Part Three – Income Inequality, Healthcare & Other Concerns

Economy Section

Getting right to reviewing the related articles, in the link about world’s richest are getting richer (while keeping in mind America may have the widest income/wealth gaps of any democratic nation), this was a basic point:

That sounds like the same kind of vitriol from Trumpeters that got Trump elected in the first place, but his MAGA boasts really have no clues nor answers how to fix it.  His base bought in & are for the most part still with him, but I wonder how long it will take for most of them to realize his rhetoric doesn’t match reality.  He talks a good game, but his actions aren’t the road to reversing the entrenched problems for the long-term.  Our increasing income inequality indicates we are lacking in real opportunities, are still beset with stagnant wages, & don’t have a dynamic economy featuring shared economic growth.  We also see where big cities, small cities, suburbs & rural areas are all struggling with economic troubles, which more or less includes the whole country for those not in the higher income brackets.  Also, find links below to problems associated with homelessness & retirement.

There are other articles below helping explain why the healthcare costs in the U.S. are so sky-high, from the prices have risen too much, there’s too much waste in the system, as a society we use too many prescription drugs that are also overpriced, our diets don’t include enough fruits & vegetables, & overall way too many are overweight/obese.  In the article on medical treatments evidence based expensive cost stents, it chronicles how medical procedures like stents & an over-reliance on prescription drugs often have questionable benefits & mainly serve to drive up costs.  But once a certain procedure, medication or scan/test becomes commonplace & routinely accepted within the medical community, it gains a foothold regardless of its veracity. There’s also the liability risk doctors must consider.  That’s a major reason why the U.S. has by far the most expensive healthcare system in the world, with the approximate 20% of GDP devoted to that sector being double or triple any other developed nations.  Avoiding our nation going bankrupt positively will require a major restructuring to our healthcare system, as our aging baby-boomer demographics also help contribute to future unfunded mandates for Medicare that are unfathomably stratospheric & catastrophic, rising to estimates into the hundreds of trillions that are far beyond our wildest dreams to ever afford.

On the spin coming out on the effects of the tax cuts, conservatives are still stuck on the obsolete notion of trickle down, which I keep hearing the old mantra the rising tide lifts all boats. In reality, with the circumstances being so dramatically different in this modern-day global economy than a few decades ago, the new reality from such tax cuts is the rising tide lifts all yachts.  Large corporate donors not only loved the tax cuts but demanded them.  Expect that the sugar-high we’ve seen lately from a rising stock market & temporary spike in optimism to be relatively short-lived.  Rising deficits could derail any of the positives, while also dissipate the current gloating coming from the administration & the GOP.  As is typical, legislation to truly help the working class are mostly AWOL, with this new tax plan possibly poised to worsen our income inequality.

In other links below, there are articles on Puerto Rico where nearly half the island is still without power even though it’s been 100+ days since the hurricane hit.  It’s hard to put a number to it, but I believe the federal government’s slow response & Trump’s flippant attitude (never communicating the needed sense of urgency) towards the emergency response likely contributed to dozens if not hundreds of American deaths that may have otherwise been prevented.  It feels like the same kind of delayed reaction boondoggle in 2012 that ended in the deaths of four Americans in Benghazi.  Of course, that prompted an exhaustive three-year congressional investigation to uncover the blunders made, so we have to wonder why there’s no such clamoring to investigate Puerto Rico’s tepid response.

Likewise, I don’t recall any investigations demanded of other similar Benghazi-like disasters which happened under Trump’s watch.  Right after he took office, the current prez rushed into a controversial raid in Yemen which caused death & injuries to Navy Seals.  We all remember the death in Charlottesville which was brought on by racist/bigoted dog whistling.  Then in October we heard of the tragic deaths of four American servicemen in Niger with an ill-conceived operation along with a sluggish rescue effort.  Strange how Benghazi earned a 3-year probe when this year’s tragedies I don’t think got checked into for even 3 days.  It’s also strange the same congressional chuckleheads that dragged out the Benghazi hearings are now anxious to close down the Russian probe after only a year.  That truly is bizarre.  Or maybe blatant partisanship?  I think we know the answer, with GOP malfeasance being so transparent.

In the last group of articles where we find the White House struggling, Congress struggling & both parties struggling in finding solutions to get things done, this paragraph comes from Once centers of hope, political parties are dying:

In the United States, the Republican party of Abraham Lincoln has been seized by Donald Trump, a man who often seems to prefer autocracy to democracy. The shift is driven by forces as disparate as an increasingly precarious and resentful workforce (nearly 60 percent of American workers are paid by the hour), a white backlash against the Obama presidency and a corporate world which rejoices in a new tax plan that richly rewards the rich. Voters may turn against the Republicans in the 2018 mid-term elections, but the Democrats, having lost a presidential election they expected to win, have not yet found either a leader or a unified message.