=========================================================== " R e a g a n ' s r e v e r s e R o b i n H o o d s " =========================================================== In These times, July 18-31, 1990. Bruce Fisher book review of: "The Politics of Rich and Poor: Wealth and the American Electorate in the Reagan Aftermath" by Kevin Phillips [Random House], a Republican commentator: - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - --> [Send the 1-line message GET POLITICS RICHPOOR ACTIV-L to] [LISTSERV@UMCVMB.BITNET for a copy of this file. ] --> [Send GET ACTIV-L ARCHIVE ACTIV-L to above address for a ] [listing with brief descriptions of other files available] - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - "In March, House majority leader Richard Gephardt and 11 of his Democratic colleagues crowded into a hearing room to release a new study on federal income-tax regressivity...the numbers are ugly and getting worse. The nation's richest million or so families have seen their *average* after-tax incomes more than double, from about $190,000 in 1977 to almost $400,000, while median-income families have seen their after-tax incomes decline 7 percent. The working poor have fared even worse. Real after-tax income for families making $16,000 in 1990 has dropped 10 percent since 1977 -- for those making under $7,000, it dropped 14 percent. "The litany is familiar. So was the Democrats' response. ``Nobody here is talking about raising any taxes,'' Gephardt told several dozen reporters who packed the room. At that, notebooks snapped shut and television lights flicked off. There was no story. "[...] Phillips' _The Politics of Rich and Poor_ predicts that hard-pressed middle-income voters will soon stage a populist revolt, just as they did in reaction to the excesses of the Gilded Age and of the Coolidge-Hoover boom. Can he be right? Maybe. Recall that last 10 days of Michael Dukakis' 1988 campaign. Phillips cites Bush campaign manager Lee Atwater's post-election admission that his camp was relieved when Dukakis eschewed economic populism, embracing "us vs. them" only when it was too late to make a difference. "``The way to win a presidential race against Republicans is to develop the class warfare issue, as Dukakis did at the end, to divide up the haves and the have-nots and to try to reinvigorate the New Deal coalition and to attack,'' Atwater told the Boston Globe. "But don't hold your breath. Phillips point out the Dukakis' ``unwillingness to indict Republican boom economics was not a personal preference; it was an old party tradition.'' Indeed. A party that relies on lawyers, real-estate tycoons and financiers for its money cannot be expected to don more than a facade of populism... "...and some liberals have simply become $60,000-a-year millionaires. In his recent New Republic essays, "For a New Equality," Mickey Kaus endorsed Dukakis-style civic liberalism but condemned downward economic redistribution, shrugging off all the data on how Reagan-era tax and fiscal policies redistribute income *upward*. "When Gephardt refused to pull the tax trigger at the March press conference, he demonstrated the electoral power of the elites for whom finance, law, real estate and other non-productive activities have meant enrichment, and he revealed the disempowerment of farmers, unionized workers, the elderly poor, racial minorities and the moderate-income family. The latter are voting less and less, while the former are growing in political strength. "...Richard Nixon, who employed the ``Sun Belt'' strategy that Phillips advanced in his 1967 _The Emerging Republican Majority_, has had good things to say about _The Politics of Rich and Poor_. So has Gov. Mario Cuomo of New York. ``Phillips says convincingly what Democrats have not been bold enough to say and Republicans won't admit: we have redistributed our wealth from the poor and the working middle class to the rich,'' writes Cuomo, ``We have compromised our fiscal integrity and risked our world position. Phillips says that the people will compel what the politicians have failed to do. I hope he's right.''...One wonders whether Gov. Cuomo will say what he would *do* about wealth transfer, fiscal integrity and America's world position -- and make some real news." [ITT July 18-31, 1990] # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # "With just 53% of the voting-age population casting ballots in the 1984 election and 50% in 1988, the well-to-do were overrepresented. Phillips estimates that those with incomes in the top fifth ``conceivably cast almost 30% of the total presidential ballots in Ronald Reagans' 1984 landslide, and people in the top two income quintiles together probably accounted for over 50% of the turnout -- and with a disproportionately Republican effect.'' thus the Gephardts hesitates. The natural constituency for economic populism isn't voting and so isn't being addressed. But that, Phillips argues, is soon to change. As a Republican, he couldn't be accused of wishful thinking. He sees cycles of boom-time capitalist heydays followed by progressive/populist reactions..." [Source: Diffferent section of same book review] ################################################################## In These Times 1300 W. Belmont Chicago, IL 60657 (312)472-5700 [Use the GET command (in the format at the top of this file) with PUBLCATN RESOURCE for a listing of alternative files. 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