The Roots of Our Problems, Part 1

My mother once said she regards the world as one giant kindergarten – we’re all still kids, basically; just bigger.

I think if we start with that premise, we can begin to figure out some of the issues that face people worldwide when it comes to the haves and have-nots.  Being on the lower end of the income spectrum, I speak from the perspective of the have-nots.  (I am aware that the have-nots in America are doing pretty damn well compared to the have-nots in other countries, but still, my perspective is my perspective – in America, I’m one of the have-nots.)

The first thing we have-nots must do if we are to “build a better tomorrow” is to get over the fact that we are the have-nots.  I’m 47 years old, have a Master’s degree from Northwestern University, and live in a one-bedroom apartment with second-hand furnishings.  I drive around Chicago’s North Shore and realize that the people who live in those big houses are, in many cases, less educated, less talented, and less intelligent than I am (that’s not boasting – I know a lot of them).  But there they live, and I’m “a renter.”  I look at where I live and think, “That’s where I live,” but I don’t live there.  See the difference?  I live in a lower-income neighborhood, but that isn’t what defines me.  It would be really easy for me to look at “where I’m at” in life and consider myself a failure, get angry at the world, grow depressed, and turn into a piece of white trash and call it a day.  But I am more than where I live; I am more than what I have or don’t have; I am more than a renter; I am more than my job.

Because that is my perspective on me, it is also my perspective on everybody.  The billionaire I am supposed to envy is more to me than his money, than his job, than his house and yacht.  He is a man.  The great equalizer we are searching for in this world is not a progressive income tax, ladies and gentlemen.  In case no one has noticed over the last hundred years, that doesn’t work – at all.  The great equalizer is nothing more than self-respect.

So, problem No. 1: envy.

Our envy of the wealthy has been eating at us and blurring our sense of justice for centuries.  The very idea that we have some twisted duty to take from the wealthy and distribute it all around creates a divide, creates that “us and them” mentality which breeds conflict.  A better tomorrow has us standing side-by-side with the wealthy as equals, as brothers – not as enemies.  Wealth equals power only because we envy what the “haves” have.  We want what they have – cash – and the wealthy use that envy against us.  Their power to influence our governments, their power to write the rules that govern us, is bought.  We want the money, and we take it in exchange for our own power.  Our Congress has been handing over the power of legislating in exchange for money for a long time.  It’s no secret.  Envying wealth is killing our country.  Self-respect kills envy.   

When we stop envying the wealthy, their power over the have-nots will disappear.  Their wealth will be only that – wealth.  It will only mean they can spend more than we can when they go to market – that’s all.  It will no longer mean they can rule us.

We are all aware of man’s weakness when it comes to greed (which is born out of envy).  For those members of Congress who simply cannot find the self-respect to rise above a greedy nature, there is an answer: term limits for all members of Congress.  There is no other way.  The People must insist.

We are also aware that some who have great wealth have come by it illegally or unjustly.  If there is credible evidence against them of wrongdoing, the answer for them is a court of law.  If they are found guilty after a trial, then we have reason to confiscate whatever of their wealth is deemed appropriate in their case.  This is the only wealth we can legitimately go after for redistribution.  If the laws are found to be unjust and allow for injustice where amassing wealth is concerned, then the People need to find the will to change those unjust laws.  We will never find justice by blindly “soaking the rich” through taxation or otherwise.  This will never answer.  In fact, the taxation (the progressive income tax) that was put in place to “soak the rich” a hundred years ago has been turned against us by the rich.  The sooner we unplug everyone from that scam, the better.

One final note on the income tax before we move on (because, believe it or not, this post isn’t really about the income tax, though that subject is an important part of the bigger picture): no one will ever convince me that forcing one person to pay more for an available government resource than what another person has to pay falls under the definition of “just.”  Ironically, I find that my own experience provides a prime example of this.

Most years as a piano tuner, my annual income tax liability hovered around $3,000.  The year after I took over another tuner’s business (he moved out of state), the liability jumped to $15,000 (years later, it’s back to what it had been, if not a little lower).  However, I don’t recall ever receiving a notice in the mail that year that went anything like this: “Sir, the United States government is pleased to inform you that you now have available to you five times more police and fire protection, five times more roads available to travel on, education for your children that is five times better than what you have been accustomed to, five times more street lighting and sewer service, five times more public health benefits, an armed Marine guard when you travel overseas…”, etc., etc., etc.  The fact is, with five times as much tax liability, the amount of government services available to me as a citizen didn’t change in the least, but suddenly those services were five times more expensive.  The rich know there is no justice in this.  When one individual pays $1,000 annually in income tax and another is told to pay $2 million for the same government services that are available to every citizen, you can bet the one who has to pay $2 million will find any way he can to avoid it.  And if you can kill the envy inside, you won’t be able to blame him.  And look at it this way: if you were expected to put $2 million a year into the coffers, would you not have some sense of entitlement when it came to writing the rules of the game?  Would you, for that kind of money, not feel entitled to having more say in the process than the one who contributes $1,000?  Of course you would!  It's human nature.  It’s time to kill the individual income tax – an unjust system that has never been the great equalizer it was pitched as by its earliest proponents.

But the main point of this first part is envy: envy is the enemy, envy divides, envy blurs what is truly just or unjust, envy leads to greed which stupidly trades power for cash.  Self-respect kills envy and creates true equality (whether the wealthy want it or not).  And let’s not forget Congressional term limits – the only real protection we can offer members of Congress; protection from themselves.  If we don't provide this protection (give them a couple of terms to do some good and then get them the hell out of there), how can we, knowing human nature, really blame them for the folly they engage in year after year?