JOE BIDEN - FIRST WE TAKE THE JOBS AND GIVE THEM TO 'CHEAP' LABOR ILLEGALS. THEN WE HAND MIDDLE AMERCA THE TAX BILLS FOR OUR ILLEGALS' MASSIVE WELFARE STATE ON THEIR BACKS. THEN WE WATCH AS MIDDLE AMERICA GOES JOBLESS AND HOMELESS. BUT THERE'S PLENTY OF FREEWAYS TO SLEEP UNDER, HEY?
What’s behind the record-breaking surge of gun violence in Portland, Oregon?
Homicides in Portland, Oregon reached an all-time high this year. The current 70 recorded homicides have matched the full-year record reached in 1987, and the number may climb to 72, due to the possible murder of two individuals in Old Town on Sunday. With two more months remaining this year, total homicides may hit one hundred.
These deaths are part of a broader surge of gun violence in the largest city in the state. By the beginning of October, the city surpassed 1,000 shootings this year, accounting for 320 injuries and three-quarters of all killings. For comparison, there were 388 shootings and 36 homicides in 2019. This year’s shootings are likely to be three times that of 2019, with double the number of murders.
The Portland Police Bureau (PPB) has attributed many of the homicides to gang violence, with more bystanders caught in crossfire compared to previous years, along with random shootings with no clear motivation. Some of the deaths have been mourners at vigils, people sitting in cars, and even children playing in a park. In addition, many killings were products of interpersonal arguments, familial disputes and domestic abuse.
Makayla Harris, an 18-year-old high school graduate, died in the crossfire of a mass shooting at food carts in downtown Portland on July 17. Alexandra Arb-Bloodgood was allegedly shot and killed by her brother-in-law in May after he got into an argument with her husband about laundry in their North Portland home.
In August, two cousins, Odion and David Turner, known as rappers 12 O’Clock and Murdock of the Wu-Tang Clan-affiliated group “Brooklyn Zu,” were shot in an “ambush-style” drive-by shooting in an RV outside a home near Northeast 82nd Street. One couple, 20-year-old Charlie Borbon-Lopez and 21-year-old Jessica Garcia, were shot and killed by an unidentified person on March 1 near K’unamokwst Park in the 5200 block of Northeast Alberta Street.
These and many other tragedies have left a major impact on the victims’ family members, as well as the broader community, who are left to grieve and try to make sense of these horrific acts of violence. While the mainstream press, local officials and police officers sensationalize the violent acts to support an expansion of the police to deter “criminals,” the deeper social causes are mentioned only in passing.
A digital tribute to victims of gun violence by the Oregonian gives a sense that most of those killed are poor and working-class people, mostly young to middle-aged men from all racial and ethnic backgrounds. The data shows that “more than half of those who have been killed are Black, Latino or Asian,” with Black residents outnumbering all others. These demographics correspond with the racial diversity of the poorest layers of the Portland population, who have been hit the hardest by the pandemic, rising social inequality and the daily hardships bound up with the broader social and economic crisis.
Over the past eighteen months, politicians from both major parties and at every level of government advanced a brutal policy of protecting the profits of the banks and big business over human life.
As a result of their decision to reopen businesses, workplaces, and schools as the pandemic continues to rage, over 750,000 people have already lost their lives to the preventable COVID-19 pandemic in the US, with millions suffering from sickness, long-term symptoms, and the death of loved ones. At the same time, the American ruling class forced workers to accept conditions of poverty, debt, and hunger, providing minimal social assistance while handing over trillions to Wall Street and the military.
The result of the capitalist response to the pandemic is the worsening of a massive social crisis, with a myriad of ailments and problems reflected in the working class. Millions of working families have lost their jobs and income, had to rely on food banks to feed their families, and been placed under huge levels of stress and social isolation.
These are the material conditions that gave way to new records of social misery in the United States, including a record 93,000 overdose deaths last year, up to 50 percent of adults reporting depression and anxiety symptoms, and increased rates of domestic violence. A recent report showed that US homicides increased by nearly 30 percent in 2020 compared to the previous year, the greatest one-year increase recorded by the FBI since it began collecting the data in 1960.
Democratic Mayor Ted Wheeler, like his counterpart Lori Lightfoot of Chicago, acknowledged “root causes” of gun violence at a recent press conference, making the usual empty promises to improve affordable housing and health care. However, the main focus of the city’s response has been to call for an expansion of the PPB.
“The reality is more Portlanders are saying they don’t feel safe in their community,” Wheeler told KGW reporter Mike Benner in an interview on Thursday. “The way we make sure people are safe is making sure we have a police bureau with the adequate tools, resources, training and staffing required to do the job effectively.”
The Portland Police Association (PPA) and local government is claiming a direct link between a $27 million decrease in police funding last year and the increase in murders. Executive director of the PPA, Daryl Turner claims that the increase in violence is directly related to budget cuts and that the city needs to hire 840 officers over the next five years to implement proper community policing and “keep Portland safe.” About 200 officers have voluntarily left the department in the past year, claiming low morale, lack of support from city officials, and burnout. As of October 10, there were 790 sworn members on the city’s police force.
Wheeler’s specific proposals include filling vacancies by rehiring recently retired offers and developing recruitment efforts. Wheeler and City Commissioner Jo-Ann Hardesty are also promoting new initiatives like the PPB’s “community oversight” Focused Intervention Team (FIT) to target gun violence, as well Portland Fire & Rescue’s Portland Street Response (PSR), which currently sends a team of social work professionals in response to mental health crises and homeless issues in the Lents neighborhood. These agencies came out of the “police reform” policies adopted by the Democratic Party after the George Floyd protests in 2020 to counter the calls to “defund the police.” Over this same period, Wheeler has supported the police department’s crackdown on left-wing protesters.
The Portland mayor’s actions follow the decision of President Joe Biden’s administration in September to allow for pandemic relief aid to be used to increase funding for local police departments. Under the announcement, states and localities are allowed to use any amount of the $350 billion they were allocated for community violence intervention programs, new equipment purchases, and hiring additional officers to either reach or surpass pre-pandemic staffing levels.
Behind their “progressive” rhetoric and promises, the Democratic Party is incapable of implementing a genuine program to end gun violence, because it would require alleviating the dire social conditions that it has helped to create through decades of budget cuts, corporate handouts, militarism, and war.
According to the Oregon Center for Public Policy, income inequality was the greatest economic challenge facing the state in 2020. The report showed that median income was $38,800 in 2018, only $3,400 higher than in 1980, after adjusting for inflation. Meanwhile the top 1 percent’s average income was $1,139,000 that year, which is more than triple its inflation-adjusted average income in 1980 of $348,000.
This inequality is reflected in the neighborhoods of Portland, with many wealthy families residing in West Portland and poorer families living in North and East Portland. The highest homicide counts exist in Parkrose, with a poverty rate of nearly 7.9 percent, and Kenton, with a poverty rate of nearly 10 percent. Old Town, known colloquially as Chinatown, has the next highest number and contains a large homeless population and a poverty rate of 6 percent. These are also neighborhoods that have been impacted by gentrification, where profit-driven urban development has dislocated long-time working-class residents.
Inequality is the strongest indicator of violent crimes. A 2019 report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime found that countries with large gaps between rich and poor are likely to have higher homicide rates than those with less pronounced income inequality. “The link holds over time, meaning that increased levels of violence correlate with increased levels of inequality.” The authors continue, “If the benefits of economic growth are not evenly distributed, those who miss out may well decide to resort to violent and criminal activities. In fact, economic growth that exacerbates income inequality drives criminal violence even more.”
Mayor Wheeler, along with the rest of the Democratic Party, serves the interests of the capitalist system and thus defends the social inequality it produces. Unable to go against their own interests, they are using this year’s violent tragedies as a pretext to beef up police departments that exist to brutalize and repress the working class in defense of private profit interests, as evinced in the approximately 1,000 people killed by police each year.
The reality is that gun violence, like other actions of social desperation, can only be addressed when the masses of working-class people are provided an environment conducive to a happier and more stable life. Every worker has the right to affordable housing, a good job, safe work conditions, free education, universal health care, and protection from COVID-19 infection and death. The working class is the only social force able to carry out a political struggle for its own rights and interests, overturning the profit-based capitalist system and establishing socialism.
Financial press reflects growing nervousness in ruling circles
A scan of the pages of the financial press reveals a deepening sense of foreboding, confusion and outright fear as a series of intractable problems triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic continue to mount.
The issues of most concern are the surge in inflation, the fragility and disruption of vital global supply chains, indications of a slowdown in the global economy, the continued impact of the pandemic in key areas of the economy and, above all, fear of the implications of the rising ride of class struggle in the US, the centre of world capitalism, and internationally.
In the past few days one can find headlines in the Wall Street Journal such as “4.3 million workers are missing. Where did they go?” “Post-Covid global economy falters due to inflation and supply-chain woes” and Accelerating inflation spreads through the economy.”
The Financial Times (FT) carries similar articles: “US inflation heats up in September as pressure persist,” “Europe’s trucker shortage becoming ‘extremely dangerous,’” “Economists slash German growth forecast as supply problems hit,” “The supply chain crisis and US ports: ‘Disruption on top of disruption’” and “China factory gate prices rise at fastest rate since 1995.”
The content of the articles matches the headlines. Reporting on Europe and Asia, for example, the Wall Street Journal said that the outlook for the global economy had “darkened” as a stream of data suggested faltering growth in the third quarter because of supply chain snarls, sharply accelerating inflation and impact of the highly infectious Delta variant.
“From Sweden and the UK to Germany and Japan, jammed ports and bottlenecks in the global flow of raw materials and components have rocked manufacturers, causing factories to halt production and executives to warn customers they will have to wait for urgently needed goods.”
According to the Journal, article around 3.8 million small and medium-sized companies in Germany were struggling with supply chain issues, with shortages affecting not only computer chips but steel, aluminium, copper and other metal as well as plastics, packaging materials and timber.
US growth is expected to slow to 1.4 percent in the third quarter compared to an average of 6.5 percent in the first half of the year, according to business tracking firm IHS Markit.
Commentary on the worsening economic situation is voicing the view that the growing problems are not transitory, but an expression of deeper shifts and government and financial authorities are out of their depth when it comes to dealing with them.
In a recent FT comment, Stephen Roach, former Morgan Stanley Asia chair, now at Yale University wrote: “Echoes of an earlier, darker period of economic history are growing louder.”
He was referring to the stagflation of the 1970s—a period of low growth and recessions combined with high inflation following the end of the post-war boom.
Roach took issue with the claim by the US Fed and other central banks that the present inflation is transitory, noting that similar things had been said at the beginning of the 1970s in response the OPEC oil embargo and El Niño related weather events.
He claimed that central bankers were wiser today but confronted new problems of their own making as a result of “breathtaking quantitative easing”—the injection of trillions of dollars into the financial system since 2008, accelerated after March 2020, in order to prevent a collapse.
“Therein lies a serious risk that was not present in the 1970s,” he wrote. “Central bankers haven’t a clue about the links between their asset holdings and the forces of supply and demand that are currently wreaking havoc on inflation.”
He noted that global value chains had become an engine of growth and a source of disinflation in the search for increased efficiencies. But as a result, “these chains were stretched taut and have become increasingly fragile.”
Roach’s comment that central bankers “haven’t a clue” about the effect of their own, massive, asset holdings is on the mark as the Fed and other central banks walk the tightrope in deciding the future direction of monetary policy as inflation sets in.
On the one hand past conventional wisdom tells them they must increase interest rates and cut asset purchases to try to counter inflation. On the other hand, they fear that such as become the dependence of the financial system on the inflow of cheap money this will cause a crisis.
The confusion and disorientation at the Fed—no doubt reflected at other central banks—has been highlighted by a research paper issued by staff economist Jeremy Rudd, reported on by the Wall Street Journal.
His report begins: “Mainstream economics is replete with ideas that ‘everyone knows’ to be true, but are actually arrant nonsense.”
According to the Journal article, Rudd takes issue with the Fed’s sanguine outlook for inflation—the insistence by chair Powell that it is “transitory” but extends this to the entire field “accusing economists of routinely making assumptions because they suit their models and theories, not because they fit the facts.”
And in a rare moment of honesty, Rudd makes the extraordinary statement in a footnote: “I leave aside the deeper concern that the primary role of mainstream economics in our society is to provide apologetics for a criminally oppressive, unsustainable, and unjust social order.”
Those sentiments are now finding living expression in the developing strike wave, particularly in the US. Workers are moving beyond the notion they should simply receive their “fair share.” There is a growing sentiment that increased exploitation, going back over decades and intensified during the pandemic, leading to enormous wealth for the corporate and financial elites, has got to end.
There is nothing which strikes fear in the ruling classes as the resistance of the working class and the development of the class struggle. The politics of the past three decades has rested on the suppression of the working class and so the growing strike wave has far-reaching political implications.
It is significant that the Financial Times, which generally does not feature extensive reports on industrial action, has carried an article in recent days on the US Kellogg’s strike. It reported comments by labour historian Bryant Simon that what was termed “frustration” among workers was highest among those who were considered essential early in the pandemic but who have seen their conditions stagnate or deteriorate as businesses have reopened.
Using a somewhat measured academic tone, Simon at least pointed to the deeper issues in the developing upsurge. “There is a kind of turmoil right now about what a job should be, what it should entail, and what is the basic social construct.”
The movement is only at its early stages, but already political issues are emerging. They concern not only wages and conditions as such but the very nature of society itself.
The situation in which wealth has been heaped upon the upper echelons to the tune of trillions of dollars, while the conditions of life for the millions who create have worsened, has not gone unnoticed. The extraordinary growth of social inequality to levels never seen in history is a powerful motivating factor.
And the growing perplexity of the ruling classes over what to do about the deepening economic crisis, and the myriad of problems bound up with it, is creating the conditions for the working class to come forward as the new leader of society on a global scale in the fight for an international socialist program.
Should Democrats embrace the billionaire's tax?
“The 360” shows you diverse perspectives on the day’s top stories and debates.
What’s happening
As congressional Democrats work to iron out the details of their ambitious social spending and infrastructure package, the lawmakers are considering a novel proposal for paying for it: a billionaire’s tax.
The new tax would reportedly close pathways that have allowed a small number of the country’s richest people to accumulate enormous wealth while paying a lower effective tax rate than most working Americans. Under current law, assets like stocks are subject to taxes only when they’re sold, regardless of how much they go up in value. If the billionaire’s tax were enacted, anyone with more than $1 billion in assets would have to pay taxes on any stocks that increase in value over the course of the year.
Estimates suggest the new tax would apply to only about 700 people, but this group holds so much of its collective wealth in stocks and other untaxed assets that the tax proposal could raise between $250 billion and $500 billion over the next 10 years. Tesla founder Elon Musk, the world’s richest person with an estimated $287 billion in personal wealth, could owe as much as $50 billion in extra taxes himself, according to one analysis.
Democrats have begun considering this unique tax plan after it reportedly became clear that Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema would not support funding the infrastructure bill by raising corporation taxes or income taxes on the wealthy.
Why there’s debate
Proponents of the billionaire’s tax say it would be a major step toward undoing tax loopholes that have allowed a handful of billionaires to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. Supporters of the tax argue that, rather than allowing that money to sit idly in billionaires’ stock portfolios, the government should use it to fund desperately needed programs like paid leave, the child tax credit, expanded health care and green energy initiatives.
The billionaires who would owe the most under the proposal are unsurprisingly critical of the plan. “A relentless attack on wealthy people makes no sense,” billionaire investor Leon Cooperman told the Daily Beast. Musk argued on Twitter that the tax would limit entrepreneurs’ ability to fund capital projects. Some of these sentiments have been echoed by conservative politicians. Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said the tax would undermine the prospects of the “next visionary start-up founder.”
There are also skeptics on the left, many of whom argue that Democrats shouldn’t concoct a brand-new, complicated tax scheme when it would be much easier to simply raise the rates on existing taxes. Others say it’s risky to tie critical infrastructure funding to a tax proposal that stands a decent chance of being ruled unconstitutional by a conservative Supreme Court.
What’s next
Though reports suggest Sinema may be open to the billionaire’s tax, it’s still unclear whether the proposal has the support of the complete Democratic caucus. The biggest question is whether West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin will back the plan.
Perspectives
Supporters
Democrats are finally willing to address the true causes of wealth inequality
“The only way to get at wealth inequality in the U.S. is to deal with capital income. Most of this money comes from having money, held in income-generating assets like stocks and other securities, debt contracts, and real estate.” — David Dayen, American Prospect
The programs the tax would fund would improve the lives of everyday Americans
“We can have nice things. And after 40 years of wire transferring money from the bottom and middle to the tippy tops, the way we can have these things is reclaiming some of our resources through a billionaire tax.” — Political journalist Anand Giridharadas
We have decades of evidence billionaires’ wealth doesn’t trickle down to everyone else
“If billionaires put their tax cuts into the economy like Republicans say, then we should have had a golden age after the Bush and Trump tax cuts. Instead we had global recession and a pandemic [where] millions lost their jobs without enough of a safety net. Raise their effin taxes.” — American Independent writer Oliver Willis
Taxing billionaires directly is a political winner
“There are three things you should know about both taxing the rich and helping children: They’re very good ideas from an economic point of view. They’re extremely popular. And they’re very much in the American tradition.” — Paul Krugman, New York Times
The plan leaves little room for clever accounting tricks the rich use to avoid paying taxes
“We’ll take what we can get. If, in fact, the current version of the wealth tax does make it into the final bill, it will be something that should make progressives smile. It targets fewer than a thousand taxpayers — the richest of the rich — and it hits them with an assessment on the actual value of their wealth that should be hard to wiggle out of.” — Hamilton Nolan, In These Times
Skeptics
The tax will inevitably grow to affect more than just billionaires
“Like all taxes, the [billionaire's tax] might begin as a tax on a few hundred billionaires (and let’s be honest, they will probably find a way to avoid paying it), but it will almost surely creep down to Joe and Jane Suburbs before long, time being a variable. There is no greater precedent for this than the income tax itself, which started off applying only to plutocrats and is now paid by garbagemen.” — Ryan Ellis, National Review
The billionaire’s tax is far too complicated
“Instead of creating an entirely new tax code for a few hundred people, it would be easier to address the games of high-fliers directly, such as retaining assets until death, which allows any appreciation to escape income taxation forever. A straight-forward way to end that game: Tax the unrealized capital gains at death at the same rate wage earners pay.” — Steven M. Rosenthal, Tax Policy Center
Determining a true value of billionaires’ assets will be tricky
“Many of the richest people in America own private businesses that are quite hard to value and seem likely to be excluded. The tax could end up exempting a lot of wealth held at the top, which is what we’ve seen with these taxes in Europe.” — Eric Zwick, University of Chicago business professor, to Bloomberg
It’s a mistake to choose a tax plan that could be tossed out by the courts
“The Democrats have an exceedingly rare opportunity to enact meaningful progressive tax reform. They can choose from a menu of constitutionally secure options. … Instead, it looks like they may waste this opportunity on a measure that, after years of court battles, ultimately accomplishes nothing.” — Daniel Hemel, Washington Post
Truly addressing inequality means taxing more than just billionaires
“At the end of the day, real progressive tax reform involves taxing the upper middle class, or lower rich class. And those are the people that Congress is still wary of spooking at this point.” — Joe Thornike, tax law historian, to Talking Points Memo
Supporters are being misleading about the actual implications of the tax
“Democrats figure that’s a fight for another day. Their sole goal now is to come up with some way, any way, to raise enough revenue on paper, however illusory, to fund their spending bill without losing the votes of Sens. Sinema and Joe Manchin. … Democrats will take any refuge in a political storm, even if it’s a mirage.” — Editorial, Wall Street Journal
Is there a topic you’d like to see covered in “The 360”? Send your suggestions to the360@yahoonews.com.
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