The novel A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens opens with the words: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness.” In an early scene of the movie version the carriage of the French aristocrat the Marquis St. Evremonde runs over a child and the Marquis tells the distraught father holding his dead child, “It’s extraordinary how you cannot take care of yourselves and your children,” and then rides on.
That scene reflects in large part what is happening in America today. Many of the corporate equivalents of the Marquis pay no federal income tax while their interests support the slashing of federal assistance to the bottom half of society who struggle with their living expenses.
ITEP, a nonpartisan research organization on tax policy, published a list of 88 corporations, all of which made extraordinary profits but paid zero in Federal income tax, thanks largely to the so-called tax reform passed at the behest of the White House. The list includes PayPal, Yum!Brands, parent company of Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut, and banking and energy companies. There’s more than one way to kill a child.
Prayer for the Day
Frustrated that we cannot feed our children, O God,
We grow in anger realizing we need more than handouts;
Confounded by talk that we are the wealthiest nation,
We look around at how we really do live.
Empower us, O Lord, to create a Nation of justice,
Where there are no poor or hungry.
In the name of the One who fed the multitudes,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
What has destroyed every previous civilization has been the tendency to the unequal distribution of wealth and power.
Henry George, American economist (1839-1897)
Today the United States has the most unequal society of all developed nations. America’s level of inequality is comparable to that of Russia, China, Argentina, and the war-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo.”
Jessica Bruder, Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century
Those who trust in their riches will wither,
But the righteous will flourish like green leaves.
Proverbs 11:28