Why do they need more money?

 

 GOP-led House approves Trump's big bill with trillions in tax breaks and Medicare cuts

 

Finally!

And I don't mean they passed the bill.

Those were my thoughts today when I pulled this month’s issue of New Republic from the mailbox and looked at the cover. Who needs that much money?

My question, which I had been trying for weeks to get into some paper’s OP-ED page, “Why do the rich need more money?” was slightly different from theirs. It was, however, a question that I thought needed to be asked, and answered, since all the cuts in the proposed budget bill would enable Congress to give the rich the tax cuts they desired.

Maybe it was a mistake opening with a Professor Corey skit from years ago, but I thought interjecting a little humor into an otherwise boring economic piece would be welcomed. Anyway, this is the question I've been asking and am still looking for an answer to.

 

* * *

Yes, but Why

 

Professor Corey, the world’s foremost authority on everything, had a skit where people asked him, “Why do you wear sneakers?”

“This is a two-part question,” he’d say, and go on to describe all the philosophical implications of the word Why. Then he’d answer the second part, “Do I wear sneakers?”

“Yes, I do.”

Congress is currently negotiating a trillion-dollar budget bill that if passed will cut numerous social programs designed to help the needy and less fortunate. The resulting savings I keep hearing will pay for tax cuts for the rich.

My question is, “Why do the rich need more money?”

Professor Corey wasn’t a member of Congress. If he were, and was working on a bill like this one, and was asked this question, he’d go into his convoluted explanation on the word why and then answer the second part, “Yes, they do.”

Will Rogers also wasn’t a member of Congress, and he didn’t think much of politicians. “With Congress,” he said, “every time they make a joke it’s a law, and every time they make a law it’s a joke.

But government isn’t a joke, or at least it shouldn’t be, although sometimes those in government seem to work damn hard at being a joke. While this bill if it passes might be considered a joke by many, its consequences are no laughing matter.

Serious questions are being posed about this bill and serious people are stepping up to answer them. Authorities from every field are explaining in detail why disadvantaged children need school lunches, why low-income folks need Medicaid to help with rising health costs, why scientists need grants to produce new vaccines and discover new cures for diseases, why the broken immigration system needs more judges, why we need less lead in our pipes and more and better water treatment plants, why social security needs to be stabilized not defunded, why college students do need assistance, why veterans have earned and do need better care, why people hit by natural disasters need all the help they can get, why agriculture and food-processing plants need more and better inspectors, why airports need more controllers and airplanes need to be made safer,  why foreign nations do need our assistance because when they do well we do well, why the arts are as necessary as arms, and why a whole host of other programs that are being threatened need to be funded because real people depend on them in so many ways. Most of all, our government needs people because problems don’t solve problems, people solve problems.

What I don’t hear is anyone explaining why the wealthy need more money.

They have found ways to legally reduce their tax bill. They have found ways to legally get around paying their taxes, often zero taxes on mindboggling wealth. When push came to shove, many resort to illegal means to get more money, and have enough wealth to avoid the consequences.

A key to their plan has been to use their money to acquire a louder voice in government. When the Supreme Court declared that their money was a legitimate voice, the game was over. The wealthy now do have the loudest voice in government and the representatives they have put in want to kill or weaken as many programs designed to help the needy as they can to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy.

So, my question to anyone in Congress, the president, or to any of the millionaires and billionaires whose money put these politicians in office is, “Why do the rich need more money?”

And the answer better not be a long dissertation on the word Why followed by a quick throwaway response, “Yes, they do.”

* * *

So, this is my answer to New Republic’s question: Who needs that much money? 

No one.

And the answer to my question: Why do the rich need more money?  

They Don’t.

I hope every voter in America is asking and answering these two questions and remember them when they vote in the 2026 and 2028 elections.