War on Poverty

A few years ago, I wrote a paper for an American Government class. The liberal teacher and I saw things differently when it came to Government giveaway programs. Because of a post that Tamara put up, I give you the conclusion from that paper:

The poverty level has remained near 12% ever since the United States abolished the gold standard in 1973, with the current level being 12.7%. It is important to note that the method the Government is using to calculate the poverty line only takes inflation into account, instead of the more accurate model which compares the percentage of the cost of living to household income. Using this method, the current cost of living has risen from 30% of individual income in 1965 to 50% of household income in 2003. Where it used to take one income to support a family, it now takes two.

This means that the effective poverty rate has more than doubled since the “War on Poverty” began, when expressed as a real percentage of household income. Despite spending trillions of dollars fighting the “war”, the “war” has been lost.

These programs, which are intended to pay low income families at the expense of the taxpayer, are only a part of the redistribution of wealth in this country. The figures for the 2003 tax year (the latest year for which I could find figures) tell the story.

According to the IRS, anyone who earns more than $57,343 a year is in the top 25% of all wage earners. Out of 128 million returns filed, over 32 million people fell into that category. Those top 25% paid $627 billion (83.88%) of the $748 billion paid in Federal income tax. The average tax bill for them was $19,512. The lowest 50% of wage earners (those making less than $29,019) only paid 3.4% of the income tax bill, or an average of $402 per taxpayer. The system of progressive taxation and government giveaway programs has gone beyond helping the needy and has progressed to a communist redistribution of wealth.

Maybe that is why the Cleavers can't make it on one income any longer.