Category: Take Action

Wells Fargo: time to pay your fair share!

By rachael_decruz | Published January 26, 2012

We want an economy that works for the 99%, not corporations and the top 1%. Yet our system continues to benefit the big banks, at the expense of the rest of us. So we’re joining together with Working Washington (props to them for the awesome photo) to put some pressure on the big banks to pay their fair share.

We’re targeting Wells Fargo for multiple different reasons. Below are just a few:

Since the 2008 bank bailout, Wells Fargo made more than $50 billion in profit — but their effective Federal income tax rate is 0%.
In fact, they got a $681 million refund.
Here in Washington State, Wells Fargo also benefits from a special $86 million tax loophole for big banks.
Wells Fargo spent $14 million lobbying in Washington DC and Olympia for rules that let the company avoid paying their fair share of taxes.
While compensation for top executives keeps growing, Wells Fargo has also laid off 6,000 workers across the country, including hundreds here in Washington.

Wells Fargo pays more on LOBBYING than they do on TAXES. That certainly doesn’t sound right to us. So, as usual, we’re taking our frustration to the streets.

Join us on Tuesday, January 31st at noon at Westlake Park. We’ll have a rally in the park and then march over to Wells Fargo to demand they listen to us.

If Wells Fargo and the other big banks (who by the way caused our financial collapse) paid their fair share, we could stop the cuts to education, health care and social service programs that are devastating our families. We could invest in our communities and our state, create much needed jobs and most importantly fuel our state’s economy.

Do the right thing. Join us on January 31st as we stand up against the big banks and tell them that it’s time to pay their fair share. Click here to register. For questions or more information, contact Chris at 206-805-6667, or at chris@washingtoncan.org.

Also posted in Economic justice, Events, Featured, Social justice | | Leave a comment

New report details big bank bonuses

By rachael_decruz | Published January 23, 2012

The New Bottom Line released a new report entitled Pulling Back the Curtain: Exposing the 1% Behind the 2011 Big Bank Bonuses. The report details how the 1% work together to make sure the country’s wealth is concentrated in the hands of the few.

While the 99% are struggling to make ends meet, to put food on the table and to find good jobs during this financial crisis, the one percent are working together to ensure an even further concentration of wealth. Read the full report to find out how!

Highlights from the report include:

The nation’s top six banks — Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs — paid out $144 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2011, second only to the record $147 billion they paid out in 2007 at the height of the economic boom.
Just half of the banks’ bonus and compensation pools would be enough to write down the principals on all underwater mortgages in the country.
If the six banks took half of their bonus and compensation pool and put it directly into a public service jobs fund, they could create 1.8 million jobs, and still have enough money left over to pay the average employee $60,605.
Just 72% of the $144 billion in bonuses and compensation at the top six banks would have been enough money to plug the $102.9 billion in budget holes for all 50 states for the current fiscal year.
The report states that average banker pay at the six biggest banks hit an all-time high in 2011. The average employee at these banks will take home $121,209 for 2011, more than twice the national median household income of $49,445. At pure investment banks such as Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, average bonuses and compensation in 2011 were double and triple the $121,209 figure.

The report also pulls back the curtain on big bank board members–the very people who decide on executive pay. It exposes how these board members work to put their corporate cronies’ pocketbooks above the public interest.

There is a way to make an economy that works for the 99% though. The report outlines how the top six Wall Street banks could re-prioritize and instead of paying out billions in bonuses to millionaire bankers, start investing back in the 99%. Recommendations included:

writing down principal on underwater mortgages,
making fair and sustainable loan modifications to prevent foreclosures,
increasing lending to small businesses,
making affordable loans to families, states, and local governments, and
paying their fair share of taxes.

This report puts facts and figures to what we’ve known to be true all along – the big banks not only aren’t paying their fair share; they’re also directly fueling the wealth and profits of the 1% at the expense of the rest of us. If they were investing that money in our communities, the difference could be measured in tangible results.

Sign our petition urging bank executives to forgo their bonuses this year and put that money back into the communities and the people they’ve bankrupted.

Also posted in Economic justice, Featured, Social justice | | 1 Comment

We Have a Chance to Make Everyone Pay Their Fair Share

By rachael_decruz | Published January 19, 2012

We’re finally turning the tables on investment bankers and Wall Street fat cats.

State Rep. Laurie Jinkins has introduced a bill that would make Wall Street speculators and the super-wealthy pay their fair share in Washington. Her legislation would create a 5 percent tax on profits of more than $10,000 from the sale of stocks and second houses (you can read the full bill here).

A tax on profits made from stocks and other capital gains is a long-term reform that would put us on track for a sustainable budget. It would only apply to the wealthiest 3 percent of Washingtonians and would raise $500 million or more each year for education, health care, and essential public services.

This tax on stock profits wouldn’t affect retirement savings accounts, the sale of farmland, charitable giving, or assets left to family members as part of a will. To read more about the capital gains tax and the positive impact it would have on our communities, read the report put together by the Washington State Budget & Policy Center.

Taxing profits on stocks and other capital gains is an important, progressive reform that will help create a sustainable budget. This is our best shot in 2012 to reform our state’s backwards tax system and put our state on a path to long-term prosperity. But it’s going to take all of us working together to overcome their high-priced lobbyists and big campaign contributions.

Please email your legislators today and tell them to support Rep. Jinkins’s progressive tax reform bill!

Rep. Jinkins’ proposal would be a huge step toward fixing our tax system that unfairly benefits millionaires and investment bankers. Washington is one of only eight states that does not tax capital gains – part of the reason our tax system is so regressive. Oregon has an 11 percent capital gains tax, and even Idaho taxes capital gains at 7.8 percent.

We have a chance to make everyone pay their fair share. This kind of tax reform will help ensure that cuts to health care, education and vital social service programs that our communities rely on are not on the chopping block each budget cycle. Our state desperately needs sustainable revenue and the capital gains tax is a way to get us there.

Also posted in Economic justice, Featured, Social justice | | Leave a comment

Support Dental Access in Washington!

By rachael_decruz | Published January 18, 2012

Routine dental care is basic health care. But many adults and children in Washington can’t get the care they need.

House Bill 2226 and Senate Bill 6126 can change that, by expanding access to routine and preventative dental care for adults and children in Washington. It does this by creating a Licensed Dental Practitioner, a mid-level provider similar to a nurse practitioner in a doctor’s office. They work under the supervision of a dentist, provide routine and preventative care, and extend the reach of dental care to people who are going without the care they need. This model has already been successfully implemented in Alaska and Minnesota.

The top five reasons it’s important to support House Bill 2226/Senate Bill 6126:

A recent survey found that a majority of Americans have put off dental care in the past 12 months because it’s too costly. Untreated dental problems turn into health crises – and they are the number one reason that uninsured Washingtonians sought emergency room care between January 2008 and June 2009.
Access to dental care is an issue of opportunity and equity. Dental care is least accessible to low-income people, people of color, and those who live in rural areas.
Right now, 30 out of 39 counties in Washington face a shortage of dental care professionals.
Creating a new mid-level dental provider – a dental therapist – is an effective way to create much needed jobs and meet the growing demands and needs of communities across our state.
Licensed Dental Practitioners could provide much needed affordable and timely routine and preventative dental care in Washington State.

House Bill 2226 and Senate Bill 6126 will expand the reach of dental care in Washington. Send an email to your legislators TODAY telling to support access to affordable dental care by supporting House Bill 2226 and Senate Bill 6126!

For more information and personal stories that highlight the current lack of dental access in Washington, check out our report, The Mouth Matters. Questions? Interested in getting involved in the campaign? Email Mariah at mariah@washingtoncan.org!