Wealthy liberals could just fire their accountants

Today I got an e-mail from  “Patriotic Millionaires,”  a group of more than 200 Americans with annual incomes over $1 million and/or assets of more than $5 million. (I’m not on the list as a millionaire, but am a gapper.) They are looking at the Forbes list and see too few blacks and Hispanics.  Well, there are more Blacks than Bruces!  Look, patriots.  All you have to do is fire your accountants—just skip over those loopholes that you’ve lobbied for.

* America’s 20 wealthiest people now own more wealth than the bottom half of the American population combined, a total of 152 million people in 57 million households.
* The wealthiest 100 households now own about as much wealth as the entire African American population in the United States. Among the Forbes 400, just 2 individuals are African-American.
* The wealthiest 186 members of the Forbes 400 own as much wealth as the entire Latino population. Just 5 members of the Forbes 400 are Latino.

4166

Attention John Edwards' supporters

RealClearPolitics provides a lesson in economics.

"Of the charter members of the first Forbes 400 in 1982, only 32 remain today. Far from a country where only the rich get richer, the wealthy in the US are very much a moving target. While there are 74 Forbes 400 members who inherited their entire fortune, 270 members are entirely self-made. Though many attended Harvard, Yale and Princeton, there are countless stories within of high school and college dropouts, not to mention others who grew up extremely poor. Politicians who regularly engage in class warfare would do well to keep the Forbes 400 out of the hands of their constituents, because it makes a mockery of the kind “Two Americas” rhetoric suggesting the existence of a glass ceiling that keeps hard workers at the bottom of the economic ladder. To read the Forbes 400 is to know with surety that the U.S. is still very much the land of opportunity. . .

For the hard of hearing, Advanced Bionics founder Alfred Mann (#204) developed cochlear implants, and for those who are immobile, Stryker Corp. CEO John Brown (#380) makes artificial hips and limbs to help the bedridden stand. With cancer still a tragic fact of life for many, Abraxis CEO Patrick Soon-Shiong (#117) presently has the patents for 30 different treatments that will hopefully over time help to make cancer go the way of polio." [unless crafty politicians can tax or sue them out of creativity and existence]

HT HP