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Economic Apartheid Kills

Joel Hirschhorn ^(2,835) Bronze Level Author

Joel Hirschhorn

http://www.delusionaldemocracy.com

Greed Conquers Guilt

Posted Tuesday, November 03, 2009 (4 days 19 hours ago.) Viewed 764 times.

What has devastated the US and global economy? The simplest explanation is unrestrained personal greed. People everywhere have had no reservations about abusing business practices, ethics, laws and cultural norms because all they cared about was amassing personal wealth. Most have also betrayed family members, friends, employers or clients. Greed is an ungodly sin that drives desires, ambitions and behavior. Greed pollutes civilization.

"I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself," said Ivan Boesky in his 1985 commencement speech at the University of California. He was sick, wrong and evil. Greed is our common enemy.

Governments have utterly failed to create and enforce laws that would prevent the disastrous impacts of unconstrained greed, whether it is in the financial world or anywhere else or among government workers that find ways to steal obscene amounts of money. Nor have religions controlled greed.

Is something missing in modern times? Yes. Strong feelings of guilt, before people commit their terrible deeds, before awful people are identified and found legally guilty. Emotional guilt must act as a deterrent to legal guilt. Guiltless greed has supplanted innocence among so many people that it rips the social fabric and brings down whole economies. Greed drives economic inequality. It pushes the middle class down into the lower class.

Once upon a time human beings were personally constrained because of strong feelings of guilt. Guilt served as the internal controlling mechanism for bad behavior or, better yet, just thoughts of behaving badly. In other words, guilt had preventive power. In better times guilt was a powerful force of negative feedback in peoples' lives. When guilty feelings go, so do shame and responsibility.

Something has clearly gone wrong in family, cultural, religious, business and education systems. In Greed We Trust has become an evil addiction guiding the lives of far too many people. They are not satisfied with a big piece of the pie. They want everything. When possessed by greed, no possessions are enough.

Seeking success within moral and legal boundaries has succumbed to unlimited self-centered selfishness. It is not enough for people to fulfill all their everyday needs and then some. They are compelled to become millionaires. Millionaires are self-propelled to become billionaires. Billionaires are self-driven to become bigger, higher ranked billionaires. Celebrities want to be even richer and more famous. Politicians want even more power and the considerable wealth that those outside government have. Corporate CEOs thirst for ever more money no matter how many perks and dollars they already receive. They want still more mansions and bigger yachts.

Modern greed has no limits. Culturally, greed is like a cosmic black hole that sucks in whatever it can conceive of. It has nothing to do with legitimate needs. It produces no remorse. It cares not about the pain it causes other people or about society. Greed is stronger than any drug addiction, any religion or moral value. Personally, greed is an emotional cancer. Among these sick people, it displaces any effective feelings of guilt. Guilt has no payoff as long as greed is repeatedly successful in delivering excessive wealth. Successful greed is so visible and in many quarters idolized that it keeps attracting more believers. Putting relatively few of these greed devils in prison does not seem to curb this trend.

"Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction," said Erich Fromm. This is what we must teach children. There is never enough for the greedy. When satisfaction is impossible, happiness is illusory.

It comes down to this: Either society through parents, teachers and religious leaders once again instills strong feelings of guilt for thoughts of greed, starting with children, or humankind continues sinking into oblivion. Self-imposed feelings of guilt must be seen as a virtue. Evil greed is an epidemic far more deadly than the flu. Generosity must replace greed; it is free of guilt.

Here's a great bumper sticker: Guilt Prevents Greed.

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What Physicians Know

Posted Sunday, November 01, 2009 (6 days 14 hours ago.) Viewed 1,777 times.

I had a long conversation with my favorite physician, who has operated on me twice successfully. He is an incredibly kind person without an ounce of greed or pretense. Like other physicians I have spoken to, he spoke eloquently about the terrible times he consistently has with private health insurance companies.

While he praises Medicare for its simplicity and certainty, he has absolutely nothing positive to say about private insurers. They take up huge amounts of time of him and his staff, trying in every possible way to deny services to their customers (his patients) and also to pay as little as possible to him. His endless struggles with the insurance companies make his life miserable. Meanwhile all he cares about is giving his patients the very best care and not making them suffer because of their insurance carriers.

Like so many of us he sees the need for major reforms of our health care system, but remains pessimistic about what Congress and President Obama will eventually deliver. He is incredulous at how executives of private insurers make vast amounts of money while making physicians and their patients suffer endless annoyances and negative impacts on health care. And they get away with making people pay more and more money for worse and worse insurance.

He also has many stories about patients that do not take medications for long term chronic conditions because they cannot afford prescriptions. He gives out as many samples that he can get, is angry that people in other nations pay much less for brand name drugs, and feels terrible for his patients because the health care system has let them down.

What would be the ideal solution to the current health care mess? My doctor believes that opening up Medicare to everyone would be wonderful, and the system could be opened up immediately. I totally agree. There is no sound reason for Congress to protect the private health insurance industry. But of course they always have and always will because it is the source of huge amounts of money for political campaigns.

While no one should be forced into Medicare, just making it available to all who want it would be fair. If private colleges compete with public ones, and private for profit hospitals compete with nonprofit ones, why shouldn't health insurance companies be put in a similar position?

Corruption blocks true and necessary health care reform. Remember that the next time you vote.

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Being Judgmental

Posted Monday, October 26, 2009 (12 days 9 hours ago.) Viewed 1,893 times.

Too many people have bought into the belief that it is wrong or undesirable to be judgmental. It has never made any sense to me to feel this way. As humans we have a responsibility to use our intelligence to think critically about everything and everyone. How else can we help make the world better?

Yes, to be judgmental is to be either negative or positive about something that is nontrivial. How else can we seek justice, make necessary changes and improve our nation and lives, if not by being judgmental.

Reaching a judgment, however, is not the same as acting on that judgment, but it is the necessary first step. Without judgmental mindsets there is no chance whatsoever of fixing the many evils that plague us.

Being a mature adult means shouldering the responsibility of being judgmental. To deny this responsibility is what should be condemned, not being judgmental.

Of course being judgmental is not the same as being nasty or bellicose. One can and should be judgmental while also being cordial and civil.

We need to use the best communication skills in delivering our judgments to others, particularly because if we believe in our judgments we should want to convince others that we have a well supported and reasoned position. This is key to obtaining larger scale changes and improvements. In other words, it makes no sense to be judgmental and then be so shy that we hold our positions in secret. No, we must be both judgmental and openly proud to tell others about our judgments.

This also means being honest and open enough to new information and thinking that may change our conclusions and positions. In other words, being judgmental without being flexible is what should be avoided. And that is the problem with so many people that we classify as extremists: they are terribly rigid in their judgments.

To be judgmental while also being respected by others requires openness to listening to the positions of others, and taking them seriously. Being sensibly judgmental is better than just being casually opinionated.

Judgment day should be everyday. Naturally to be judgmental one must be open to be judged by others.

"We praise or blame as one or the other affords more opportunity for exhibiting our power of judgment." Friedrich Nietzsche got it right. We must inform and develop our power of judgment.

Save your judgments for things that really matter. Do not fear to be judgmental about yourself. When someone proudly claims to be nonjudgmental, think seriously about them.

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Tax Me More

Posted Monday, October 19, 2009 (19 days 14 hours ago.) Viewed 144 times.

In these absurd economic times there are some wealthy Americans that are working to get the government to collect more income tax from them. This is a mission of the group Wealth for the Common Good.

They have a petition that calls on Congress and President Obama to immediately reverse the Bush-era tax cuts for people with taxable incomes over $235,000. The increased revenue, an estimated $43 billion a year, says the group, should go toward making long overdue investments in education, health, transportation, infrastructure, and green energy systems.

Those hit by the change would see a minimal tax increase-from 35 percent to 39.6 percent, a rate still far lower than the one under President Reagan. Even though this would raise $43 billion per year, it would only affect a very small fraction of US taxpayers-about 2.5 percent.

The Bush-era tax cuts gave $700 billion in breaks over eight years to people with annual incomes more than $200,000. The US borrowed money to make these tax cuts possible, even as the nation's schools, infrastructure, research institutions and social services were in need of new investments. Of course, it takes money to make money. So these wealthy Americans made out like bandits during the bubble economy that eventually burst.

Note that in 1955, the top 400 taxpayers paid 51 percent of their average income of $12.3 million (adjusted to 2006 dollars). In 2006, the most recent data available, the top 400 paid 17.2 percent of their average income of $263 million in federal taxes. And that 17.2 percent rate is much lower than tax rates for the rich in , When the rich paid much higher taxes there was high economic growth and much more shared national prosperity with low economic inequality.

Interestingly, as a presidential candidate, Barack Obama pledged to raise taxes on households with incomes over $250,000 by reversing the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts. Nevertheless, a majority of these high-income individuals, 52 percent, still voted for him.

If so many of the wealthy seem to be good enough citizens to support this, then why don't we hear more about this? Why is there any reluctance by Congress to make this happen? What better time than now, when paying for genuine health care reform could benefit from taxing the wealthy more?

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