When We Say "Ownership Society", We Mean....

According to "Reconciliation Tax Cuts Would Average $43,000 for Households with Income Over $1 Million, Revised 5/11/06", by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities:

The owners:

About 87 percent of the benefits of the reconciliation conference agreement would flow to the 14 percent of households with incomes above $100,000, and 55 percent of the benefits would go to the 3 percent with incomes above $200,000. Households earning more than $1 million a year, which represent only 0.2 percent of all households, would receive 22 percent of the benefits of these tax cuts.

The owned:

In contrast, the three-quarters of households with incomes below $75,000 would receive just 5 percent of the benefits. The 60 percent of households with incomes below $50,000 would receive less than 2 percent of all benefits. In total, 68 percent of all households would receive no benefits whatsoever from the tax-cut package.

Questions?

Fudging the Numbers: SS, Tax Cuts and Actuarial Science

From "Will the Administration Claim the Cost of Fixing Social Security Rose $700 Billion Because Congress Did Not Act Last Year?", a 1 May 2006 article from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

President Bush and other Administration officials often claim that delaying action on Social Security by "...just one year adds $600 billion [or $700 billion] to the cost of fixing Social Security." Such claims may be repeated on May 1 when the Social Security Trustees release their annual report on the program's finances. Such claims, however, are not accurate.

And, for the curious, the title question is answered in a later article (revised 15 June 2006) titled "What the New Trustees' Report Shows About Social Security", the answer, apparently, being yes.

Despotism

1946 short film by Encyclopedia Brittanica.

Scary, innit?