Bernie Sanders: Trump's economy is great for billionaires, not for working families

Bernie Sanders, Opinion contributor Published 3:15 a.m. ET July 17, 2018

Excerpts:

The truth is that in America today, 43 percent of households live paycheck to paycheck and can't afford to pay for their housing, food, child care, health care, transportation and their cell phone without going into debt. Further, about half of older Americans have no retirement savings and no idea how they will be able to retire in dignity. In terms of our young people, hundreds of thousands are unable to go to college because of the cost and millions are dealing with oppressive student debt.

As the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care to all, over 30 million Americans have no health insurance and even more are under-insured. As part of our dysfunctional health care system, one out of five Americans can’t afford the medicine prescribed by their doctors.

While American workers have seen their compensation stagnate over the past 40 years, corporate CEOs have seen their incomes go up by as much as 937 percent. Over the first four months of this year, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, saw his wealth go up by $275 million — each and every day. While low-income workers at Walmart are forced to rely on food stamps, Medicaid and public housing to survive, the Walton family is now worth over $175 billion.

While the very rich are getting even richer as half of our people continue to struggle economically, Donald Trump’s policies are moving this country in exactly the wrong direction. There is no moral justification for Trump to be supporting massive tax breaks for billionaires, and then present a budget which would force enormous cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security Disability Insurance, education and nutrition. We can and we must do better.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/07/17/bernie-sanders-donald-trump-economy-jobs-income-employment-column/782404002/