At 11:58 AM -0700 5/15/05, Jim Devine wrote:
One way to decide who's really a capitalist is to think of the
independently wealthy. They can earn a decent income without doing
any work (though they may _want_ to work because they can reject bad
jobs and have access to good ones). How much wealth (net of debt)
must someone own to earn a decent income? define the latter as the
median income of the country.
So take the US median family income in 2003 of $52,680 (source: ERP,
table B-33). The yield on high-grade tax-free municipal bonds in
2003 was 4.73% (source: ERP, table B-73). Thus, the required
municipal bond ownership to earn median family income was $1,113,742
in 2003 (this equals the medium income/interest rate).
Roughly, if you own more than $1 million in net worth, you're truly
rich, a capitalist.
A mere $1 million in net worth, yielding a measly annual family
income of $52,680, would afford a person only a shabby-genteel
existence, haunted by fear of a medical disaster, bankruptcy, and
proletarianization, especially in her pre-Medicare
late-middle/early-old age, especially if there is no other earner in
the family through whom she can get access to group health insurance
coverage and she has one or more dependents:
<blockquote>Needing to buy your own health insurance makes you one of
the unwanted children of the insurance marketplace. Consider the case
of Carolyn Weaver, who over the last decade has fallen into virtually
every trap in this market. In 1992, Weaver bought her own
health-insurance policy from Washington National Insurance Co., under
an arrangement called a "group discretionary trust" (see "Trap 2,"
below). With a deductible of $500, the policy cost $1,665 a year and
because a test revealed that Weaver had a blood factor that might
lead to rheumatoid arthritis, it excluded coverage for arthritis and
for most diseases of the spine.
Shortly after Weaver got the policy, Washington National hiked her
premiums almost 64 percent, attributing the increase to the higher
cost of medical care. Premiums kept rising and Weaver had to increase
her deductible to $5,000, to afford the policy. By this year, because
of Weaver's advancing age (she is now 63) and rising health-care
costs, the annual premium had reached $18,500. The final straw:
Washington National has canceled her coverage because it is leaving
the individual-health-insurance market.
Weaver has been scouring the market for new insurance, but because
other health problems have developed, she has had a tough time
finding a carrier willing to insure her at a price she can afford.
She may have to settle for a policy that covers some basic hospital
and surgical care but not routine office visits or drugs.
("The Perils of Buying Your Own Policy,"
<http://www.consumerreports.org/main/detailv2.jsp?CONTENT%3C%3Ecnt_id=160135&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=18151>)</blockquote>
--
Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/>
* Monthly Review: <http://monthlyreview.org/>
* Greens for Nader: <http://greensfornader.net/>
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/>
* Calendars of Events in Columbus:
<http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>,
<http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/>
* Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/>
* Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/>
* Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio>
* Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>
