From CNN‘s American Morning (2/1/10), an interview by anchor Kiran Chetry with White HouseOMB director Peter Orszag:
CHETRY: You also talk about letting taxes expire for families that make over $250,000. Some would argue that in some parts of the country that is middle class.
ORSZAG: Well, I guess it’s not the parts of the country where I’ve been.
Households that make $250,000 or more a year make up 1.5 percent of the U.S. public.
Don’t you imagine Chetry meant that’s middle class for the people who count?
Like her?
CNN is beginning to sound like FOX NEWS, adding another issue: who’s paying for the costs of your operations? You might want to have interviewers better informed on the issues prior to the actual interview.
News Flash! NPR, formerly a rat’s nest of bad old liberals, has fully redeemed itself with a whole new generation of incompetent, ignorant interviewers willing and eager to trash any initiative whatever by a democratic president.
@Roger Bloyce:
Um, what? NPR? This article is about CNN. Post to the wrong page?
That I did. Sorry, All.
The real outrage here is not that Chetry quoted 250K but that, technically, she’s correct (at least closer to correct than the functioning middle class income)! The wage gap between rich and poor has become so large, that what regular folks consider “middle class” is simply a richer version of poor.
How many people do you, personally, know that make even 1 million dollars? That’s $1,000,000.00 – well over the coveted “6 figures” of just 100K. And yet the highest US income is over 1.5 BILLION dollars (yes, that’s earned by ONE individual. I don’t begrudge O her due, just saying, we could use some of that too!).
Do the math. Then you’ll really have something to get outraged about: that our entire rich AND middle class is only 1.5 percent of the U.S. public – the rest of us are POOR!
@CNN (sent a few minutes ago):
In a CNN Monday morning discussion with Peter Orszag, Kiran Chetry mentioned that “some would argue” that some families making over $250,000 would somehow still count as middle class.
Hilarious! I love that!
But seriously, someone please ask Kiran to avoid citing CNN’s anonymous, mythical correspondent known as Mr. “Some.” I find it difficult to trust the perspective of a figure who doesn’t have the clout to show his face on national television with Wolf Blitzer.
After consulting with my sock puppet buddy, Mr. Others, I firmly believe that Kiran is from another planet. According to Others, a quarter million dollar annual salary is not an appropriate classification for middle class families–no matter what part of the planet Kiran thinks she’s on.
Thanks for the good laughs!
“CHETRY: You also talk about letting taxes expire for families that make over $250,000.”
Please tell me that Orszag was talking about NOT letting taxes expire for that 1.5%.
Most incomes don’t come to $100K a year. We lived on Long Island up till 2000, our combined salary was only $49K. Long Island taxes are very high that is why we left. THe price of oil has skyrocketed for both home and car as well as our food bills. Where we are now, the average annual salary is about $24K, which is for a family of four. Lots of folks would love to make at least $100K a year, $250K would be a dream. Those are earn over $250K be thankful that you have that kind of job. Taxes should be pro-rated according to one’s income. People who make that kind of money, hate to pay taxes. When confronted with the facts that the IRS should not make a general rate, say 20% (just my example, not actual rate). 20% of a lower income is quite a dent in the family budget, while those over $250K it shouldn’t be a problem. Why should lower income people pay for those making 10 times more than they are?
@deyb if “the rest of us are POOR”, then, what of “the rest of the World”? I’m a home-owner whose household of two lives on about $1200. a month… comfortably; and even though we will work until we die, it’s probably a healthier option than Some.
We still live better than probably 70% of the rest of the people on the planet… at least in the area covered by fiscal statistics. I’d prefer to think of myself as “Lower middle-class”… and am willing to swell the ranks of the “wealthy” by a percentage point or two, for my own peace of mind, I suppose… ^..^
The really sad – and damning – thing is that this “Kiran Chetry” person (who, thank god, I’ve never before heard of) is probably clueless in terms of the real ecnomy and real incomes. Where in the world do they (netwks) find these people? And what should we do with them in a just world – they apparently have no employable skills.
What gets lost in this discussion is the difference between
income and wealth. The rich not only have far greater income
than the rest of us. They have immense wealth, built over years
of having far greater income than the rest of us. The median
household income is $50,000. That means fully 50% of all house-
hold incomes are BELOW $50,000. But the picuture is even more
lop-sided if you look at the wealth of the top 1%. Their income
for the rest of their lives sitting at home doing nothing will be
far greater than $50,000. That’s known as “unearned income”
from capital gains, stock dividends, and interest income.
The problem with our finances is that most of us (except the truly rich) spend more than we can afford. The person earning $250,000 may have bought a million dollar (or greater) home, may be accustomed to taking wonderful vacations, buying steaks and lobsters, and the best money can buy. Then their children reach college age and they are faced with costs of $25,000 at public universities to $50,000 or more at a private one. If they’ve lived high on the hog (and this is not a nation of savers), they are in deep trouble.
It really isn’t what you make that counts – it’s what you spend. The forclosures in some of our most expensive neighborhoods is testimony to that kernel of wisdom which my mother gave me.
Ha! Yeah, in some parts of the country that’s middle class, like Beveryly Hills and Franklin Lakes, NJ!
No, wait, that’s lower class in those neighborhoods of millionaires.
Chetry just said that because SHE and her fellow CNN on-air airheads make at least that much and they don’t want to pay more taxes.
No, wait, she couldn’t be biased because she’s a professional journalist who paid her dues to become a CNN anchor before she was 30. And she’s so pretty, too!
All the witty quips here are moving us off the issues.
I turned my back on the professions to go to a top Journalism School and became a national reporter. I now weep at what the media has become in a single generation. CNN IS sadly aping Fox. NPR HAS clearly dumbed down. It hasn’t offered a news analysis in weeks–even from Dan Shore–that I couldn’t have written myself with no research.
As for the middle class thing–I’ve lived in two of America’s wealthiest counties–Nassau and Marin. You can certainly make it on 250K in either, so it takes much less to live in almost every other county. A priori–Middle Class is NOT $250,000 anywhere.
We can’t both accept the media are now airheads–and then parse their words to death as if they are anything more than fillers between ad spots. They are not.
I never heard of Kiran Chetry. What is it? Certainly not a reporter. Of course, I don’t watch FOX Lite, CNN. In fact I don’t watch any network news. I watch local news – primarily to get local weather.
Read a newspaper – a week later one or more articles will appear on TV as News!
Great Post! This might be a little off topic but has anyone ever been to an island Boracay? Its like that movie The Beach with Leonardo Dicaprio!
I am a 45 year old college graduate that made $28,000 this past year (2009), my highest income so far in my life. I have never paid federal income tax, I always get back what I’ve paid, sometimes more. In the past year, the bonus I recieved from the feds didn’t come close to covering, social security and medicare deducted from my paycheck. If you include: state income tax, state and local sales tax, personal property tax, registration and inspection fees for my vehicle, then I made less than $23,000. On top of that I paid over $8000.00 child support, my ex-wife left me for another man and got custody of my children because kids need to be with their mother. It didn’t matter that I was a stay at home dad from the time my first was born till my second started kindergarten, I was the primary caregiver then, and remain so to this day. I buy my kids school clothes and pay all their school expenses: books, lunch expenses, pictures, sport and activity fees on top of child support. My tiny one bedroom one bathroom trailer only costs $150 rent a month, otherwise I would be homeless, I look at homeless people on the street and realise that if my paycheck doesn’t come next week then I will be joining them. I have about $500.00 a month to pay electric, water, phone (which I need to stay in touch with my kids) health insurance, mostly for my children, which is mandated by the divorce agreement ( i didn’t agree to), auto insurance which is required in my state. I have a computer that my parents bought me 3 years ago for my birthday, I suck a two bar wireless signal from my neighbors, (they authorize my free usage). I have no tv or radio, I do have 50 or so songs on my pc that I listen to alot. My daily meal is supplied by my parents, I dont eat breakfast or lunch. My employer and elected officials, who make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year think I should thank them for living so well. Don’t get me wrong I am happy to be living in the U.S. I am richer than most people of the world just because I was born in this great country, but it really pisses me off when millionaires say I’m greedy for wanting a 3% raise. They think that if I make $30,000 and they only make $537,282.00 that I am somehow cheating them