What are the specifics of Hillary Clinton's plan to revitalize the middle class and end the

[JDPriestly]

extreme income disparity that is destroying the economy of our country?

I don't see the structure of it.

She says she wants to make college more "affordable."

She wants paid family leave I gather.

She wants higher wages -- but how high?

She says she wants to strengthen Social Security. How does she want to do that? Is she now willing to raise the cap on the taxable income?

She says she wants to clean up Wall Street but also the "dark economy."

What other programs is she proposing to help the middle class and the poor?

And how does she propose to pay for them?

Thanks. I have not been able to glean anything but vague ideas from what she says.

She wants to do something, but what?

Hilalry supporters ask how Bernie is going to pay for his proposals. He is providing answers to that question. Hillary is not. So, how is Hillary going to find the money to fund her proposals?

How is she going to find the money to fund her international interventions?

Who is going to pay for Hillary's programs?

[Fred Sanders]

1. She would like to respond with this:

http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/Hillary_Economy.htm

To summarize:

" In an April 14 press conference in Monticello, Iowa, she laid out the four pillars of her platform:

Create the economy of tomorrow, not yesterday. She recognizes that income inequality is depressing demand, and slowing economic growth. She mentioned that hedge fund managers pay lower taxes (via the capital gains tax) than most middle-class Americans. Her focus is on creating jobs, and may steal from husband Bill's 14 job creation ideas.

Strengthen families. This would presumably include the emphasis on "healthcare, education, and enrichment emphasized in the newly-released epilog to her book, Hard Choices. She supports Obama’s proposal to make community college free.

Defense. She supports free trade agreements, which she's said is more important than defense in establishing global leadership. So, you can expect her to push for a comprehensive defense solution that includes diplomacy as much as military might. (Source: The Daily Beast, Clinton Speech to Economic Club, October 14, 2011)

Change campaign financing."

I know Bernie has a plan also, and I found it as easily as I found Clinton's.

There are one or two degrees of seperation in a few areas of actual policy versus actual rhetoric.

[JDPriestly]

7. Right off, I see problems.

She wants to shift the cost of social programs like leave for new mothers onto employers. That will be hard to get through Congress.

Then she favors "free" trade, which thus far is one of the main reasons for the decline of the middle class.

She supports free trade agreements, which she's said is more important than defense in establishing global leadership.

. . . .

Clinton was Secretary of State from 2009-2013. . . . . She drafted the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and pried open Chinese markets to U.S. companies

. . . .

Create the American Retirement Account to allow tax-deferred contributions of up to $5,000 per year. The first $1000 contributed into any retirement account will be eligible for dollar-to-dollar tax credits. (Source: HillaryClinton.com, Issues)

http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/Hillary_Economy.htm

SO THE TRUTH IS OUT: HILLARY TAKES CREDIT FOR DRAFTING THE TPP.

In addition, the retirement savings account will just result in more retirement money being gobbled up by the fraud, greed and sharp money "managers" on Wall Street. We need to raise the cap on contributions to Social Security and strengthen that system.

Maybe Hillary wants to be managing the private investments in her Wall Street accounts when she is in her late 80s and 90s, but I don't. I want strong Social Security.

It looks like she also will raise taxes or impose financial costs on the members of the middle class who own small businesses and also on larger corporations to pay for her social programs.

Programs like family leave for new mothers, free tuition for college education (Hillary limits it to free community college education) and pre-school education have to be paid for.

Hillary is being, again, dishonest about the fact that the burden for these programs will fall on the middle class under her proposals. She says she won't raise taxes on the middle class, but the middle class will still pay for her proposals because she is not adequately raising taxes on the very, very rich. She can't. They are funding her campaign.

Sanders is being honest with us. He is telling us what programs he wants to provide and how he will pay for them.

Let's put Hillary on notice that she needs to do that too.

And it is interesting how Hillary has lied about her role in the negotiations of the TPP. When convenient, she says the agreement does not meet her standards.

But from this article, we now know that she negotiated it. She has taken credit for the TPPP.

Hillary. Who in the world is falling for those vague statements.

[Fred Sanders]

9. I like the fact that Sanders is going to give a major speech on his vision for America and to

explain "democratic socialism" to Americans and lay out how he sees America looking like in 10 years....closest to the models of Europe and Canada and explain why that is better and how economic policies will advance that vision.....I really do.

Maybe he took Bill Maher's recent counsel on the issue, which was good advice, I thought.

It is important for Sanders to explain to Amedicans the full range of options available because the corporate media are not going to do it.

He has the stage, I truly wish him well!

[JDPriestly]

14. I listened to the speech JaneyVee posted.

Hillary lists the many economic problems we have, offers "growth" (a vague word that could mean almost anything) as the solution and then defines what our society would look like if we had "growth," but she apparently wants to fund that growth by placing mandates on employers to provide family leave and do all sorts of things they will not willingly do.

Hillary's plan is very much like George H.W. Bush's -- the thousands of points of light.

She does not offer ways to fund the programs she thinks would help.

She has a good staff who write flowery speeches for her, but there is no substance.

She will never get her programs passed through Congress, and she leaves out any workably specific solutions to problems.

Hillary is a fraud.

After listening to the speech JaneyVee posted, I am more convinced of it than ever.

It's really sad that people are falling ro her. She speaks in vague generalities.

She wants churches and non-profits to help with early childhood education. They can do that if they get government funding to help them do that. And then you breach the separation of church and state that has been important to the harmony and peace in our country. We are a country of religious diversity. Asking churches to help a little is fine, but relying on churches to carry out government policies has, in the past, proved foolish when it goes too far.

Hillary's "proposals" sound good, but she does not speak in terms ttat are definite enough about how she will pay for them.

People are asking Bernie to be specific. It's actually Hillary who needs to be asked to be specific.

A speech of around an hour. Just listen to it.

[Fred Sanders]

22. It is a long campaign, as I am often reminded when I point out how much Clinton leads by....so....

Plenty of time to give details and specifics to satisfy Sanders supporters, and Clintin supporters, to both their hearts content.

[bigwillq]

2. They both have plenty of time to offer specifics.

And I am sure they both will in the coming weeks and months.

[BlueCheese]

3. From her website:

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/plan-raise-american-incomes/

And in the interest of equal time...

https://berniesanders.com/issues/income-and-wealth-inequality/

[JDPriestly]

15. Lots of plans -- and no plan to fund them.

Here is the only concrete statement about raising the money to fund her plans:

Reform our tax code so the wealthiest pay their fair share. Hillary supports ending the “carried interest” loophole, enacting the “Buffett Rule” that ensures no millionaire pays a lower effective tax rate than their secretary, and closing tax loopholes and expenditures that benefit the wealthiest taxpayers to pay for her plan to make college affordable and refinance student debt.

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/plan-raise-american-incomes/

Hillary's plan is like George H.W. Bush's -- a thousand points of life -- or was it a million?

It led to a recession and Bush was not re-elected to the White House.

Hillary's economic plan is just a lot of hot air and no money behind it.

[Cleita]

4. She wants to do all those things as long as they don't upset business as usual.

Bernie makes college affordable by making it tuition free, like we used to have in California before Reagan and Jarvis destroyed that little social program. I guess Hillary is aiming for lower interest on student loans and improving Pell Grants. I see her solutions as capitalistic not socialistic as Bernie would do it.

To cut to the chase, we the middle class tax payers will pay for Hillary's programs. Bernie OTOH will go after the rich to pay for his programs for education, health care, Social Security et al. If Hillary admits she will tax the working and middle classes, she will lose.

[hill2016]

8. didn't Bernie just

support a small increase in the payroll tax on everybody to fund parental leave?

[JDPriestly]

10. He also supports lifting the cap on the payroll taxes.

I think that is a good idea. The cap is far, far too low.

All income should be taxed to pay for programs that provide the social safety net in our society. This would not be from the same tax portion that funds Medicare or Social Security. It would be an added tax specifically for this person.

Here:

http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/Hillary_Economy.htm

Hillary states that she would require employers to pay for the family leave for new mothers.

She also takes credit for negotiating the TPP.

Now that is an interesting thing, because she is recently said she would not vote for it.

I do not trust Hilary.

I also don't like the idea of the retirement savings accounts. It would be better to better fund Social Security. Who wants to have to do all the work involved in managing investments in their 80s and 90s?

My mother was doing these things in her 90s and although she was great at managing money, very intelligent and well educated, it just upset her unbelievably to do all that business at the age of 95 - 98. It was too much for her. Just going to the bank was a tremendous burden.

If you are rich enough to pay someone to do all that paperwork and watching interest rates and investments for you, then those accounts are no doubt great. But for most of us, they are more trouble than they are worth. We should all be putting more into Social Security and investing that money in American infrastructure improvement which pays us all in the end.

[hill2016]

12. ok two questions for you

(1) Why is he proposing a donut hole so people between the existing cap and $250k don't pay more?

(2) How would you propose changing the benefits for people who are faced with increased payroll taxes?

[Maedhros]

13. Usually when Conservatives want to make something "more affordable"

they pass laws allowing tax-free savings accounts to be opened to pay for the thing.

See, if all those grasping wastrels who can't pay rent or buy food would just save money, then the problem would be solved!

[JDPriestly]

16. Hillary wants to give a tax credit of $2500 to help with college expenses.

You have to have taxable income to benefit from a tax credit. Hillary does not seem to understand that. Most wealthy people do not understand that tax credits are of no use to people who make just enough not to be eligible for aid of some sort but not enough to pay much in taxes.

Her economic plan does not explain how she will raise the money to deal with all the problems that she acknowledges that we have:

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/plan-raise-american-incomes/

It's a lot of hot air over nothing.

Remember Bush's thousand or was it million points of light? That seems to be Hillary's plan.

She wants all these programs but she does not say how she will fund them.

Elsewhere she promises to balance the budget --- all while "keeping America safe" of course.

Hillary is not offering real answers to our problems.

[Fearless]

21. $2500 versus free in state tuition...

Hmm.... It ain't 1970, 2500 isn't going to a damn thing.

[JaneyVee]

5. Here:

https://m.

#

[JDPriestly]

17. Janey, I watched the whole thing.

Hillary describes the sorry state of our economy very well, and she proposes programs if you can call full employment a program and the other pie in the sky policies she proposes programs, but she does not propose workable ways to pay for it all. She proposes one concrete money-raising method -- raising taxes on the rich, but doesn't say how she would do it other than getting rid of the carried interest rule and applying the Buffet rule in tax law.

How she will get that through Congress considering how much the Republicans abhor her is beyond me.

Hillary is pulling the wool over a lot of eyes.

Have you actually listened to the whole speech?

Have you read this very vague statement?

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/plan-raise-american-incomes/

Voting for Hillary is a waste of time.

[reformist2]

6. All the polls show people prefer Hillary over Bernie on the issue of income inequality!!!

[JDPriestly]

11. Because no one knows where Hillary stands on it. She speaks in tepid generalities.

At this website, there are some concrete answers and I don't like them.

http://useconomy.about.com/od/fiscalpolicy/p/Hillary_Economy.htm

There, she took credit for the TPP.

Right there, I will never vote for her. Never.

The TPP is undemocratic and will undermine our sovereignty.

People favor Hillary because they know her name but they don't know what she is for.

She wants family leave, but she wants employers to pay for it. Good luck with that.

She wants to raise the minimum wage to $15. That's good. But once we raise the minimum wage to $15 and make sure that it rises as costs rise, then we need to pay the costs of the social programs like Family leave from a small amount of those increased wages.

Hillary says nothing about raising the cap on the payroll taxes. I suspect that if we did that and made all earned income including bonuses and in some way investment earnings subject to the payroll tax, we could reduce the percentage taken out of paychecks for that tax and to support the things payroll taxes pay for.

[JDPriestly]

18. Read this:

https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/plan-raise-american-incomes/

and listen to the speech JaneyVee posted.

Hillary is good at describing what is wrong in our economy and what we need to do about it. In fact, she agrees with Bernie on most points except that Bernie's plan goes much further and would probably really solve some problems while Hillary's plan is just a baby-step in an economy that needs giant steps toward solving income inequality and stimulating growth.

Hillary correctly recognizes that lack of economic growth is our problem. But she takes credit for negotiating the TPP, Bill signed NAFTA, and as long as we are involved in "free" trade with countries in which wages and living standards are so much lower than ours, there is no way we are going to have job and wage growth. The jobs will go where the wages are low. That means we have to have low wages to keep our jobs.

Hillary just doesn't get it.

She does not identify clearly where she would find the money to fund the development programs she vaguely proposes.

Read all the posts on this thread. Watch the video that JaneyVee posted.. It's about an hour and read the articles at the links. Tell me just precisely how Hillary plans to pay for all her dreamy ideas.

And the tax credit for $2500 to fund college is a joke. Many, many American families earn too little to benefit from a $2500 tax credit, and college costs so much more than $2500 per year that I can't believe she would propose such a deal.

I wonder how much they paid for Chelsea's tuition at Stanford plus room and board. Apparently Hillary does not realize how much the cost of education has risen since then.

Hillary's proposal -- pie in the sky funded by a thousand points of light -- somewhere out there in the universe.

People are being taken.

Bernie tells you who will pay for what. He is the honest candidate here.

[BlueCheese]

19. It didn't take very long for me to find out more by searching for "Hillary Clinton tax plan" online.

It seems a big component is dramatically raising the tax rates on short-term capital gains and taxing high-frequency trading. The right people are against it, like Grover Norquist, so it can't be all bad.

http://time.com/3969682/hillary-clinton-tax-capital-gains/

http://taxfoundation.org/blog/details-hillary-clinton-s-capital-gains-tax-proposal

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-10-08/hillary-clinton-steps-into-hft-controversy-with-tax-proposal

[JDPriestly]

20. That's Bernie's plan also.