The choice, the choosers, the chosen

In my previous discussions of the Powell Memorandum I've shown that the current income inequality in America was a deliberate choice, created through specific policy decisions.

Essayist Terrence Heath shows that others are starting to notice. David Callahan wrote:

A dramatic rise in inequality in the U.S. since the 1970s has long been explained as the inevitable byproduct of a changing economy: Globalization has sent good manufacturing jobs overseas and technological change has automated other jobs, while the rise of an information economy has increased the premium on education and advanced skills.

These trends have been unfortunate for the bottom half of Americans, but are nobody’s fault in particular.

Or so goes the story.

Heath paraphrases:

Inequality just happens. It’s nobody’s fault. It’s just a natural part of a changing economy.

Except, of course, when it’s not.

The Powell Memorandum had 3 main points:

* Attack unions.

* Take control of government and attack democracy. That includes tax cuts for the rich and a robust Defense Dept. to suck money away from social program.

* Get various groups in the lower classes to battle each other.

Heath and Callahan lists the efforts of the 1% a bit differently, but mostly confirming that the Powell Memorandum is behind it all.

* Tax cuts for the rich. This money that the rich keep gets detached from actual work, being invested in creating more wealth and buying legislators.

* Attack collective bargaining.

* Set global trade treaties to benefit the 1%.

Nope, inequality doesn't just happen.

The people who chose inequality have been making more choices to keep that inequality growing. A big one is: Demanding a reduction in the federal deficit (such as the cuts known as the sequester) to prevent the economy from growing enough to put the working class back to work. Another way to say it: Making people unemployed widens the inequality gap. Yup, inequality is a choice.

Heath has answered the questions: What are the choices being made? Who is doing the choosing?

One more question: Who are they choosing for? Who is suffering the consequences of those choices?

The broad answer is: The 99%.

But there are two alarming parts to that answer. The first, according to Paul Krugman, is that we're creating a permanent underclass of unemployed Americans. The second is that poverty is spreading to the suburbs. The busyness of my church's food pantry testifies to that.