Katrina vanden Heuvel: Taking On Inequality

[marmar]

from The Nation:



Taking On Inequality
posted by Katrina vanden Heuvel on 06/08/2008 @ 10:53am



In December, I wrote about Robert Greenwald's attempt to mobilize outrage against Gilded Age-like inequality and the hedge-funders with his War on Greed series of short films. Now, another creative effort is being led by the Service Employees International Union, with July 17 protests scheduled in 100 cities in twenty-five countries.

Stephen Lerner, the director of the SEIU's private equity project, told the New York Times, "We think the buyout industry and the way it operates are systematic of what's wrong in this economy. We want to make them responsible corporate citizens."

The SEIU is focused on the Carlyle Group and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, and how they game the system to take over companies with little of their own money, lay off workers, reap the profits when they resell, and pay a lower tax rate than their own secretaries do.

I called closing this tax loophole that allows mega-billionaires to be taxed at 15 percent--lower than most working Americans--a litmus test for Democrats on whether the party stands for working people, and leading Senate Democrats failed.

The good news is that Democratic presidential nominee, Senator Barack Obama, quickly spoke out against the decision by Democrats not to take on the loophole after more than twenty lobbying firms worked to preserve it. At the time the campaign issued a statement saying, "If there was ever a doubt that Washington lobbyists don't actually represent real Americans, it's the fact that they stopped leaders of both parties from requiring elite investment firms to pay their fair share of taxes, even as middle-class families struggle to pay theirs. When I'm President, the American people won't have to spend record amounts on lobbying to get their voice heard in Washington. I will close tax loopholes for big corporations...." ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut/327366