What Is Needed To Restore The American Dream
Minimum Wage Needs To Go Up To A Fair Wage And The Rich Should Pay Their Fair Share Of Taxes
The wealthy should have to pay their fair share of taxes but this just isn't happening. I've never understood why it isn't set up so that the more you make the higher the rate of taxes you'll have to pay. It should be that way but it isn't there yet and I seriously doubt if it ever will be.
Minimum wage needs to go up to a wage that people can really live at but usually what happens is that when the minimum wage goes up the prices of everything else goes up. Or if they do raise minimum wage they set it up so it happens over a year or two. This shouldn't be. Minimum wage needs to be raised to a fair wage that would allow people to really live. I don't care if the price of a Big Mac does go up $2. It would enable people to pay their bills. In most American cities its impossible for anyone to live on a minimum wage job.
Minimum wage needs to be at least $12.00 per hour for people to be able to live. We need a rent credit that would return part of low income peoples rent back to them if they pay in state or federal tax. If they don't pay anything in then no they shouldn't get anything.
We Need To Settle The Immigration Issue Once And For All
We need to severely reduce the amount of new immigrants that are allowed to come to our country and we need to close both the Mexican and Canadian borders to illegal immigration and we need to close them in such a way that no one who is illegal can get in. Let the people already here stay but make them become American citizens and pay taxes. But any illegal immigrants in the future need to be returned to where they come from. We also need to include a section in the law that would prohibit any child born to illegal immigrants in the USA from ever becoming an American citizen.
We Need To Restore The Draft For The Military
We need to require every able bodied American citizen to serve two years of active military duty and five years of in active reserve. Use the major portion of this new military here on projects in the USA. All High School graduates would serve the two years with in five years of graduating High School.
Require Every American To Be A High School Graduate
One way we could do this is to make a national law that you can not get a drivers license unless you graduate High School. Also raise the age when you can quit school from 16 to 19 nationwide.
We Need A Cap On Imports In The United States
We need to cap imports in the United States so that 80 percent of any product manufactured or assembled would have to be done in the United States. This should have been done a long time ago and to hell with NAFTA. We should not import over 20 percent of any manufactured or assembled product. This would help to restore the American Dream more than anything else.
There are cities all across the American South that became ghost towns after NAFTA and all the textile mills were closed. This should never have been allowed to happen. Americans need to organize and demand that all the jobs that were taken over seas have to come back to America. If we said that only 20 percent of textiles manufactured or assembled could be imported then that would mean that 80 percent of all textiles manufactured or assembled would have to be made in the USA and that would help to restore the American Dream.
We must restore the American Dream or America will become a third world country.
We Need To Legalize Marijuana Nation Wide
We need to legalize marijuana on a nation wide basis and tax it. And we need to allow the little man to grow and sell it. This along would create tens of thousands of jobs nationwide. No I don't smoke marijuana and never have but its stupid to keep it illegal and lock up all the people we do for it. Just plain stupid. Make it 100 percent legal and say you have to be 18 to grow it or smoke it. Establish a cheap permit for people who want to grow it and sell it. Prohibition of Alcohol never worked and its never going to work with marijuana. Let the country make money off of it.
We Are Going To Have To Rebuild America's Roads, Bridges, And Etc.
In the next 20 to 40 years we are going to have a major problem with America's Bridges, Roads, Parks, Schools, and ETC. Lets take all able bodied prisoners in Americas prisons that are non violent and let them rebuild America. Give them 4 days off for every day worked. This would mean that a man could build a 20 year sentence in 5 years. Would that not be a lot more fair than what we are currently doing. We are locking more people up than almost any other nation. This is just plain stupid. We should cap non violent sentences at 10 years. Hell lock up the people that need to be forever but don't give a man caught with a pound of marijuana 32 years. Yes there are really men in American prisons who have received 32 or more years for a pound of weed or a few pills. Come on people get real. We need to stop a lot of cities from using the court system in their area as a cash register to create local funding. A lot of it is being stolen anyway by corrupt officials.
Install Strict Term Limits In The The U.S.. House And Senate
We need to pass a law that a U.S.. Senator can only have one six year term in his or her life and that he or she can not work as a lobbyist for 10 years after the last day they serve as a U.S.. Senator.
We need to restrict U.S.. Congress Persons to two 4 year terms with the same restriction that they could not work as a lobbyist for 10 years after the last day they serve in Congress.
This would be the best thing that could ever happen to the U.S.. Senate or Congress. It would do away with career politicians and we would have new blood coming in all the time.
Final Words
I know I probably stepped on some ones toes there, or probably seriously pissed someone off but those changes could change America for the better forever. It would restore the American Dream and yes it would seriously piss off some other countries. But America needs to be for the Americans. We must restore the American Dream or America is doomed to become a third world country. Each generation is no longer better off than the generation before. Something has to be done. I don't have all the anwsers but I thought of some of the major ways that we could restore the American Dream. How do you want your children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren to live. Major changes have to be made if America is to be restored. And yes a lot of them will be unpopular changes.You've got some good points here, but our idea of "fair" differs quite a bit.
I would also take exception with the idea that we let too many immigrants in; there is absolutely nothing wrong with accepting immigrants, and particularly immigrants that can and well support themselves. There is, however, a great deal wrong with allowing millions upon millions of illegal aliens to occupy our country and with the presidents refusal to uphold his constitutional duty to control our borders (and not just Obama - this has been going on for decades).Your post poses so many questions that I am not sure what you really mean.
ie.
So what do you think is a "fair share" for rich people taxes?
Are you just interested in fair sounding percentages, or actual dollars paid?
Our current tax system is progressive, do you mean the uphill rise should be steeper?
Are you saying you want a teenager getting paid the same as someone supporting a family? After all, folks just entering the workforce usually start at the bottom. Or are you saying that if someone lacks the initiative to better themselves the government should ensure that folks that did support them?
Why do you think prices increase when minimum wage rates increase? If Big Mac's price goes up at the same rate as the minimum wage does, will that make them any more affordable to those minimum wage workers?
What bills should a minimum wage be required to cover? Rent/utilities/food? Or maybe a car payment also. Or maybe the cable bill too. What about life insurance bills? Or cell phones, or internet subscriptions, or monthly transportation costs? How about a clothing allowance, everyone needs to buy clothes once in a while, is that a bill minimum wages should cover too? Should it also be enough for a frugal family to save for a vacation?
Just what bills do you think a person should be able to pay with your minimum wage?
If $12 an hour is a fair minimum "liveable" wage in Podunk, will it be the same in New York or San Fransisco? Or will the minimum need to be higher in high cost areas?
(ps. low income folks don't pay state or federal income taxes - so why the "rent credit" idea?)
If you checked, you will probably find that number of immigrants that we legally allow to enter our country could actually stand increasing, ie. business professionals, scientific minds, and a few other categories that would be of great benefit to us as a nation.
But you are right in that our illegal immigration policies are a mess. How would you fix those borders you mention? A Berlin wall-type construction manned by the military? It would be much to flip of me to mention Germany and China's experience with that concept - so I won't.
And while I agree that the "anchor baby" concept we currently have is a problem, are you certain you want to place the "never ever" citizenship restriction on a newborn that didn't come here by choice? Are you advocating punishing them for their whole life because of something their parents did?
Your military "draft" views do have some merit - if there were absolutely no exemptions. You did mean no exceptions right?
Require every student to graduate? Hmmm... that calls to mind the old adage about the horse. You know. The one about leading them to water...
If they can't quit school until 19, then does the age of majority and military service also need to go up to 19? I guess that means 19 as the legal driving age also?
Now your import ideas have some real meat.
Your plan would mean that 20% of our TVs/phones/fill-in-the-blank would cost $100 and the remaining 80% would cost $500.
No wait, that's not right. We probably won't have that other 80% because manufacturers won't be able to stay in business losing money on what they make. Or maybe they won't stay in business because they can't sell enough of the stuff they do make because the 1%ers only need so many TVs/cell phones/fill-in-the-blank, and all that stuff will be too expensive for the rest of us to afford.
(hint: see GM bankruptcy causes)
And how do we bring all those overseas jobs back if they only existed because they made the products we buy affordable? Will we need those workers if there is no market for the things they make? Will that $12 minimum wage allow folks to pay $139 for a pair of shoes they now pay $39 for?
There were ghost towns around the closed buggy whip factories too. And around the closed sugar beet processing plants in central Colorado, and around the...
Spot on about the pot, although if it became just another ag product you may be a little optimistic in your jobs forecast.
Return the chain-gangs, now you're talking. Forced labor - what's wrong with that?
(ps, again, if you check you will find that most states already do have "work for time" programs available to prisoners for work in/on state projects and facilities.)
Term limits? Senate/Congress? Now you have confused me. I thought Congress was the Senate and the House? Is the House of Representatives now Congress? And are you saying you want to change a Congressman's, (formerly known as a Representative(?)), term to four years? Double their current two year terms?
Why does a "Congressman" get two terms and a Senator only one? What if a state's Senator does valid great things for their state, and the people overwhelmingly want him to serve again? Any exceptions to your term limits? Like maybe a Super-Super voter majority overrides the limits? (kinda like in the Senate and House now?)
Why not look at the option of using elections as term limits? Too hard to educate the voters? Easier to just tell them what they can do?
As for your "Final words" You are certainly right that your proposed changes would change America forever, although I think there is room for debate on the "for the better" part.
And damn right! America is for Americans. Close them borders and slash those imports. We don't need them - they need us. Hmmm.. wait, didn't we have this isolationist mindset once before? Somewhere between WW I and WW II? How did that work for us?
Just sayin'...
GAYou tackle many facets of the US that have been overlooked with the guise that free enterprise and capitalism will take care of the void. Unfortunately for free enterprise and capitalism to take place there has to be agreement by all parties and fair competition to be the guidelines for it to take place equally. What has happened with the corrupt political system we have in this country the tables are slanted to those who can buy favor and thereby secure a more "fair" place in the competitive structure.
If you want to make a minimum wage be one you can universally apply would be impossible and the current government IRS deduction and write off system falls far short of making a difference in the mess.
Just look at this to determine where people would fall as far as making a livable wage.
http://livingwage.mit.edu/The tax code is set up that the more you make the higher the rate you pay in income taxes.
Raising minimum wage doesn't help anything, it increases unemployment and increases inflation.
Draft and forced graduation? If anything, we need more students learning trades rather than traditional education.
You can't make things better by capping imports. Please research trade to see how trade is good. It's not bad.
We need to decriminalize all drugs. All of them. Follow Portugal's example.So maccy D's would have to lay off burger flippers if they were forced to pay them a couple of dollars extra! I think not.
Why is a reasonable amount of inflation (growth) wrong?
That flies right in the face of all evidence. When the US economy was booming it also had draconian import tariffs and a total ban on some imports.Given (and I'm guessing here): each McD's has 6 employees on duty at any given time, and that it is open 18 hours per day.
2*6*18*30 plus estimated bennie cost of an additional 8% (7.5 FICA +.5 unemployment, workman's comp. etc.) the monthly cost for that $2 is $7,000. Given that McD's are typically small Mom and Pop franchises, I doubt that the owners are pulling much more than that out each month in profits. Certainly removing $84,000 per year from the franchise owner's pocket will absolutely result in making the investment financially unrewarding.
And inflation is not growth; even a socialist should recognize that! Growth is production and sales of additional cars, not swapping out the price tag on each car for one reading a higher figure.Typically a mom and pop franchise!
A franchise costs between £125,000 to £325,000 plus one off fee of £30,000. I don't know of many moms and pops that have that sort of money at their disposal.
And have you not considered that the increase in disposable income will be positively reflected in their profits?
Inflation may not be growth on the surface, but a growing economy sees some inflation whereas a shrinking economy shows lower inflation or even deflation. Using wages to control inflation is cruel and not particularly effective.OK, it's always a giant corporation that buys the franchise. GM maybe, or Tesco.
Does that mean that the potential franchisee (Tesco) will be happy to fork out $500,000 for no expected return?
Yes, I considered it. With a profit of perhaps 5% and 1% of the $2 raise going to buy big mac's the return for losing that $84,000 per year is 84,000*.01*.05, or $42 per year. Do you think that will entice GM to keep the failing McD's open?
Yes a growing economy sees some inflation, at least in our recent experience. Does that mean that inflation caused it to grow or that growing caused some inflation? I know where I'd put MY money on the question...and whether I'd create inflation merely to have inflation with no other "benefit".
What do you think the reason is that young people with little to no experience have such a large unemployment rate?
And even if McDonald's could afford it, that doesn't mean every business could afford it. Believe it or not, there are a lot of people employed by businesses that are barely getting by. Increase their costs and guess what will happen.Because supply of labour exceeds demand.
So, what right does any business have to demand that its employees subsidise it?Why does supply exceed demand so much? Why is that group of workers so hard to employ?
Who is demanding anything? Employment is voluntary trade. Nobody is subsidizing anybody. Obama just said that having a job is good thing and you do a job and get paid for it.
Or we could just stop spending trillions on pointless, idiotic wars. That alone would fix almost all of our problems in one fell swoop.
I agree but we have some serious problems like the roads and bridges that are going to fail unless they are repaired. It is a lot worse problem than the average American knows.
The only really sensible idea on there is the legalisation of cannabis. Plus, most of your points are exactly the opposite of what allowed the American dream to become somewhat realistic in the first place:
1. Low taxes, and the lack of arbitrary price controls such as minimum wage allowed individuals with limited resources to start businesses and expand relatively quickly.
2. It was the massive immigration influx that brought the skills and resources necessary for a thriving economy.
3. Military drafts are for totalitarian states - what the US was trying to get away from in the first place.
4. Young people of 19 and below, though many not staying in school, benefited from the experience and skills gained from work, and put them in much greater stead for a career than any number of years in a classroom would.
5. The US economy was based on free exchange - there were few tariffs, precisely because the competition stimulates production. Basically there are 2 ways of obtaining cars in America: first, getting the materials necessary and building them. Alternatively, you can plant corn, let it grow, and then send the harvest to Japan, and then cars will arrive from Japan. Preventing the cars from arriving from Japan will only hurt the corn grower. Re-stated: any caps on imports will ultimately harm American production.
6. What we need to do is free the non-violent offenders, not put them into slavery, taking a wealth-creating market away from wealth-creators. Take the concept of the American dream to the next level: privatise the roads and bridges, and then just watch them magically get fixed.
7. All this is going to do is encourage politicians to do as much harm as they possibly can in a short amount of time. Just fire them all.The American dream has little to do with money. It's about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. FREEDOM.
From here it appears to be all about money!
Look at the scorn poured on those who aren't motivated by the lust for money.Yes, it looks that way from here at times too. Still, the American dream is freedom.
The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Freedom to be independent. Independent of mother and father, and independent of daddy government.
As far as the legalization of marijuana, it should be done already.
Even more to the point is the ability of the American people to utilize the product of hemp. Not for internal consumption, but for every other reason. For the fact that Henry Ford created a vehicle completely form hemp. For the fact that this resource could directly effect the U.S. economy in such a positive manner. To know we could build stronger dwellings, more environmentally friendly products across the board!
We need to reign in the corporate population in the field of paper, steel, and oil. We deserve the ability to utilize a natural resource at our own discretion. Again, this has nothing to do with medical marijuana. IMO, that is a completely different issue.
Do some research and imagine what the American entrepreneurial spirit could accomplish if given a new avenue of opportunity. From growing it, to using it in manufacturing, adding in the tax revenue, it would be a win, win, win, scenario!"For the fact that Henry Ford created a vehicle completely form hemp"
Cylinder walls made from hemp? And battery acid and lead plates? Windshields and lamp filaments? Electrical conductors? Or was this "vehicle" actually a child's tricycle?The vehicle was made from hemp. The body panels, fenders, etc, I believe it was @ 70% fiber and 30% resin. The engine and electrical system, I doubt it. It did run on hemp fuel.
Either way, hemp could be an economy altering product. Not including medical uses for marijuana.
When Henry Ford told a New York Times reporter that ethyl alcohol was "the fuel of the future" in 1925, he was expressing an opinion that was widely shared in the automotive industry. "The fuel of the future is going to come from fruit like that sumach out by the road, or from apples, weeds, sawdust -- almost anything," he said. "There is fuel in every bit of vegetable matter that can be fermented. There's enough alcohol in one year's yield of an acre of potatoes to drive the machinery necessary to cultivate the fields for a hundred years."
Ford recognized the utility of the hemp plant. He constructed a car of resin stiffened hemp fiber, and even ran the car on ethanol made from hemp. Ford knew that hemp could produce vast economic resources if widely cultivated.
http://www.hempcar.org/ford.shtml
Henry Ford's Hemp Plastic Car (1941)
http://youtu.be/BLKDTfQMhfgNow that I would definitely believe. That most, but not all, of a car was made of hemp. It is indeed a very valuable plant, just not the miracle solution that was portrayed.
Hempcrete, Made From Hemp, Used To Build Houses
Imagine you had a building material that was energy-efficient, non-toxic and resistant to mold, insects and fire. The material may even have a higher R-value, or thermal resistance, than concrete, a claim that is still being investigated. The only problem? The base of the Hempcrete creation is hemp, which comes from the cannabis sativa plant -- the same one that produces marijuana, which is a federally banned substance. Because of this, industrial hemp production is illegal in the United States.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/1 … 06662.html
The possibilities are endless!The sad thing about that is that the best hemp for such uses is produced by the hemp plants that give you little or no high!
There have been suggestions that the ban on growing hemp are less to do with reducing the supply of cannabis and more to do with eliminating competition with none plant based alternatives.Down, boy, down!
Hemp is good, but not that good. You're getting carried away.
The R value of concrete is probably the lowest of everything used in a house. It really sucks.
And "energy-efficient, non-toxic and resistant to mold, insects and fire" sounds more like drywall ($7 for a 4'X8' sheet), although it will actually put a fire out, not be merely resistant to fire.
Hemp is nice, but not nearly as nice as the industry advertising would have you believe.We have no idea, because the American entrepreneurial spirit has not been allowed to experiment with it.
How about on the wholesale end, if hemp were to be a traded commodity? Since it can grow almost everywhere, anyone with a parcel of land could join the farming community. Which IMO, is something that America is lacking, the small farmer. It helped create this nation, and it could help save it. Why should a renewable resource be illegal for us to deal with?
The applications of hemp are unknown, we never had a chance to try it!
The fact is, legalizing hemp could not hurt our economy, only help it. It would be a new tax resource for the government, and possibly there would be society changing products that emerge. Everything from cooking oil to building materials, the possibilities are endless!You're not going to bring back the small farmer with hemp. Even if legalized so that, like any other crop, any size farmer could grow it they still could not compete. About the only product that isn't true for is tobacco and even there it takes a decent sized farm, not an acre or 10.
I'd like to see it legal, yes. And I would expect to see some new uses for it, although it will take time. As with any crop, specialized farming and harvesting methods will have to be found and used.
Just a thought, but would you allow GMO hemp? Improve yields, strength, insect resistance, etc.? Forget the Mary Jane - we could probably do wonders with a crop designed and planted for non-foodstuff uses.My hope would be a product that is free of a corporate monopoly. It is probably a dream, but I would like to have something that could induce a small business minded recuperation of society.
I am also only speaking of hemp the product, not the puff. But, that would bring the topic to a whole nother level.Being a small business is getting tougher and tougher. Outside of highly valuable, very difficult to grow crops I don't see the small farmer ever coming back. Ely Whitney started the process and it is ongoing today.
The only hope for us all is term limits, publicly financed campaigns and lobby reform. Otherwise the corporate ownership of the government continues unabated.
I agree, and the immortal persons do not care one bit for the human race.
For starters; we need politicians that understands and loves America's history; and politicians should be required to know how to add and subtract...hence...balance a checkbook!
The American Dream is essentially about opportunity for upward mobility, especially from one generation to the next. The sad fact is that the USA has the most sluggish mobility between classes of any wealthy democracy. We're behind Canada, Australia, Japan, even Britain as well as all of western Europe.
One reason is because the USA also has the widest economic inequality of any of the rich democracies. The wider the class difference, the harder it is to get across the gulf from, say, lower class to upper class, the way Horatio Alger did.
Politicians love to talk about the American Dream, and to talk about their own families. Few of them, however, address the lower rates of mobility today than 50 years ago when some of their parents came from Cuba, Mexico, or Europe. Even fewer propose how to do something to actually increase mobility. Instead, they propose more tax cuts for the rich.
In sum, the USA has the worst of both worlds -- wide inequality and relatively little opportunity to move up, at least compared to earlier generations.If Citizens United could be repealed, it would be a start. Get rid of the extreme right winged crazies in Congress. A more moderate government is necessary to restore what's left of the American Dream.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-205.ZS.html
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 558 U.S. 310 (2010), is a US constitutional law case, in which the United States Supreme Court held that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting political independent expenditures by corporations, associations, or labor unions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_U … Commission
There is another case due to be heard on 10/8, if the Supreme Court remains open?I'm not surprised with your response. There are many who have no idea what it is and how it changed how our country governs. In Jan. 2010, the Supreme court ruled 'that corporations can (officially) buy elections and run our government.'
Justice Stevens in his dissent said:
". . . corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires. Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their 'personhood' often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of “We the People” by whom and for whom our Constitution was established."
~Supreme Court Justice Stevens, January 2010
On Oct. 8, the wolf McConnell will show up in wolf's clothing and make a case to the Supreme Court to eliminate any limits on campaign contributions and ask that candidates can accept unlimited donations.
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