Articles
The Rent Is Too Damn HighIt is true in the city of New York and every other city including Wilmington Delaware. Zohran Mamdani has pledged to freeze the rent if he gets elected New York's mayor. Whether that would be the one million rent stabilized units or all rentals, whether council would go along, or whether the courts would allow it in the Age of Trump, who knows? In Wilmington Delaware the city council rejected a motion to institute a rent stabilization program.
Read More Sovereignty And Migration What gives a country the right to secure its borders, and exist as a sovereign state?
If we surveyed the history of the 194 countries in the world today, it's doubtful that any of them are populated by the descendants of the people who first discovered the uninhabited land. But, if one of those countries was still occupied by those descendants it would not give them a moral right to the exclusive possession of the land in perpetuity. No group of people have a greater moral right to a portion of the Earth than others. Read More Tariffs Will Make America Great Again?The Federal Government was funded largely by tariffs from its beginning and throughout the 19th century when America had the highest wages in the world. Today tariffs are being advocated once again with 56% of Americans in support. We need them, they say, because corporations are exporting jobs. We are importing cheap products made by people who are paid food, clothing, and shelter — just enough to keep them from getting too weak to work. The only way Americans could compete is to live like slaves as well. Tariffs enable higher prices out of which high wages can be paid, and corporations retain the incentive to invest in American factories. In short, they say: Tariffs prevent wages from falling to the lower levels of other countries.
Read More The Fear of Want!The Fear of Want Breeds the Worship of Wealth said Henry George in 1879. Today, approximately 11 percent of our population are impoverished, and nearly two million Americans are incarcerated. We have an elaborate welfare system that redistributes nearly a trillion dollars per year (3.5% of GDP) to those who are unable to work, find employment, or earn enough to provide for their families.
Read More Two Wrongs Do Not Make A RightWhat about Ukraine? Making war on another country is mass murder, which includes conscripted soldiers who are killed on both sides.
By the end of WWII, Russia (AKA The Soviet Union) had the world's largest army. Ever since they have been in a contest with the United States over who would dominate the world, you may remember, in the 1950s, Russia sent weapons to North Korea, and in the 60s, to North Vietnam to fight the Americans. In the 80s, the United States sent weapons to Afghanistan to fight the Russians. Now, the US is sending weapons to Ukraine. It's not equal to 10% of the money that goes to the annual US military budget, but it has killed and ruined the lives of countless people and significantly increased the profits for the weapons makers. Read More Chinese Electric CarsWith a tariff, we do to our own citizens in times of peace what we do to our enemies with a blockade in times of war — make it more difficult to get valuable products from other countries. That was the wisdom of Henry George in 1886.
If each party did not get a greater value than the one they gave, no one would trade. Getting something you value more than the thing you give is instinctive. Yet we are told by vested interests that the more we export, and the less we import, the more prosperous we become, and all too many American workers believe it. Read More As the World BurnsGreetings Voters:
Today, inflation is down but ever present; housing rents keep rising faster than wages, and homeownership is progressively harder to achieve. Heat waves and severe weather are increasing, and the conflict in Ukraine portends a nuclear war. All this, and another recession, is on schedule for 2026. Read More The American DilemmaPresident Trump was a demagogue, for sure. He could be treated as a felon and disqualified from running in 2024. But the contempt and machinations of his tens of millions of followers and the motley mob that ransacked the U.S Capital are rooted in the intractable problems of unemployment, stagnant wages, and the exorbitant cost of housing. By exploring the cause and working for a solution, President Biden and the new Congress could eliminate the threat of another demagogue as they build toward a just and prosperous nation.
Read More More Education Will Not Reduce Poverty?Henry George places a hundred shipwrecked men on an island from which there is no escape. He draws attention to whether one of them has the weapons to make the other 99 his chattel slaves, or one of them has title to the island and the means to enforce it: it makes no difference to the one or the ninety-nine; they are his slaves. Because of the one's ownership of the island, the other 99 would have to work for bare subsistence, just enough to keep them healthy enough to work maximum efficiency, which is the slave's wage.
Read More. Black Lives Matter
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The Universal Basic IncomeThe Universal Basic Income: U.B.I. or the Basic Income Guarantee: B.I.G. or the citizen's dividend: CD. The citizen's dividend does not mean to exclude non-citizens who, as residents, have the same natural rights, and have, to the same extent as citizens, created values above those that can be attributed to individuals or corporations of people. Although they cannot vote, non-citizens should be entitled to the same protections and benefits of government as those who can.
Read More Funding - Pandemic NeedsHere we are in a pandemic. The epidemiologists say our best defense is personal distancing, and all recreational and non-essential activities curtailed. That means trillions of dollars’ worth of goods and services are not being produced, and millions and millions of workers are unemployed. So, the unemployed workers don't have money to buy the necessities they need—primarily food and shelter (mortgage payments or rent).
Read More Reflections on Earth DayWhen the first Earth Day was being celebrated, I had recently been acquainted with "Progress and Poverty" by Henry George. I thought to myself, 'now there is a marriage,' the paramount need for sustainability in preserving our species, and the requisite to a just and prosperous civilization—equal rights to the Earth.
Read More JuneteenthHappy Juneteenth, now a National Holiday in remembrance of the day that the former slaves in Galveston, Texas, were told about the Emancipation Proclamation, the surrender of Lee, and the end of slavery in the 11 states that were the Confederacy.
Read More Saving The Middle Class“It is as though an immense wedge were being forced, not underneath society, but through it. Those who are above the point of separation are elevated, but those who are below — are crushed down.” Those are the words of Henry George in his classic work: Progress And Poverty — 1879.
Read More HousingAffordable housing is a national crisis. A significant number of Americans throughout the country cannot afford to rent a habitable dwelling, and many more are impoverished by its cost. And, because it's a national problem, the high cost of housing cannot be fully solved within a single city like Wilmington, Delaware.
Read More Ending Poverty In America 4-7-16Inspired by Henry George’s Progress & Poverty
The rich are getting richer while wages for the 99% have been frozen since the 1960s. The vast majority of the adult population are willing and able to work and would like to exchange their labor for the products and services of other people’s labor, but at the beginning of 2016 the percentage of the adult population that was employed is about 59 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That is 4 percent less of the adult population than was working before the recession began in 2008. Read More Tax Reform 2016There is really only one legitimate way to reform our tax system, and that is for each and everyone of us to pay for the benefits we receive from the government — nothing more. Land, meaning the surface of the Earth, includes mineral resources and airwaves, and its value measures exactly the benefits received from society. Government represents society and transfers those values to individuals and corporations with the title to land. Without title, no social benefits are accessible. All that is needed for tax reform is to make every title to land conditional upon the payment of its rental value — and abolish all other taxes. By doing that, everyone pays for the value of the benefits received and no one is robbed of the things they’ve produced, which are their rightful property. Read More
Does Low Interest Really Help?The majority of Americans owe more money in mortgages on their homes and car loans than they have in interest baring investments like bonds, money markets, and savings accounts. Therefore, low interest rates and inflation seem to work in their favor — especially with fixed rate mortgages. Read More
Cities Need HelpThe mayor of Los Angeles is now advocating revenue sharing from the Federal Government. With high rates of unemployment and large concentrations of poverty it seems like it might be the only reasonable way for cities to meet their expenses. Most old industrial cities have large distressed areas where unemployment, robbery, murder, and drugs make them unprofitable for business and incapable of providing the tax revenues they consume. Read More
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Murder Town, USAWilmington, Delaware — Corporation city, the bastion of capitalism and private enterprise, the birthplace of the DuPont company — has now been branded “Murder Town USA”. It’s been ranked the third most dangerous of its size and the 5th most dangerous city in the country. Perhaps the murders are an outcome of poverty, and Wilmington is just one more “Tale of two cities” — one black and one white, one prosperous and one poor. Twenty-five percent of its residents live in poverty with unemployment and low wages at the root. At the same time, there are parcels with vacant land or empty buildings in many areas of the city. Read More
Run the Government Like a BusinessIf Mitt Romney and the corporate backed candidates for congress win in the next election it seems more than likely they will, at the very least, want to run our governments like a business. Is this a good idea? It’s hard to imagine anything less equitable or inefficient than a system that takes from each a percentage of their income or outgo in a sales tax without any reference to the value of benefits received by the taxpayer. Read More
School District FundingIt has come to my attention that there is yet another referendum on increasing taxes for schools in Brandywine Hundred. The primary justification for school taxes is simply that each of us was provided the opportunity of a free education, and therefore, we are obligated to contribute to the education of those who come after us. Read More
Exporting JobsHow do we stop American companies from sending our jobs to China? They’ve been laying off workers, closing down factories, and sending jobs to other countries at an increasing rate for the last 50 years. And right now we need all the jobs we can get. How do we stop American companies from hiring people in other countries to make the products that are consumed in the United States—that is, without having Americans work for the same subsistence slave wages that other people are working for in impoverished countries all over the world? Read More
Raffles Had the Winning TicketRaffles had the winning ticket, say the followers of Henry George. In 1819, some fifty years before the publication of Progress And Poverty Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles established the British trading port of Singapore. Not only was it advantageously situated for trade, at the end of the Malay Peninsula, but it was set up with no tariffs or other taxes to inhibit commerce.
Slavery and gaming were outlawed, and all revenue was derived from the rental value of land. As any Georgist would have predicted that population and productivity would grow at a rapid pace. Read More Taxes Kill JobsTaxes kill jobs is the message of political candidates. The American economic system causes unemployment and recessions; that is true, but without revenue and the role of government the U.S. would surely be a third world country. Read More
Illegal Immigration (2007)It is illegal to enter the United States without permission, yet there are an estimated 12 million people who have entered the country this way and remain. Why has the U.S. government allocated so few resources to enforcing the law? I suspect it is harder to sneak into a major league baseball game then to cross the U.S. Mexican border, once you get there. Are illegal immigrants more profitable than the very same people would be if they entered the country with a green card? Do illegal, low paid immigrants have any effect on the general level of wages throughout the country? Read More
Immigration & JobsIllegal immigrants make up a little over 5 percent of the U.S. Workforce, according to the Pew Research Center — having stabilized during the recession, and only increased slightly since. However, since 2010 the U.S. government has issued an average of over a million Green Cards per year. Read More
Importing Products or Exporting Jobs? What do you think? Is the U.S. exporting jobs to China? In 2010 Americans bought $292 billion worth of products from China, and the Chinese only bought $55 billion worth of products from the U.S. That’s $237 billion dollars worth of difference from China alone. Read More
Reflections on the Gettysburg AddressIt was a masterful dedication to the field of the most horrific battle ever fought in America and the war that consumed 600,000 lives in the cause that this nation might live” as it was conceived — “where all men are created equal”. It was “four score and seven years” from the moment of that great declaration in 1776 until the emancipation of four million slaves. In the four score and seventy years since, America has come a long way toward the goal of social, legal, and political equality. However, as chattel slavery was abolished, another form of slavery began to emerge. Legal and political rights mean little without economic opportunity. The connection between free men and free land is self evident, but few of the former slaves got any land at all. As the terrorism and despotism of the former slave states that began with the withdrawal of Federal Troops, slowly ameliorated, the free land that had so grossly enhanced the lives of European immigrants, was exhausted. Read More
The Legal Minimum WageWould An Increase In The Min. Wage Cause Unemployment?
Ever since it was proposed and enacted in 1938 during the Great Depression it has been assumed by many that the Legal Minimum Wage causes unemployment. Today there are not only those who argue that it causes unemployment, but others that argue the opposite — that every increase in the Min. Wage increases the buying power of workers, and therefore, by increasing the demand for products and services, it increases the number of jobs. The following is an analysis of these arguments and a proposal. Read More |