Reading for June 29th : The New York Times “Richest are Leaving Even The Rich Far Behind”

Ah okay, so this is the last reading for this class. Sort of a bittersweet end but nonetheless a fitting one. The New York Times article “Richest are Leaving Even The Rich Far Behind” was published in 2005 though arguably, the situation has progressively gotten worse. The article talks about how the Bush tax cuts benefited the rich as many of the top earners pay taxes equivalent of what middle class and upper middle class people make, although these top earners earn a minimum of 87 million dollars. No wonder our social services in the U.S. are increasingly being underfunded as the rich do not help to pay adequate taxes to fund such things as Medicare, Medicaid, etc. Does this contribute to the growing health disparities between the rich and the poor as well? Probably.

These individuals who are considered hyper rich continue to get richer, leaving the rich even far behind. The have gone far ahead of the rest of the population and the Bush cuts only further propelled this. Promises of tax cuts mostly benefitting the low to middle class Americans resulted in 53% of the cuts going to the top 10% of earners. Our situation now echoes that of 2005 as wealth continues to become concentrated in a very view number of people who arguably earn much more than the actual value that they create in society. This idea of a meritocracy makes us believe that they earn more because they somehow deserve it when in fact this class has shown us the barriers and inequalities that different individuals face, that challenges this very idea of an America that is based on ideas of meritocracy. Sure, hard work pays off but sometimes it doesn’t and in this case, the hyper-rich use their incomes to just accumulate more and more capital, a self feeding system that concentrates wealth and power in only a few.