By Dan Murphy
The U.S. government has been in need of means testing their entitlement programs for more than a decade. Means testing is defined as putting a condition on receiving a welfare payment from Uncle Sam.
Placing an income limit on those receiving a benefit from the government is the most common proposal of means testing. It appears that the first means test we will have will come in the next stimulus -releif payments going out to Americans soon.
President Joe Biden and Congress appear to be close on a $1,400 payment going out to Americans who make less that $75,000. Previous pandemic relief payments of $1,200 and $600 have gone out to all Americans.
That means that Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg all received relief payments. What type of relief do they need?
The same argument can be made for Social Security. You can draw the line wherever you want–$250,000 or $1 Million. Anyone earning that high of an income doesn’t need, and should not receive, benefits that were designed for those who need it most.
It is also interesting to note that democrats and republicans in congress have switched their normal roles for relief payments to Americans. Republicans stepped forward to say that not everyone needs a relief check, most of all American families earning $150,000 or more, and those Americans who did not lose their job. Democrats had originally called for every American to receive the benefit.
The reason that republicans said no to the upper middle class and wealthy receiving a check is that- We Cannot Afford It! Every Trillion that we hand out to the American people is borrowed money, money that someone will have to pay for at some time, likely my daughters genreation and my unborn grandchild.
I do support providing ‘basic income’ as Andrew Yang calls it, to those who lost their job and are told to stay at home and have no income or savings. They are the ones who should receive the $1,400 stiumul check now being discussed.
Some have written that It’s Not Progressive to give money to the rich,” and they are correct. Catherine Rampell from the Washington Post writes, “the supposedly “progressive” left is demanding funds get siphoned off to rich, fully employed households that have been financially unharmed by the recession…Employment of low-wage workers is still down since last January, whereas employment of higher-wage workers is slightly up. Higher-income households have amassed tons of savings, both because many of the activities they usually spend on (travel, restaurants) remain shuttered or unsafe; and because assets they’re more likely to own (housing, stocks) have appreciated….The hard part is actually finding and delivering money to poor people.”
The only question is to identify and come to an agreement on who is rich? In Westchester those earning $100,000 as a family is not considered rich.
