EricHiggin said:
Just watch the movie documentary "Inequality For All". It will explain why Trumps plan will work (for the most part). Back when equality (mostly financial but in other ways as well) was more balanced, America boomed. It was the lead up to the 1930's, and 2008 that inequality raised to an all time high and ironically led to the market/system crashes. One of the best periods for farmers in North America were the 1960's to 1980's when equality across the board was very balanced. My grandparents had next to nothing back then and were able to build a thriving farm business. The people who worked on the farm were from here, not other countries. Ever since my parents took over the farm in the 1980's, things just kept getting worse and worse and continues to go downhill because of the way the system has changed. It doesn't matter how much more work we do, or how much more efficient we do things, they simply just pay the bills, never getting ahead. Farmers used to make all the money back then, but processing and distribution make all the money nowadays. My mothers side of the family started with very little in a small city and they were eventually able to constatly buy newer homes and vehicles and have the newest toys. Grandpa worked in factories and grandma worked as a farm labourer. They were a middle class family back then like a lot of other growing middle class families. People I know who are middle class today who live in the cities, don't live anything like that. Only the wealthiest top percent do today. We really need to look to the past to figure out whats best for the future for everyone. This will most certainly mean the top percentage of wealthy people would have to learn to cope with a lower standard of living, but truthfully, they never should have been living as luxurious as they were in the first place. They never used to if you look at the numbers and charts, so what makes them so much more special today? The reason "luxury" items are so expensive today, most of the time, is just because they can charge way more because there are super wealthy people who will pay for it. Why work harder and sell more of your product to many wealthy people, when you could work much less, and sell your product for WAY more, to a few wealthy people, easily getting ahead. Thats America today, and thats one of the many things that need to change. The other big thing that needs to change are people's perceptions of value and worth. Anyone who thinks its ok to pay $600 for a touch screen phone or $2000+ for a laptop, yet isn't happy about having to pay $5 for a basket of tomatoes or peaches (when you really should be paying closer to $10), needs a serious life lesson in terms of what is actually important and what money is really worth. This type of thinking leads to robots doing most of the work, and more and more people fighting for the scraps. |
I agree with most of what you say, yet I have no clue what Trump's plan is to reduce inequality. Scrapping trade agreements, stopping immigration, raising import duties, how does that connect to reducing inequality.
I'm not familiar with farming in the US in the 60's to 80's. I lived in Europe until 2002. There farming was heavily subsidized and excess products were exported to poor countries, resulting in making it hard for local farmers to compete with those cheap subsidized products. So yeah it was good to be a farmer, and after the subsidies ended it got a lot harder.
Nowadays big business like Monsanto has taken over farming. Yet I haven't heard Trump going to do anything about that. Quite the opposite http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/01/monsanto-bayer-trump-antitrust Actions speak louder than words. Trump is full on continuing/expanding the anti labor union agenda, while at the same time promising to give the power back to the people lol.
