When are things going to start getting great for you?
I mean, literally, for you? You personally?
Now, actually think about this, because I’m not asking when things are going to get bad or worse for someone else. I’m not asking you when a big tax break is coming for someone else. I’m not asking when the government is going to lock up or send back or take away from someone else.
When will it be great for you?
Because I have to tell you, after the events of Tuesday, when Republican senators, including the two sellouts from Alabama, shoved through Trump’s marquee spending bill, it doesn’t seem as if things are going to be great for you anytime soon. In fact, it seems as if things are going to become exponentially worse for you.
That’s assuming, of course, that you are not a member of the upper class. That you won’t benefit from stock dividends or the massive tax cuts for wealthy families.
If you’re not in that top 10 percent of earners—those hauling in over $400,000 per year, for whom nearly 70 percent of the tax breaks and savings in this bill aid—then you probably are about to get hosed. Or at the very least, you’re going to get zilch—like almost everyone who is considered middle class in America today—while more than $3 trillion is added to the deficit.
I know we don’t care about deficits anymore, but it seems weird to rack up such a big un’ without a single benefit going to the working class. But then, I’m a lib, well, hell, I just don’t understand the bigger picture here.
So, I’m asking you: When do things get great for you—for us?
And don’t sell me this nonsense about not needing the government to do anything for you, because at $3 trillion the government is most definitely doing things for somebody out there.
So, what’s it doing for you?
Aside from closing your rural hospitals? That’s what’s going to happen under this bill, as it sucks dollars away from Medicaid funding in most states and also tinkers with payouts in all of them, creating a drain on hospitals teetering on the edge.
Oh, oh, oh—I almost forgot: Trump sold our two senators on this awfulness by allegedly giving Alabama $500 million for rural hospital funding. Which, no. 1, I’ll believe it when I see it, and no. 2, screw those poor people in those other states who are going to lose health care, amirite? We might claim we’re making America great, but really … it’s more about getting whatever we can for ourselves.
Which again brings me back around to the central question here: When’s it getting great for you?
Because it’s not going to if you rely on food stamps, or if you operate any one of a number of businesses that rely on food stamp customers.
It’s not going to if you have a student loan.
It’s not going to if you ever plan on being sick and paying for insurance or health care.
(This is one that continues to drive me insane. Read this and know it: When you kick people off of Medicaid, they’re still going to get sick, have accidents and need care, and they’re going to go to a hospital and receive it. And we—the paying consumers of that health care and insurance—will foot that bill. Only it will be extremely more expensive. But maybe the momentary glee of believing, stupidly, that you prevented an immigrant from receiving decent care was worth the extra you’ll be paying.)
It’s also not going to be great for you if you’re working overtime in Alabama. Because also on Tuesday, Alabama Republicans essentially passed the largest ever tax increase on working Alabamians.
By eliminating the overtime tax repeal, Republicans in Alabama imposed a 5 percent tax on every working stiff in the state who puts in a little extra time to help their families. And they did it to pay for—wait for the recurring theme here—rich people to send their children to private schools.
You know, I still haven’t identified when anything gets great for most of you, but I sure have spotted lots of ways that things are getting better and better for rich folks. You know, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think that maybe Republicans—from the ones at the state and local levels all the way up through Congress and the White House—have used racism, hatred, fear and bigotry to con y’all into voting for stuff that benefits a bunch of rich people, including themselves, at the expense of all of y’all.
But then, there I go being a great big ol’ lib again when I’m sure there’s something I’m missing in all this. Certainly, you’ll be able to tell me where I’ve gone wrong.
So, when do things get great for the regular folks?
