Weekly Writing Challenge: Mind the Gap

This Weekly Writing Challenge is about the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement of last year. I live in Canada, but still saw and heard about the movement here. We had our version of it in some of our major cities.

Now, I’m not saying that I took too much notice of the whole thing. My thoughts are …  It was a nice idea to think that a ‘sit in’ would have any effect on the gap between the rich and the poor. If it were only that easy.

It would be a wonderful thing to see more equality in household incomes, where everyone had at least enough to live comfortably. But, I certainly don’t see the day coming when the rich are going to fork out their hard-earned (maybe not so hard) money to give to anyone else, no matter how much in need they are. And, frankly, I don’t believe that anyone has the right to tell them they should.

In my humble opinion, the whole system needs to be revamped. The rich are enabled by tax deductions, shelters and rebates. While the poor seem to put out an extremely high percentage of their income to fund the government, maybe in these very endeavors.

It may seem like a very simple idea, but I believe that everyone should pay the same percentage of tax, except the extremely poor, who should pay none. If everyone paid 10% tax, the governments would have all kinds of money from the rich to fund programs to help the poor.

Enough catering to the rich! Treat them like ordinary citizens, rather than give them special treatment because they can buy support. Expect as much from them, and the poor would be better off, because the government would have more in the way of funds to help them. Yes, I know this is a very simplistic plan, but you never know, it might work.

Don’t worry! I’m not running for office! I’m just sharing my simple vision for a way to financial equality.

Today

The wind is strong. Definitely contrary to a good hair day. It had rained all night, but cleared by morning. The only remnant of the stormy weather is this darn wind. The sky is light blue and full of sunlight, with the odd cloud soaring past. And, the ocean moves with a million white caps.

It’s Monday, so no pleasure boats dot the harbor. Just the regular flights of the sea planes and the ferry coming and going. Everyone is back at work. School has begun its new year. I can hear the children on their way home from the school in the neighborhood.

I’m sitting quietly at my computer putting down my thoughts for others to share. I usually write poetry, so this is a rather difficult exercise. But, it’s good to try new things and reach outside our comfort zone, at least once in a while. I’ll keep this short, because I’ve run out of ideas. Maybe next time I will find more to say.