Comments for The Congressional Progressive Caucus Budget: A Serious Budget That the Serious People Won't Take Seriously at http://www.cepr.net , comment 1 to 1 out of 1 comments http://www.cepr.net Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:45:56 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/cepr-blog/the-congressional-progressive-caucus-budget-a-serious-budget-that-the-serious-people-wont-take-seriously#comment-22756 It appears that the only "solution" offered is that of having govt invest in infrastructure -- decent paying jobs, almost exclusively for middle class men who have only recently lost their jobs. In most American families, women are co- or sole providers. Unless we dig out the old trickle-down economics theory, current budget plans do nothing to ease/reduce American poverty, nothing to expand opportunities for the post-middle class. They do nothing to end the use of super-cheap replacement labor (workfare, etc.), which serves to shrink the middle class. Each plan ignores reality: Not everyone can work, and there simply aren't jobs for all who desperately need one. Employers today won't hire those who have been out of work for a while. How do you get a job without a home address, phone, clean clothes, bus fare? You don't, and there's nowhere to go from there. What should we do about all those left behind? It's not possible to strengthen (much less, rebuild) the middle class without shoring up the poor. On a larger scale, no democracy can survive the extreme economic inequality that today's generation achieved nor, I would add, should it. I've seen no budget plan, including that of the "Progressive Caucus," that legitimately addresses these issues, so it's not possible to reverse the deep decline of the US. - DHFabian Wed, 20 Mar 2013 09:08:54 +0100