Middle Class Squeeze
On the 2006 election front, Deval Patrick announced today that he will run for Governor of Massachusetts. Patrick has been thinking of running for some time, but made the formal campaign announcement today. Patrick joins Attorney General Tom Riley as candidates for the democratic nomination for governor. (Globe Article)
Two Christian Science Monitor articles today tell the story of the squeeze moderate income Americans feel everyday. The first, (link), compares the income gaps between the rich and the not so rich in 19 advanced industrial countries. Not only does the US have the biggest and fastest growing income gap between rich and poor but lower income Americans, particularly children, suffer more than in our competitor nations. Why? A smaller and shrinking social safety net for everything from education and housing to retirement benefits and health care. The other article (link), tells the story of our ever flattening federal tax structure that shifts the effective tax burden straight to the middle class. What does this have to do with the health care constitutional amendment?
As incomes shrink and taxes take a bigger relative bite out middle-income workers there is less left over to pay for the basics – food, clothing, housing and health care. What used to be a problem for “them” is now a problem for all of us and the cost of health care coverage is one of the major drivers. How we solve this problem will surely require a healthy dose of Yankee ingenuity. But the constitutional amendment is the essential commitment to make sure we get the job done and start reversing the income squeeze that all but the most affluent experience every day.
Two Christian Science Monitor articles today tell the story of the squeeze moderate income Americans feel everyday. The first, (link), compares the income gaps between the rich and the not so rich in 19 advanced industrial countries. Not only does the US have the biggest and fastest growing income gap between rich and poor but lower income Americans, particularly children, suffer more than in our competitor nations. Why? A smaller and shrinking social safety net for everything from education and housing to retirement benefits and health care. The other article (link), tells the story of our ever flattening federal tax structure that shifts the effective tax burden straight to the middle class. What does this have to do with the health care constitutional amendment?
As incomes shrink and taxes take a bigger relative bite out middle-income workers there is less left over to pay for the basics – food, clothing, housing and health care. What used to be a problem for “them” is now a problem for all of us and the cost of health care coverage is one of the major drivers. How we solve this problem will surely require a healthy dose of Yankee ingenuity. But the constitutional amendment is the essential commitment to make sure we get the job done and start reversing the income squeeze that all but the most affluent experience every day.
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