Decade of Greed?

ED RUBENSTEIN

WERE THE Eighties a decade of Greed? Was Reaganomics a party for the rich paid for by the middle class? The networks think so. Sam Donaldson says: “The average pre-tax income of the richest 1 per cent has jumped 86 per cent in constant dollars since 1977, while the bottom four-fifths of Americans have seen their pre-tax income actually drop by almost 4 per cent. . . those in the top 1 per cent are paying 35 per cent less than they did in 1977.” The Democrats agree: Democratic National Chairman Ron Brown has fashioned the entire “fairness issue” around these notions. And “leading Republican columnist” Kevin Phillips has added the ingredient of bipartisan support with his book The Politics of Rich and Poor. The recent budget agreement responded to this new consensus by taxing luxury items and imposing the first increase in the top tax rate since World War II.

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ED RUBENSTEIN

WERE THE Eighties a decade of Greed? Was Reaganomics a party for the rich paid for by the middle class? The networks think so. Sam Donaldson says: “The average pre-tax income of the richest 1 per cent has jumped 86 per cent in constant dollars since 1977, while the bottom four-fifths of Americans have seen their pre-tax income actually drop by almost 4 per cent. . . those in the top 1 per cent are paying 35 per cent less than they did in 1977.” The Democrats agree: Democratic National Chairman Ron Brown has fashioned the entire “fairness issue” around these notions. And “leading Republican columnist” Kevin Phillips has added the ingredient of bipartisan support with his book The Politics of Rich and Poor. The recent budget agreement responded to this new consensus by taxing luxury items and imposing the first increase in the top tax rate since World War II.