Studies show right-wing beliefs are wrong

Reports on earnings of the 1%, Rhode Island public workers shatter right-wing myths
By Will Collette


Not that it will matter to conservatives who don't need facts to form their conclusions, but a new report by the Congressional Budget Office shows that Occupy Wall Street is right. And another new report by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the public worker unions are right and the RI Statewide Coalition is wrong.


What do these new reports show?

First, let's look at the new report from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. Attractively titled, “Trends in the Distribution of Household Income Between 1979 and 2007,” the report does what the title promises. Overall, it shows that average household income increased by 62% over that period. But the mind-blowing data come when you look at how those increases were distributed.

The bottom 20% only saw their incomes increase by 18% over that 28 year period. Income for the middle 60% of the population grew by 40%.


Inflation, measured by the Consumer Price Index, shows that you would need $286 in 2007 dollars to buy what you could buy for $100 in 1979. So 80% of the population didn't come close to keeping up with inflation. 


The top 1%, by sharp contrast, did just fine. Their incomes grew by an average of 275%. 

The re-distribution of income in the United States over the period is among the most significant in American history. But contrary to the conservative nightmare of some Marxist transfer of income from the rich to the poor, the rise of the 1% has been on the backs of the rest of us. But to utter such heresy is "class warfare." After all, the rich deserve it, and the p0or don't.


The second report, the new statistics from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, reviews the extent to which states have adjusted their government work forces since the economic downturn started in 2007.


California and Rhode Island stood out in the new data. California cut the highest number of total employees from its public payrolls, dropping over 116,000 workers. Rhode Island has had the highest percentage drop in its public work force - arguably a more important statistic than California - cutting its employees by 6.84% since 2007. California's cut of 116,000 jobs only translated into a drop of 4.65%. 

Much of this happened in one big rush when former Governor Donald Carcieri, aided by such right-wing organizations as the RI Statewide Coalition, threatened to take a meat cleaver to retirement benefits, creating a mass exodus of early retirements.


We are still feeling the terrible effects of that craven political move today in the form of:

• The pension "crisis" which was triggered by all those unanticipated early retirements (and the loss of payments of employees into the retirement system);
• Increased agency costs when contractors had to be hired at premium rates to fill holes created by the exodus;
• Reduced and deteriorated public services;
• Reduced economic activity in the state that deepened and lengthened RI's recession.

So now Rhode Island will work on its latest economic fix - pension reform - and will almost certainly cut pension benefits to present retirees, create a two-tier retirement system for those still working, create even more of a wealth gap and probably more unanticipated consequences.