When Mitt Romney issued his now-infamous “47 percent” remark during the 2012 presidential campaign, in which he insisted that roughly half of the American public is dependent on hand-outs and will never be persuaded to “take responsibility for themselves,” many in the media and among the general public seemed shocked. But was there any reason to be surprised that an economic plutocrat like Romney might feel that way? Fact is, Romney (as with his running mate, Paul Ryan, who previously had suggested as many as 60 percent of Americans were “takers” rather than “makers”) was not going off-script in the least. He was merely giving voice to an all-too-common belief among the nation’s ruling elite and their conservative media mouthpieces: namely, that the poor are simply different from the rich in terms of values, work ethic and talent. While the latter create jobs and add value to the larger society, the former simply live off the more productive.
Rather than criticize the wealthy, the poor and working class should be thanking them for all the good they do, or so the thinking goes. According to billionaire real estate investor Sam Zell, “the one percent work harder,” and rather than criticize them, everyone else should emulate them. Likewise, Forbes columnist Harry Binswanger has said in all seriousness that anyone “who earns a million dollars or more should be exempt from all income taxes,” and because even that tax rate of zero is insufficient thanks for all the good they do for the world, “to augment the tax-exemption, in an annual public ceremony, the year’s top earner should be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.”
