Working In These Times
GOP Wants to Extend Bush Tax Cuts, Not Jobless Benefits. Can Dems Seize the Moment?
U.S. Senate Minority Whip Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) speaks in opposition to the unemployment benefits extension being sought by Senate Democrats during a news conference on March 26, 2010. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
The Republicans are brazenly displaying their loyalty to the richest 1 percent of Americans by fighting to extend George W. Bush's tax cuts at the very same time they oppose an extension of unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless.
So why aren't leading Democrats happier as the Republicans recklessly show their blatant disregard for the desperate and devotion to rich? White House spokesman Robert Gibson even predicted this week that the Republicans could re-take the House. What gives?
The Republicans' utterly indefensible position was neatly captured in a McClatchy Newspapers headline: "GOP: No more help for jobless, but rich must keep tax cuts." Steven Benen of the Washington Monthly explains the GOP's hypocritical posture:
Republicans almost unanimously oppose spending $33.9 billion for extended unemployment benefits for some 2.5 million people who've lost them, because they say it would increase federal budget deficits.
At the same time, they're pushing a permanent extension of Bush administration tax cuts, especially for the wealthy, which could increase federal budget deficits by trillions of dollars over the next 10 years….
It's generally hard to guess what the public will find compelling, but if I had to guess, I'd say more Americans would rather spend $33.9 billion for extended unemployment benefits than $678 billion for tax cuts for the wealthy.
$217 FOR WORKING FAMILIES VS. $93,000 FOR MILLIONAIRES
In The War At Home, Frances Fox Piven documents that the median Bush tax cut for ordinary Americans has been a measly $217 a year, while it showers $93,000 annually on those earning more than $1 million.
So why aren't Democratic leaders jubilant about the chance to exploit the Republicans' naked act of class warfare? After all, the Republicans, in the midst of severe economic hardship, are supporting more wealth for those who need it least?
Moreover, tax cuts for the wealthy just add to their massive bank accounts and provide virtually no economic stimulus—unlike unemployment benefits, which get devoted to food, mortgage, and gas as soon as the weekly check arrives.
Unforunately, there's good reason for the Democrats' pessimism, based on their shabby treatment of their most excited and hopeful voters. This is bound to be a crucial factor shaping who shows up at the polls in a non-presidential year.
Perhaps top Democrats are finally recognizing the huge "enthusiasm gap" between their now demoralized, drifting constituents and the ferocious and focused activism of the Republican base.
Obama entered the White House facing an unprecedented level of problems, but he also had an extraordinarily involved and well-organized base of voters. But the White House has taken these voters for granted while playing for legitimacy with Wall Street. For example, It's amazing to recall that just weeks before the BP disaster Obama had capitulated to endorsing off-shore drilling.
STIMULUS PLAN NOT ENOUGH—ECONOMICALLY OR POLITICALLY
On the positive side, Democratic voters will typically point to Obama's all-out fight for the $787 stimulus program, which stopped the hemorrhage of 700,000 jobs being lost every month.
However, that signal victory has not been enough to either revitalize the economy nor restore the morale of core Democratic voters, as many of them are especially hard-hit by the Great Recessions. (Art Levine recently articulated on this site the paralysis of the Democrats in delivering substantive economic improvement for their most ardent supporters.)
To make matters worse, most Democrats in Congress have not been responding to the GOP denial of extended unemployment insurance as if the Republicans had staged a Pearl Harbor-style bombing run on working-class America.
If the Democrats had more credibility as tough fighters willing to risk anything for working people hammered by Wall Street, they would be much better positioned to use the current situation to dramatize the distinctions between the two parties as we head toward November's elections.
For example, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) argues that America cannot afford extended unemployment benefits without offsetting cuts in human-service programs. At the same time, Kyl argues that continuing Bush's regressive tax cuts is a moral crusade so urgent that the resulting deficits need not be considered. "[Y]ou should never have to offset cost of a deliberate decision to reduce tax rates on Americans," he thundered incoherently.
Let's try to translate Kyl: extending unemployment checks (at a maximum of $350 a week) must be offset by human-service cuts. But tax cuts averaging $93,000 a year for millionaires are a cause so sacrosanct that its impact on deficits need never be considered.
It will be both tragic and farcical if the Democrats can't seize on such hypocrisy and use it to define the Republicans for the November elections.
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Comments
This article is consciously misleads the working class, is intellectually dishonest, and represents a continuation of
trade union leadership to save the disastrous capitalist system. The cruxt of the article is that we should be expending more energy and treasure of the workers to drive the Democrats to the Left This is NOT what the working class needs at this time. Both parties are the parties of Capital and are both ideologically and materially controlled by finance capital
ie. JP Morgan-Chase, Goldman-Sachs and the think-tank whores for big capital like Council on Foreign Relations (Rockefeller family controlled) and many others.
This failed strategy negates the building of rank-and-file power in the shops and and building powerful strikes with international solkidarity of US and other global workers. The working class can NEVER win the committment of these parties to labors main needs to for full employment, obtaining a improved living standard, eliminating the racist pay differentials that still permeate virtually every industry in this society, and building a movement with the long range goal of extinguishing the the power of capital over labor. Labor does NOT NEED or WANT any saviour, we need to take matters into our own hands and let the laws be damned. Every movemnt worht its salt has come from the power of the worker whether the Civil Rights Movement or the powerful labor movement built in the 1930’s. The violence of capital against labor is an every day fact of life. We need to fire all the lawyers who control labor stratetgy with their kiss of death and obedience to the bosses’ laws. We need to do what ever it takes to rebuild the power of the union movement. That means getting rid of labor faker’s who never worked a day in their lives and those who have gotten too soft from the cushy salaries they receive that far outstrips that of the average worker they represent. That means stopping the giveaway of tens of millions of workers money for political action funds. That means spending the same monies on building strike funds and organizing unorganized workers and sending delegations of workers to meet our brothers and sisters overseas to plan joint strike actions to foil the global corporations that shift production when workers strike only on a national basis. Internationalism is the order of the day
Opposition to imerialist wars for oil and natural gas as in Iraq and Afghanistan must be opposed. No working class blood for oil!
The only way the working class can turn around this frontal assault by capital is going on the offensive instead of wasting time on the political whores of Caoital. There is NO way that unions can match the money the banks and industry can muster for their political lobbies. We will have our time, if and only if, we see the capitalist system not as our friend, but our class enemy.
Wechsler, I’m not sure if you’re overly idealistic or playing the role of the mole, but I disagree with a number of points.
You wrote, “Labor does NOT NEED or WANT any savior, we need to take matters into our own hands and let the laws be damned.” What labor does need is a strong leader (and Trumka does have the potential). Any movement without a leader simply spins in circles until it exhausts itself. The masses don’t organize and take matters into their own hands without a leader.
There’s no question that many unions were corrupted, step by step, by impositions made by corporate powers.
Most of our unions have been crushed; we are rare among modern nations in that we no longer have a protected right to unionize. As a result of this, remaining unions have been left impotent. The unions MUST belong to the workers, and workers must regain control of them. History clearly shows us how we got into our current mess—and how to get out of it.
Yes, we do need leaders to organize and strengthen the power of ordinary workers to fight for all that has been taken from them since the 1980s. Individually, we can only complain. Together, we can force government to intervene and turn back the long list of pro-corporate policies that have so horribly damaged this country.
Remember, when union membership was at its largest and strongest in the US, it resulted in building a country that had the highest quality of life on Earth. Without strong unions, we would not have had the vast middle class that we had prior to Reagan. Since then, most unions have been crushed, and the quality of life in the US has deteriorated so far and so fast that it leaves us dizzy.
Mr Fabian, I think you misinterpreted my comments. When I say labor needs no saviors, I am primarily talking about endorsing and and putting our efforts into electing capitalist politicians rather than putting the effort and money into grass-roots organizing , strike support, and mass rallies against the bosses and their political system like racist immigration policies, bosses wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere to rip off the world energy resources for the benefit of that small parasitic class that rules us.
Of course we need leaders. But we need leaders who come from the working class, are still part of the working class, and who are fearless warriors as well as shrewd organizers. Screw the lawyers whose legal beagle ideas hem us into trying to fight by the bosses rules. Screw their laws . They only protect the property and power of their class not ours. I am not a patriot for the red,white,and blue. That is Wall Street’s flag , has always been Wall Street’s flag, and will always be Wall Street’s flag. My loyalty is not their laws their rules , but to the need of my fellow working brothers and sisters who are struggling to survive as the bourgeois prosper at our expense.
Ira Wechsler - I did misinterpret, and I apologize. You make some good points. One thing I don’t understand is why “we the ordinary” can’t seem to pull things together and organize on a large scale. Where are all the spokespeople? The rallies? Have Americans really grown so timid? We’re in as much of a crisis as we were early in the 20th century, and back then, workers finally stood up and said, “That’s enough!” Then we had strong unions, like the more advanced nations have today. It was those unions that built that vast middle class we had until the 1980s.
So, why are American workers today like deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck?
The political and social stability enjoyed in America has been a direct result of the existence of an expansive middle class. We all know the middle class way of life has been jeopardized by self serving corporate capitalist who’s greed has known no bounds. The systematic destruction of our nation’s unions since the Reagan eighties has served to shrink the number of middle class families while inflating the number of those living in poverty.
How can it be that Corporations like GE and BP can have net earnings of $10 billion dollars or more and pay no tax while working class families struggling without a job are abandoned? How can it be that Corporations are rewarded with tax incentives and credits as they offshore millions of good paying American jobs? How can it be that working class Americans have been indirectly forced to lower their standard of living so that those in the developing world can increase theirs? One word comes to mind- REPUBLICAN
When the middle class has been eroded to a point where most citizens are not considered to belong then we will have social unrest. When enough Americans have been forced to abandon their way of life as middle class citizens just to be relegated to daily survival then we will have upheaval and anarchy, then it will be too late.
We have been on this path for too long now while many of our brethren have succumbed to the “Republican Spin”.
The working class have allowed themselves to be divided on petty meaningless issues while ignoring issues important to their own economic well being.
It will be interesting to see just how the R spin machine frames their own hypocrisy.
Dear friends:
You all raise important aspects in response to my article. Allow me to add some reflections:
TO IRA: I think if you had read some of my previous articles and posts, you would see that my emphasis is on mass action by working class people to exercise power wherever they have leverage—whether it is sitdowns against plant closings or block home foreclosures. That also includes voting for pro-worker candidates, including selected Democrats, as a means of shifting the nation’s policy framework to the Left.
In my view, labor needs to stop functioning exclusively as a lobbying group and an electoral machine and use its resources to instigate and support action at the local level against each and every relocation of jobs to China, Mexico, and other repressive low-wage nations.
TO JUSTICE 22: Our situation is unfortunately more complex than moving people away from the “election-season” issues of guns, abortion and gays that the Republicans have used to divide working people.
While the Republicans have become more vile than ever, the Democrats have become less reliable allies of working people than at any time since the New Deal..
Just think of an auto bailout by the Obama team that resulted in more plant closings in the US and more cars outsourced to Mexico and China; a healthcare plan that enriches insurers and drug companies while leaving some 20 million uncovered, no cost controls, and a vast, parasitic insurance bureaucracy still in place; weak Wall Street reform that leaves some mega-banks too big to fail; and continuation of Bush’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
TO DH FABIAN: In my view, the relative passivity of working people in response to current brutal economic crisis—whose horrific effects on working families’ health, economic security, and their ability to hang on to their homes I have discussed in many articles—is due to several factors:
1) EXPECTATIONS: The great upsurge of unionization in the 1930’s occurred during an economic upturn when a new generation of young workers—who had not endured labor’s defeats during the 1920’s—was less fearful about losing their jobs and had higher expectations than earlier in the crisis.
2) A WEAKENED SENSE OF ECONOMIC RIGHTS: OVer the last three decades, working people have been constantly hammered with the notion that they should abandon any expectation of economic security in the name of fighting “global competition” (no matter that a huge percentage of imports comes from US corporate operations overseas.
3. SENSE OF POWERLESSNEED: While polling (see past blog posts by me) show overwhelmingly opposition to corporate offshoring of jobs, people feel powerless in face of supposedly all-powerful transnational corporations. As argued above, labor needs to both popularize the notion of economic rights for workers—to job security, to universal healthcare, decent food and housing, etc.—and to contest each and every instance of job loss at the local level to re-ignite workers’ sense of agency.
I hope these brief comments serve to clarify where I’m coming from and to enrich our discussion. Please stay in touch! Best, Roger.
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Your article states ” I’d say more Americans would rather spend $33.9 billion for extended unemployment benefits than $678 billion for tax cuts for the wealthy.” First, $678B is an estimate over TEN years. Do you think comparing the extension (additional funds) of $33.9B in one year to a ten year figure is fair, or are you trying to promote a specific agenda?
Providing an incentive for not working only gives you more people not working. I think having a safety net is important but not a way of life.
Under the Bush tax cuts the ‘rich’ paid a higher percentage of the overall taxes. The top 1% pay 40% of taxes while the bottom 47% pay NOTHING.
You seem to focused on dollar amounts. The people that only get $217 probably don’t pay taxes or pay almost nothing. In comparison, I pay several hundred thousand dollars in federal taxes each year but I didn’t receive a ‘tax refund’ from Bush or Obama. Interesting, you believe in a progressive tax but not a progressive refund.
What’s wrong with a ‘rich’ person being able to keep more of what they earn? It’s not your money, you didn’t EARN it. The way some politicians phrase taxes, “we can’t afford the Bush tax cuts.” Whose money is it? To me, it seems like politicians think all money belongs to them first, and they determine how much we should be able to keep. That’s freedom?
I believe in fair, that all people are equal. Personally, I think a flat tax where EVERYONE pays the same percentage is fair.
I wish I had more time to respond to this article, but I have to go to work.
Dean Johnson, With all due respect, you don’t “get it.” Claiming that UI is a “disincentive” to finding work is as ludicrous as the old talking point that welfare was a disincentive to finding work. Both notions betray stunning ignorance. On welfare, we were told that “generous” benefits (which, except for a very brief time in the 1970s, remained well below the poverty line) were a disincentive. This is the same thing as saying that people simply prefer being treated like trash while living with miserable deprivation, essentially at the mercy of others. In reality, before “reform”, over 80% of those on AFDC voluntarily quit
welfare for work in under 5 years, eager to earn a normal paycheck; even minimum wage work was a vast improvement over welfare. Anyone who actually experienced it knows that the idea that people would choose hunger and deprivation over a job is crazy.
UI provides considerably higher income than welfare did, but it is also time-limited, whether the economy improves or not. Once the UI runs out, well, we no longer have a safety net, so people are living with extreme anxiety, desperate to land a job before their UI expires. If they don’t manage to get a job, they can lose absolutely everything—including their children (our welfare reform policies include a provision that gives the state the right to “take indefinite custody” of children if parents have no income/assets).
You think that isn’t a strong enough incentive to find work?
DH:
Despite the emotional aspect of this program, there is an economical compoent that needs to be considered.
First, lets start with the basic understanding that the PURPOSE of unemployment benefits are to provide a bridge or short term relief when, at no fault to their own, a person loses their job (eg. layoffs). This is an insurance program where the term is usually around 26 weeks (1/2 year). In that period, able bodied persons should be able to find gainful employment. What you propose by extending the benefits is to change this into an entitlement program.
I understand that currently the labor department indicates that there are 5 people applying for every job available. The problem of extending the benefits (AGAIN) is to determine how are we going to pay for them?
When a person’s benefits ‘run out’ they will NEED to find a job. The job may be less desireable and will most likely pay less than the job they previously had. I call this a port in the storm. With an engineering degree and a MBA I took various temp jobs including data entry just to ‘feed the wolf’.
I agree that the majority of recipients are seeking employment; however, you have to admit there are people who will not aggressively seek employment because they
have the weekly supplement. The incentive to find a job is related to the difference between the amount received from UI and how much the new job pays, in a way the compensating differential. The amount one receives for UI varies by state with a high of $900/wk in MA, and a low of $210/wk MS. In most cases I believe that UI provides little assistance and the amount received is barely enough to live on. For example, a person making $100K and is laid off and only receives $386/wk will not have enough to pay for the mortgage, and other monthly payments (unless he/she planned ahead - another time). I’ll agree in these instances UI is not a disincentive. However, that is not representative of the body as a whole (even though you may think it is). If you look at the average profile/income level of the unemployed worker the result is unemployment goes up when unemployment benefits go up. Ask yourself, would you work 40 hrs. per week and receive $420/wk if you get $380 in UI (personally, I would)?
In this economic environment, higher paying jobs are not abundant; therefore, there is LESS incentive to
take a job. Scarce jobs means that the increase in unemployment rate from these benefits is higher, people are going to stay out of the job market longer the higher the
benefit and the longer it lasts.
By extending the unemployment benefits, Congress is just shifting the responsibility of addressing the problem of job creation. On a side note, I wouldn’t care as much if as President Obama said - everyone needs to have skin in the game. To me that means EVERYONE pays taxes, and the same percentage. Think of the incentative to work harder and invest more. Again, when 47% of the people DON’T pay ANY taxes what do they care if people take advantage of the system.
Dean, I disagree on point after point, and it’s very difficult to know which points to zero in on. Clearly, you have been a financially secure person, outside of the realm of ordinary working class/poor. You are citing popular conservative theories that aren’t based on the experience of ordinary., working class people.
I strongly disagree with your theory that some people on UI are merely enjoying a free ride, not aggressively seeking employment. They don’t have that option. Benefits are time-limited, and jobs are scarce (since hundreds of thousands of our jobs continue to be outsourced to foreign countries). It takes much longer to find work today, so people obviously can’t afford to take time off from the job hunt. If they can’t find work within this narrow window of time, they will lose their homes, maybe their children (our welfare “reform” includes a provision that allows the state to “take indefinite custody” of children whose parents are unemployed and out of money), maybe their lives. The stakes couldn’t be higher.
When we had welfare, some 80% of recipients voluntarily quit welfare for work within 5 years for the most obvious of reasons: Poverty is miserable. It’s human nature to want a measure of security and freedom, neither of which was possible under welfare. People can’t turn to family and friends for help today because they’re in the same sinking boat. The reality is that when there are far more people in desperate need of a job than there are job openings, many are going to be left out, with no income. What should we do about them? Let them die?
Of course the answer is “jobs”, but 30+ years of massive corporate welfare has left us with fewer, not more, jobs.
We need to establish an entirely new economic model
that includes legitimate regulations and responsibilities for corporations. There is actually a great deal that COULD be done, but here’s the bottom line: You can’t turn a “ship of state” around quickly. It takes time. Under the absolutely best-case scenario, it will be years before there is enough jobs for all who desperately need them. What would you suggest doing about the many for whom there simply aren’t any jobs?
Forget one point that you stress: Who doesn’t pay taxes? The poor don’t pay property or income taxes because their income is too low and they own no property; the rich are free to choose the same circumstances if they want to avoid taxes. The low-income pay a disproportionate amount of their income in sales taxes and fees.
DH:
I love it, while you correctly assume that I am financially secure you don’t know my history. I’ve worked since I was 12 (paper routes), then to dishwasher, landscaper/laying sod, assembly line worker, bar back, bus boy (table engineer), etc. I’ve worked my way UP the ladder without handouts. I paid for ALL my education including two advanced degrees. Yes, I know what it’s like to not have money.
People make choices… I love my REAL life experience, while working on the assembly line everyone my age went out and bought the new IROC Z28 with the t-tops. I wanted one SO badly, but I saved my money for college. I didn’t get the benefits (pleasure) of driving that vehicle. I invested in my future. Now, based on that and other choices I’m in a much better position than those who made other choices. Now, these same people want the dividends of my investments….is that fair? What ever happened to personal responsibility?
I have invested, saved and planned for my future other have not ... again their choice. The only difference, I don’t ask others to be responsible for my decisions, why should I be forced by government to be responsible for theirs. I’m a libertarian, who somehow navigated to this site. I love the opportunity to debate issues, and this will be a great site.
What I would have done is not execute the stimulus plan but give a tax holiday for one year and watch the capital investment. Personally, I would have started a day care, or invested in an assisted living facility, and/or bought a plane. All of which would have created JOBS.
Do you really think the government can run any organization effectively? Health care (Medicare, Medicaid, VA, CHIPS)? The post office? Fannie/Freddie?
I’ll comment more later.
Dear Dean Johnson:
The political linguist George Lakoff has often remarked that “Frames trump facts.”
Your frame on the increasingly-unequal economic system runs something like this:
1) My individual initiative alone determines my success
But didn’t your access to education depend on the collective fight of previous generations for universal public education and expanded access to higher education?
2) Everyone has the same amount of choice and the same chance to become Bill Gates.
So the poor and working-class kids of America have the same schools, healthcare, food, and other opportunities as the children of the richest 1%?
3) The wealth accumulated by Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and the executives at BP merely reflects their hard work.
But what about government subsidies which are infinitely larger than unemployment benefits? The evasion of taxes ($100 billion lost to offshore tax havens alone)? What about the willingness to have workers and their families shot down like Carnegie and Rockefeller did or the environment destroyed to save a few dollars when you have billions on hand? Do those reflect admirable qualities that society ought to reward?
4) The richest 1% pay an unfair tax burden, and the working class and poor are “lucky duckies,” as the Wall Street Journal once put it, who needn’t pay income taxes.
This neatly neglects the fact of inequality so massive it is almost beyond comprehension: the richest 1% earn 23.5% of all annual income in the US, up from about an 8% share in 1980. The richest 1% earns more than the bottom 50% of families combined.
5) Corporate CEOs create all wealth and thus merit golden parachutes, tax breaks, and other elements of a true safety net. In short, the rich need the carrot to incentivize them. In contrast, the workers and poor need the stick as an incentive—so take away unemployment benefits, healthcare, college scholarships, housing assistance. But mere working people what about all the people before me who fought for universal public education? For the expansion of higher education so that people like you could attend?
6) A willingness to work at any wage builds a better society.
No, a willingness to work at any wage a) depends on crushing the right of workers to form unions and b) builds a society premised on ever-lower wages and ever more brutal exploitation.
7) A severe economic downturn, like any other period in our history, is a superb time for tax cuts to spur capital production and hiring.
This is absurd: no matter what kind of tax breaks corporations get, no sane CEO is going to spend more on equipment and hire more workers when he is already clogged with excess inventory and can’t move the stuff off his shelves.
What is needed right now is more economic equality so that there is more spending power among working people and the poor, thereby re-starting the economy. Until people start spending again, our economy will remain stagnant and joblessness will remain widespread and devastating.
8) The final part of your frame: democratic government is intrinsically inefficient at meeting human needs, while
private-sector dictatorships called corporations are focused on serving the public.
Mr. Johnson, while the VA and Medicare have their flaws, they are far more popular than profit-fixated healthcare run by insurers who have no concern for health and no qualification to dictate the terms of its delivery. The VA, until Bush budget cuts and policy distortions set in, was known for “the best care anywhere,” as one well-documented book put it.
As for private-sector results, look at Enron, BP, and dozens of others whose criminal policies have devastated the lives of millions. Or examine the real record of supposed success GE, whose consistent profitability has been built on the destruction and export of US jobs to low-wage dictatorships in places like China.
Best, Roger Bybee
Dear Roger:
Excellent job in laying out the real deal in America today!
Thank you.
Dear Justice 22:
Thanks so much! It’s good not to be accused of consciously tr4ying to protect the more liberal wing of the ruling class!
Please stay in touch. Best, Roger.
Dear onil sk:
As you can see from the above exchange, most replies are sincere, and surprisingly diverse in their ideological starting-points, which makes it always interesting to respond.
However, an increasing number of spammers latch on like leeches. Unfortunately, I don’t have a cure but I know the In These Times crew is working on one. Best, Roger Bybee