We have this expression that "idle hands are the devil's workshop."  Change the word from "hands" to "money" and this principle can be used to explain the disaster area America has become since 1980.  Reagan freed the rich from high taxes while unleashing an all-out war on the unions that gave America its middle class.  The resulting excess "idle money" began the rich people's war on the middle class.  Unlimited riches gave rise to unlimited campaign donations and right-wing institutes.  Four decades later, the 99% are increasingly being left behind by the top 1%, or more accurately, the top 0.1%.  Corruption of the American system has grown everywhere during these four decades of the rich not sharing America's productivity growth with the rest of us 99%.  We have developed a working-class austerity "mean" mentality that supports this ongoing plundering of the middle class by the rich by using resentments to divide us into warring tribes.

Existing Structure

The prevalent divide of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat tends to favor a perspective of the top 20% versus the bottom 80%.  This is very misleading.  By focusing on the top 20% it can be shown certain things, like the fact that a college degree leads to significantly higher income.  That this top 20% can be shown to have a good lifestyle while 40% of America lives from paycheck to paycheck completely hides the fact that the top 1% has more than quadrupled their incomes relative to the rest of us 99% the last forty years.  The professional class is fooling themselves that they have done well, while even they have shown little improvement over forty years ago.  This new pattern, so drastically different than the forty years prior to 1980, is so entrenched that classic divide and conquer strategies like pitting the millennials against the boomers make sense to the millennials who have never known another America like the one the boomers grew up in.  They fail to see that the boomers did not take advantage of them, the rich did, the top 1% and the deluded 12% that think they are in the top 1% and the next 23% that expect to be 1% someday, engineered the election of Ronald Reagan to once and for all time put the rich back in charge by lowering the top tax rate from 70% to 28% and the capital gains tax rate lowered as well. Together with a union busting strategy and heel dragging on raising the minimum wage.  Further the working class has been led to believe that immigrants and affirmative action recipients are taking their jobs, when the rich and the lost growth from militarization of society into an empire has led to their disadvantage.  The automation excuse ignores the Germany example of how advanced manufacturing can replace automated jobs with new manufacturing and engineering jobs.  Just as manufacturing and productivity shrink with every military buildup, the overseas placement of jobs proceeds with the cost-free aid of military protection and financial investment enrichment of the rich 1% class.  The Wall Street Journal showed that all New York Stock Exchange stocks from 2000-2010 added 3 million jobs overseas, reducing 900,000 at home.  People are overpaid one third in weapons industries, whether they are blue collar, while collar or engineers, and top financial jobs helping the rich exploit the rest of us are extremely lucrative topping many best jobs lists.  The financial industry has grown to ten times its share of national profits since 1980.  Meanwhile, the auto industry and manufacturing in general have faded away, as the richest city in American moved from Detroit (autos) in 1960 to Boston (MIT top military research institution) in the Cold War eighties to the Washington DC area today where seven of the ten richest counties in America are now located.  Wall Street and the Pentagon enable our government to exploit the rest of us in the name of rising inequality going straight to the top 1%.  The red states resist, but they are shooting at the wrong enemy, unwittingly voting in the exploiters.  Ironically, the college degree and up educated are trying to put America back into balance, unfortunately with piecemeal improvements rather than a return to taxing the rich as in our "Glory Days" before 1980.

Billionaires

Always the rich and famous have been with us and influential.  Perhaps never more since the Gilded Age of the late Nineteenth century have the rich been in control of America.  Long have the rich been kingmakers.  Since the Citizens United decision of the Supreme Court in 2010 there has been a flood gate of big money into politics for both parties, a trend that started around 1980.  Ralph Nader wrote "Only the Super Rich Can Save Us" noting this trend favored the rich and corporate interests, but enough rich people existed that valued democracy enough to try and right the balance.  Lately, the internet and small donor only fundraising by candidates have been able to fight back with an unusual number of underfunded candidates beginning to win this way.  On the left, George Soros provides money, Warren Buffett has suggested the 30% minimum tax on the rich, and Jeff Bezos of Amazon has bought the Washington Post, and Tom Steyer has waged an aggressive impeachment campaign.  On the right, the Mercer family has funded Trump, while the Koch brothers have founded the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and promoted right wing academic organizations on campuses across the country.  Sheldon Adelman is another major conservative donor.  The Bradley Foundation leads in right wing funding even over better-known Heritage and CATO.  Many of these right-wing institutions started in the seventies making the post-1980 changes possible.

Nobel Peace Prize

The economy draining properties of military spending, proven by the Reuschlein science, are perfect for filling the need to reduce armies, as called for in Nobel's will.  As such several people have nominated me for the Nobel Peace Prize starting with 2016 and each subsequent year.  This is your chance to join them in the history that will be confidential for 50 years.  Many qualify including social science professors and associate professors, including law, history, and theology and others.  Also, members of national governments and legislatures and many others can nominate.  Deadline this year is midnight GMT time on 1-31-19, 5pm Chicago time.  But act immediately because they must reply to your application first before you can submit it.   

Social Science Associate Professors May Nominate Reuschlein for Nobel Peace Prize:

https://www.nobelpeaceprize.org/Nomination/Nominator-application-form

List of Empire Economics Special Findings by Reuschlein:

https://www.academia.edu/37217512/Findings_and_Special_Claims_November_2017_2_pages

Please cite this work as follows:

Reuschlein, Robert. (2019, January 29), "Idle Money Devil's Workshop", Madison, WI:  Real Economy Institute.  Retrieved from: https://www.expertclick.com/NewsRelease/Idle-Money-Devil's-Workshop,2019167038.aspx

Dr. Peace, Robert Reuschlein, Real Economy Institute

Nominated Vetted 2016 (2 Web Looks), Given Odds 2017 (3 Web Looks), Strongly Considered 2018 (48 Web Looks, one million words) Nobel Peace Prize, a favorite in 2019 (pace well ahead of last year) for Nobel Peace Prize to be announced Friday October 4^th, 2019.

Contact: bobreuschlein@gmail.com, Info: www.realeconomy.com