An interesting theory.
The Class-Domination Theory of Power
by G. William Domhoff
April 2005
NOTE: WhoRulesAmerica.net is largely based on my book, Who Rules America?, first published in 1967 and now in its 6th edition. This on-line document is presented as a summary of some of the main ideas in that book.
Who has predominant power in the United States? The short answer, from 1776 to the present, is: Those who have the money have the power. George Washington was one of the biggest landowners of his day; presidents in the late 19th century were close to the railroad interests; for the Bush family, it was oil and other natural resources, agribusiness, and finance. But to be more exact, those who own income-producing property — corporations, real estate, and agribusinesses — set the rules within which policy battles are waged.
via Who Rules America: The Class-Domination Theory of Power.
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Online lessons geared toward teaching high school students economics as if people mattered. From United for a Fair Economy.
Teaching Economics As If People Mattered.
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Quite unlike today’s public, what Depression-era Americans wanted from their government was, on many counts, more not less. And despite their far more dire economic straits, they remained more optimistic than today’s public. Nor did average Americans then turn their ire upon their Groton-Harvard-educated president — this despite his failure, over his first term in office, to bring a swift end to their hardship. FDR had his detractors but these tended to be fellow members of the social and economic elite.
via How a Different America Responded to the Great Depression – Pew Research Center.
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It’s hard to figure out what the corporations have to complain about. Corporate America registered the highest profits on record last quarter. Companies are sitting on more than a trillion dollars in cash. CEOs are pocketing record compensation. Wall Street is back handing out million-dollar bonuses. The president’s tax deal extends their tax breaks, promises a lower rate on their estates and extends billions in corporate tax subsidies.
The AFL-CIO provides a helpfu guide to just how well the barons meeting with the president are doing. John Chambers, the chairman and chief executive officer of Cisco, was paid $10.2 million during last year’s recession — about 320 times the $32,048 that the average worker took home. Kenneth Chennault, chairman and chief executive officer of American Express, made do with $17.3 million — or an astounding 524 times what the average worker makes.
via Opinion: Getting all of America working – Robert L. Borosage – POLITICO.com.
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Today, 75 years and 4 months since Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act, a Democratic president is ignoring his wisdom and abandoning his strategy for protecting the program from shifting political winds. If congressional Democrats go along with Obama on this, it could mark the beginning of the end of Social Security as we have known it.
via Obama vs. FDR on Social Security | The New Rules Project.
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The media were quick to condemn ACORN’s alleged misbehavior, but they’ve been extraordinarily slow to report on independent studies that have exonerated the organization. Investigations by two state attorneys general uncovered no illegal behavior. According to the GAO, all complaints filed against ACORN with the Federal Elections Commission were dismissed. Six FBI investigations into alleged voter fraud by ACORN employees were closed without indictments.
This March a federal District Court ruled that the law Congress passed cutting off ACORN’s federal funding was a bill of attainder, a type of law specifically prohibited by the Constitution because of the Founding Fathers’ fear that a powerful and vindictive federal government could single out a single individual or organization for penalties.
via ACORN deserves an apology, too | The New Rules Project.
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With unemployment high and millions of families in need, for the first time since 1996 when President Clinton and Congress created the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant as part of welfare reform, no additional TANF funds are available from the federal government to help states respond to the large increases in the number of impoverished families as a result of a recession.
Consequently, with the need for emergency and temporary assistance (including help finding work) at their highest levels in decades, more low-income parents will go without jobs, more homeless families will go without shelter, fewer low-wage workers will receive help with child care expenses, and fewer families involved with the child welfare system will receive preventive services.
via Federal TANF Funding Shrinking While Need Remains High — Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
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But there was second hypothesis: Maybe a good chunk of the political class is just so insulated from the realities in the report that they don’t feel the same sense of urgency that most Americans do. Things are terrible on Main Street, but on Wall Street, Pennsylvania Avenue, and K Street, they don’t look so gloomy. How else can we explain why everyone in Washington was talking about deficit reduction (at least until they decided to blow another hole in the budget), even while polls show that Americans ranked it way, way below fixing the economy?
It’s not clear which is scarier — that our leaders don’t think they can lead, or that they don’t want to.
Either way, the middle-class economy keeps falling, and no one is there to hear it.
via Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson: The Great Disconnect.
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According to the report, more than 90 percent of Americans experienced at least one major economic “shock” during these 18 months: a substantial drop in wealth or income, a large increase in nondiscretionary spending (such as medical costs), or similar dislocation. Even if you ignore big wealth losses — ubiquitous because of the fall in the housing and the stock markets — roughly 7 in 10 Americans saw their earnings substantially decline or their nondiscretionary expenses substantially rise. Nearly a quarter saw their income fall by 25 percent or more.
via Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson: The Great Disconnect.
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Another important article from Robert Reich with his solutions for a true economic recovery.
This is not a recovery. It’s a continuing jobs emergency and it demands action
via Robert Reich (The American Jobs Emergency Requires Action).
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Mr. Reich has some very good ideas. Please read the rest of the article at the link below.
Here’s the real story. For three decades, an increasing share of the benefits of economic growth have gone to the top 1 percent. Thirty years ago, the top got 9 percent of total income. Not they take in almost a quarter. Meanwhile, the earnings of the typical worker have barely budged.
The vast middle class no longer has the purchasing power to keep the economy going. (The rich spend a much lower portion of their incomes.) The crisis was averted before now only because middle-class families found ways to keep spending more than they took in – by women going into paid work, by working longer hours, and finally by using their homes as collateral to borrow. But when the housing bubble burst, the game was up.
The solution is to reorganize the economy so the benefits of growth are more widely shared. Exempt the first $20,000 of income from payroll taxes, and apply payroll taxes to incomes over $250,000. Extend Medicare to all. Extend the Earned Income Tax Credit all the way up through families earning $50,000. Make higher education free to families that now can’t afford it. Rehire teachers. Repair and rebuild our infrastructure. Create a new WPA to put the unemployed back to work…
But here’s the obstacle. As income and wealth have risen to the top, so has political power. Money is being used to bribe politicians and fill the airwaves with misleading ads that block all of this.
via Robert Reich (Why the Tax Deal Confirms the Republican Worldview).
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With the global integration of markets and cultures over the past few decades, the concepts of human rights and democracy can no longer be considered apart from the economics of inequality. Of the Four Freedoms articulated by Roosevelt in 1941, Freedom from Want is still a dream for at least half of the world population. For this reason, when the Universal Declaration marks its 60th Anniversary in December there will be little to celebrate. We live in a time defined by the most dissolute world records: there are more billionaires today than ever before, a number crossing into four figures for the first time to reach 1,125. There are more millionaires today than ever, passing 10 million for the first time last year and adding an extra zero to the tally, reaching 10.1 million millionaires.
via The Economics of Global Democracy – STWR – Share The World’s Resources.
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More than 1.4 billion people live in poverty so extreme that they can barely survive, and around 25,000 people die from hunger each day whilst a new billionaire is created every second day. The call for a global safety net has never been so urgent – and compels the international community to transform economic priorities and guarantee the universal securing of basic human needs.
via Poverty & Inequality.
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