From 2020-2023, oddly enough under Biden’s administration, billionaires in the U.S. saw their income go up 42%. 3 billionaires: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Larry Ellison, together saw their wealth go up by 84%. Elon Musk’s wealth went from 25 billion to 188.5 billion. The Waltons of Walmart had their fortune go from 161 billion to 230 billion. In 2020 there was only 1 $100 billion billionaire; now there are 10. Seems like the rich have already done quite well under Biden’s policies, but has that wealth filtered down to us? How much richer does Donald Trump think the rich need to be before their wealth gets trickled down to the rest of us?

Under the tax cuts of 2017, which Donald Trump is so proud of, the poorest Americans got an average $70 a year tax reduction, and the middle-class taxpayers had an average $910 a year reduction. Those piddly amounts didn’t really change our lives much at all. I wonder how many $100,000’s or millions in tax reductions the top 5% or top 1% received? Yet Mr. Trump thinks we need to do much more to help the rich get richer because eventually that will improve the poor and middle-class lives. If it hasn’t worked under Biden, which Trump himself has said Biden’s economy is terrible, why will more of the same work under Trump? Instead of trickle down, it seems like a tinkle-on economic theory. And we all know who is being tinkled on.

Donald Carper

Clearfield