Republican Policies Are Unfair To Most

As you can see from the chart above (based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Congressional Budget Office), between 1947 and 1979 all sector in the United States saw family income grow at fairly equal percentages. This is because productivity gains and income growth was shared by all groups. The Republicans changed that when Ronald Reagan took office in 1980, and instituted his infamous "trickle-down" economic policies (which the Republicans continue to follow today).

The "trickle-down" policy (or "Voodoo economics" as Bush I called it), proposed that it should be made easier for the rich to get richer -- and that when they do, they will share some of their new-found wealth with the rest of America. It was a ludicrous idea, and none of that wealth was ever shared. All the Republican policies did was make the rich much richer, create a vast gap in wealth and income between the rich and the rest of America, throw this nation into a serious recession, and cost the country millions of jobs (in addition to more millions of jobs exported to other countries).

The chart above only goes through 2007. The gap in wealth and income has grown much larger since then. Most of the income is still going to the top 20% (especially the top 1%), while the rest of America is left to compete for the scraps. And yet, the Republicans seem intent on continuing to follow the same obviously failed economic policies.

It just shows how caught up in their ideology they really are. They know their policies have failed, but keep saying if we just do it some more it will work someday. But it won't. It'll just do what it has done for the last 30 years -- make the rich richer and everyone else poorer. It is already destroying the middle class in America, which grows smaller with each passing year. Soon we will be nothing more than an over-sized banana republic, where there are only two classes -- the rich and the poor (in fact, some banana republics already have a fairer distribution of wealth and income than the United States does).

There is only one solution for the present. The Republicans must be voted out of power completely (at least until moderates again reclaim that party -- people willing to compromise for the good of the country). The Republicans must not be allowed to continue to block job creation efforts and a return to sane economic policy.