{"id":108135,"date":"2015-11-20T00:19:43","date_gmt":"2015-11-20T07:19:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fact-check-democratic-candidates-miss-on-dollars-common-sense\/"},"modified":"2015-11-20T00:19:43","modified_gmt":"2015-11-20T07:19:43","slug":"fact-check-democratic-candidates-miss-on-dollars-common-sense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fact-check-democratic-candidates-miss-on-dollars-common-sense\/","title":{"rendered":"Fact Check: Democratic candidates miss on dollars, common sense"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Democratic
Democratic presidential candidates Bernie Sanders, left, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Martin O\u2019Malley take the stage before a Democratic presidential primary debate, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2015.<\/span>Associated Press<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O\u2019Malley said that in President Ronald Reagan\u2019s first term, the highest marginal income tax rate was 70 percent. But Reagan signed a bill in his first year dropping that to 50 percent, and it dropped again to 28 percent in his second term. The top marginal tax rate of 70 percent was established in 1964, when Congress passed a tax cut backed by President John F. Kennedy. In the decades before that, the top rate was much higher \u2013 hovering at 90 percent.<\/p>\n

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders said that the U.S. \u201chas more income and wealth inequality than any major country on earth.\u201d But the World Bank statistics list at least 41 countries with greater income inequality than the U.S. \u2013 including Israel, Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Argentina. And as for wealth inequality, the share of wealth held by the top 1 percent in the U.S. puts it in 11th place among 37 nations listed in the Global Wealth Databook.<\/p>\n

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrongly said that wages \u201chaven\u2019t risen since the turn of the last century.\u201d Real average weekly earnings of rank-and-file workers rose 7.2 percent since 1999. While not a huge increase, real weekly wages have jumped 2.3 percent in the most recent 12 months alone.<\/p>\n

Sanders repeated one of his campaign trail talking points: \u201cBut we are going to end the absurdity, as Warren Buffet often remind us \u2026 that billionaires pay an effective tax rate lower than nurses or truck drivers.\u201d That\u2019s the case for some in those professions \u2014 compared with billionaires who earn their money through investments \u2014 but it\u2019s not accurate for all. A truck driver would have to earn more than the median salary to pay a higher effective rate.<\/p>\n

Sanders said that the United States is the only major country that doesn\u2019t guarantee health care to everyone as a right. Among the wealthy Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development nations, America \u2013 with the possible exception of Mexico \u2013 stands out as the only one that lacks universal coverage.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis nation is the most powerful military in the world,\u201d Sanders said. \u201cWe\u2019re spending over $600 billion a year on the military. And yet significantly less than 10 percent of that money is used to fight international terrorism.\u201d The Defense Department spends $60 billion on anti-terrorism operations in Afghanistan and in the battle with ISIS- nearly 11 percent of total defense dollars,as Sanders said. But Sanders used an overly restricted definition that also ignores that a hefty amount of counterterrorism spending takes place outside of the Defense Department.<\/p>\n

When Clinton cited Princeton economist Alan Krueger\u2019s support for her minimum wage proposal, O\u2019Malley called him a Wall Street economist. He\u2019s not. Krueger is a Princeton economist. Research shows hat a minimum wage set as high as $12 an hour will do more good than harm for low-wage workers, but a $15-an-hour national minimum wage would put us in uncharted waters, and risk undesirable and unintended consequences.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Malley said, \u201cNet immigration from Mexico last year was zero. Fact-check me.\u201d Census data from 2010 up to 2013 support O\u2019Malley\u2019s point, as the population of people living in America but born in Mexico fell by about 40,000 since 2010. Experts said this is a strong indication of a prevailing trend. Other data, including a rapid decline in apprehensions at the border and changing demographics in Mexico add weight to the conclusion that O\u2019Malley\u2019s point is correct.<\/p>\n

Chip Tuthill lives in Mancos. Website used: www.factcheck.org<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Democratic presidential candidates Bernie Sanders, left, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Martin O\u2019Malley take the stage before a Democratic presidential primary debate, Saturday, Nov. 14, 2015.Associated Press Former Maryland Gov. Martin O\u2019Malley said that in President Ronald Reagan\u2019s first term, the highest marginal income tax rate was 70 percent. But Reagan signed a bill in his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":108136,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5758],"tags":[21,83,299],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-108135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-columnists","tag-cortez","tag-mancos","tag-national-elections"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108135"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=108135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}