Aug. 7, 2019

By letting banks charge excessive credit card fees, US raises prices for all, shifts billions of $$$ to the wealthier

Karl Polzer

There are many mechanisms through which the financial establishment systematically drains money from workers struggling to pay their bills.  Some hum along in plain sight while regulators and members of Congress barely take notice.  Such is the case with the $80 billion in fees that banks will extract from credit and debit card transactions this year.  

While other countries have lowered credit card transaction costs, either through non-bank market innovation (in China) or regulation (in the European Union, Australia, and other nations), U.S. policymakers empower banks and credit card networks to levy what amounts to a doubly regressive national sales tax...

(Also see the note on excessive credit card interest rates beginning on p. 6.)

A winner for the poor? Soda machine offers lower price for cash in Poulsbo, WA

Saez/Zucman's "The Triumph of Injustice: How the Rich Dodge Taxes and How To Make Them Pay"

Map of golf clubs in and around San Francisco

Ways To Replace the "Cadillac" High-Cost Health Plan Tax

click below

(Nearly) 100 economists, policy experts warn against repeal without replacement.

Warning: Read the article above at your own risk. Author declaims any responsibility for variation in sense of humor. Note that some links in this article are intended to provide useful information, others irony.

NRA HQ in the Northern Virginia suburbs.

Effects of Raising the Federal Minimum Wage

Congressional Budget Office - July 2019

Findings: "In an average week in 2025, the $15 option would boost the wages of 17 million workers who would otherwise earn less than $15 per hour. Another 10 million workers otherwise earning slightly more than $15 per hour might see their wages rise as well. But 1.3 million other workers would become jobless, according to CBO’s median estimate. There is a two-thirds chance that the change in employment would be between about zero and a decrease of 3.7 million workers. The number of people with annual income below the poverty threshold in 2025 would fall by 1.3 million." … Similar, but smaller effects for minimum wage of $12 … Ditto for $10 minimum wage.

MIT Living Wage Calculator Provides Powerful Tool for State and Local Policymakers

Many U.S. households earning less than a living wage: MIT analysis

"Across all family sizes, the living wage exceeds the poverty threshold, often used to identify need. State minimum wages provide for only a portion of the living wage. For two adult, two children families, the minimum wage covers 73.0% of the living wage at best in the District of Columbia and 41.8% at worst in Virginia. This means that families earning between the poverty threshold ($25,298 for two working adults, two children on average in 2018) and the living wage $67,146) on average for two working adults, two children per year before taxes), may fall short of the income and assistance they require to meet their basic needs."

Example: Maryland is one of the wealthiest states in the U.S., but income varies widely by region. This has made it difficult for the legislature to set a uniform minimum wage.

Possible option: Set a statewide minimum wage at $15/hour (or other level) and let local governments reduce it up to a fixed percentage (say 30%) to account for regional differences. It's important to index any minimum to inflation.

Joseph Stiglitz discusses his new book and "progressive capitalism" plan to rebuild America’s middle class on SalonTV.

America: Build This Wall! :)

 The stand off over building a border wall sadly embodies the narrow-mindedness of America’s leaders and disrespects the creative potential of American capitalism.  It’s an undeniable fact that Donald, Chuck and Nancy are thinking way too small to discern the proper dimensions of a win-win agreement that could profit the United States for centuries...

Distribution of Household Income before/after Transfers and Taxes: CBO

Summary of slides released November 2018

In 2015, household income was unevenly distributed: Households at the top of the income distribution received significantly more income than households at the bottom of the distribution.

Before accounting for the effects of means-tested transfers and federal taxes:

• Average income among households in the lowest quintile (or fifth) of the income distribution was about $20,000.
• Average income among households in the highest quintile was about $292,000.
• Within the highest quintile, income was highly skewed toward the very top of the distribution: Among households in the bottom half of the highest quintile (the 81st to 90th percentiles), average income was $157,000; among the 1.2 million households in the top 1 percent of the distribution, it was $1.9 million.

The combined effect of means-tested transfers and federal taxes in 2015 was, on average, to increase income at the bottom of the income distribution and decrease income at the top of the distribution.

After accounting for the effects of means-tested transfers and federal taxes:

• Average income among households in the lowest quintile of the income distribution was about $33,000.
• Average income among households in the highest quintile was about $215,000.
• Among households in the bottom half of the highest quintile, average income was $125,000; among households in the top 1 percent, it was $1.2 million.

Below: Taxes, transfers resulted in significantly more income growth from 1979-2015 for the bottom income group than the middle three, while the top income group was held harmless.

Would Adam Smith favor policies creating a more inclusive economy?

Karl Polzer – Center on Capital & Social Equity

In a recent op-ed, I suggested that Congress establish a universal retirement savings system, possibly funded by a tiny tax on financial market transactions. In another, that growing income and wealth inequality has shrunk Social Security’s revenue and that taxing capital gains and high earnings could help the program stay solvent without cutting benefits.  What would Adam Smith, the father of modern economic analysis, think of taxing financial transactions and capital gains?  The notion of including all workers in saving and ownership of working capital?  Helping correct the tendency of modern capitalism to concentrate wealth?  Although conservative economists often cite Smith as a siren of an unfettered market, he might give these proposals serious consideration.  Times have changed.  Yet his manner of reasoning remains vital in addressing issues we face today.

Growing inequality has shrunk Social Security’s tax base. Revitalizing it could restore solvency without cutting benefits.

As the graying and outsized baby boom generation claims Social Security benefits, Americans increasingly doubt whether the program can pay all that it has promised – or even continue to cut checks at all.  In their annual report released June 5, Social Security’s Trustees warn that, unless Congress acts to restore the program’s long-term solvency, by 2034 it will only have sufficient funds to pay 77 cents of each dollar currently promised. By then, the Social Security trust fund will be empty and the program will lack legal authority to pay out more than it can bring in through earmarked taxes. An adjustment this size in 2018 would drop the average annual  Social Security payment of $16,848 to $12,973. Most older Americans depend on Social Security for all or most of their income. 

The longer Congress plays chicken on this issue, the greater the risk that changes such as tax increases or benefit cuts, or a combination, will have major economic impacts on retirees and workers. The trustees’ report emphasizes the growing ratio of retirees receiving benefits to workers contributing payroll taxes as a major force impinging on the program’s solvency. Underlying factors include the size of the baby boom generation and a lower birth rate.  But other forces are at work.  Growing wealth and income inequality have significantly eroded Social Security’s tax base.    

First, wealth inequality: As Americans at the top of the economic spectrum continue to amass equities, bonds, and other assets, the portion of national income from capital investment has increased significantly, pushing down the portion earned through labor.  In the United States, labor’s share of earnings fell about eight percentage points between 1995 and 2013 (compared to a bit over three percentage points in other Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries).  Since Social Security relies primarily on a tax on labor for its sustenance, the relative growth of capital income gradually is choking off a source of revenue.  

Second, income inequality: As part of its structure to promote fairness between economic classes, Social Security replaces relatively more lifetime income for lower-wage workers than those with higher wages – but also caps wages subject to its payroll tax, in part to increase the net value of Social Security in the eyes of higher earners.  The wage cap for 2018 is $128,400.  Over the past several decades, wages of lower-income Americans have stagnated, while those at the top have grown significantly.  As a result, the trustees note that portion of wage income taxed by Social Security has dropped by about six percentage points (see p. 144). In agency jargon, the “taxable ratio” of payroll fell from 88.6 percent in 1984 to 82.6 percent in 2000, and has fluctuated near the latter level since then. Social Security Administration (SSA) actuaries assume the ratio will remain about 82.5 percent over the next decade.  In summary, unless the tax cap on earnings keeps up with the growing prosperity of those at the top, Social Security’s tax base shrinks as a portion of national income.

America's Inequality and What To Do about It

The Poor Will Always Be with Us. Will the Middle Class?

Analysis including Housing Assets Finds Piketty May Have Underestimated Wealth Gap

The Rate of Return on Everything - CEPR

"One of the most intensely debated economic questions in recent years is the relationship between real returns on wealth, and the real rate of growth. In his influential book, Piketty (2014) argued that if the return to capital exceeded the rate of economic growth, rentiers would accumulate wealth at a faster rate than incomes grow. Comparing returns to growth, or “r minus g'' in Piketty's vernacular, we uncover that in fact “r >> g” for more countries, more years, and more dramatically than Piketty himself reported."

These two figures show that the only exceptions to “r>>g” happen in very special periods: the years in or right around wartime. In the pre-WW2 period, r minus g was on average 5% per annum (excluding WW1). As of today, this gap is still quite large – in the range of 3%–4% – and it narrowed to 2% during the 1970s oil crises, before widening in the years leading up to the Global Crisis.

"We show that income inequality has increased in nearly all world regions in recent decades, but at different speeds. The fact that inequality levels are so different among countries, even when countries share similar levels of development, highlights the important roles that national policies and institutions play in shaping inequality."

How Humans Extract Rent from Nature's Gifts

"As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce. The wood of the forest, the grass of the field, and all the natural fruits of the earth, which, when land was in common, cost the labourer only the trouble of gathering them, come, even to him, to have an additional price fixed upon them. He must then pay for the licence to gather them, and must give up to the landlord a portion of what his labour either collects or produces. This portion, or, what comes to the same thing, the price of this portion, constitutes the rent of land, and in the price of the greater part of commodities, makes a third.” 

― Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations

Indian income inequality, 1922-2014: From British Raj to Billionaire Raj?  

Lucas Chancel & Thomas Piketty, 

This chart shows that collective income accruing to India's “middle 40” rose to just over 45 percent by the early 1980s, while that of the top 10 percent declined from about 37 percent in 1951 to 30 percent. After 1990 the two trends reverse. The top 10 percent garnered more than 55 percent of all income in 2014, almost double its share in the early 1980s, while the middle 40 percent’s share fell to just over 30 percent.

U.S. Tax Policy Should Boost Retirement Savings for All Workers, Not Just the Wealthiest

Center on Capital & Social Equity - October 2017

Current tax breaks for retirement savings mainly subsidize the top half of the income distribution, leaving almost half the workforce out of the system. Part of the federal tax subsidy for 401(k)s should be rechanneled into a retirement savers tax credit that all workers get ($500 to $1,000 a year).

In 2017 employees can put up to $18,000 in tax-deferred defined contribution plans (e.g., 401(k)s) and those 50 or older can put aside an additional $6,000. Total employee and employer contributions are limited to $54,000. The Tax Policy Center estimates that in 2016 the tax savings from all tax-qualified pension and defined contribution accounts averaged about $1,040 per taxpayer. (No kidding: 1040.) These tax savings, however, were extremely tilted toward the well-off. Only 4.4 percent of workers in the lowest fifth of the income distribution received any tax benefit and their average tax savings in 2016 was $20. In contrast, 82 percent of the highest-paid quintile received a tax benefits with an average benefit of $4,750. About 48 percent of the middle fifth received a tax benefit with an average savings of $580.

The result of this tax policy? About half the American population has put aside virtually nothing for retirement, while many wealthy people are being paid to save money they would have saved anyway. It’s clear that retirement savings tax breaks could be better targeted.  For more information see:

• Distribution of Tax Benefits by Family Income
• Retirement Tax Incentives Are Ripe for Reform Current Incentives Are Expensive, Inefficient, and Inequitable
• Who Benefits from Asset Building Tax Subsidies?
• Estimates of a Proposal to Establish Guaranteed Retirement Accounts, Financed by Reduced Limits on Current Law Contributions to Defined Contribution Retirement Saving Plans
• There's a Better Way To Target Retirement Savings Tax Breaks

Atlas freed?

"Worry not at all about inequality if it is achieved by smart betterment....But do worry about inequality if it is achieved by using the government to get protection for favored groups.  It is what a large government, worth capturing to get the protection, is mainly used for, to the detriment of most of the people off-stage."

Are Workers Receiving the EITC Being Shortchanged on Social Security?

updated October 2017

..."Under the current system, a person whose highest earnings averaged $15,000 a year over 35 years would end up with about $10,542 in annual Social Security benefits – the same as a worker averaging $15,000 wages plus various amounts of EITC.  A worker averaging $20,000 in wages would end up with $1,600 (15%) more in annual Social Security benefits compared with another with the same total income but instead averaging $15,000 wages and taking home $5,000 in EITC.  Similarly, someone averaging $25,000 in wages would end up with $3,200 (30%) more in Social Security benefits than a counterpart averaging $15,000 and receiving $10,000 in EITC."

Green lines: current law    Purple: proposed increases 

D's Push for Major EITC Expansion

September 2017

Two members of Congress are teaming up to bring much-needed relief to low-wage workers and their families through an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).

Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Representative Ro Khanna (D-CA) introduced the  Grow American Incomes Now (GAIN) Act in both the House and Senate. Currently, a family of three can receive a maximum EITC of $6,318, while workers without dependent children can receive at most a $510 credit.  The legislation would roughly double the EITC for eligible workers raising children and increase the credit for workers without dependent children nearly six fold. The bill also lowers the qualifying age for the EITC from 25 to 21.

CCSE comment:

Expanding the EITC is a good idea. However, as the share of workers' income provided by government subsidies rises, the case becomes stronger for the federal government to begin making corresponding payments to Social Security.  Also, a way to simplify tax policy might be to coordinate the EITC and Child Tax Credit (CTC) in the following way: the EITC could be based solely on income, not family structure. The refundable component of the Child Tax Credit could be expanded to provide additional income for low- and middle-income families.

September 2017 - Karl Polzer

Expanding Use, Scope of the EITC & Child Tax Credit: a Win-Win for Workers and Employers

This paper makes the case that helping employees access the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit – along with supporting bipartisan legislation to expand these programs – can help industries with large numbers of low-to-middle wage workers. In the long-term care field, such a strategy can improve worker income through government wage supplements, thus encouraging more to enter the workforce. Increased labor supply would dampen employer wage costs – all while expanding the range of affordable services providers can offer. This could result in hundreds of millions of dollars of added value in worker earnings as well as provider and customer savings.

From Soviets to Oligarchs: Inequality and Property in Russia 1905-2016

"...(T)op  income  shares  are  now  similar to (or  higher than) the levels observed in the U.S.  ... inequality  has  increased substantially more in Russia than in China and other ex-communist countries in Eastern Europe. ...the wealth held offshore by rich Russians is about three times larger than official net foreign reserves, and is comparable in magnitude to total household financial assets held in Russia."

High earnings of labour are an advantage to the society - Adam Smith

“Is this improvement in the circumstances of the lower ranks of the people to be regarded as an advantage or as an inconveniency to the society? The answer seems at first sight abundantly plain.  Servants, labourers and workmen of different kinds make up the far greater part of every great political society.  But what improves the circumstances of the greater part can never be regarded as an inconveniency to the whole.  No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable.  It is but equity, besides, that they who feed, cloath and lodge the whole body of the people, should have such a share of the produce of their own labour as to be themselves tolerably well fed, clothed and lodged.”

-- The Wealth of Nations (originally published in 1776)

A Life Lived in Truth

For the last eight years of Liu Xiaobo’s life, the Chinese authorities robbed him of his liberty and his dignity. But in the state-enforced silence surrounding Liu’s stage-managed death, the words of his Nobel Prize lecture ring out even louder: “Freedom of expression is the foundation of human rights, the source of humanity, and the mother of truth.”

Warren Buffett: Government Should Do More on Income Inequality - short video

"Natural forces of a market economy and capitalism will drive that disparity unless government does things to help." Buffett says EITC should be expanded so workers can have decent lives. (See CCSE article on this site about relationship of EITC and Social Security.)

Robin Hood Tax Reform - May 2017

How Modest Changes in Health, Retirement Tax Breaks Could Produce Major Gains in US Health Access, Financial Security – at Little or No Added Government Cost

..."The positive impacts of two such changes discussed below could include 1) lowering the rate of health care cost inflation; 2) providing revenue to help subsidize health insurance for the unemployed; 3) creating seed money and a low-cost infrastructure for a universal retirement savings system; and 4) increasing retirement security for low- and middle-income people; and 5) helping people save for long-term care costs. Looking at benefit tax exclusion is already on the table as Congress faces the unsavory chore of developing a fix for the Affordable Care Act’s clumsily designed “Cadillac” health plan excise tax. Most importantly, these changes could result in greater economic fairness and inclusion."

Reformed Tax Incentives Among Tools Needed To Boost Retirement Saving

David Kamin of NYU law school presents proposed changes at the Aspen Institute.

Obama Signs Bipartisan Bill To Speed Miracle Cures to Market.  Who Will Have Access to the New Technology?  Who Won’t?

In a city that’s witnessed trench warfare between Congress and the White House during the last six years of the Obama Administration, this was a rare moment: a bipartisan love fest.  On Dec. 13, 2016, President Obama signed the "21st Century Cures Act," which includes expanded funding to push medical technology through the development pipeline. “We are bringing to reality the possibility of new breakthroughs to some of the greatest health-care challenges of our time,” Obama said. “It is wonderful to see how well Democrats and Republicans in the closing day of this Congress came together around a common cause.”

The legislation was backed by a coalition of interests, including the powerful pharmaceutical industry, academia, and consumer groups supporting speedier medical research.  Its few critics have mainly argued that the popular funding provisions “mask a worrisome loosening of regulations at the Food and Drug Administration that could put patients at risk.”

Hardly anyone, however, is asking the million-dollar question:  Which Americans will end up having access to new miracle cures, many of which promise to be extremely expensive?  And, who will not?  The country’s patchwork of health insurance already is rationing expensive new technology to some populations, particularly low-income people.  Congress, meanwhile, has begun a fractious debate over repealing, and possibly replacing, the Affordable Care Act (ACA).  So, while lawmakers have just put their collective foot on the technology gas pedal, they may soon slam the brakes on funding for expanded coverage, potentially throwing millions of Americans into the ranks of the uninsured...              

Traditions of Democracy

    "The tradition of Jefferson and Jackson might recede, but it could never disappear.  It was bound to endure in America so long as liberal capitalistic society endured, for it was the creation of the internal necessities of such a society.  American democracy has come to accept the struggle among competing groups for the control of the state as a positive virtue -- indeed, as the only foundation for liberty.  The business community has been ordinarily the most powerful of these groups, and liberalism in America has been ordinarily the movement on the part of other sections of society to restrain the power of the business community.  This was the tradition of Jefferson and Jackson, and it has been the basic meaning of American liberalism."  

Excerpt from Chapter 37, "The Age of Jackson," Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

June 30, 2016

Reflections on American Wealth Concentration – and What To Do About It

Just over one year ago, the Center on Capital & Social Equity (CCSE) began exploring the phenomenon of growing wealth concentration and inequality, while advocating for a more inclusive form of capitalism. Following are some general observations.

Over the past year, the issue of economic inequality in the United States has moved from the backburner to center stage. Much credit for this goes to Sen. Bernie Sanders’ attack on the “top one percent” in his run for the Democratic nomination. While there is ample reason to question many details of his proposals, Sanders’ call for an increased role for government in providing opportunity and essential services resonated with many Americans who feel they have been left out of the economic mainstream. Yet the problems posed by rising economic inequality are deeply rooted and go well beyond the disproportional gains of the top one percent. They will be harder to address than portrayed in election rhetoric and require judicious use of public resources.

Three observations can be made about economic inequality in the United States. First, income and wealth inequality have grown steadily since the 1980s, suggesting that some of the causes are structural in nature. Second, high levels of inequality increase the risk of political and economic instability. Finally, moving toward an economy that is less unequal and offers opportunity to more Americans will require major changes in public policy and shifts in spending.

Life Expectancy Gap is Large - and Expanding

The gap in life expectancy between the richest 1% and poorest 1% was 14.6 years for men and 10.1 years for women.  A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association also found that inequality in Americans' life expectancy is growing over time.

How the U.S. Retirement Savings System Magnifies Wealth Inequality

Karl Polzer, Center on Capital & Social Equity 

Economic inequality and wealth concentration have have emerged as central issues in the U.S. presidential race. While these concerns appear to have risen to the forefront quite suddenly, forces driving wealth concentration have been building for decades. As analysts probe the dynamics beneath these trends, they may find that America's shift to a defined contribution retirement system is playing an increasing role in the concentration of wealth... 

Virginia's push to end veteran homelessness faces steep challenges

On Nov. 11, 2015, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe announced that the state was the first to "functionally" end homelessness among veterans of the U.S. armed forces.  To assist two veterans living on the street not aware of the program, the Center on Capital & Social Equity contacted the governor's office, asking how veterans can gain access to housing and other services under the collaboration involving state, federal, and local government agencies.

The Virginia Department of Veterans Services provided information (click on the button below), including contact points at the local and state levels where veterans and their advocates can begin the process of finding temporary or permanent housing.

To follow up, we contacted three Northern Virginia jurisdictions and found an array of barriers to functionally ending veteran homelessness.  These problems include lack of  knowledge on the part of local officials of the state's initiative; lack of affordable and subsidized housing resources; high housing prices; lack of shelter space (for example, Fairfax County has 1 million residents but only three homeless shelters that can't meet wintertime demand); unwillingness by many street people to seek help (for a variety of reasons); coordination issues between state and local, local and local, and federal and state and local agencies; bottlenecks like having to go through shelters to gain access to housing, when shelter space is limited; and many other factors.

While helping one of the veterans gain access to temporary shelter and services, we reported these issues back to the state officials who said they will take steps to increase awareness of the governor's initiative, including posting information about the program on a state website.  For more detail, see our correspondence with state and local officials, which can be accessed by clicking the second button below.

Let’s sell health insurance “across states lines” – through Medicare

Republicans, stop with being the party of “no.” It’s time to step up to the plate and seize the initiative on health policy...

Playing Immigration Piñata

Deception and hypocrisy are no strangers to politics. This seems particularly true in recent incantations about illegal immigration. Republican presidential candidates – other than Jeb Bush – mostly want to round up illegals and dump them into Mexico. Donald Trump wants to spend billions to build a massive wall in the wrong place...

How Can U.S. Policy Reduce Financial Risk for the Very Old?

Retirement Strategy:  When Should I Start Receiving Social Security Checks?

Americans can begin taking Social Security between ages 62 and 70. Waiting to take Social Security can increase the amount on your check significantly.  Collecting Social Security benefits early has the opposite effect. 

When to start depends on many factors including your life situation,  needs and plans.  Most Americans begin taking Social Security early.

The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offers this planning tool and other information to help people work through this decision.   

"In God We Trust" was adopted as the official motto of the United States in 1956 as an alternative or replacement to the unofficial motto of E pluribus unum, which was adopted when the Great Seal of the United States was created and adopted in 1782. Secularists have expressed objections to its use and have sought to have the religious reference removed from the currency.  Wikipedia, 2015