Forum Post: Occupy Capitol Hill

First, I'd like to profile myself for clarity before anyone calls me an old, rich, white Republican.

I am an 18-year-old sophomore attending NYC community college. I am currently unemployed but actively searching for work, taking the responsibility for my success or failure on my own shoulders. I do not blame others for my failures, I make them my own, and I learn from them. Hardship makes me stronger, strife builds my resilience, but it does not motivate me to construct a theory as to how those with better fortunes than I have somehow demoralized, disenfranchised, or bastardized me. I identify myself as a libertarian, and a strong proponent of government leaving the private sector to itself. The government, in its failed and foolhardy attempts to rescue the economy, have made it the true criminal in this whole scenario.

The majority of those employed on Wall Street are middle-classmen making 5-figure salaries struggling to make ends meet just as much as anyone else in this day and age.

Call out the government that threw billions of dollars in taxpayer money at a burning fire and bailed out anyone who asked for it. Call out the government that has not yet punished Eric Holder and those involved with Operation Fast and Furious, the ATF operation that saw taxpayer money fund thousands of weapons for the violent Sinaloa cartel in Mexico. Call out the government that took recess as the economy worsened, with President Obama stating he would propose his now defunct jobs bill only AFTER he had enjoyed his week-long biking/golfing excursion. Call out the government that defies logic and funnels 50% of all tax revenues into Medicare and Medicaid alone. In the next 10 years, 100% of all tax revenues by their current margin will go to those programs, which signals a minimum 50% mandatory increase in total tax revenues.

The problem here is not capitalism, but the absence of it. Our government has refused to allow the cycles of growth and temporary recession to run their course. They have, instead, sought to rescue that which they had no capability of saving and, in so doing, have further debased and worsened the recession from which we may have already recovered, had laissez faire capitalism been allowed to proceed.

This country was built on the capitalist ideals of a work ethic unparalleled by its contemporaries. While it is permissible to say that in this current economic climate, hard work is not the miracle formula for success, it is inherently and perhaps ironically selfish and greedy to suggest that the top 1% now must surrender the fruits of their labors to the "99%".

Statistics show that, as of last year, the top 1% of tax payers paid 40% (est.) of ALL federal income tax revenues, undoubtedly the most profitable of any federal tax category. The top 1% paid more in federal income tax revenues than the entire bottom 95% as a cohesive whole. However, it is estimated that 30% of Americans pay no income tax whatsoever, and it is safe to assume that many of those in that dubious 30% also belong to the affectionately, albeit misguidedly dubbed "99%". It is foolish to believe that corporate greed is the flaw.

A flat income tax, much like Herman Cain's "9-9-9 plan" would eliminate the loopholes and fineprint that allow 30% of those in this country to avoid paying their fair share. These loopholes are easily exploitable and, thus, are exploited. They, along with the government that drafted them, form the core nucleus of the problems facing our nation and our economy today.

Capitalism has survived over 200 years in this country, through prosperous and seemingly hopeless circumstances and times. It has not failed entirely ever before, and it may not fail here. However, in order for that to be true, the government must be held accountable for its prominent, center-stage role in the perpetuation of the economic crisis and the unemployment still facing our country. As I deal with this crisis in the first-person perspective and search to find employment amidst all that troubles this country's economy, I make those troubles my motivation to excel and work as hard as I can to elevate myself above my current status, and I do not seek to blame my failure on the success of others.

Occupy Capitol Hill.

Something to think about.