Occupy your money

[n2doc]

BY JESS ZIMMERMAN
21 OCT 2011 1:00 PM





The Occupy movement has been going green, so why not make your green get Occupied? Occupy George has some pretty stark money-based infographics, and templates for printing them onto your own bills. Chances are any bill in your possession will eventually end up in the pocket of the 1 percent, so why not let it educate them while it's there?

(We checked, and this is legal -- you're not allowed to deface a bill "with intent to render such item(s) unfit to be reissued," but these are clearly still circulable.)

http://www.grist.org/list#item-2011-10-21-occupy-your-money

http://occupygeorge.com/

[orpupilofnature57]

1. Graphics & pictures work ,maybe the next generation will get it.

[mdmc]

2. ..

[lunatica]

3. Good visual

[spin]

4. K&R (n/t)

[NYC_SKP]

5. Math Check: Distribute the wealth of the top 400 = doubling the wealth of everybody else?

Checking...

True?

:shrug:

[woo me with science]

7. Check out the math in this Jon Stewart segment:

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/entertainment/2011/08/jon-stewart-has-had-it-how-fox-talks-about-class-warfare/41474/

(video at link)

On Thursday night, Jon Stewart used Warren Buffett's "Stop Coddling the Super Rich" op-ed as a springboard for a light-hearted lecture on income inequality. Namely, he seconded the suggestion that increasing the tax rate on the rich would be a better solution to cutting the national debt than broadening the tax base to lower income families.

But the idea of raising tax rates on the top 2 percent of earners was decried as socialism and class warfare on Fox News for, among other things, according to numbers Stewart quoted, raising a mere $700 billion in revenue over the next ten years.

The Daily Show host then pointed to this chart that Business Insider posted showing that the bottom 50 percent of the country only controls 2.5 percent of U.S. wealth. Stewart quipped: "So raising the income tax rate on the top 2 percent of earners would raise $700 billion dollars, but taking half of everything the bottom 50 percent have in this country would do the same. I see the problem here: we need to take all of what the bottom 50 percent have."

[tblue37]

6. I love the way that "Occupy X" has become shorthand for

addressing one's protest against some specific aspect of the abusive economy/political system, and doing so specifically in terms of the anger against the co-opting and devouring of everything by the most wealthy.

[sarcasmo]

8. Kick!

[Miss_Underestimated]

9. probably more effective to put this on $100 dollar bills - more likely to be seen by the 1%

:eyes:

[tkmorris]

11. Those aren't the ones you need to reach

The 1%ers already know how much wealth they possess. It's the 99%ers who don't yet understand just how BADLY they are getting shafted that we need to educate. We have the power if we would simply learn to wield it.

[rhett o rick]

10. I doubt the 1% see any bills. nm

[tkmorris]

12. Love the idea, but those graphs are impossible

The one on the face of the bill suggests that the top 400 richest own approximately half the wealth. The one on the reverse suggests that the top 1% own less wealth than that, around 35% if my eyeball estimate is accurate. Something is off here.