Paper

John Roth

Comp 105

Professor Darling

December 7, 2014

Income Inequality

            Many people have moved to America because of the American Dream. They came here because they believed that they could become wealthy while living in a place of freedom. When many of these people got to America they realized that there are many inequalities here too. Some of the inequalities that affected people in the past were racial and gender discrimination. However many of those inequalities were ended when the citizens started to stand up for their rights and protest the problems. Many of those people knew that they might not be able to see the improvement in their lives but still protested to help stop the problems so the future generations would live better lives. Americans must stand up to fix the problem of income inequality, just like they have stood up to fix many past issues.

            Today there is a new type of inequality that is affecting the American citizens, and that is income inequality. Income inequality is always going to happen in any economy but the gap between rich and poor has grown much too large in the United States. “The United States ranks first among all developed countries in Income Inequality.”(Reich). This is a problem that must be fixed so the American people are all given a chance to succeed. Right now many people are having trouble finding jobs or are working for lower wages. This could be a problem for me when I am trying to find a job and support a family. The problem starts with the government but has a negative effect on the economy. Communities in the United States must rally to get this problem fixed. The government is being run to benefit the wealthy. The wealthy are able to use their money to have a greater say then the average citizen. This has had a negative effect on the economy which is trying to recover from a recession. “The economy must have a strong middle class to be able to grow”(Reich), which the United States does not have. This can be fixed by the people living in communities. The citizens of the United States, including me, must stand up and make this issue known. If middle class communities are able to make income inequality a well known problem it can be fixed.

            The government is a major cause of the huge gap between the rich and the poor right now. The government is supposed to allow every citizen in the United States to have their voices heard, but right now this is not happening. It is easier for candidates supported by the rich to campaign than those candidates supported by the middle class. Candidates supported by the rich are given millions of dollars in donations to run their campaigns. This allows them to travel more, hold larger rallies, and buy a lot of television ads. More exposure for a candidate means that they are more likely to get elected. Corporations can also donate to campaign funds now, which creates another problem. The United States Government is supposed to protect the rights of the people and not corporations that are operating in the country. The wealthy have a large influence on our government that allows their interests to be put ahead of the average American citizen. An example is that the tax rate for the wealthy has declined, “The United States has generally cut top income tax rates over the past half century.”(Markovich). When this happens to the tax rate, it normally leads to an economic crash.

                        The United States economy used to be one of the strongest in the world but income inequality has caused our economy to weaken. Our economy relies on a strong work force. As of right now the work force in America is very unskilled. Right now in the United States more people are working in minimum wage jobs than ever before.

“Many of the corporations have started outsourcing jobs to other countries in this present day global economy. Workers who are highly skilled and have college degree have benefited from this but not the everyday working American, they have lost jobs to foreign countries and see larger competition from foreign workers.”(Markovich).

This causes many middle class Americans to lose their jobs or work for lower wages. Many factories in America have already been closed because it is cheaper to make the product in another country. If this continues to happen it will be very hard for our economy to start improving again.

            The United States economy grows with the middle class because most citizens in the United States are part of the middle class. Most goods or services in the United States are mostly purchased or used by the middle class. If the middle class is unemployed or does not make enough money to buy these companies goods or services then many companies will have to go out of business or cutback. This means that in order for our economy to begin to improve our middle class needs to improve because they far outnumber the wealthy. Even though the wealthy make more money does not mean they spend more. The wealthy will never purchase as many things as a strong middle class can. Even though the average American citizen did not cause this problem they must be the ones to change it.

            A very important part of American society is voting. Many people do not vote anymore for local, state, or even federal elections. A large part of this problem is that the middle class is not very well represented in the government. Most government officials right now have came from a rich background and were elected by the rich. If more middle class Americans start to vote it is more likely that a person who has their interests in mind would be elected. Voting is not hard to do and does not take very much time but it can have a huge effect on the issue of Income Inequality. That is why it is important that more people make an effort to vote on Election Day. It should also be stressed to children how important it is to vote. As of right now there are very few people in the younger generations who vote. If people in communities can stress the importance of voting the government will be more likely to stick up for the people of the middle class and not just the wealthy.

            Many people in the United States do not get involved in their communities issues today.  It takes a lot of time and effort and many people will disagree with your views. These are the reasons many people are not involved in their communities or sharing their views to help solve a problem. However to stop the gap from the rich and poor from growing people must stand up in their communities and make this problem well known. Many issues are fixed by the government when they are brought up in the community and a strong point is made that people are unhappy about the situation. Everyone knows that income inequality is a huge problem in the United States but the wealthy do not care but they will still be rich either way. That is why the working class must make these issues well known in their communities, workplaces, and at other social gatherings. An example of this is from Soul Of A Citizen.

“Virginia Ramirez tried to get a city agency to fix her poor neighbors house because it was unsafe to live in. When the neighbor died Virginia decided it was time to stand up to the city and attended a COPS group. They secured funds to help fix up the neighborhood. Virginia began becoming more involved in her community and was eventually able to get some of her problems noticed by the U.S. senate.”(Loeb 22-27).

 This just shows that when you make time to stand up against something negative happening in your community it is more likely to get resolved. People must stand up for what is right in their community more, including me, and I intend to try to raise awareness to many issues like income inequality.

Right now the government is focusing on many issues other than income inequality. If there are enough people in the Unites States who are willing to protest this issue it could be brought to the government’s attention. This could benefit the working class in many ways. The government could pass bills that would help the middle class and lessen corporate greed. They could also increase funding to school districts and universities all around the country so citizens can become better trained for a specific occupation. If the citizens make this a large enough issue it could affect who gets elected into public offices. Instead of campaigning to benefit major corporations, the candidates would be trying to win the votes of the people and a major issue that they would focus on is income inequality.

 People of the working class must continue to try to make the issue of income inequality know in the community. They might not see the improvement in their lifetime but they should still stand up against income inequality so their children are not affected by this issue. As of right now no one has done much of anything to try and stop the gap between wealthy and poor from growing, and that is a very bad thing. It means that most people have lost hope that this issue will be fixed and are just accepting. Cornel West explains the importance of staying hopeful, “This hope is not the same as optimism. Optimism adopts the role of spectator who surveys the evidence in order to infer that things are not going to get better.”(West 296). People must remain hopeful because the issue of income inequality is still very fixable, and there are still people who believe. Those people that are still hopeful must show the rest of the working class that so they will help with the efforts of putting an end to this terrible problem. It is not going to be easy but I believe if enough people come together and take a stand against income inequality we can fix the issue of income inequality. Maybe not in my parents’ lifetime, or even my lifetime but this is a problem that can be fixed for the future generations.

Income Inequality is becoming a larger problem in America and many people are starting to bring light to this issue. Right now there is too much inequality in income and it is really hurting our economy. Even though it is mostly the governments fault that this is occurring because it is run mostly for the wealthy, the people in working class communities must be the ones to put an end to this problem. People in working class communities must begin to vote, hold protests, and rallies to make this issue better known and important enough for the government to take their view into consideration. Our country succeeds with the middle class communities so they must form together and stand up for their rights to fix the widening gap between the rich and the poor. Our country has gone through many great hardships in the past with the help of communities. Like slavery, segregation, unfair work conditions, and child labor. Those were issues fixed by the citizens in our country. With hard work, dedication, and sacrifice the middle class can put an end to income inequality. They must stand up to the wealthy to finally put this problem to rest.