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Show A isdom & Wisecracks 7 V57sherrieinfelt Balancing the checkbook While the budget battle wages in Washington, the average American sits at home and balances his own checkbook. And most find the picture pic-ture getting bleaker and bleaker. Because the middle class has typically been the strength and glory of America, that same class is repeatedly called upon to carry the burden of the nation's woes as well as her victories. Although by population it is the largest class of citizens, it has fallen into the enviable position of being a majority tyrannized by minorities. squeezing out enough for an adequate ade-quate savings account. They're the ones who cannot afford af-ford many material luxuries of life, and yet they contribute most notably to the communities in which they live, making their neighborhoods better places to live. And what's really unfair about a system that continually picks on the same class of people to sacrifice is that out of the paychecks of these middle class people comes a regular, generous deduction for FICA, which goes to to pay the Social Security entitlements of our retired folks. Now it is well understood that the retirees worked hard for years and paid into the fund for all the years they worked. However, it's a very short time before they've received all the monies that they paid into the system. Then, the current workers take over and begin paying them from their current paychecks (who will pay theirs when they retire?) The problem with the Social Security system is that many of the people receiving it already earn more than $30,000 a yearmore than sufficient for most lifestyles. And yet Congressmen have such a fear of the "elderly" lobby that they don't dare pass legislation to mess with the system and stop Social Security entitlements to those who really have no financial need of them. But spineless legislators are not new to us, are they? Part of the problem is that the middle class is so used to "sucking it up and giving a little more" that they don't know enough to fight for themselves once in awhile. It was appalling to learn recently that approximately ap-proximately half of all Americans said in a poll that they would not be willing to sacrifice any federal government services for the sake of reducing the deficit. How absurd! Would the average middle class family not make immediate sacrifices in order to keep its personal per-sonal budget in balance? It's time we ALL began demanding that a few sacrifices be made. The federal government is the most expensive provider of services for most programs, pro-grams, so why do we keep using them? For every dollar of services provided.it costs a dollar just to administer ad-minister the program. That's inefficiency to the core, and it's mostly middle class dollars being squandered. It's about time for us to start being more self-sufficient. self-sufficient. We don't need Uncle Sam to do everything for us.. .only the things we realistically cannot do for ourselves. Then if we have to go without, it will be our own fault and not that of lawmakers in Washington. Washing-ton. It's this attitude of "give me, give me, more, more" that got us in a financial crisis, and unless we change that attitude, our nation will fall. There can be no greatness in any nation whose citizens will not, cannot stand on their own. We are i nearing that point in this country, because if the middle class continues con-tinues to diminish in size and strength, so goes the backbone of our society. How so? Because lobby groups for the elderly, the poor, the handicapped, children, and other special interests are so strong and well-organized, it is virtually impossible for members of Congress to ignore their wishes. The middle class supposedly encompasses en-compasses everyone else. ..and we have no powerful lobbyists representing repre-senting us specifically. As a result, those with an income between $16-22,000 a year will be hit hardest when the upcoming budget compromises yield their inevitable in-evitable tax increases.. .Hardly an income group that seems capable of giving any more. These are the average Americans who make too much to qualify for government welfare programs. They're also the ones raising families, while costs of living escalate much quicker than their salaries. These are the people who live frugally from paycheck to paycheck, generally not even |