Adam L. Silverman, PhD*
COL Lang's recent post on attempts by the GOP to return America to a new Gilded Age excellently picked apart what is being proposed and why. I wanted to follow up with some additional information I have come across and took note of in case I had reason to use it. The first is an excellent article in The Atlantic from last winter. The article, by Chrystia Freeland, a business correspondent, delineates how the wealthiest of Americans have essentially detached themselves from the rest of us. They have fully embraced the concept of globalization by recognizing that they and their capital can go anywhere, therefore they don't really need the US or the rest of us Americans. In doing so they have broken the last bits of the economic portions of the American social contract. Essentially all of the rest of us are just disposable. This, as I've mentioned before in regards to military service, is at the heart of the book AWOL and Freeland's article makes a more general and economic complement to that argument. And Timothy Noah (before Slate let him go...) did an outstanding multipart series on income inequality.
Another excellent piece, especially now that one of the major GOP candidates for the party's presidential nomination has said that corporations are people, is a lecture given by Harper'scontributing editor and law professor Scott Horton that was reprinted in (at least the online version) of Harper's. Professor Horton's presentation takes a look at the corporation through the eyes of James Madison and presents a stark contrast to how many in America, and certainly the (conservative wing of the) Supreme Court based on recent rulings, view and should understand corporations.
Finally, just a couple of links to some chart heavy sites dealing with how Americans are compensated for their work, facts about US inequality, debunking some major tax myths, historical top tax rates. New gilded age indeed...
*Adam L. Silverman, PhD is the Culture and Foreign Language Advisor at the US Army War College. The views expressed here are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of the US Army War College and/or the US Army.
