The 99% Manifesto: A Return
to Democracy and the Middle Class
To best turn around the fortunes of the bottom 99% of Americans who own a mere 60% of America’s wealth, the following points will instruct us 99%ers on how to accomplish this goal.
1) Corporations are not people. Corporations are entities created by people to conduct business. Period.
2) Corporations are in business to efficiently produce goods and services for public consumption. Profits are the reward for successfully accomplishing this goal and are not the goal unto themselves.
3) The federal government was designed by our founding fathers with three branches – the legislative, executive and judicial, each counterbalancing the other. No branch was designed to operate with unlimited power, but rather to work in concert with the other powers for the public good.
A
nation also functions with three main groups – its citizenry, businesses and
government. When all three groups are relatively equal in power, the nation
prospers. The
The government is the citizens’ venue by which to counterbalance and regulate corporations. No individual can match a corporation’s power. Without input from its citizens, the government thus becomes the handmaiden for the corporations to exploit as they wish.
4) No individual or group of individuals has any inherent right to wealth. The distribution of wealth is based on a set of rules as agreed upon by society.
Capitalism is an economic system
devised by the wealthy for the wealthy. Only by Franklin Roosevelt’s efforts in
the 1930’s to combat the Great Depression and the economic growth spurred on by
the Second World War did the
“We hold these truths to be self
evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator
with certain unalienable rights, that among these are
Life,
5) The two great economic systems of the 20th Century were free market capitalism and communism. Capitalism focuses completely on individual wealth, regardless of the effect on the rest of society. Communism (socialism) focuses on society as a whole, ignoring the extraordinary work of individuals.
Society functions best when everybody is
able to have all of their needs met, regardless of occupation, and when
individuals can prosper by creating wealth benefiting all of society. This
means taking the best that capitalism and socialism has to offer. Both systems
used in their extreme form have caused great suffering for millions. The
6) Corporations and wealthy individuals have advocated shrinking the federal government without providing any real justification for this idea. They have two unstated purposes for this goal.
First is the more obvious goal of seriously reducing, if not eliminating, income taxes, both on a corporate and individual level.
Second,
and more insidiously, is the unstated goal of privatizing all government
services so as to effectively eliminate the government and thus the only venue
by which the citizenry can collectively wield power. Without a strong federal government, corporations will hold absolute
power over the
Not only that,
corporations seek to privatize traditional government services so as to
increase their wealth. Why else has the trend toward private prisons and
private contractors to help fight the wars in
Why did George W. Bush push so hard to privatize Social Security several years ago? With effectively complete privatization, not only do corporations gain tremendous wealth, but they also effectively silence any opposition from the general public, unable to exercise any control over corporate excess.
Adolf
Hitler made his idea of exterminating the Jews and other undesirables known in
his book “Mein Kampf”,
written in the early 1920’s. He made no secret of his ambitions, yet nobody
listened to him or took him seriously because he was merely a failed artist and
a disgruntled former Army corporal. And yet the world was so surprised when he
actually exterminated 6 million Jews during World War II! Will the history of
not listening to statements of intention repeat itself in the
7) Corporations often complain of government regulation, saying that it hinders business growth. Some also state that, as a “private” concern, government has no business regulating business.
Every person in the
Yet corporations often proclaim themselves as above the concerns of society, citing the need to efficiently grow their business. For them, regulations, designed to protect all individuals from corporate excess, simply obstruct the goals of the shareholders, namely maximizing profits.
Corporate actions seriously impact all of society, necessitating regulations to ensure that individuals and our environment are not harmed.
Corporations are no more “private” concerning their actions than individuals are. Therefore, they are subject to the same laws governing their actions that people are.
Some people complain of government bureaucracy and proclaim corporations as being superior because they’re more efficient. Used with malicious intent, efficiency can grievously damage a society. Nazi Germany was renowned for its efficiency.
8) Some
have noted that Americans amassed extraordinary personal debt in recent years
by going on a “wild spending spree”. However, nobody mentions this is
conjunction with the fact that
Corporate and government leaders have assured the public during this time, especially the last decade, that taxes on the wealthy and corporations need to be reduced so that they can create more jobs for Americans. These leaders have promised that, with sufficiently low taxes, the American economy will take off and widespread prosperity will once again grace our fair land. The workers of this nation have believed this, despite mounting evidence to the contrary.
What’s happened is that the corporations have amassed great wealth through lower taxes without passing these benefits on the rest of the nation. They’re hoarding $2 trillion in cash with no plans to spend it. Corporations have no motivation to hire Americans, yet they continue to ask for more tax cuts to “trickle down” these savings to the populace. The key word is “trickle”. A steady flow prospers all, but a trickle leaves many thirsty.
Many people bought into tax cuts for the wealthy and still expect that to bring prosperity to the workers of this nation, even though this result has demonstrably not happened. Instead, the wealthy have used tax cuts to hoard increasing sums of wealth for themselves. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again, expecting different results. So why do so many of the 99% insist in believing in tax cuts for the wealthy?
Certain presidential candidates espouse flat tax rates, making the idea of everybody paying the same rate as fair to all. That only continues the same trend, taking from the majority and giving it to the wealthy in hopes of seeing the money flow back to the majority. What evidence exists that it’s ever going to happen with the overseas job market and job saving technology so easily available?
The reason personal debt increased so alarmingly is that people were striving to maintain a well established standard of living while expecting general prosperity to return to this nation. Only when the Wall Street investment banks collapsed in 2008 did it become apparent that the expectations of good economic times were seriously out of whack with reality. Only then did consumers, faced with a clear picture of possible economic disaster, make the hard and necessary choice to cut back on consumer spending to save their own personal economies.
For the last few decades,
especially the last one, the corporate and government leaders have sold the
public down the river while funneling much of
The only way for the middle class to regain its strength is to increase taxes on the corporations and the higher earners, leaving taxes alone (if not reducing them) for everybody else. “Trickle down” economics has been an unmitigated disaster for the majority of Americans. Money must flow directly into the pockets of the workers, empowering them to reassert their own prosperity.
9) Corporations and wealthy Americans have amassed power and wealth not seen since 1929. They have essentially monopolized the political process in this nation, stifling the public’s ability to pass legislation beneficial to the citizenry as a whole.
Therefore, as has been suggested by various parties for many years, it is mandatory that all political campaigns be 100% publicly financed. All private contributions, regardless of the source (including from the candidates themselves), will become illegal. This financing change must apply wholly at the federal, state and local levels across the entire nation.
By applying this uniformly across all political institutions, everybody will equally be “denied” their right to free speech and will have no cause to claim discrimination. Voting is the equalizing exercise of free speech.
10) Corporations have granted extremely generous salaries to their CEO’s and other officers. These salaries have often been paid as a reward for laying off workers despite ongoing profitability.
As a measure to give corporations pause before paying such exorbitant salaries, a law limiting the deductibility of employees’ salaries must be enacted. One million dollars per year is more than enough for anybody to live on comfortably and is a good limit to allow full deductibility for tax purposes. Using $50,000 for the average corporate worker, this assumes a ratio of 20:1 of CEO to average worker pay, well within the norms of most other industrialized nations. All salary expense above $1 million per employee per year shall be fully taxable to the payer. This covers all forms of compensation, including but not limited to salary, bonuses, stock options, severance pay and deferred compensation.
This measure applies to all employees, not just corporate executives. It covers professional athletes, entertainers, hedge fund managers and all other professions.
While this won’t end the paying of exorbitant salaries (expected to decrease under this proposal), it will provide revenues for the public good as compensation for the continued transfer of wealth to the top 1%ers.
11) American workers have seen their standard of living erode for the last three decades, especially so in the last one. Many Americans remain unemployed, not knowing when their next job will come.
In recent years, corporations have consistently reduced American work forces in favor of shipping jobs overseas and eliminating jobs through technology. Despite record profits and nearly $2 trillion available in cash, increased corporate hiring of Americans is nearly non-existent.
Given this, corporations should not
be rewarded for shipping jobs overseas and using cheap labor to manufacture
their goods. All costs of overseas
operations that could be performed in the
The additional expense of
manufacturing overseas will better level the playing field and give
corporations additional incentive to manufacture their goods in the
12) Corporations have frequently laid off American workers despite making substantial profits. This is a clear example of placing profits over all other considerations.
To justify layoffs, corporations will be required to pay a fine
to the federal government for each
This provision protects American jobs and saves American workers from losing their jobs just to protect healthy profits.
13) Corporations use lobbyists to exercise their will by persuading the government to pass legislation benefiting their interests. Individuals do not have the same access to their legislators. Only large groups of individuals have any chance of getting legislation passed benefiting the general public.
Therefore, legislation must be enacted to re-categorize all lobbying expenses as non-deductible for tax purposes. This better serves the public interest.
14) Many have denounced the government subsidies paid to Big Oil and Big Agriculture along with other industries. At one time, it made sense to support these industries to support their survival and growth, essential to the public good.
That time has long since passed. Subsidies to Big Oil and Big Agriculture represent nothing but pure profit to these industries and no longer represent the public good.
Subsidies to clean energy are
vitally necessary for the
All subsides to Big Oil and Big Agriculture, along with other unnecessary big business subsidies, must immediately end.
15) Wall Street and Big Banks created the housing crisis that plunged our economy into the Great Recession. Their actions, designed to create great wealth for themselves, greatly increased housing values for several years until 2008. Those homeowners buying homes during that period paid artificially high prices for their homes and are now struggling to keep the payments up on homes no longer worth the purchase price.
To recharge the economy and to fairly support these homeowners, the federal government must immediately and without reservation refinance these homes using today’s very low interest rates. Not only does this action provide more cash for the homeowners to spend, boosting economic growth, but it also provides justice for homeowners who overpaid for their homes based the greed of Wall Street and Big Banks.
16) State and local governments, under tremendous financial pressure, are burdened with enormous pension costs. These costs are forcing these governments to reduce or eliminate services vital to the public good.
All efforts must be made to rein in the pension costs, including revising pensions currently being paid to retirees. Most pensions are modest in amount, but the high pensions are the source of financial pressure.
17) Another form of excessive wealth damaging to the public is “pain and suffering” payments beyond demonstrated damages awarded to plaintiffs in various lawsuits. Often the payers are insurance companies, who, rather than being punished for the transgression, simply pass the cost on to its customers, who have nothing to do with the lawsuit. Paying for “pain and suffering” is a legitimate concept, but is sometimes taken to excess.
Therefore, to minimize the damage to non-involved premium payers, punitive damages must be limited to a maximum of $5 million per person. While a rare event, excessive punitive payments can also inflict undue hardship on cash strapped municipalities struggling to balance their budgets.
18) The media contributes to the wealth divide by publishing material glorifying great wealth. Fortune and Forbes contribute especially to this by publishing wealth lists annually.
Wealth is not an indicator of character. Great people can be wealthy, middle class or poor. This also applies to people of questionable character.
Great wealth concentrated in few hands takes wealth and opportunity away from millions of other people. Such economic maldistribution causes societal stress and serious hardship for a large proportion of the population.
Character, not wealth, should be admired and rewarded. All wealth lists should be denounced as detrimental to society’s good.
19) The
Someone breaking into a home and stealing hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of goods will likely be incarcerated for ten to twenty years. Yet, a businessman caught stealing millions of dollars through stock market manipulation or other non-violent methods will likely be imprisoned for only a few years, along with making restitution and paying a fine far less than their total wealth. A billionaire can shrug off a $10 million fine, but 20 years in prison is equal for everybody.
White collar crime must be treated as an extremely serious offense, the severity of the punishment meted in proportion to the economic damage done. Not only must the financial penalties be highly substantial, but the prison sentences lengthy, including life sentences without the possibility of parole, for the worst offenders. One could argue that Bernie Madoff, who created over $50 billion of combined economic damage to many individuals, should have been executed for his crimes. This would not only fairly punish him for his extraordinary crimes but would also serve as an example to all other white collar miscreants, showing that the general public is dead serious about dealing with financial malfeasance.
20) The wealthy have become very adept at manipulating voters into considering social issues (abortion, gay marriage, illegal immigration, etc.) as the primary issues in elections. They have persuaded voters into lowering taxes for the wealthy, providing little benefit to the average voter.
Voters must be educated and encouraged to vote in their own best economic interests. Nothing matters in elections as much as economics. If only voters consistently voted in their own best economic interests, the wealthy would have fewer representatives in government and the economic makeup of elected government officials would better represent the general population.
21) Employers posting “Jobless need not apply” or other similar statements on their job postings must be prosecuted for discrimination to the fullest extent of the law. These actions, along with the offending employers, must be publicized and the companies boycotted by the general public. Such heinous and blatant discrimination runs counter to the sense of fair play that this nation was built on.
22) This
manifesto is intended to wake up the American public to the reality of the
state of
Andre Lower
Here’s the short version.
1) Corporations are not people.
2) Corporations’ main function is to efficiently produce goods and services.
3) This nation functions best when the power between the citizens, government and businesses is equally distributed.
4) Nobody has an inherent right to wealth.
5) Economics works best when everybody thrives and the best are well rewarded.
6) A strong federal government is necessary to counter corporate power.
7) Corporations must be held accountable for their actions.
8) Taxes must be increased on the wealthy and more money must flow directly to the middle class.
9) All political campaigns must be 100% publicly financed.
10) All annual compensation per employee exceeding $1 million must be taxable to the payer.
11)
All costs of overseas operations that could be
performed in the
12) Employers laying off employees during reasonably profitable years must be fined.
13) All lobbying expenses must be taxable to the payer.
14) Unnecessary subsidies to Big Business must end.
15) Homeowners whose houses are “under water” must have their mortgages refinanced.
16) Excessive pension costs must be reined in.
17) “Pain and suffering” damages must be limited to $5 million per person.
18) Wealth lists must be denounced.
19) White collar criminals must be seriously held accountable for their actions.
20) Voters must learn to vote in their own best economic interests.
21) “Jobless need not apply” is never acceptable.
22) Wake up and act now!