Billion dollar companies often end up getting tax refunds. There's no reason why Mitt Romney pays more than half of what I pay in taxes.
And oh for the love of all that is Holy. We are not demanding free shit. We are demanding to have the same opportunities that previous generations had. A summer job used to be able to pay for Yale. Even a part-time summer job. You'd have to work just about every summer from the time you are 5 to pay for a St. John's education on your own.
Germany has free college, Ireland has free college, most of Europe does in fact and it's why most Europe nations are surpassing us in education. It opens up the game to more kids.
Our most prosperous time was when most of our country had college paid for under the GI Bill and we started to build highways and rebuild railroads. It created jobs and opportunities and people knew how to make and fix things because they could pay for the education to learn how to do it.
Democratic Socialism is what most of Europe has, especially Ireland. It does work. FDR was labeled a socialist as well with the minimum wage, job programs, and most of the New Deal. You know, that little thing that pulled us out of the Great Depression and led to the most prosperous economy America has ever had? That same economy that the Reagan party has destroyed?
A summer job used to be able to pay for Yale??? WTF... What type of summer jobs were those? Started working summer jobs when I was 15, lucky if I could afford gas and a few drinks based on what I made. Guess I should have worked as a nuclear engineer or private banker in the summers instead. BTW, have you heard of the PIGS in Europe? Ireland is the I in the PIGS their economy is not doing so good, just like the socialist economies of Portugal, Greece, Spain and pretty much all the other socialist governments in Europe that you so desperately want to model after. Sad
Yes a minimum wage summer job used to pay for Yale. Back in the 60s. And as for the person who said the New Deal took us out a wartime economy. The New Deal was implemented in the mid 1930's. Long after World War 1 ended and before World War 2 started. And how do you explain that World War 2 took us out of the Great Depression when Bush put us in two wars and turned a surplus into a deficit?
And isn't it funny how Trump rails against China? Last I checked, China was a Communist country with a planned economy which is associated with Marxist economies.
Now I am in no way advocating communism or even outright socialism. But lack of regulation helped lead to the Great Depression. Deregulation by Clinton and Bush helped lead to The Great Recession. You need a referee to make sure the game is fair. Right now the American Government is Tim Donaghy and the Boston College Point Shaving Team. Capitalism and Socialism can lead to horrendously poor countries and extreme poverty when they are let to run on their own. Capitalism can provide for short booms but huge busts. When they work together in a balance, it creates the most prosperous economy we have ever had. You need Capitalism to promote hard work and opportunity and ambition. You need socialism to provide a safety net. Yes, Socialism is bad when implemented on its own. But Bernie Sanders is not going to come in here and get everything he wants done. Nobody is. FDR didn't. Most of his policies weren't as effective as they could've been because they were blocked or repealed by a Republican Congress. But the money has to be taken out of Politics. The influence major corporations and the extreme wealthy have needs to be stopped.
The minimum wage needs to rise, college needs to be at least affordable. And it's funny because despite my choice in candidate, I'm an Independent and would probably have more success running as a Republican if I was ever to become a politician. The solutions I come up with for those problems tend to lean more on the Conservative spectrum. But that's the problem with the Republicans right now. Instead of finding the conservative solution, they deny the problem exists.