Dear America's Poor,

Please stop buying homes you cannot afford, and please stop throwing yourself into debt to keep up with your neighbors (e.g., buying junk that destroys our planet). Please stop having babies you cannot afford to raise nor educate. Also, please teach the children you do have, that they actually have to work to accomplish things in life.

Thanks,
The Rich

PS. If you knew the amount of money we do pour into the economy in taxes alone (capital gains or not), you'd realize that the government is screwing everyone when it comes to distribution of funds collected.

Yes, please take your lot shamelessly and wait to gather in your beggars cloths outside my gated mansion protected by my private army as we slide to third world status.

If there weren't so damn many non-rich people, the rich people would also have more oxygen in the air to breath.

Or maybe we should have the rich-line at the supermarket and a non-rich line. We sure could have a rich-line for Public Services and a non-rich line. Or at water fountains. Or buses, airports, special highway lanes for the rich-people, Hospitals, and other Public transportation. Probably should also have special preferences for a rich person's vote versus a non-rich person as well as special military service for the rich.

But that sounds like an awfully radical slippery slope and more like something Hitler would have believed!

Oh, Leming...you wouldn't be a liberal, would you? You have so grossly mischaracterized what Kitty said and it's sad, really that you feel that way.

Kitty, can any of us middle-class people sign your letter too? Hopefully, even Leming66 will figure things out if we do.

Lem...here's the problem. Poor (or more likely, lower middle to middle class) people buy $200,000 houses. They max out their monthly budget on a morgage. They leave nothing behind to buy food, clothes, oh, and make the car payment. They default. My interest rates go up. I get screwed. Fortunately, I only bought a $100,000 house, so I won't have to declare bankruptcy. That's called "planning."

Here's another one for you, Lemmiwinks. You don't need a $300 cell phone. Take the free one that comes with the package. You don't need a $1500 plasma TV. Get the standard $200 boob-tube from Wal-Mart. You don't need a $40,000 Lexus. Get the $20,000 Toyota (besides, it's the same damn car). Buy the $7 box of condoms, or use your HMO to get a "procedure" so you don't have your 10th, 11th, and 12th child that you have no means to raise.

Lemon, you are the epitome of the age of entitlement. You seem to adhere to the mindset that we all "deserve" the nicest house, and we have a "right" to have as many kids as we want, regardless of whether or not we can raise them. I want it, therefore I must have it. If I can't afford it, then it needs to be provided for me. No one is asking anyone to leave their neigborhood. We're just asking that people take responsibility for themselves for a change.

FordTruck5Speed:

I appreciate your take on Lemming's post, but I have to ask: isn't it possible that L sees the writing on the wall, and really does secretly crave the nearest spot to the intercom box outside the gate?

Lemming: not to worry. I'll always have something for you to carry from A to B, or something that needs trimming/planting, or some fence that needs painting. For such a one as you, there'll always be work around the place.

ta

FordTruck5Speed:

Lem...here's the problem. Poor (or more likely, lower middle to middle class) people buy $200,000 houses. They max out their monthly budget on a morgage. They leave nothing behind to buy food, clothes, oh, and make the car payment. They default. My interest rates go up. I get screwed.

That's funny, interest rates seem to be falling at the moment.

In reality, it takes two to borrow money. You forgot the lender that is eager to make more money off his money without doing any labour. Who is lazy in that equation? Besides, the rich are getting bailed out by the feds. They may still lose some money, but not everything they have. The poor are not getting their houses back.

and that's the meat and potatoes of the problem. In our simplified economic class problem, labor=money. So, as a poorer person, I can be a "hard-worker" and a "smart worker" and turn my equation of wealth into labor+2=money+1. Great, right? It really is, despite the apparent disparity, because we even have an economy that still (for the time being) allows a little breathing room, so that the patient and prudent can take their "+1" and save it for years until it becomes something, say a "10." Now what's so shitty is that the equation works BOTH ways, and the balance is quickly slipping so that a smaller number of people have enough to abuse, and abuse it thoroughly they do, the transverse money=labor. They take money, tun it into labor (1:1 remember), poorer folk add their "+2" and are happy to get their "+1" and.....and....wait, shouldn't their be another +1 somewhere. Oh yeah, the rich take that plus one, from every hour, every laborer, every day....So a rich person can make their "10" in one 10 hour workday from their 10 employees, which is significantly quicker than the years put forth by hardworking laborers. Years versus days, another fun equation...I shouldn't have to remind you that time is money

Interest rates fell because the fed cut them, but that's not even my main point.

First of all, I'm not a fan of federal bailouts, regardless of who they benefit. That aside, your post is inaccurate, as it assumes that "labor" has to involve a shovel or a hammer. Lenders don't do physical labor, but they do provide a service that virtually everyone in the country has used at one point or another. I currently have a couple of car loans and a mortgage to pay off. You have to understand that their business is to lend money. The risk they take is in the lending of said money, because as I've pointed out, idiots borrow more than they can pay back and hence, don't pay it back. The money that lenders make in interest and fees is 1) the payoff for taking the risk, 2) the price of the service they provide, and 3) their source of personal income. Hey, the guys at the bank have to eat too, you know.

Now, I feel bad for anyone that loses their house. Then again, the feds give away free houses all the time. Ever hear of HUD? Trust me, a friend of mine is a landlord. HUD is an absolute nightmare for any property owner. I could tell you stories, but I think I'd overload Slate's servers. All that aside, we're still missing the main idea here that people who make a bunch of money aren't being "mean" to you when they collect their dough. I know, I know, there are some CEOs that make some pretty stupid decisions, and yes, they can be self-serving. But the idea that simply "being rich" means you owe the world something, or that you stole from someone else is absurd and completely inaccurate.

KH:

So, what you're saying is, that if you have 2 and you add 1, you get 1 more than if you had taken away 1 plus the 2 you had minus the wind chill factor divided by the square root of Alex Rodriguez's batting average times Marc Andre-Fleury's save percentage in Septemberdivided by the number stardates in Capt. Picard's log, right? I apologize. I'm not a mathematician, so I was lost after the seventeenth "+1".

I'd love to respond, but could I ask you to translate your post into English for me?

Actually Ford, I would have responded to my own post in just the same way that you did. I must have had a bad coffee that morning or something.

I was trying to creatively describe how money makes money, and those that have enough to reach a tipping point are "done" working. I'm not absolutely against that, because I too would like to retire and I too would be happy to leave a hefty inheritance to my children. But I do get cynical about the people who have that untouchable amount of money. Call it jealousy or justice, either will be correct depending on my mood.

I understand how tax-breaks and capital gains taxes CAN be beneficial - the theory that the wealthy can invest more, and thus create jobs etc for those below is sound - but that's not how the wealthy all use the money. The kind of benevolent or socially progressive person it would require is also the kind who never makes it to wealth, because he already has needy people below him who he might throw money towards in sympathy.

And here's one last point I have to make. You gave three reasons justifying lender's pay. And I only have a small beef with #1 (well, of course I think they charge to much for their service, but I'll say that about anything). The risk that must be paid for is made up by them. I'm not an Actuary, but I do know some, and they even agree that risk assessment can be "shady". The price of service is dictated by the market demand. The price of risk is agreed upon by the industry.

"But there are all these people defaulting because risks were UNDERESTIMATED"

Pooh-pooh. The banks look like they lost money now, but only because the real estate will be presently undervalued. When it bounces back, suddenly no one will be feeling so bad about that property ownership.